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Title: The Death of Wallenstein
       A Play

Author: Frederich Schiller

Release Date: October 26, 2006 [EBook #6787]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH OF WALLENSTEIN ***




Produced by Tapio Riikonen and David Widger





              THE DEATH OF WALLENSTEIN.

            Translated by S. T. Coleridge.



DRAMATIS PERSONAE.


WALLENSTEIN, Duke of Friedland, Generalissimo of the Imperial Forces in
   the Thirty Years' War.
DUCHESS OF FREIDLAND, Wife of Wallenstein.
THEKLA, her Daughter, Princess of Friedland.
THE COUNTESS TERZKY, Sister of the Duchess.
LADY NEUBRUNN.
OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI, Lieutenant-General.
MAX. PICCOLOMINI, his Son, Colonel of a Regiment of Cuirassiers.
COUNT TERZKY, the Commander of several Regiments, and
   Brother-in-law of Wallenstein.
ILLO, Field-Marshal, Wallenstein's Confidant.
ISOLANI, General of the Croats.
BUTLER, an Irishman, Commander of a Regiment of Dragoons.
GORDON, Governor of Egra.
MAJOR GERALDIN.
CAPTAIN DEVEREUX.
CAPTAIN MACDONALD.
AN ADJUTANT.
NEUMANN, Captain of Cavalry, Aide-de-Camp to TERZKY.
COLONEL WRANGEL, Envoy from the Swedes.
ROSENBURG, Master of Horse.
SWEDISH CAPTAIN.
SENI.
BURGOMASTER of Egra.
ANSPESSADE of the Cuirassiers.
GROOM OF THE CHAMBER. | Belonging
A PAGE.        | to the Duke.
Cuirassiers, Dragoons, and Servants.




ACT I.

SCENE I.

   A room fitted up for astrological labors, and provided with
   celestial charts, with globes, telescopes, quadrants, and other
   mathematical instruments. Seven colossal figures, representing the
   planets, each with a transparent star of different color on its
   head, stand in a semicircle in the background, so that Mars and
   Saturn are nearest the eye. The remainder of the scene and its
   disposition is given in the fourth scene of the second act. There
   must be a curtain over the figures, which may be dropped and conceal
   them on occasions.

   [In the fifth scene of this act it must be dropped; but in the
   seventh scene it must be again drawn up wholly or in part.]

   WALLENSTEIN at a black table, on which, a speculum astrologicum is
   described with chalk. SENI is taking observations through a window.

WALLENSTEIN.
All well--and now let it be ended, Seni. Come,
The dawn commences, and Mars rules the hour;
We must give o'er the operation. Come,
We know enough.

SENI.
         Your highness must permit me
Just to contemplate Venus. She is now rising
Like as a sun so shines she in the east.

WALLENSTEIN.
She is at present in her perigee,
And now shoots down her strongest influences.
     [Contemplating the figure on the table.
Auspicious aspect! fateful in conjunction,
At length the mighty three corradiate;
And the two stars of blessing, Jupiter
And Venus, take between them the malignant
Slyly-malicious Mars, and thus compel
Into my service that old mischief-founder:
For long he viewed me hostilely, and ever
With beam oblique, or perpendicular,
Now in the Quartile, now in the Secundan,
Shot his red lightnings at my stars, disturbing
Their blessed influences and sweet aspects:
Now they have conquered the old enemy,
And bring him in the heavens a prisoner to me.

SENI (who has come down from the window).
And in a corner-house, your highness--think of that!
That makes each influence of double strength.

WALLENSTEIN.
And sun and moon, too, in the Sextile aspect,
The soft light with the vehement--so I love it.
Sol is the heart, Luna the head of heaven,
Bold be the plan, fiery the execution.

SENI.
And both the mighty Lumina by no
Maleficus affronted. Lo! Saturnus,
Innocuous, powerless, in cadente Domo.

WALLENSTEIN.
The empire of Saturnus is gone by;
Lord of the secret birth of things is he;
Within the lap of earth, and in the depths
Of the imagination dominates;
And his are all things that eschew the light.
The time is o'er of brooding and contrivance,
For Jupiter, the lustrous, lordeth now,
And the dark work, complete of preparation,
He draws by force into the realm of light.
Now must we hasten on to action, ere
The scheme, and most auspicious positure
Parts o'er my head, and takes once more its flight,
For the heaven's journey still, and adjourn not.
     [There are knocks at the door.
There's some one knocking there. See who it is.

TERZKY (from without).
Open, and let me in.

WALLENSTEIN.
           Ay--'tis Terzky.
What is there of such urgence? We are busy.

TERZKY (from without).
Lay all aside at present, I entreat you;
It suffers no delaying.

WALLENSTEIN.
             Open, Seni!

   [While SENI opens the door for TERZKY, WALLENSTEIN draws the curtain
   over the figures.



SCENE II.

   WALLENSTEIN, COUNT TERZKY.

TERZKY (enters).
Hast thou already heard it? He is taken.
Gallas has given him up to the emperor.

   [SENI draws off the black table, and exit.

WALLENSTEIN (to TERZKY).
Who has been taken? Who is given up?

TERZKY.
The man who knows our secrets, who knows every
Negotiation with the Swede and Saxon,
Through whose hands all and everything has passed----

WALLENSTEIN (drawing back).
Nay, not Sesina? Say, no! I entreat thee.

TERZKY.
All on his road for Regensburg to the Swede
He was plunged down upon by Gallas' agent,
Who had been long in ambush, lurking for him.
There must have been found on him my whole packet
To Thur, to Kinsky, to Oxenstiern, to Arnheim:
All this is in their hands; they have now an insight
Into the whole--our measures and our motives.



SCENE III.

   To them enters ILLO.

ILLO (to TERZKY).
Has he heard it?

TERZKY.
He has heard it.

ILLO (to WALLENSTEIN).
         Thinkest thou still
To make thy peace with the emperor, to regain
His confidence? E'en were it now thy wish
To abandon all thy plans, yet still they know
What thou hast wished: then forwards thou must press;
Retreat is now no longer in thy power.

TERZKY.
They have documents against us, and in hands,
Which show beyond all power of contradiction----

WALLENSTEIN.
Of my handwriting--no iota. Thee
I punish or thy lies.

ILLO.
            And thou believest,
That what this man, and what thy sister's husband,
Did in thy name, will not stand on thy reckoning?
His word must pass for thy word with the Swede,
And not with those that hate thee at Vienna?

TERZKY.
In writing thou gavest nothing; but bethink thee,
How far thou venturedst by word of mouth
With this Sesina! And will he be silent?
If he can save himself by yielding up
Thy secret purposes, will he retain them?

ILLO.
Thyself dost not conceive it possible;
And since they now have evidence authentic
How far thou hast already gone, speak! tell us,
What art thou waiting for? Thou canst no longer
Keep thy command; and beyond hope of rescue
Thou'rt lost if thou resign'st it.

WALLENSTEIN.
                  In the army
Lies my security. The army will not
Abandon me. Whatever they may know,
The power is mine, and they must gulp it down
And if I give them caution for my fealty,
They must be satisfied, at least appear so.

ILLO.
The army, duke, is thine now; for this moment
'Tis thine: but think with terror on the slow,
The quiet power of time. From open violence
The attachment of thy soldiery secures thee
To-day, to-morrow: but grant'st thou them a respite,
Unheard, unseen, they'll undermine that love
On which thou now dost feel so firm a footing,
With wily theft will draw away from thee
One after the other----

WALLENSTEIN.
            'Tis a cursed accident!
Oh! I will call it a most blessed one,
If it work on thee as it ought to do,
Hurry thee on to action--to decision.
The Swedish general?

WALLENSTEIN.
           He's arrived! Know'st
What his commission is----

ILLO.
             To thee alone
Will he intrust the purpose of his coming.

WALLENSTEIN.
A cursed, cursed accident! Yes, yes,
Sesina knows too much, and won't be silent.

TERZKY.
He's a Bohemian fugitive and rebel,
His neck is forfeit. Can he save himself
At thy cost, think you he will scruple it?
And if they put him to the torture, will he,
Will he, that dastardling, have strength enough----

WALLENSTEIN (lost in thought).
Their confidence is lost, irreparably!
And I may act which way I will, I shall
Be and remain forever in their thought
A traitor to my country. How sincerely
Soever I return back to my duty,
It will no longer help me----

ILLO.
               Ruin thee,
That it will do! Not thy fidelity,
Thy weakness will be deemed the sole occasion----

WALLENSTEIN (pacing up and down in extreme agitation).
What! I must realize it now in earnest,
Because I toyed too freely with the thought!
Accursed he who dallies with a devil!
And must I--I must realize it now--
Now, while I have the power, it must take place!

ILLO.
Now--now--ere they can ward and parry it!

WALLENSTEIN (looking at the paper of Signatures).
I have the generals' word--a written promise!
Max. Piccolomini stands not here--how's that?

TERZRY.
It was--be fancied----

ILLO.
           Mere self-willedness.
There needed no such thing 'twixt him and you.

WALLENSTEIN.
He is quite right; there needed no such thing.
The regiments, too, deny to march for Flanders
Have sent me in a paper of remonstrance,
And openly resist the imperial orders.
The first step to revolt's already taken.

ILLO.
Believe me, thou wilt find it far more easy
To lead them over to the enemy
Than to the Spaniard.

WALLENSTEIN.
            I will hear, however,
What the Swede has to say to me.

ILLO (eagerly to TERZKY).
                 Go, call him,
He stands without the door in waiting.

WALLENSTEIN.
                    Stay!
Stay but a little. It hath taken me
All by surprise; it came too quick upon me;
'Tis wholly novel that an accident,
With its dark lordship, and blind agency,
Should force me on with it.

ILLO.
               First hear him only,
And then weigh it.

          [Exeunt TERZKY and ILLO.



SCENE IV.

