The Piccolomini

SCENE IV

MAX. PICCOLOMINI, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI, QUESTENBERG.

MAX   Ha! there he is himself. Welcome, my father!

[He embraces his father. As he turns round, he observes

      QUESTENBERG, and draws back with a cold and reserved air.   You are engaged, I see. I'll not disturb you.OCTAVIO   How, Max.? Look closer at this visitor.   Attention, Max., an old friend merits – reverence   Belongs of right to the envoy of your sovereign.MAX. (drily)   Von Questenberg! – welcome – if you bring with you   Aught good to our headquarters.QUESTENBERG (seizing his hand)                    Nay, draw not   Your hand away, Count Piccolimini!   Not on my own account alone I seized it,   And nothing common will I say therewith.

[Taking the hands of both.

   Octavio – Max. Piccolomini!   O savior names, and full of happy omen!   Ne'er will her prosperous genius turn from Austria,   While two such stars, with blessed influences   Beaming protection, shine above her hosts.MAX   Heh! Noble minister! You miss your part.   You come not here to act a panegyric.   You're sent, I know, to find fault and to scold us —   I must not be beforehand with my comrades.OCTAVIO (to MAX.)   He comes from court, where people are not quite   So well contented with the duke as here.MAX   What now have they contrived to find out in him?   That he alone determines for himself   What he himself alone doth understand!   Well, therein he does right, and will persist in't   Heaven never meant him for that passive thing   That can be struck and hammered out to suit   Another's taste and fancy. He'll not dance   To every tune of every minister.   It goes against his nature – he can't do it,   He is possessed by a commanding spirit,   And his, too, is the station of command.   And well for us it is so! There exist   Few fit to rule themselves, but few that use   Their intellects intelligently. Then   Well for the whole, if there be found a man   Who makes himself what nature destined him,   The pause, the central point, to thousand thousands   Stands fixed and stately, like a firm-built column,   Where all may press with joy and confidence —   Now such a man is Wallenstein; and if   Another better suits the court – no other   But such a one as he can serve the army.QUESTENBERG   The army? Doubtless!MAX               What delight to observe   How he incites and strengthens all around him,   Infusing life and vigor. Every power   Seems as it were redoubled by his presence   He draws forth every latent energy,   Showing to each his own peculiar talent,   Yet leaving all to be what nature made them,   And watching only that they be naught else   In the right place and time; and he has skill   To mould the power's of all to his own end.QUESTENBERG   But who denies his knowledge of mankind,   And skill to use it? Our complaint is this:   That in the master he forgets the servant,   As if he claimed by birth his present honors.MAX   And does he not so? Is he not endowed   With every gift and power to carry out   The high intents of nature, and to win   A ruler's station by a ruler's talent?QUESTENBERG   So then it seems to rest with him alone   What is the worth of all mankind beside!MAX   Uncommon men require no common trust;   Give him but scope and he will set the bounds.QUESTENBERG   The proof is yet to come.MAX                 Thus are ye ever.   Ye shrink from every thing of depth, and think   Yourselves are only safe while ye're in shallows.OCTAVIO (to QUESTENBERG)   'Twere best to yield with a good grace, my friend;   Of him there you'll make nothing.MAX. (continuing)                     In their fear   They call a spirit up, and when he comes,   Straight their flesh creeps and quivers, and they dread him   More than the ills for which they called him up.   The uncommon, the sublime, must seem and be   Like things of every day. But in the field,   Ay, there the Present Being makes itself felt.   The personal must command, the actual eye   Examine. If to be the chieftain asks   All that is great in nature, let it be   Likewise his privilege to move and act   In all the correspondences of greatness.   The oracle within him, that which lives,   He must invoke and question – not dead books,   Not ordinances, not mould-rotted papers.OCTAVIO   My son! of those old narrow ordinances   Let us not hold too lightly. They are weights   Of priceless value, which oppressed mankind,   Tied to the volatile will of their oppressors.   For always formidable was the League   And partnership of free power with free will.   The way of ancient ordinance, though it winds,   Is yet no devious path. Straight forward goes   The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path   Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies, and rapid;   Shattering that it may reach, and shattering what it reaches,   My son, the road the human being travels,   That, on which blessing comes and goes, doth follow   The river's course, the valley's playful windings,   Curves round the cornfield and the hill of vines,   Honoring the holy bounds of property!   