The Dynasts: An Epic-Drama of the War with Napoleon Part 47

There's no news yet.-- These several days while I have been sitting by him He has inquired the quarter of the wind, And where that moment beaked the stable-c.o.c.k.

When I said "East," he answered "That is well!

Those are the breezes that will speed him home!"

So cling his heart-strings to his country's cause.

FARQUHAR

I fear that Wellesley's visit here by now Strung him to tensest strain. He quite broke down, And has fast faded since.

LADY HESTER

Ah! now he wakes.

Please come and speak to him as you would wish [to TOMLINE].

[LADY HESTER, TOMLINE,and FARQUHAR retire behind the bed, where in a short time voices are heard in prayer. Afterwards the Bishop goes to a writing-table, and LADY HESTER comes to the doorway. Steps are heard on the stairs, and PITT'S friend ROSE, the President of the Board of Trade, appears on the landing and makes inquiries.]

LADY HESTER [whispering]

He wills the wardenry of his affairs To his old friend the Bishop. But his words Bespeak too much anxiety for me, And underrate his services so far That he has doubts if his high deeds deserve Such size of recognition by the State As would award slim pensions to his kin.

He had been fain to write down his intents, But the quill dropped from his unmuscled hand.-- Now his friend Tomline pens what he dictates And gleans the lippings of his last desires.

[ROSE and LADY HESTER turn. They see the Bishop bending over the bed with a sheet of paper on which he has previously been writing. A little later he dips a quill and holds it within the bed-curtain, spreading the paper beneath. A thin white hand emerges from behind the curtain and signs the paper. The Bishop beckons forward the two servants, who also sign.

FARQUHAR on one side of the bed, and TOMLINE on the other, are spoken to by the dying man. The Bishop afterwards withdraws from the bed and comes to the landing where the others are.]

TOMLINE

A list of his directions has been drawn, And feeling somewhat more at mental ease He asks Sir Walter if he has long to live.

Farquhar just answered, in a soothing tone, That hope still frailly breathed recovery.

At this my dear friend smiled and shook his head, As if to say: "I can translate your words, But I reproach not friendship's lullabies."

ROSE

Rest he required; and rest was not for him.

[FARQUHAR comes forward as they wait.]

FARQUHAR

His spell of concentration on these things, Determined now, that long have wasted him, Have left him in a numbing lethargy, From which I fear he may not rouse to strength For speech with earth again.

ROSE

But hark. He does.

[The listen.]

PITT

My country! How I leave my country!...

TOMLINE

Ah,-- Immense the matter those poor words contain!

ROSE

Still does his soul stay wrestling with that theme, And still it will, even semi-consciously, Until the drama's done.

[They continue to converse by the doorway in whispers. PITT sinks slowly into a stupor, from which he never awakens.]

SPIRIT OF THE PITIES [to Spirit of the Years]

Do you intend to speak to him ere the close?

SPIRIT OF THE YEARS

Nay, I have spoke too often! Time and time, When all Earth's light has lain on the nether side, And yapping midnight winds have leapt on the roofs, And raised for him an evil harlequinade Of national disasters in long train, That tortured him with harrowing grimace, Now I would leave him to pa.s.s out in peace, And seek the silence unperturbedly.

SPIRIT SINISTER

Even ITS official Spirit can show ruth At man's f.a.g end, when his destruction's sure!

SPIRIT OF THE YEARS

It suits us ill to cavil each with each.

I might retort. I only say to thee ITS slaves we are: ITS slaves must ever be!

CHORUS [aerial music]

Yea, from the Void we fetch, like these, And tarry till That please To null us by Whose stress we emanate.-- Our incorporeal sense, Our overseeings, our supernal state, Our readings Why and Whence, Are but the flower of Man's intelligence; And that but an unreckoned incident Of the all-urging Will, raptly magnipotent.

[A gauze of shadow overdraws.]