WALLENSTEIN (in soliloquy).
            Is it possible?
Is't so? I can no longer what I would?
No longer draw back at my liking? I
Must do the deed, because I thought of it?
And fed this heart here with a dream?
Because I did not scowl temptation from my presence,
Dallied with thoughts of possible fulfilment,
Commenced no movement, left all time uncertain,
And only kept the road, the access open?
By the great God of Heaven! it was not
My serious meaning, it was ne'er resolved.
I but amused myself with thinking of it.
The free-will tempted me, the power to do
Or not to do it. Was it criminal
To make the fancy minister to hope,
To fill the air with pretty toys of air,
And clutch fantastic sceptres moving toward me?
Was not the will kept free? Beheld I not
The road of duty close beside me--but
One little step, and once more I was in it!
Where am I? Whither have I been transported?
No road, no track behind me, but a wall,
Impenetrable, insurmountable,
Rises obedient to the spells I muttered
And meant not--my own doings tower behind me.
     [Pauses and remains in deep thought.
A punishable man I seem, the guilt,
Try what I will, I cannot roll off from me;
The equivocal demeanor of my life
Bears witness on my prosecutor's party.
And even my purest acts from purest motives
Suspicion poisons with malicious gloss.
Were I that thing for which I pass, that traitor,
A goodly outside I had sure reserved,
Had drawn the coverings thick and double round me,
Been calm and chary of my utterance;
But being conscious of the innocence
Of my intent, my uncorrupted will,
I gave way to my humors, to my passion:
Bold were my words, because my deeds were not
Now every planless measure, chance event,
The threat of rage, the vaunt of joy and triumph,
And all the May-games of a heart overflowing,
Will they connect, and weave them all together
Into one web of treason; all will be plan,
My eye ne'er absent from the far-off mark,
Step tracing step, each step a politic progress;
And out of all they'll fabricate a charge
So specious, that I must myself stand dumb.
I am caught in my own net, and only force,
Naught but a sudden rent can liberate me.

               [Pauses again.

How else! since that the heart's unbiased instinct
Impelled me to the daring deed, which now
Necessity, self-preservation, orders.
Stern is the on-look of necessity,
Not without shudder may a human hand
Grasp the mysterious urn of destiny.
My deed was mine, remaining in my bosom;
Once suffered to escape from its safe corner
Within the heart, its nursery and birthplace,
Sent forth into the foreign, it belongs
Forever to those sly malicious powers
Whom never art of man conciliated.

   [Paces in agitation through the chamber, then pauses, and, after
   the pause, breaks out again into audible soliloquy.

What it thy enterprise? thy aim? thy object?
Hast honestly confessed it to thyself?
Power seated on a quiet throne thou'dst shake,
Power on an ancient, consecrated throne,
Strong in possession, founded in all custom;
Power by a thousand tough and stringy roots
Fixed to the people's pious nursery faith.
This, this will be no strife of strength with strength.
That feared I not. I brave each combatant,
Whom I can look on, fixing eye to eye,
Who, full himself of courage, kindles courage
In me too. 'Tis a foe invisible
The which I fear--a fearful enemy,
Which in the human heart opposes me,
By its coward fear alone made fearful to me.
Not that, which full of life, instinct with power,
Makes known its present being; that is not
The true, the perilously formidable.
O no! it is the common, the quite common,
The thing of an eternal yesterday.
Whatever was, and evermore returns,
Sterling to-morrow, for to-day 'twas sterling!
For of the wholly common is man made,
And custom is his nurse! Woe then to them
Who lay irreverent hands upon his old
House furniture, the dear inheritance
From his forefathers! For time consecrates;
And what is gray with age becomes religion.
Be in possession, and thou hast the right,
And sacred will the many guard it for thee!

   [To the PAGE,--who here enters.

The Swedish officer? Well, let him enter.

   [The PAGE exit, WALLENSTEIN fixes his eye in deep thought
   on the door.

Yet, it is pure--as yet!--the crime has come
Not o'er this threshold yet--so slender is
The boundary that divideth life's two paths.



SCENE V.

   WALLENSTEIN and WRANGEL.

WALLENSTEIN (after having fixed a searching look on him).
Your name is Wrangel?

WRANGEL.
            Gustave Wrangel, General
Of the Sudermanian Blues.

WALLENSTEIN.
              It was a Wrangel
Who injured me materially at Stralsund,
And by his brave resistance was the cause
Of the opposition which that seaport made.

WRANGEL.
It was the doing of the element
With which you fought, my lord! and not my merit,
The Baltic Neptune did assert his freedom:
The sea and land, it seemed were not to serve
One and the same.

WALLENSTEIN
You plucked the admiral's hat from off my head.

WRANGEL.
I come to place a diadem thereon.

WALLENSTEIN (makes the motion for him to take a seat, and seats himself).
         And where are your credentials
Come you provided with full powers, sir general?

WRANGEL.
There are so many scruples yet to solve----

WALLENSTEIN (having read the credentials).
An able letter! Ay--he is a prudent,
Intelligent master whom you serve, sir general!
The chancellor writes me that he but fulfils
His late departed sovereign's own idea
In helping me to the Bohemian crown.

WRANGEL.
He says the truth. Our great king, now in heaven,
Did ever deem most highly of your grace's
Pre-eminent sense and military genius;
And always the commanding intellect,
He said, should have command, and be the king.

WALLENSTEIN.
Yes, he might say it safely. General Wrangel,
      [Taking his hand affectionately.
Come, fair and open. Trust me, I was always
A Swede at heart. Eh! that did you experience
Both in Silesia and at Nuremberg;
I had you often in my power, and let you
Always slip out by some back door or other.
'Tis this for which the court can ne'er forgive me,
Which drives me to this present step: and since
Our interests so run in one direction,
E'en let us have a thorough confidence
Each in the other.

WRANGEL.
          Confidence will come
Has each but only first security.

WALLENSTEIN.
The chancellor still, I see, does not quite trust me;
And, I confess--the game does not lie wholly
To my advantage. Without doubt he thinks,
If I can play false with the emperor,
Who is my sovereign, I can do the like
With the enemy, and that the one, too, were
Sooner to be forgiven me than the other.
Is not this your opinion, too, sir general?

WRANGEL.
I have here a duty merely, no opinion.

WALLENSTEIN.
The emperor hath urged me to the uttermost
I can no longer honorably serve him.
For my security, in self-defence,
I take this hard step, which my conscience blames.

WRANGEL.
That I believe. So far would no one go
Who was not forced to it.
           [After a pause.
              What may have impelled
Your princely highness in this wise to act
Toward your sovereign lord and emperor,
Beseems not us to expound or criticise.
The Swede is fighting for his good old cause,
With his good sword and conscience. This concurrence,
This opportunity is in our favor,
And all advantages in war are lawful.
We take what offers without questioning;
And if all have its due and just proportions----

WALLENSTEIN.
Of what then are ye doubting? Of my will?
Or of my power? I pledged me to the chancellor,
Would he trust me with sixteen thousand men,
That I would instantly go over to them
With eighteen thousand of the emperor's troops.

WRANGEL.
Your grace is known to be a mighty war-chief,
To be a second Attila and Pyrrhus.
'Tis talked of still with fresh astonishment,
How some years past, beyond all human faith,
You called an army forth like a creation:
But yet----

WALLENSTEIN.
      But yet?

WRANGEL.
           But still the chancellor thinks
It might yet be an easier thing from nothing
To call forth sixty thousand men of battle,
Than to persuade one-sixtieth part of them----

WALLENSTEIN.
What now? Out with it, friend?

WRANGEL.
                 To break their oaths.

WALLENSTEIN.
And he thinks so? He judges like a Swede,
And like a Protestant. You Lutherans
Fight for your Bible. You are interested
About the cause; and with your hearts you follow
Your banners. Among you whoe'er deserts
To the enemy hath broken covenant
With two lords at one time. We've no such fancies.

WRANGEL.
Great God in heaven! Have then the people here
No house and home, no fireside, no altar?

WALLENSTEIN.
I will explain that to you, how it stands:
The Austrian has a country, ay, and loves it,
And has good cause to love it--but this army
That calls itself the imperial, this that houses
Here in Bohemia, this has none--no country;
This is an outcast of all foreign lands,
Unclaimed by town or tribe, to whom belongs
Nothing except the universal sun.
And this Bohemian land for which we fight
Loves not the master whom the chance of war,
Not its own choice or will, hath given to it.
Men murmur at the oppression of their conscience,
And power hath only awed but not appeased them.
A glowing and avenging memory lives
Of cruel deeds committed on these plains;
How can the son forget that here his father
Was hunted by the bloodhound to the mass?
A people thus oppressed must still be feared,
Whether they suffer or avenge their wrongs.

WRANGEL.
But then the nobles and the officers?
Such a desertion, such a felony,
It is without example, my lord duke,
In the world's history.

WALLENSTEIN.
             They are all mine--
Mine unconditionally--mine on all terms.
Not me, your own eyes you must trust.

   [He gives him the paper containing the written oath. WRANGEL reads
   it through, and, having read it, lays it on the table,--remaining
   silent.

                    So then;
Now comprehend you?

WRANGEL.
           Comprehend who can!
My lord duke, I will let the mask drop--yes!
I've full powers for a final settlement.
The Rhinegrave stands but four days' march from here
With fifteen thousand men, and only waits
For orders to proceed and join your army.
These orders I give out immediately
We're compromised.

WALLENSTEIN.
          What asks the chancellor?

WRANGEL (considerately).
Twelve regiments, every man a Swede--my head
The warranty--and all might prove at last
Only false play----

WALLENSTEIN (starting).
          Sir Swede!

WRANGEL (calmly proceeding).
                Am therefore forced
To insist thereon, that he do formally,
Irrevocably break with the emperor,
Else not a Swede is trusted to Duke Friedland.

WALLENSTEIN.
Come, brief and open! What is the demand?

WRANGEL.
That he forthwith disarm the Spanish regiments
Attached to the emperor, that he seize on Prague,
And to the Swedes give up that city, with
The strong pass Egra.

WALLENSTEIN.
            That is much indeed!
Prague!--Egra's granted--but--but Prague! 'Twon't do.
I give you every security
Which you may ask of me in common reason--
But Prague--Bohemia--these, sir general,
I can myself protect.

WRANGEL.
            We doubt it not.
But 'tis not the protection that is now
Our sole concern. We want security,
That we shall not expend our men and money
All to no purpose.

WALLENSTEIN.
          'Tis but reasonable.

WRANGEL.
And till we are indemnified, so long
Stays Prague in pledge.

WALLENSTEIN.
             Then trust you us so little?