And thus secure, though late, leads to its end.QUESTENBERG   Oh, hear your father, noble youth! hear him   Who is at once the hero and the man.OCTAVIO   My son, the nursling of the camp spoke in thee!   A war of fifteen years   Hath been thy education and thy school.   Peace hast thou never witnessed! There exists   An higher than the warrior's excellence.   In war itself war is no ultimate purpose,   The vast and sudden deeds of violence,   Adventures wild, and wonders of the moment,   These are not they, my son, that generate   The calm, the blissful, and the enduring mighty!   Lo there! the soldier, rapid architect!   Builds his light town of canvas, and at once   The whole scene moves and bustles momently.   With arms, and neighing steeds, and mirth and quarrel   The motley market fills; the roads, the streams   Are crowded with new freights; trade stirs and hurries,   But on some morrow morn, all suddenly,   The tents drop down, the horde renews its march.   Dreary, and solitary as a churchyard;   The meadow and down-trodden seed-plot lie,   And the year's harvest is gone utterly.MAX   Oh, let the emperor make peace, my father!   Most gladly would I give the blood-stained laurel   For the first violet5 of the leafless spring,   Plucked in those quiet fields where I have journeyed.OCTAVIO   What ails thee? What so moves thee all at once?MAX   Peace have I ne'er beheld? I have beheld it.   From thence am I come hither: oh, that sight,   It glimmers still before me, like some landscape   Left in the distance, – some delicious landscape!   My road conducted me through countries where   The war has not yet reached. Life, life, my father —   My venerable father, life has charms   Which we have never experienced. We have been   But voyaging along its barren coasts,   Like some poor ever-roaming horde of pirates,   That, crowded in the rank and narrow ship,   House on the wild sea with wild usages,   Nor know aught of the mainland, but the bays   Where safeliest they may venture a thieves' landing.   Whate'er in the inland dales the land conceals   Of fair and exquisite, oh, nothing, nothing,   Do we behold of that in our rude voyage.OCTAVIO (attentive, with an appearance of uneasiness)   And so your journey has revealed this to you?MAX   'Twas the first leisure of my life. O tell me,   What is the meed and purpose of the toil,   The painful toil which robbed me of my youth,   Left me a heart unsouled and solitary,   A spirit uninformed, unornamented!   For the camp's stir, and crowd, and ceaseless larum,   The neighing war-horse, the air-shattering trumpet,   The unvaried, still returning hour of duty,   Word of command, and exercise of arms —   There's nothing here, there's nothing in all this,   To satisfy the heart, the gasping heart!   Mere bustling nothingness, where the soul is not —   This cannot be the sole felicity,   These cannot be man's best and only pleasures!OCTAVIO   Much hast thou learnt, my son, in this short journey.MAX   Oh day, thrice lovely! when at length the soldier   Returns home into life; when he becomes   A fellow-man among his fellow-men.   The colors are unfurled, the cavalcade   Mashals, and now the buzz is hushed, and hark!   Now the soft peace-march beats, home, brothers, home!   The caps and helmet are all garlanded   With green boughs, the last plundering of the fields.   The city gates fly open of themselves,   They need no longer the petard to tear them.   The ramparts are all filled with men and women,   With peaceful men and women, that send onwards.   Kisses and welcomings upon the air,   Which they make breezy with affectionate gestures.   From all the towers rings out the merry peal,   The joyous vespers of a bloody day.   O happy man, O fortunate! for whom   The well-known door, the faithful arms are open,   The faithful tender arms with mute embracing.QUESTENBERG (apparently much affected)           O that you should speak   Of such a distant, distant time, and not   Of the to-morrow, not of this to-day.MAX. (turning round to him quick and vehement)   Where lies the fault but on you in Vienna!   I will deal openly with you, Questenberg.   Just now, as first I saw you standing here   (I'll own it to you freely), indignation   Crowded and pressed my inmost soul together.   'Tis ye that hinder peace, ye! – and the warrior,   It is the warrior that must force it from you.   Ye fret the general's life out, blacken him,   Hold him up as a rebel, and heaven knows   What else still worse, because he spares the Saxons,   And tries to awaken confidence in the enemy;   Which yet's the only way to peace: for if   War intermit not during war, how then   And whence can peace come? Your own plagues fall on you!   Even as I love what's virtuous, hate I you.   And here I make this vow, here pledge myself,   My blood shall spurt out for this Wallenstein,   And my heart drain off, drop by drop, ere ye   Shall revel and dance jubilee o'er his ruin.[Exit

SCENE V

QUESTENBERG, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI.

QUESTENBERG   Alas! alas! and stands it so?

[Then in pressing and impatient tones.

   What friend! and do we let him go away   In this delusion – let him go away?   Not call him back immediately, not open   His eyes, upon the spot?OCTAVIO (recovering himself out of a deep study)                He has now opened mine,   And I see more than pleases me.QUESTENBERG                   What is it?OCTAVIO   Curse on this journey!QUESTENBERG               But why so? What is it?OCTAVIO   Come, come along, friend! I must follow up   The ominous track immediately. Mine eyes   Are opened now, and I must use them. Come!

[Draws QUESTENBERG on with him.

QUESTENBERG   What now? Where go you then?OCTAVIO                   To her herself.QUESTENBERG                           To —OCTAVIO (interrupting him and correcting himself)   To the duke. Come, let us go 'Tis done, 'tis done,   I see the net that is thrown over him.   Oh! he returns not to me as he went.QUESTENBERG   Nay, but explain yourself.OCTAVIO                 And that I should not   Foresee it, not prevent this journey! Wherefore   Did I keep it from him? You were in the right.   I should have warned him. Now it is too late.QUESTENBERG   But what's too late? Bethink yourself, my friend,   That you are talking absolute riddles to me.OCTAVIO (more collected)   Come I to the duke's. 'Tis close upon the hour   Which he appointed you for audience. Come!   A curse, a threefold curse, upon this journey!

[He leads QUESTENBERG off.

ACT II

SCENE I

Changes to a spacious chamber in the house of the Duke of Friedland. Servants employed in putting the tables and chairs in order. During this enters SENI, like an old Italian doctor, in black, and clothed somewhat fantastically. He carries a white staff, with which he marks out the quarters of the heavens.

FIRST SERVANT. Come – to it, lads, to it! Make an end of it. I hear the sentry call out, "Stand to your arms!" They will be here in a minute.

SECOND SERVANT. Why were we not told before that the audience would be held here? Nothing prepared – no orders – no instructions.

THIRD SERVANT. Ay, and why was the balcony chamber countermanded, that with the great worked carpet? There one can look about one.

FIRST SERVANT. Nay, that you must ask the mathematician there. He says it is an unlucky chamber.

SECOND SERVANT. Poh! stuff and nonsense! that's what I call a hum. A chamber is a chamber; what much can the place signify in the affair?

SENI (with gravity)   My son, there's nothing insignificant,   Nothing! But yet in every earthly thing,   First and most principal is place and time.

FIRST SERVANT (to the second). Say nothing to him, Nat. The duke

   himself must let him have his own will.SENI (counts the chairs, half in a loud, half in a low voice, till he comes to eleven, which he repeats)   Eleven! an evil number! Set twelve chairs.   Twelve! twelve signs hath the zodiac: five and seven,   The holy numbers, include themselves in twelve.

SECOND SERVANT. And what may you have to object against eleven? I should like to know that now.

SENI   Eleven is transgression; eleven oversteps   The ten commandments.

SECOND SERVANT. That's good? and why do you call five a holy number?

SENI   Five is the soul of man: for even as man   Is mingled up of good and evil, so   The five is the first number that's made up   Of even and odd.

SECOND SERVANT. The foolish old coxcomb!

FIRST SERVANT. Ay! let him alone though. I like to hear him; there is

   more in his words than can be seen at first sight.

THIRD SERVANT. Off, they come.

SECOND SERVANT. There! Out at the side-door.

[They hurry off: SENI follows slowly. A page brings the staff of command on a red cushion, and places it on the table, near the duke's chair. They are announced from without, and the wings of the door fly open.

SCENE II

WALLENSTEIN, DUCHESS.