WRANGEL (rising).
The Swede, if he would treat well with the German,
Must keep a sharp lookout. We have been called
Over the Baltic, we have saved the empire
From ruin--with our best blood have we sealed
The liberty of faith and gospel truth.
But now already is the benefaction
No longer felt, the load alone is felt.
Ye look askance with evil eye upon us,
As foreigners, intruders in the empire,
And would fain send us with some paltry sum
Of money, home again to our old forests.
No, no! my lord duke! it never was
For Judas' pay, for chinking gold and silver,
That we did leave our king by the Great Stone. [1]
No, not for gold and silver have there bled
So many of our Swedish nobles--neither
Will we, with empty laurels for our payment,
Hoist sail for our own country. Citizens
Will we remain upon the soil, the which
Our monarch conquered for himself and died.

WALLENSTEIN.
Help to keep down the common enemy,
And the fair border land must needs be yours.

WRANGEL.
But when the common enemy lies vanquished,
Who knits together our new friendship then?
We know, Duke Friedland! though perhaps the Swede
Ought not to have known it, that you carry on
Secret negotiations with the Saxons.
Who is our warranty that we are not
The sacrifices in those articles
Which 'tis thought needful to conceal from us?

WALLENSTEIN (rises).
Think you of something better, Gustave Wrangel!
Of Prague no more.

WRANGEL.
          Here my commission ends.

WALLENSTEIN.
Surrender up to you my capital!
Far liever would I force about, and step
Back to my emperor.

WRANGEL.
           If time yet permits----

WALLENSTEIN.
That lies with me, even now, at any hour.

WRANGEL.
Some days ago, perhaps. To-day, no longer;
No longer since Sesina's been a prisoner.
   [WALLENSTEIN is struck, and silenced.
My lord duke, hear me--we believe that you
At present do mean honorably by us.
Since yesterday we're sure of that--and now
This paper warrants for the troops, there's nothing
Stands in the way of our full confidence.
Prague shall not part us. Hear! The chancellor
Contents himself with Alstadt; to your grace
He gives up Ratschin and the narrow side.
But Egra above all must open to us,
Ere we can think of any junction.

WALLENSTEIN.
                  You,
You therefore must I trust, and not you me?
I will consider of your proposition.

WRANGEL.
I must entreat that your consideration
Occupy not too long a time. Already
Has this negotiation, my lord duke!
Crept on into the second year. If nothing
Is settled this time, will the chancellor
Consider it as broken off forever?

WALLENSTEIN.
Ye press me hard. A measure such as this
Ought to be thought of.

WRANGEL.
             Ay! but think of this too,
That sudden action only can procure it.
Success--think first of this, your highness.

               [Exit WRANGEL.



SCENE VI.

   WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY, and ILLO (re-enter).

ILLO.
Is't all right?

TERZKY.
         Are you compromised?

ILLO.
                    This Swede
Went smiling from you. Yes! you're compromised.

WALLENSTEIN.
As yet is nothing settled; and (well weighed)
I feel myself inclined to leave it so.

TERZKY.
How? What is that?

WALLENSTEIN.
           Come on me what will come,
The doing evil to avoid an evil
Cannot be good!

TERZKY.
         Nay, but bethink you, duke.

WALLENSTEIN.
To live upon the mercy of these Swedes!
Of these proud-hearted Swedes!--I could not bear it.

ILLO.
Goest thou as fugitive, as mendicant?
Bringest thou not more to them than thou receivest?

WALLENSTEIN.
How fared it with the brave and royal Bourbon
Who sold himself unto his country's foes,
And pierced the bosom of his father-land?
Curses were his reward, and men's abhorrence
Avenged the unnatural and revolting deed.

ILLO.
Is that thy case?

WALLENSTEIN.
          True faith, I tell thee,
Must ever be the dearest friend of man
His nature prompts him to assert its rights.
The enmity of sects, the rage of parties,
Long-cherished envy, jealousy, unite;'
And all the struggling elements of evil
Suspend their conflict, and together league
In one alliance 'gainst their common foe--
The savage beast that breaks into the fold,
Where men repose in confidence and peace.
For vain were man's own prudence to protect him.
'Tis only in the forehead nature plants
The watchful eye; the back, without defence,
Must find its shield in man's fidelity.

TERZKY.
Think not more meanly off thyself than do
Thy foes, who stretch their hands with joy to greet thee.
Less scrupulous far was the imperial Charles,
The powerful head of this illustrious house;
With open arms he gave the Bourbon welcome;
For still by policy the world is ruled.



SCENE VII.

   To these enter the COUNTESS TERZKY.

WALLENSTEIN.
Who sent for you? There is no business here
For women.

COUNTESS
      I am come to bid you joy.

WALLENSTEIN.
Use thy authority, Terzky; bid her go.

COUNTESS.
Come I perhaps too early? I hope not.

WALLENSTEIN.
Set not this tongue upon me, I entreat you:
You know it is the weapon that destroys me.
I am routed, if a woman but attack me:
I cannot traffic in the trade of words
With that unreasoning sex.

COUNTESS.
              I had already
Given the Bohemians a king.

WALLENSTEIN (sarcastically).
               They have one,
In consequence, no doubt.

COUNTESS (to the others).
              Ha! what new scruple?

TERZKY.
The duke will not.

COUNTESS.
          He will not what he must!

ILLO.
It lies with you now. Try. For I am silenced
When folks begin to talk to me of conscience
And of fidelity.

COUNTESS.
         How? then, when all
Lay in the far-off distance, when the road
Stretched out before thine eyes interminably,
Then hadst thou courage and resolve; and now,
Now that the dream is being realized,
The purpose ripe, the issue ascertained,
Dost thou begin to play the dastard now?
Planned merely, 'tis a common felony;
Accomplished, an immortal undertaking:
And with success comes pardon hand in hand,
For all event is God's arbitrament.

SERVANT (enters).
The Colonel Piccolomini.

COUNTESS (hastily).
            --Must wait.

WALLENSTEIN.
I cannot see him now. Another time.

SERVANT.
But for two minutes he entreats an audience
Of the most urgent nature is his business.

WALLENSTEIN.
Who knows what he may bring us! I will hear him.

COUNTESS (laughs).
Urgent for him, no doubt? but thou may'st wait.

WALLENSTEIN.
What is it?

COUNTESS.
       Thou shalt be informed hereafter.
First let the Swede and thee be compromised.

                 [Exit SERVANT.

WALLENSTEIN.
If there were yet a choice! if yet some milder
Way of escape were possible--I still
Will choose it, and avoid the last extreme.

COUNTESS.
Desirest thou nothing further? Such a way
Lies still before thee. Send this Wrangel off.
Forget thou thy old hopes, cast far away
All thy past life; determine to commence
A new one. Virtue hath her heroes too,
As well as fame and fortune. To Vienna
Hence--to the emperor--kneel before the throne;
Take a full coffer with thee--say aloud,
Thou didst but wish to prove thy fealty;
Thy whole intention but to dupe the Swede.

ILLO.
For that too 'tis too late. They know too much;
He would but bear his own head to the block.

COUNTESS.
I fear not that. They have not evidence
To attaint him legally, and they avoid
The avowal of an arbitrary power.
They'll let the duke resign without disturbance.
I see how all will end. The King of Hungary
Makes his appearance, and 'twill of itself
Be understood, and then the duke retires.
There will not want a formal declaration.
The young king will administer the oath
To the whole army; and so all returns
To the old position. On some morrow morning
The duke departs; and now 'tis stir and bustle
Within his castles. He will hunt and build;
Superintend his horses' pedigrees,
Creates himself a court, gives golden keys,
And introduceth strictest ceremony
In fine proportions, and nice etiquette;
Keeps open table with high cheer: in brief,
Commenceth mighty king--in miniature.
And while he prudently demeans himself,
And gives himself no actual importance,
He will be let appear whate'er he likes:
And who dares doubt, that Friedland will appear
A mighty prince to his last dying hour?
Well now, what then? Duke Friedland is as others,
A fire-new noble, whom the war hath raised
To price and currency, a Jonah's gourd,
An over-night creation of court-favor,
Which, with an undistinguishable ease,
Makes baron or makes prince.

WALLENSTEIN (in extreme agitation).
               Take her away.
Let in the young Count Piccolomini.

COUNTESS.
Art thou in earnest? I entreat thee!
Canst thou consent to bear thyself to thy own grave,
So ignominiously to be dried up?
Thy life, that arrogated such an height
To end in such a nothing! To be nothing,
When one was always nothing, is an evil
That asks no stretch of patience, a light evil;
But to become a nothing, having been----

WALLENSTEIN (starts up in violent agitation).
Show me a way out of this stifling crowd,
Ye powers of aidance! Show me such a way
As I am capable of going. I
Am no tongue-hero, no fine virtue-prattler;
I cannot warm by thinking; cannot say
To the good luck that turns her back upon me
Magnanimously: "Go; I need thee not."
Cease I to work, I am annihilated.
Dangers nor sacrifices will I shun,
If so I may avoid the last extreme;
But ere I sink down into nothingness,
Leave off so little, who began so great,
Ere that the world confuses me with those
Poor wretches, whom a day creates and crumbles,
This age and after ages [2] speak my name
With hate and dread; and Friedland be redemption
For each accursed deed.

COUNTESS.
             What is there here, then,
So against nature? Help me to perceive it!
Oh, let not superstition's nightly goblins
Subdue thy clear, bright spirit! Art thou bid
To murder? with abhorred, accursed poniard,
To violate the breasts that nourished thee?
That were against our nature, that might aptly
Make thy flesh shudder, and thy whole heart sicken. [3]
Yet not a few, and for a meaner object,
Have ventured even this, ay, and performed it.
What is there in thy case so black and monstrous?
Thou art accused of treason--whether with
Or without justice is not now the question--
Thou art lost if thou dost not avail thee quickly
Of the power which thou possessest--Friedland! Duke!
Tell me where lives that thing so meek and tame,
That doth not all his living faculties
Put forth in preservation of his life?
What deed so daring, which necessity
And desperation will not sanctify?

WALLENSTEIN.
Once was this Ferdinand so gracious to me;
He loved me; he esteemed me; I was placed
The nearest to his heart. Full many a time
We like familiar friends, both at one table,
Have banqueted together--he and I;
And the young kings themselves held me the basin
Wherewith to wash me--and is't come to this?