WALLENSTEIN   You went, then, through Vienna, were presented   To the Queen of Hungary?DUCHESS   Yes; and to the empress, too,   And by both majesties were we admitted   To kiss the hand.WALLENSTEIN             And how was it received,   That I had sent for wife and daughter hither   To the camp, in winter-time?DUCHESS                  I did even that   Which you commissioned me to do. I told them   You had determined on our daughter's marriage,   And wished, ere yet you went into the field,   To show the elected husband his betrothed.WALLENSTEIN   And did they guess the choice which I had made?DUCHESS   They only hoped and wished it may have fallen   Upon no foreign nor yet Lutheran noble.WALLENSTEIN   And you – what do you wish, Elizabeth?DUCHESS   Your will, you know, was always mine.WALLENSTEIN (after a pause)                      Well, then, —   And in all else, of what kind and complexion   Was your reception at the court?

[The DUCHESS casts her eyes on the ground, and remains silent.

   Hide nothing from me. How were you received?DUCHESS   O! my dear lord, all is not what it was.   A canker-worm, my lord, a canker-worm   Has stolen into the bud.WALLENSTEIN                Ay! is it so?   What, they were lax? they failed of the old respect?DUCHESS   Not of respect. No honors were omitted,   No outward courtesy; but in the place   Of condescending, confidential kindness,   Familiar and endearing, there were given me   Only these honors and that solemn courtesy.   Ah! and the tenderness which was put on,   It was the guise of pity, not of favor.   No! Albrecht's wife, Duke Albrecht's princely wife,   Count Harrach's noble daughter, should not so —   Not wholly so should she have been received.WALLENSTEIN   Yes, yes; they have taken offence. My latest conduct   They railed at it, no doubt.DUCHESS                  O that they had!   I have been long accustomed to defend you,   To heal and pacify distempered spirits.   No; no one railed at you. They wrapped them up,   O Heaven! in such oppressive, solemn silence!   Here is no every-day misunderstanding,   No transient pique, no cloud that passes over;   Something most luckless, most unhealable,   Has taken place. The Queen of Hungary   Used formerly to call me her dear aunt,   And ever at departure to embrace me —WALLENSTEIN   Now she omitted it?DUCHESS (wiping away her tears after a pause)              She did embrace me,   But then first when I had already taken   My formal leave, and when the door already   Had closed upon me, then did she come out   In haste, as she had suddenly bethought herself,   And pressed me to her bosom, more with anguish   Than tenderness.WALLENSTEIN (seizes her hand soothingly)            Nay, now collect yourself.   And what of Eggenberg and Lichtenstein,   And of our other friends there?DUCHESS (shaking her head)                    I saw none.WALLENSTEIN   The ambassador from Spain, who once was wont   To plead so warmly for me?DUCHESS                 Silent, silent!WALLENSTEIN   These suns then are eclipsed for us. Henceforward   Must we roll on, our own fire, our own light.DUCHESS   And were it – were it, my dear lord, in that   Which moved about the court in buzz and whisper,   But in the country let itself be heard   Aloud – in that which Father Lanormain   In sundry hints and —WALLENSTEIN (eagerly)               Lanormain! what said he?DUCHESS   That you're accused of having daringly   O'erstepped the powers intrusted to you, charged   With traitorous contempt of the emperor   And his supreme behests. The proud Bavarian,   He and the Spaniards stand up your accusers —   That there's a storm collecting over you   Of far more fearful menace than the former one   Which whirled you headlong down at Regensburg.   And people talk, said he, of – Ah!

[Stifling extreme emotion.

WALLENSTEIN                     Proceed!DUCHESS   I cannot utter it!WALLENSTEIN             Proceed!DUCHESS                  They talk —WALLENSTEIN   Well!DUCHESS       Of a second —          (catches her voice and hesitates.)WALLENSTEIN              Second —DUCHESS                    Most disgraceful   Dismission.WALLENSTEIN          Talk they?

[Strides across the chamber in vehement agitation.

                Oh! they force, they thrust me   With violence, against my own will, onward!DUCHESS (presses near him in entreaty)   Oh! if there yet be time, my husband, if   By giving way and by submission, this   Can be averted – my dear Lord, give way!   Win down your proud heart to it! Tell the heart,   It is your sovereign lord, your emperor,   Before whom you retreat. Oh! no longer   Low trickling malice blacken your good meaning   With abhorred venomous glosses. Stand you up   Shielded and helmed and weaponed with the truth,   And drive before you into uttermost shame   These slanderous liars! Few firm friends have we —   You know it! The swift growth of our good fortune   It hath but set us up a mark for hatred.   What are we, if the sovereign's grace and favor   Stand not before us!