COUNTESS.
So faithfully preservest thou each small favor,
And hast no memory for contumelies?
Must I remind thee, how at Regensburg
This man repaid thy faithful services?
All ranks and all conditions in the empire
Thou hadst wronged to make him great,--hadst loaded on thee,
On thee, the hate, the curse of the whole world.
No friend existed for thee in all Germany,
And why? because thou hadst existed only
For the emperor. To the emperor alone
Clung Friedland in that storm which gathered round him
At Regensburg in the Diet--and he dropped thee!
He let thee fall! he let thee fall a victim
To the Bavarian, to that insolent!
Deposed, stripped bare of all thy dignity
And power, amid the taunting of thy foe
Thou wert let drop into obscurity.
Say not, the restoration of thy honor
Has made atonement for that first injustice.
No honest good-will was it that replaced thee;
The law of hard necessity replaced thee,
Which they had fain opposed, but that they could not.

WALLENSTEIN.
Not to their good wishes, that is certain,
Nor yet to his affection I'm indebted
For this high office; and if I abuse it,
I shall therein abuse no confidence.

COUNTESS.
Affection! confidence!--they needed thee.
Necessity, impetuous remonstrant!
Who not with empty names, or shows of proxy,
Is served, who'll have the thing and not the symbol,
Ever seeks out the greatest and the best,
And at the rudder places him, e'en though
She had been forced to take him from the rabble--
She, this necessity, it was that placed thee
In this high office; it was she that gave thee
Thy letters-patent of inauguration.
For, to the uttermost moment that they can,
This race still help themselves at cheapest rate
With slavish souls, with puppets! At the approach
Of extreme peril, when a hollow image
Is found a hollow image and no more,
Then falls the power into the mighty hands
Of nature, of the spirit-giant born,
Who listens only to himself, knows nothing
Of stipulations, duties, reverences,
And, like the emancipated force of fire,
Unmastered scorches, ere it reaches them,
Their fine-spun webs, their artificial policy.

WALLENSTEIN.
'Tis true! they saw me always as I am--
Always! I did not cheat them in the bargain.
I never held it worth my pains to hide
The bold all-grasping habit of my soul.

COUNTESS.
Nay rather--thou hast ever shown thyself
A formidable man, without restraint;
Hast exercised the full prerogatives
Of thy impetuous nature, which had been
Once granted to thee. Therefore, duke, not thou,
Who hast still remained consistent with thyself,
But they are in the wrong, who, fearing thee,
Intrusted such a power in hands they feared.
For, by the laws of spirit, in the right
Is every individual character
That acts in strict consistence with itself:
Self-contradiction is the only wrong.
Wert thou another being, then, when thou
Eight years ago pursuedst thy march with fire,
And sword, and desolation, through the circles
Of Germany, the universal scourge,
Didst mock all ordinances of the empire,
The fearful rights of strength alone exertedst,
Trampledst to earth each rank, each magistracy,
All to extend thy Sultan's domination?
Then was the time to break thee in, to curb
Thy haughty will, to teach thee ordinance.
But no, the emperor felt no touch of conscience;
What served him pleased him, and without a murmur
He stamped his broad seal on these lawless deeds.
What at that time was right, because thou didst it
For him, to-day is all at once become
Opprobrious, foul, because it is directed
Against him. O most flimsy superstition!

WALLENSTEIN (rising).
I never saw it in this light before,
'Tis even so. The emperor perpetrated
Deeds through my arm, deeds most unorderly.
And even this prince's mantle, which I wear,
I owe to what were services to him,
But most high misdemeanors 'gainst the empire.

COUNTESS.
Then betwixt thee and him (confess it, Friedland!)
The point can be no more of right and duty,
Only of power and the opportunity.
That opportunity, lo! it comes yonder
Approaching with swift steeds; then with a swing
Throw thyself up into the chariot-seat,
Seize with firm hand the reins ere thy opponent
Anticipate thee, and himself make conquest
Of the now empty seat. The moment comes;
It is already here, when thou must write
The absolute total of thy life's vast sum.
The constellations stand victorious o'er thee,
The planets shoot good fortune in fair junctions,
And tell thee, "Now's the time!" The starry courses
Hast thou thy life-long measured to no purpose?
The quadrant and the circle, were they playthings?

   [Pointing to the different objects in the room.

The zodiacs, the rolling orbs of heaven,
Hast pictured on these walls and all around thee.
In dumb, foreboding symbols hast thou placed
These seven presiding lords of destiny--
For toys? Is all this preparation nothing?
Is there no marrow in this hollow art,
That even to thyself it doth avail
Nothing, and has no influence over thee
In the great moment of decision?

WALLENSTEIN (during this last speech walks up and down with inward
   struggles, laboring with passion; stops suddenly, stands still, then
   interrupting the COUNTESS).
Send Wrangel to me--I will instantly
Despatch three couriers----

ILLO (hurrying out).
              God in heaven be praised!

WALLENSTEIN.
It is his evil genius and mine.
Our evil genius! It chastises him
Through me, the instrument of his ambition;
And I expect no less, than that revenge
E'en now is whetting for my breast the poinard.
Who sows the serpent's teeth let him not hope
To reap a joyous harvest. Every crime
Has, in the moment of its perpetration,
Its own avenging angel--dark misgiving,
An ominous sinking at the inmost heart.
He can no longer trust me. Then no longer
Can I retreat--so come that which must come.
Still destiny preserves its due relations,
The heart within us is its absolute
Vicegerent.         [To TERZKY.
       Go, conduct you Gustave Wrangel
To my state cabinet. Myself will speak to
The couriers. And despatch immediately
A servant for Octavio Piccolomini.

   [To the COUNTESS, who cannot conceal her triumph.

No exultation! woman, triumph not!
For jealous are the powers of destiny,
Joy premature, and shouts ere victory,
Encroach upon their rights and privileges.
We sow the seed, and they the growth determine.

   [While he is making his exit the curtain drops.




ACT II.

SCENE I.

   Scene as in the preceding Act.

   WALLENSTEIN, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI.

WALLENSTEIN (coming forward in conversation).
He sends me word from Linz that he lies sick;
But I have sure intelligence that he
Secretes himself at Frauenberg with Gallas.
Secure them both, and send them to me hither.
Remember, thou takest on thee the command
Of those same Spanish regiments,--constantly
Make preparation, and be never ready;
And if they urge thee to draw out against me,
Still answer yes, and stand as thou went fettered.
I know, that it is doing thee a service
To keep thee out of action in this business.
Thou lovest to linger on in fair appearances;
Steps of extremity are not thy province,
Therefore have I sought out this part for thee.
Thou wilt this time be of most service to me
By thy inertness. The meantime, if fortune
Declare itself on my side, thou wilt know
What is to do.

     [Enter MAX. PICCOLOMINI.

        Now go, Octavio.
This night must thou be off, take my own horses
Him here I keep with me--make short farewell--
Trust me, I think we all shall meet again
In joy and thriving fortunes.

OCTAVIO (to his son).
                I shall see you
Yet ere I go.



SCENE II.

   WALLENSTEIN, MAX. PICCOLOMINI.

MAX. (advances to him).
My general!

WALLENSTEIN.
       That I am no longer, if
Thou stylest thyself the emperor's officer.

MAX.
Then thou wilt leave the army, general?

WALLENSTEIN.
I have renounced the service of the emperor.

MAX.
And thou wilt leave the army?

WALLENSTEIN.
                Rather hope I
To bind it nearer still and faster to me.
     [He seats himself.
Yes, Max., I have delayed to open it to thee,
Even till the hour of acting 'gins to strike.
Youth's fortunate feeling doth seize easily
The absolute right, yea, and a joy it is
To exercise the single apprehension
Where the sums square in proof;
But where it happens, that of two sure evils
One must be taken, where the heart not wholly
Brings itself back from out the strife of duties,
There 'tis a blessing to have no election,
And blank necessity is grace and favor.
This is now present: do not look behind thee,--
It can no more avail thee. Look thou forwards!
Think not! judge not! prepare thyself to act!
The court--it hath determined on my ruin,
Therefore I will be beforehand with them.
We'll join the Swedes--right gallant fellows are they,
And our good friends.
   [He stops himself, expecting PICCOLOMINI's answer.
I have taken thee by surprise. Answer me not:
I grant thee time to recollect thyself.

   [He rises, retires to the back of the stage. MAX. remains
   for a long time motionless, in a trance of excessive anguish.
   At his first motion WALLENSTEIN returns, and places himself
   before him.

MAX.
My general, this day thou makest me
Of age to speak in my own right and person,
For till this day I have been spared the trouble
To find out my own road. Thee have I followed
With most implicit, unconditional faith,
Sure of the right path if I followed thee.
To-day, for the first time, dost thou refer
Me to myself, and forcest me to make
Election between thee and my own heart.

WALLENSTEIN.
Soft cradled thee thy fortune till to-day;
Thy duties thou couldst exercise in sport,
Indulge all lovely instincts, act forever
With undivided heart. It can remain
No longer thus. Like enemies, the roads
Start from each other. Duties strive with duties,
Thou must needs choose thy party in the war
Which is now kindling 'twixt thy friend and him
Who is thy emperor.

MAX.
           War! is that the name?
War is as frightful as heaven's pestilence,
Yet it is good, is it heaven's will as that is.
Is that a good war, which against the emperor
Thou wagest with the emperor's own army?
O God of heaven! what a change is this.
Beseems it me to offer such persuasion
To thee, who like the fixed star of the pole
Wert all I gazed at on life's trackless ocean?
O! what a rent thou makest in my heart!
The ingrained instinct of old reverence,
The holy habit of obediency,
Must I pluck life asunder from thy name?
Nay, do not turn thy countenance upon me--
It always was as a god looking upon me!
Duke Wallenstein, its power has not departed;
The senses still are in thy bonds, although
Bleeding, the soul hath freed itself.

WALLENSTEIN.
                    Max., hear me.

MAX.
Oh, do it not, I pray thee, do it not!
There is a pure and noble soul within thee,
Knows not of this unblest unlucky doing.
Thy will is chaste, it is thy fancy only
Which hath polluted thee--and innocence,
It will not let itself be driven away
From that world-awing aspect. Thou wilt not,
Thou canst not end in this. It would reduce
All human creatures to disloyalty
Against the nobleness of their own nature.
'Twill justify the vulgar misbelief,
Which holdeth nothing noble in free will,
And trusts itself to impotence alone,
Made powerful only in an unknown power.

WALLENSTEIN.
The world will judge me harshly, I expect it.
Already have I said to my own self
All thou canst say to me. Who but avoids
The extreme, can he by going round avoid it?
But here there is no choice. Yes, I must use
Or suffer violence--so stands the case,
There remains nothing possible but that.

MAX.
Oh, that is never possible for thee!
'Tis the last desperate resource of those
Cheap souls, to whom their honor, their good name,
Is their poor saving, their last worthless keep,
Which, having staked and lost, they staked themselves
In the mad rage of gaming. Thou art rich
And glorious; with an unpolluted heart
Thou canst make conquest of whate'er seems highest!
But he who once hath acted infamy
Does nothing more in this world.

WALLENSTEIN (grasps his hand).
                 Calmly, Max.!
Much that is great and excellent will we
Perform together yet. And if we only
Stand on the height with dignity, 'tis soon
Forgotten, Max., by what road we ascended.
Believe me, many a crown shines spotless now,
That yet was deeply sullied in the winning.
To the evil spirit doth the earth belong,
Not to the good. All that the powers divine
Send from above are universal blessings
Their light rejoices us, their air refreshes,
But never yet was man enriched by them:
In their eternal realm no property
Is to be struggled for--all there is general.
The jewel, the all-valued gold we win
From the deceiving powers, depraved in nature,
That dwell beneath the day and blessed sunlight.
Not without sacrifices are they rendered
Propitious, and there lives no soul on earth
That e'er retired unsullied from their service.

MAX.
Whate'er is human to the human being
Do I allow--and to the vehement
And striving spirit readily I pardon
The excess of action; but to thee, my general!
Above all others make I large concession.
For thou must move a world and be the master--
He kills thee who condemns thee to inaction.
So be it then! maintain thee in thy post
By violence. Resist the emperor,
And if it must be force with force repel;
I will not praise it, yet I can forgive it.
But not--not to the traitor--yes! the word
Is spoken out--
Not to the traitor can I yield a pardon.
That is no mere excess! that is no error
Of human nature--that is wholly different,
Oh, that is black, black as the pit of hell!
   [WALLENSTEIN betrays a sudden agitation.
Thou canst not hear it named, and wilt thou do it?
O turn back to thy duty. That thou canst,
I hold it certain. Send me to Vienna;
I'll make thy peace for thee with the emperor.
He knows thee not. But I do know thee. He
Shall see thee, duke! with my unclouded eye,
And I bring back his confidence to thee.

WALLENSTEIN.
It is too late! Thou knowest not what has happened.

MAX.
Were it too late, and were things gone so far,
That a crime only could prevent thy fall,
Then--fall! fall honorably, even as thou stoodest,
Lose the command. Go from the stage of war!
Thou canst with splendor do it--do it too
With innocence. Thou hast lived much for others,
At length live thou for thy own self. I follow thee.
My destiny I never part from thine.

WALLENSTEIN.
It is too late! Even now, while thou art losing
Thy words, one after another, are the mile-stones
Left fast behind by my post couriers,
Who bear the order on to Prague and Egra.

   [MAX. stands as convulsed, with a gesture and countenance
   expressing the most intense anguish.

Yield thyself to it. We act as we are forced.
I cannot give assent to my own shame
And ruin. Thou--no--thou canst not forsake me!
So let us do, what must be done, with dignity,
With a firm step. What am I doing worse
Than did famed Caesar at the Rubicon,
When he the legions led against his country,
The which his country had delivered to him?
Had he thrown down the sword, he had been lost.
As I were, if I but disarmed myself.
I trace out something in me of this spirit.
Give me his luck, that other thing I'll bear.

   [MAX. quits him abruptly. WALLENSTEIN startled and overpowered,
   continues looking after him, and is still in this posture when
   TERZKY enters.



SCENE III.

   WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY.

TERZKY.
Max. Piccolomini just left you?

WALLENSTEIN.
                 Where is Wrangel?

TERZKY.
He is already gone.

WALLENSTEIN.
           In such a hurry?

TERZKY.
It is as if the earth had swallowed him.
He had scarce left thee, when I went to seek him.
I wished some words with him--but he was gone.
How, when, and where, could no one tell me.
Nay, I half believe it was the devil himself;
A human creature could not so at once
Have vanished.

ILLO (enters).
        Is it true that thou wilt send
Octavio?

TERZKY.
     How, Octavio! Whither send him?

WALLENSTEIN.
He goes to Frauenberg, and will lead hither
The Spanish and Italian regiments.

ILLO.
                  No!
Nay, heaven forbid!

WALLENSTEIN.
           And why should heaven forbid?

ILLO.
Him!--that deceiver! Wouldst thou trust to him
The soldiery? Him wilt thou let slip from thee,
Now in the very instant that decides us----

TERZKY.
Thou wilt not do this! No! I pray thee, no!

WALLENSTEIN.
Ye are whimsical.

ILLO.
          O but for this time, duke,
Yield to our warning! Let him not depart.

WALLENSTEIN.
And why should I not trust him only this time,
Who have always trusted him? What, then, has happened
That I should lose my good opinion of him?
In complaisance to your whims, not my own,
I must, forsooth, give up a rooted judgment.
Think not I am a woman. Having trusted him
E'en till to-day, to-day too will I trust him.

TERZKY.
Must it be he--he only? Send another.

WALLENSTEIN.
It must be he, whom I myself have chosen;
He is well fitted for the business.
Therefore I gave it him.

ILLO.
             Because he's an Italian--
Therefore is he well fitted for the business!

WALLENSTEIN.
I know you love them not, nor sire nor son,
Because that I esteem them, love them, visibly
Esteem them, love them more than you and others,
E'en as they merit. Therefore are they eye-blights,
Thorns in your footpath. But your jealousies,
In what affect they me or my concerns?
Are they the worse to me because you hate them?
Love or hate one another as you will,
I leave to each man his own moods and likings;
Yet know the worth of each of you to me.

ILLO.
Von Questenberg, while he was here, was always
Lurking about with this Octavio.

WALLENSTEIN.
It happened with my knowledge and permission.

ILLO.
I know that secret messengers came to him
From Gallas----

WALLENSTEIN.
        That's not true.

ILLO.
                 O thou art blind,
With thy deep-seeing eyes!

WALLENSTEIN.
              Thou wilt not shake
My faith for me; my faith, which founds itself
On the profoundest science. If 'tis false,
Then the whole science of the stars is false;
For know, I have a pledge from Fate itself,
That he is the most faithful of my friends.

ILLO.
Hast thou a pledge that this pledge is not false?

WALLENSTEIN.
There exist moments in the life of man,
When he is nearer the great Soul of the world
Than is man's custom, and possesses freely
The power of questioning his destiny:
And such a moment 'twas, when in the night
Before the action in the plains of Luetzen,
Leaning against a tree, thoughts crowding thoughts,
I looked out far upon the ominous plain.
My whole life, past and future, in this moment
Before my mind's eye glided in procession,
And to the destiny of the next morning
The spirit, filled with anxious presentiment,
Did knit the most removed futurity.
Then said I also to myself, "So many
Dost thou command. They follow all thy stars,
And as on some great number set their all
Upon thy single head, and only man
The vessel of thy fortune. Yet a day
Will come, when destiny shall once more scatter
All these in many a several direction:
Few be they who will stand out faithful to thee."
I yearned to know which one was faithfulest
Of all, my camp included. Great destiny,
Give me a sign! And he shall be the man,
Who, on the approaching morning, comes the first
To meet me with a token of his love:
And thinking this, I fell into a slumber,
Then midmost in the battle was I led
In spirit. Great the pressure and the tumult!
Then was my horse killed under me: I sank;
And over me away, all unconcernedly,
Drove horse and rider--and thus trod to pieces
I lay, and panted like a dying man;
Then seized me suddenly a savior arm;
It was Octavio's--I woke at once,
'Twas broad day, and Octavio stood before me.
"My brother," said he, "do not ride to-day
The dapple, as you're wont; but mount the horse
Which I have chosen for thee. Do it, brother!
In love to me. A strong dream warned me so."
It was the swiftness of this horse that snatched me
From the hot pursuit of Bannier's dragoons.
My cousin rode the dapple on that day,
And never more saw I or horse or rider.

ILLO.
That was a chance.

WALLENSTEIN (significantly).
          There's no such thing as chance
And what to us seems merest accident
Springs from the deepest source of destiny.
In brief, 'tis signed and sealed that this Octavio
Is my good angel--and now no word more.

              [He is retiring.

TERZKY.
This is my comfort--Max. remains our hostage.

ILLO.
And he shall never stir from here alive.

WALLENSTEIN (stops and turns himself round).
Are ye not like the women, who forever
Only recur to their first word, although
One had been talking reason by the hour!
Know, that the human being's thoughts and deeds
Are not like ocean billows, blindly moved.
The inner world, his microcosmus, is
The deep shaft, out of which they spring eternally.
They grow by certain laws, like the tree's fruit--
No juggling chance can metamorphose them.
Have I the human kernel first examined?
Then I know, too, the future will and action.

                     [Exeunt.



SCENE IV.

   Chamber in the residence of Piccolomini: OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI
   (attired for travelling), an ADJUTANT.

OCTAVIO.
Is the detachment here?

ADJUTANT.
             It waits below.

OCTAVIO.
And are the soldiers trusty, adjutant?
Say, from what regiment hast thou chosen them?

ADJUTANT.
From Tiefenbach's.

OCTAVIO.
That regiment is loyal,
Keep them in silence in the inner court,
Unseen by all, and when the signal peals
Then close the doors, keep watch upon the house.
And all ye meet be instantly arrested.
                  [Exit ADJUTANT.
I hope indeed I shall not need their service,
So certain feel I of my well-laid plans;
But when an empire's safety is at stake
'Twere better too much caution than too little.



SCENE V.

   A chamber in PICCOLOMINI's dwelling-house: OCTAVIO,
   PICCOLOMINI, ISOLANI, entering.