SCENE III

Enter the Countess TERZKY, leading in her hand the Princess THEKLA, richly adorned with brilliants.

COUNTESS, TEKLA, WALLENSTEIN, DUCHESS.

COUNTESS   How sister? What, already upon business?

[Observing the countenance of the DUCHESS.

   And business of no pleasing kind I see,   Ere he has gladdened at his child. The first   Moment belongs to joy. Here, Friedland! father!   This is thy daughter.

[THEKLA approaches with a shy and timid air, and bends herself as about to kiss his hand. He receives her in his arms, and remains standing for some time lost in the feeling of her presence.

WALLENSTEIN   Yes! pure and lovely hath hope risen on me,   I take her as the pledge of greater fortune.DUCHESS   'Twas but a little child when you departed   To raise up that great army for the emperor   And after, at the close of the campaign,   When you returned home out of Pomerania,   Your daughter was already in the convent,   Wherein she has remained till now.WALLENSTEIN                     The while   We in the field here gave our cares and toils   To make her great, and fight her a free way   To the loftiest earthly good; lo! mother Nature   Within the peaceful, silent convent walls,   Has done her part, and out of her free grace   Hath she bestowed on the beloved child   The god-like; and now leads her thus adorned   To meet her splendid fortune, and my hope.DUCHESS (to THEKLA)   Thou wouldst not now have recognized thy father,   Wouldst thou, my child? She counted scarce eight years   When last she saw your face.THEKLA                  O yes, yes, mother!   At the first glance! My father has not altered.   The form that stands before me falsifies   No feature of the image that hath lived   So long within me!WALLENSTEIN             The voice of my child!

[Then after a pause.

   I was indignant at my destiny,   That it denied me a man-child, to be   Heir of my name and of my prosperous fortune,   And re-illume my soon-extinguished being   In a proud line of princes.   I wronged my destiny. Here upon this head,   So lovely in its maiden bloom, will I   Let fall the garland of a life of war,   Nor deem it lost, if only I can wreath it,   Transmuted to a regal ornament,   Around these beauteous brows.

[He clasps her in his arms as PICCOLOMINI enters.

SCENE IV

Enter MAX. PICCOLOMINI, and some time after COUNT TERZKY, the others remaining as before.

COUNTESS   There comes the Paladin who protected us.WALLENSTEIN   Max.! Welcome, ever welcome! Always wert thou   The morning star of my best joys!MAX                     My general —WALLENSTEIN   Till now it was the emperor who rewarded thee,   I but the instrument. This day thou hast bound   The father to thee, Max.! the fortunate father,   And this debt Friedland's self must pay.MAX                        My prince!   You made no common hurry to transfer it.   I come with shame: yea, not without a pang!   For scarce have I arrived here, scarce delivered   The mother and the daughter to your arms,   But there is brought to me from your equerry 6   A splendid richly-plated hunting dress   So to remunerate me for my troubles —   Yes, yes, remunerate me, – since a trouble   It must be, a mere office, not a favor   Which I leaped forward to receive, and which   I came with grateful heart to thank you for.   No! 'twas not so intended, that my business   Should be my highest best good fortune!

[TERZKY enters; and delivers letters to the DUKE, which he breaks open hurriedly.

COUNTESS (to MAX.)   Remunerate your trouble! For his joy,   He makes you recompense. 'Tis not unfitting   For you, Count Piccolomini, to feel   So tenderly – my brother it beseems   To show himself forever great and princely.THEKLA   Then I too must have scruples of his love:   For his munificent hands did ornament me   Ere yet the father's heart had spoken to me.MAX   Yes; 'tis his nature ever to be giving   And making happy.

[He grasps the hand of the DUCHESS with still increasing warmth.

             How my heart pours out   Its all of thanks to him! O! how I seem   To utter all things in the dear name – Friedland.   While I shall live, so long will I remain   The captive of this name: in it shall bloom   My every fortune, every lovely hope.   Inextricably as in some magic ring   In this name hath my destiny charm-bound me!COUNTESS (who during this time has been anxiously watching the DUKE, and remarks that he is lost in thought over the letters)   My brother wishes us to leave him. Come.WALLENSTEIN (turns himself round quick, collects himself, and speaks with cheerfulness to the DUCHESS)   Once more I bid thee welcome to the camp,   Thou art the hostess of this court. You, Max.,   Will now again administer your old office,   While we perform the sovereign's business here.

[MAX. PICCOLOMINI offers the DUCHESS his arm; the COUNTESS accompanies the PRINCESS.

TERZKY (calling after him)   Max., we depend on seeing you at the meeting.

SCENE V

WALLENSTEIN, COUNT TERZKY.

WALLENSTEIN (in deep thought, to himself)   She has seen all things as they are – it is so,   And squares completely with my other notices,   They have determined finally in Vienna,   Have given me my successor already;   It is the King of Hungary, Ferdinand,   The emperor's delicate son! he's now their savior,   He's the new star that's rising now! Of us   They think themselves already fairly rid,   And as we were deceased, the heir already   Is entering on possession – Therefore – despatch!

[As he turns round he observes TERZKY, and gives him a letter.

   Count Altringer will have himself excused,   And Gallas too – I like not this!TERZKY                    And if   Thou loiterest longer, all will fall away,   One following the other.WALLENSTEIN                Altringer   Is master of the Tyrol passes. I must forthwith   Send some one to him, that he let not in   The Spaniards on me from the Milanese.   – Well, and the old Sesin, that ancient trader   In contraband negotiations, he   Has shown himself again of late. What brings he   From the Count Thur?TERZKY              The count communicates   He has found out the Swedish chancellor   At Halberstadt, where the convention's held,   Who says, you've tired him out, and that he'll have   No further dealings with you.WALLENSTEIN                   And why so?TERZKY   He says, you are never in earnest in your speeches;   That you decoy the Swedes – to make fools of them;   Will league yourself with Saxony against them,   And at last make yourself a riddance of them   With a paltry sum of money.WALLENSTEIN                  So then, doubtless,   Yes, doubtless, this same modest Swede expects   That I shall yield him some fair German tract   For his prey and booty, that ourselves at last   On our own soil and native territory   May be no longer our own lords and masters!   An excellent scheme! No, no! They must be off,   Off, off! away! we want no such neighbors.TERZKY   Nay, yield them up that dot, that speck of land —   It goes not from your portion. If you win   The game, what matters it to you who pays it?WALLENSTEIN   Off with them, off! Thou understand'st not this.   Never shall it be said of me, I parcelled   My native land away, dismembered Germany,   Betrayed it to a foreigner, in order   To come with stealthy tread, and filch away   My own share of the plunder – Never! never!   No foreign power shall strike root in the empire,   And least of all these Goths! these hungry wolves!   Who send such envious, hot, and greedy glances   Toward the rich blessings of our German lands!   I'll have their aid to cast and draw my nets,   But not a single fish of all the draught   Shall they come in for.TERZKY                You will deal, however,   More fairly with the Saxons? they lose patience   While you shift round and make so many curves.   Say, to what purpose all these masks? Your friends   Are plunged in doubts, baffled, and led astray in you.   There's Oxenstiern, there's Arnheim – neither knows   What he should think of your procrastinations,   And in the end I prove the liar; all   Passes through me. I've not even your handwriting.WALLENSTEIN   I never give handwriting; and thou knowest it.TERZKY   But how can it be known that you are in earnest,   If the act follows not upon the word?   You must yourself acknowledge, that in all   Your intercourses hitherto with the enemy,   You might have done with safety all you have done.   Had you meant nothing further than to gull him   For the emperor's service.WALLENSTEIN (after a pause, during which he looks narrowly on TERZKY)                And from whence dost thou know   That I'm not gulling him for the emperor's service?   Whence knowest thou that I'm not gulling all of you?   Dost thou know me so well? When made I thee   The intendant of my secret purposes?   I am not conscious that I ever opened   My inmost thoughts to thee. The emperor, it is true,   Hath dealt with me amiss; and if I would   I could repay him with usurious interest   For the evil he hath done me. It delights me   To know my power; but whether I shall use it,   Of that I should have thought that thou couldst speak   No wiser than thy fellows.TERZKY   So hast thou always played thy game with us.

[Enter ILLO.