ISOLANI.
Here am I--well! who comes yet of the others?

OCTAVIO (with an air of mystery).
But, first, a word with you, Count Isolani.

ISOLANI (assuming the same air of mystery).
Will it explode, ha? Is the duke about
To make the attempt? In me, friend, you may place
Full confidence--nay, put me to the proof.

OCTAVIO.
That may happen.

ISOLANI.
         Noble brother, I am
Not one of those men who in words are valiant,
And when it comes to action skulk away.
The duke has acted towards me as a friend:
God knows it is so; and I owe him all;
He may rely on my fidelity.

OCTAVIO.
That will be seen hereafter.

ISOLANI.
               Be on your guard,
All think not as I think; and there are many
Who still hold with the court--yes, and they say
That these stolen signatures bind them to nothing.

OCTAVIO.
Indeed! Pray name to me the chiefs that think so;

ISOLANI.
Plague upon them! all the Germans think so
Esterhazy, Kaunitz, Deodati, too,
Insist upon obedience to the court.

OCTAVIO.
I am rejoiced to hear it.

ISOLANI.
              You rejoice?

OCTAVIO.
That the emperor has yet such gallant servants,
And loving friends.

ISOLANI.
           Nay, jeer not, I entreat you.
They are no such worthless fellows, I assure you.

OCTAVIO.
I am assured already. God forbid
That I should jest! In very serious earnest,
I am rejoiced to see an honest cause
So strong.

ISOLANI.
      The devil!--what!--why, what means this?
Are you not, then----For what, then, am I here?

OCTAVIO.
That you may make full declaration, whether
You will be called the friend or enemy
Of the emperor.

ISOLANI (with an air of defiance).
         That declaration, friend,
I'll make to him in whom a right is placed
To put that question to me.

OCTAVIO.
               Whether, count,
That right is mine, this paper may instruct you.

ISOLANI (stammering).
Why,--why--what! this is the emperor's hand and seal
               [Reads.
"Whereas the officers collectively
Throughout our army will obey the orders
Of the Lieutenant-General Piccolomini,
As from ourselves."--Hem!--Yes! so!--Yes! yes!
I--I give you joy, lieutenant-general!

OCTAVIO.
And you submit to the order?

ISOLANI.
               I--
But you have taken me so by surprise
Time for reflection one must have----

OCTAVIO.
                   Two minutes.

ISOLANI.
My God! But then the case is----

OCTAVIO.
                 Plain and simple.
You must declare you, whether you determine
To act a treason 'gainst your lord and sovereign,
Or whether you will serve him faithfully.

ISOLANI.
Treason! My God! But who talks then of treason?

OCTAVIO.
That is the case. The prince-duke is a traitor--
Means to lead over to the enemy
The emperor's army. Now, count! brief and full--
Say, will you break your oath to the emperor?
Sell yourself to the enemy? Say, will you?

ISOLANI.
What mean you? I--I break my oath, d'ye say,
To his imperial majesty?
Did I say so! When, when have I said that?

OCTAVIO.
You have not said it yet--not yet. This instant
I wait to hear, count, whether you will say it.

ISOLANI.
Ay! that delights me now, that you yourself
Bear witness for me that I never said so.

OCTAVIO.
And you renounce the duke then?

ISOLANI.
                 If he's planning
Treason--why, treason breaks all bonds asunder.

OCTAVIO.
And are determined, too, to fight against him?

ISOLANI.
He has done me service--but if he's a villain,
Perdition seize him! All scores are rubbed off.

OCTAVIO.
I am rejoiced that you are so well disposed.
This night break off in the utmost secrecy
With all the light-armed troops--it must appear
As came the order from the duke himself.
At Frauenberg's the place of rendezvous;
There will Count Gallas give you further orders.

ISOLANI.
It shall be done. But you'll remember me
With the emperor--how well disposed you found me.

OCTAVIO.
I will not fail to mention it honorably.

   [Exit ISOLANI. A SERVANT enters.

What, Colonel Butler! Show him up.

ISOLANI (returning).
Forgive me too my bearish ways, old father!
Lord God! how should I know, then, what a great
Person I had before me.

OCTAVIO.
             No excuses!

ISOLANI.
I am a merry lad, and if at time
A rash word might escape me 'gainst the court
Amidst my wine,--you know no harm was meant.

OCTAVIO.
You need not be uneasy on that score.
That has succeeded. Fortune favor us
With all the others only but as much.

                  [Exit.



SCENE VI.

   OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI, BUTLER.

BUTLER.
At your command, lieutenant-general.

OCTAVIO.
Welcome, as honored friend and visitor.

BUTLER.
You do me too much honor.

OCTAVIO (after both have seated themselves)
              You have not
Returned the advances which I made you yesterday--
Misunderstood them as mere empty forms.
That wish proceeded from my heart--I was
In earnest with you--for 'tis now a time
In which the honest should unite most closely.

BUTLER.
'Tis only the like-minded can unite.

OCTAVIO.
True! and I name all honest men like-minded.
I never charge a man but with those acts
To which his character deliberately
Impels him; for alas! the violence
Of blind misunderstandings often thrusts
The very best of us from the right track.
You came through Frauenberg. Did the Count Gallas
Say nothing to you? Tell me. He's my friend.

BUTLER.
His words were lost on me.

OCTAVIO.
              It grieves me sorely
To hear it: for his counsel was most wise.
I had myself the like to offer.

BUTLER.
                 Spare
Yourself the trouble--me the embarrassment.
To have deserved so ill your good opinion.

OCTAVIO.
The time is precious--let us talk openly.
You know how matters stand here. Wallenstein
Meditates treason--I can tell you further,
He has committed treason; but few hours
Have past since he a covenant concluded
With the enemy. The messengers are now
Full on their way to Egra and to Prague.
To-morrow he intends to lead us over
To the enemy. But he deceives himself;
For prudence wakes--the emperor has still
Many and faithful friends here, and they stand
In closest union, mighty though unseen.
This manifesto sentences the duke--
Recalls the obedience of the army from him,
And summons all the loyal, all the honest,
To join and recognize in me their leader.
Choose--will you share with us an honest cause?
Or with the evil share an evil lot?

BUTLER (rises).
His lot is mine.

OCTAVIO.
         Is that your last resolve?

BUTLER.
It is.

OCTAVIO.
    Nay, but bethink you, Colonel Butler.
As yet you have time. Within my faithful breast
That rashly uttered word remains interred.
Recall it, Butler! choose a better party;
You have not chosen the right one.

BUTLER (going).
                  Any other
Commands for me, lieutenant-general?

OCTAVIO.
See your white hairs; recall that word!

BUTLER.
                     Farewell!

OCTAVIO.
What! Would you draw this good and gallant sword
In such a cause? Into a curse would you
Transform the gratitude which you have earned
By forty years' fidelity from Austria?

BUTLER (laughing with bitterness).
Gratitude from the House of Austria!

             [He is going.

OCTAVIO (permits him to go as far as the door, then calls after him).
Butler!

BUTLER.
     What wish you?

OCTAVIO.
             How was't with the count?

BUTLER.
Count? what?

OCTAVIO (coldly).
       The title that you wished, I mean.

BUTLER (starts in sudden passion).
Hell and damnation!

OCTAVIO (coldly).
           You petitioned for it--
And your petition was repelled--was it so?

BUTLER.
Your insolent scoff shall not go by unpunished.
Draw!

OCTAVIO.
Nay! your sword to its sheath! and tell me calmly
How all that happened. I will not refuse you
Your satisfaction afterwards. Calmly, Butler!

BUTLER.
Be the whole world acquainted with the weakness
For which I never can forgive myself,
Lieutenant-general! Yes; I have ambition.
Ne'er was I able to endure contempt.
It stung me to the quick that birth and title
Should have more weight than merit has in the army.
I would fain not be meaner than my equal,
So in an evil hour I let myself
Be tempted to that measure. It was folly!
But yet so hard a penance it deserved not.
It might have been refused; but wherefore barb
And venom the refusal with contempt?
Why dash to earth and crush with heaviest scorn
The gray-haired man, the faithful veteran?
Why to the baseness of his parentage
Refer him with such cruel roughness, only
Because he had a weak hour and forgot himself?
But nature gives a sting e'en to the worm
Which wanton power treads on in sport and insult.

OCTAVIO.
You must have been calumniated. Guess you
The enemy who did you this ill service?

BUTLER.
Be't who it will--a most low-hearted scoundrel!
Some vile court-minion must it be, some Spaniard;
Some young squire of some ancient family,
In whose light I may stand; some envious knave,
Stung to his soul by my fair self-earned honors!

OCTAVIO.
But tell me, did the duke approve that measure?

BUTLER.
Himself impelled me to it, used his interest
In my behalf with all the warmth of friendship.

OCTAVIO.
Ay! are you sure of that?

BUTLER.
              I read the letter.

OCTAVIO.
And so did I--but the contents were different.
   [BUTLER is suddenly struck.
By chance I'm in possession of that letter--
Can leave it to your own eyes to convince you.

   [He gives him the letter.

BUTLER.
Ha! what is this?

OCTAVIO.
          I fear me, Colonel Butler,
An infamous game have they been playing with you.
The duke, you say, impelled you to this measure?
Now, in this letter, talks he in contempt
Concerning you; counsels the minister
To give sound chastisement to your conceit,
For so he calls it.

   [BUTLER reads through the letter; his knees tremble, he seizes a
   chair, and sinks clown in it.

You have no enemy, no persecutor;
There's no one wishes ill to you. Ascribe
The insult you received to the duke only.
His aim is clear and palpable. He wished
To tear you from your emperor: he hoped
To gain from your revenge what he well knew
(What your long tried fidelity convinced him)
He ne'er could dare expect from your calm reason.
A blind tool would he make you, in contempt
Use you, as means of most abandoned ends.
He has gained his point. Too well has he succeeded
In luring you away from that good path
On which you had been journeying forty years!

BUTLER (his voice trembling).
Can e'er the emperor's majesty forgive me?

OCTAVIO.
More than forgive you. He would fain compensate
For that affront, and most unmerited grievance
Sustained by a deserving gallant veteran.
From his free impulse he confirms the present,
Which the duke made you for a wicked purpose.
The regiment, which you now command, is yours.

   [BUTLER attempts to rise, sinks down again. He labors inwardly
   with violent emotions; tries to speak and cannot. At length
   he takes his sword from the belt, and offers it to PICCOLOMINI.

OCTAVIO.
What wish you? Recollect yourself, friend.

BUTLER.
                       Take it.

OCTAVIO.
But to what purpose? Calm yourself.

BUTLER.
                    O take it!
I am no longer worthy of this sword.

OCTAVIO.
Receive it then anew, from my hands--and
Wear it with honor for the right cause ever.

BUTLER.
Perjure myself to such a gracious sovereign?

OCTAVIO.
You'll make amends. Quick! break off from the duke!

BUTLER.
Break off from him.

OCTAVIO.
           What now? Bethink thyself.

BUTLER (no longer governing his emotion).
Only break off from him? He dies! he dies!

OCTAVIO.
Come after me to Frauenberg, where now
All who are loyal are assembling under
Counts Altringer and Gallas. Many others
I've brought to a remembrance of their duty
This night be sure that you escape from Pilsen.

BUTLER (strides up and down in excessive agitation, then steps up to
   OCTAVIO with resolved countenance).
Count Piccolomini! dare that man speak
Of honor to you, who once broke his troth.

OCTAVIO.
He who repents so deeply of it dares.

BUTLER.
Then leave me here upon my word of honor!

OCTAVIO.
What's your design?

BUTLER.
           Leave me and my regiment.

OCTAVIO.
I have full confidence in you. But tell me
What are you brooding?

BUTLER.
            That the deed will tell you.
Ask me no more at present. Trust me.
Ye may trust safely. By the living God,
Ye give him over, not to his good angel!
Farewell.
           [Exit BUTLER.

SERVANT (enters with a billet).
      A stranger left it, and is gone.
The prince-duke's horses wait for you below.

           [Exit SERVANT.

OCTAVIO (reads).
"Be sure, make haste! Your faithful Isolani."
--O that I had but left this town behind me.
To split upon a rock so near the haven!
Away! This is no longer a safe place
For me! Where can my son be tarrying!



SCENE VII.

   OCTAVIO and MAX. PICCOLOMINI.

   MAX. enters almost in a state of derangement, from extreme
   agitation; his eyes roll wildly, his walk is unsteady, and he
   appears not to observe his father, who stands at a distance,
   and gazes at him with a countenance expressive of compassion.
   He paces with long strides through the chamber, then stands still
   again, and at last throws himself into a chair, staring vacantly
   at the object directly before him.

OCTAVIO (advances to him).
I am going off, my son.
   [Receiving no answer, he takes his hands
             My son, farewell.

MAX.
                       Farewell.

OCTAVIO.
Thou wilt soon follow me?

MAX.
              I follow thee?
Thy way is crooked--it is not my way.
   [OCTAVIO drops his hand and starts back.
Oh, hadst thou been but simple and sincere,
Ne'er had it come to this--all had stood otherwise.
He had not done that foul and horrible deed,
The virtuous had retained their influence over him
He had not fallen into the snares of villains.
Wherefore so like a thief, and thief's accomplice
Didst creep behind him lurking for thy prey!
Oh, unblest falsehood! Mother of all evil!
Thou misery-making demon, it is thou
That sinkest us in perdition. Simple truth,
Sustainer of the world, had saved us all!
Father, I will not, I cannot excuse thee!
Wallenstein has deceived me--oh, most foully!
But thou has acted not much better.

OCTAVIO.
                   Son
My son, ah! I forgive thy agony!

MAX. (rises and contemplates his father with looks of suspicion).
Was't possible? hadst thou the heart, my father,
Hadst thou the heart to drive it to such lengths,
With cold premeditated purpose? Thou--
Hadst thou the heart to wish to see him guilty
Rather than saved? Thou risest by his fall.
Octavio, 'twill not please me.

OCTAVIO.
                God in heaven!

MAX.
Oh, woe is me! sure I have changed my nature.
How comes suspicion here--in the free soul?
Hope, confidence, belief, are gone; for all
Lied to me, all that I e'er loved or honored.
No, no! not all! She--she yet lives for me,
And she is true, and open as the heavens
Deceit is everywhere, hypocrisy,
Murder, and poisoning, treason, perjury:
The single holy spot is our love,
The only unprofaned in human nature.

OCTAVIO.
Max.!--we will go together. 'Twill be better.

MAX.
What? ere I've taken a last parting leave,
The very last--no, never!

OCTAVIO.
              Spare thyself
The pang of necessary separation.
Come with me! Come, my son!

   [Attempts to take him with him.

MAX.
No! as sure as God lives, no!

OCTAVIO (more urgently).
Come with me, I command thee! I, thy father.

MAX.
Command me what is human. I stay here.

OCTAVIO.
Max.! in the emperor's name I bid thee come.

MAX.
No emperor has power to prescribe
Laws to the heart; and wouldst thou wish to rob me
Of the sole blessing which my fate has left me,
Her sympathy? Must then a cruel deed
Be done with cruelty? The unalterable
Shall I perform ignobly--steal away,
With stealthy coward flight forsake her? No!
She shall behold my suffering, my sore anguish,
Hear the complaints of the disparted soul,
And weep tears o'er me. Oh! the human race
Have steely souls--but she is as an angel.
From the black deadly madness of despair
Will she redeem my soul, and in soft words
Of comfort, plaining, loose this pang of death!

OCTAVIO.
Thou wilt not tear thyself away; thou canst not.
Oh, come, my son! I bid thee save thy virtue.

MAX.
Squander not thou thy words in vain.
The heart I follow, for I dare trust to it.

OCTAVIO (trembling, and losing all self-command).
Max.! Max.! if that most damned thing could be,
If thou--my son--my own blood--(dare I think it?)
Do sell thyself to him, the infamous,
Do stamp this brand upon our noble house,
Then shall the world behold the horrible deed,
And in unnatural combat shall the steel
Of the son trickle with the father's blood.

MAX.
Oh, hadst thou always better thought of men,
Thou hadst then acted better. Curst suspicion,
Unholy, miserable doubt! To him
Nothing on earth remains unwrenched and firm
Who has no faith.

OCTAVIO.
          And if I trust thy heart,
Will it be always in thy power to follow it?

MAX.
The heart's voice thou hast not o'erpowered--as little
Will Wallenstein be able to o'erpower it.

OCTAVIO.
O, Max.! I see thee never more again!

MAX.
Unworthy of thee wilt thou never see me.

OCTAVIO.
I go to Frauenberg--the Pappenheimers
I leave thee here, the Lothrings too; Tsokana
And Tiefenbach remain here to protect thee.
They love thee, and are faithful to their oath,
And will far rather fall in gallant contest
Than leave their rightful leader and their honor.

MAX.
Rely on this, I either leave my life
In the struggle, or conduct them out of Pilsen.

OCTAVIO.
Farewell, my son!

MAX.
          Farewell!

OCTAVIO.
               How! not one look
Of filial love? No grasp of the hand at parting?
It is a bloody war to which we are going,
And the event uncertain and in darkness.
So used we not to part--it was not so!
Is it then true? I have a son no longer?

   [MAX. falls into his arms, they hold each other for a long time
   in a speechless embrace, then go away at different sides.

              (The curtain drops.)




ACT III.

SCENE I.

   A chamber in the house of the Duchess of Friedland.

   COUNTESS TERZKY, THEKLA, LADY NEUBRUNN (the two latter sit
   at the same table at work).

COUNTESS (watching them from the opposite side).
So you have nothing to ask me--nothing?
I have been waiting for a word from you.
And could you then endure in all this time
Not once to speak his name?

   [THEKLA remaining silent, the COUNTESS rises and advances to her.

               Why, how comes this?
Perhaps I am already grown superfluous,
And other ways exist, besides through me
Confess it to me, Thekla: have you seen him?

THEKLA.
To-day and yesterday I have not seen him.

COUNTESS.
And not heard from him, either? Come, be open.

THEKLA.
No Syllable.

COUNTESS.
       And still you are so calm?

THEKLA.
I am.

COUNTESS.
    May it please you, leave us, Lady Neubrunn.

               [Exit LADY NEUBRUNN.



SCENE II.

   The COUNTESS, THEKLA.

COUNTESS.
It does not please me, princess, that he holds
Himself so still, exactly at this time.

THEKLA.
Exactly at this time?

COUNTESS.
            He now knows all
'Twere now the moment to declare himself.

THEKLA.
If I'm to understand you, speak less darkly.

COUNTESS.
'Twas for that purpose that I bade her leave us.
Thekla, you are no more a child. Your heart
Is no more in nonage: for you love,
And boldness dwells with love--that you have proved
Your nature moulds itself upon your father's
More than your mother's spirit. Therefore may you
Hear what were too much for her fortitude.

THEKLA.
Enough: no further preface, I entreat you.
At once, out with it! Be it what it may,
It is not possible that it should torture me
More than this introduction. What have you
To say to me? Tell me the whole, and briefly!

COUNTESS.
You'll not be frightened----

THEKLA.
              Name it, I entreat you.

COUNTESS.
Lies within my power to do your father
A weighty service----

THEKLA.
           Lies within my power.

COUNTESS.
Max. Piccolomini loves you. You can link him
Indissolubly to your father.

THEKLA.
                I?
What need of me for that? And is he not
Already linked to him?

COUNTESS.
            He was.

THEKLA.
                 And wherefore
Should he not be so now--not be so always?

COUNTESS.
He cleaves to the emperor too.

THEKLA.
                Not more than duty
And honor may demand of him.

COUNTESS.
                We ask
Proofs of his love, and not proofs of his honor.
Duty and honor!
Those are ambiguous words with many meanings.
You should interpret them for him: his love
Should be the sole definer of his honor.

THEKLA.
How?

COUNTESS.
The emperor or you must he renounce.

THEKLA.
He will accompany my father gladly
In his retirement. From himself you heard,
How much he wished to lay aside the sword.

COUNTESS.
He must not lay the sword aside, we mean;
He must unsheath it in your father's cause.

THEKLA.
He'll spend with gladness and alacrity
His life, his heart's blood in my father's cause,
If shame or injury be intended him.

COUNTESS.
You will not understand me. Well, hear then:
Your father has fallen off from the emperor,
And is about to join the enemy
With the whole soldiery----

THEKLA.
              Alas, my mother!

COUNTESS.
There needs a great example to draw on
The army after him. The Piccolomini
Possess the love and reverence of the troops;
They govern all opinions, and wherever
They lead the way, none hesitate to follow.
The son secures the father to our interests--
You've much in your hands at this moment.

THEKLA.
                      Ah,
My miserable mother! what a death-stroke
Awaits thee! No! she never will survive it.

COUNTESS.
She will accommodate her soul to that
Which is and must be. I do know your mother:
The far-off future weighs upon her heart
With torture of anxiety; but is it
Unalterably, actually present,
She soon resigns herself, and bears it calmly.

THEKLA.
O my foreboding bosom! Even now,
E'en now 'tis here, that icy hand of horror!
And my young hope lies shuddering in its grasp;
I knew it well--no sooner had I entered,
An heavy ominous presentiment
Revealed to me that spirits of death were hovering
Over my happy fortune. But why, think I
First of myself? My mother! O my mother!

COUNTESS.

Calm yourself! Break not out in vain lamenting!
Preserve you for your father the firm friend,
And for yourself the lover, all will yet
Prove good and fortunate.

THEKLA.
              Prove good! What good?
Must we not part; part ne'er to meet again?

COUNTESS.
He parts not from you! He cannot part from you.

THEKLA.
Alas, for his sore anguish! It will rend
His heart asunder.

COUNTESS.
          If indeed he loves you.
His resolution will be speedily taken.

THEKLA.
His resolution will be speedily taken--
Oh, do not doubt of that! A resolution!
Does there remain one to be taken?

COUNTESS.
                   Hush!
Collect yourself! I hear your mother coming.

THERLA.
How shall I bear to see her?

COUNTESS.
               Collect yourself.



SCENE III.

   To them enter the DUCHESS.

DUCHESS (to the COUNTESS).
Who was here, sister? I heard some one talking,
And passionately, too.

COUNTESS.
            Nay! there was no one.

DUCHESS.
I am growing so timorous, every trifling noise
Scatters my spirits, and announces to me
The footstep of some messenger of evil.
And you can tell me, sister, what the event is?
Will he agree to do the emperor's pleasure,
And send the horse regiments to the cardinal?
Tell me, has he dismissed von Questenberg
With a favorable answer?

COUNTESS.
             No, he has not.

DUCHESS.
Alas! then all is lost! I see it coming,
The worst that can come! Yes, they will depose him;
The accursed business of the Regensburg diet
Will all be acted o'er again!

COUNTESS.
                No! never!
Make your heart easy, sister, as to that.

   [THEKLA, in extreme agitation, throws herself upon her mother,
   and enfolds her in her arms, weeping.

DUCHESS.
             Yes, my poor child!
Thou too hast lost a most affectionate godmother
In the empress. Oh, that stern, unbending man!
In this unhappy marriage what have I
Not suffered, not endured? For even as if
I had been linked on to some wheel of fire
That restless, ceaseless, whirls impetuous onward,
I have passed a life of frights and horrors with him,
And ever to the brink of some abyss
With dizzy headlong violence he bears me.
Nay, do not weep, my child. Let not my sufferings
Presignify unhappiness to thee,
Nor blacken with their shade the fate that waits thee.
There lives no second Friedland; thou, my child,
Hast not to fear thy mother's destiny.

THEELA.
Oh, let us supplicate him, dearest mother!
Quick! quick! here's no abiding-place for us.
Here every coming hour broods into life
Some new affrightful monster.

DUCHESS.
                Thou wilt share
An easier, calmer lot, my child! We, too,
I and thy father, witnessed happy days.
Still think I with delight of those first years,
When he was making progress with glad effort,
When his ambition was a genial fire,
Not that consuming flame which now it is.
The emperor loved him, trusted him; and all
He undertook could not but be successful.
But since that ill-starred day at Regensburg,
Which plunged him headlong from his dignity,
A gloomy, uncompanionable spirit,
Unsteady and suspicious, has possessed him.
His quiet mind forsook him, and no longer
Did he yield up himself in joy and faith
To his old luck and individual power;
But thenceforth turned his heart and best affections
All to those cloudy sciences which never
Have yet made happy him who followed them.

COUNTESS.
You see it, sister! as your eyes permit you,
But surely this is not the conversation
To pass the time in which we are waiting for him.
You know he will be soon here. Would you have him
Find her in this condition?

DUCHESS.
               Come, my child!
Come, wipe away thy tears, and show thy father
A cheerful countenance. See, the tie-knot here
Is off; this hair must not hang so dishevelled.
Come, dearest! dry thy tears up. They deform
Thy gentle eye. Well, now--what was I saying?
Yes, in good truth, this Piccolomini
Is a most noble and deserving gentleman.

COUNTESS.
That is he, sister!

THEKLA (to the COUNTESS, with narks of great oppression of spirits).
           Aunt, you will excuse me?

              (Is going).

COUNTESS.
But, whither? See, your father comes!

THEKLA.
I cannot see him now.

COUNTESS.
            Nay, but bethink you.

THEKLA.
Believe me, I cannot sustain his presence.

COUNTESS.
But he will miss you, will ask after you.

DUCHESS.
What, now? Why is she going?

COUNTESS.
                She's not well.

DUCHESS (anxiously).
What ails, then, my beloved child?

   [Both follow the PRINCESS, and endeavor to detain her. During
   this WALLENSTEIN appears, engaged in conversation with ILLO.



SCENE IV.

   WALLENSTEIN, ILLO, COUNTESS, DUCHESS, THEKLA.

WALLENSTEIN.
All quiet in the camp?

ILLO.
            It is all quiet.

WALLENSTEIN.
In a few hours may couriers come from Prague
With tidings that this capital is ours.
Then we may drop the mask, and to the troops
Assembled in this town make known the measure
And its result together. In such cases
Example does the whole. Whoever is foremost
Still leads the herd. An imitative creature
Is man. The troops at Prague conceive no other,
Than that the Pilsen army has gone through
The forms of homage to us; and in Pilsen
They shall swear fealty to us, because
The example has been given them by Prague.
Butler, you tell me, has declared himself?

ILLO.
At his own bidding, unsolicited,
He came to offer you himself and regiment.

WALLENSTEIN,
I find we must not give implicit credence
To every warning voice that makes itself
Be listened to in the heart. To hold us back,
Oft does the lying spirit counterfeit
The voice of truth and inward revelation,
Scattering false oracles. And thus have I
To entreat forgiveness for that secretly.
I've wronged this honorable gallant man,
This Butler: for a feeling of the which
I am not master (fear I would not call it),
Creeps o'er me instantly, with sense of shuddering,
At his approach, and stops love's joyous motion.
And this same man, against whom I am warned,
This honest man is he who reaches to me
The first pledge of my fortune.

ILLO.
                 And doubt not
That his example will win over to you
The best men in the army.

WALLENSTEIN.
              Go and send
Isolani hither. Send him immediately.
He is under recent obligations to me:
With him will I commence the trial. Go.

              [Exit ILLO.

WALLENSTEIN (turns himself round to the females).
Lo, there's the mother with the darling daughter.
For once we'll have an interval of rest--
Come! my heart yearns to live a cloudless hour
In the beloved circle of my family.

COUNTESS.
'Tis long since we've been thus together, brother.

WALLENSTEIN (to the COUNTESS, aside).
Can she sustain the news? Is she prepared?

COUNTESS.
Not yet.

WALLENSTEIN.
     Come here, my sweet girl! Seat thee by me,
For there is a good spirit on thy lips.
Thy mother praised to me thy ready skill;
She says a voice of melody dwells in thee,
Which doth enchant the soul. Now such a voice
Will drive away from me the evil demon
That beats his black wings close above my head.

DUCHESS.
Where is thy lute, my daughter? Let thy father
Hear some small trial of thy skill.

THEKLA.
                   My mother
I----

DUCHESS.
Trembling? Come, collect thyself. Go, cheer
Thy father.

THEKLA.
       O my mother! I--I cannot.

COUNTESS.
How, what is that, niece?

THEKLA (to the COUNTESS).
O spare me--sing--now--in this sore anxiety,
Of the overburdened soul--to sing to him
Who is thrusting, even now, my mother headlong
Into her grave.

DUCHESS.
         How, Thekla! Humorsome!
What! shall thy father have expressed a wish
In vain?

COUNTESS.
     Here is the lute.

THEKLA.
               My God! how can I----

   [The orchestra plays. During the ritornello THEKLA expresses in her
   gestures and countenance the struggle of her feelings; and at the
   moment that she should begin to sing, contracts herself together, as
   one shuddering, throws the instrument down, and retires abruptly.

DUCHESS.
My child! Oh, she is ill----

WALLENSTEIN.
               What ails the maiden?
Say, is she often so?

COUNTESS.
            Since then herself
Has now betrayed it, I too must no longer
Conceal it.

WALLENSTEIN.
       What?

COUNTESS.
          She loves him!

WALLENSTEIN.
                  Loves him? Whom?

COUNTESS.
Max. does she love! Max. Piccolomini!
Hast thou never noticed it? Nor yet my sister?

DUCHESS.
Was it this that lay so heavy on her heart?
God's blessing on thee,--my sweet child! Thou needest
Never take shame upon thee for thy choice.

COUNTESS.
This journey, if 'twere not thy aim, ascribe it
To thine own self. Thou shouldst have chosen another
To have attended her.

WALLENSTEIN.
            And does he know it?

COUNTESS.
Yes, and he hopes to win her.

WALLENSTEIN.
                Hopes to win her!
Is the boy mad?

COUNTESS.
         Well--hear it from themselves.

WALLENSTEIN.
He thinks to carry off Duke Friedland's daughter!
Ay? The thought pleases me.
The young man has no groveling spirit.

COUNTESS.
                     Since
Such and such constant favor you have shown him----

WALLENSTEIN.
He chooses finally to be my heir.
And true it is, I love the youth; yea, honor him.
But must he therefore be my daughter's husband?
Is it daughters only? Is it only children
That we must show our favor by?

DUCHESS.
His noble disposition and his manners----

WALLENSTEIN.
Win him my heart, but not my daughter.

DUCHESS.
                    Then
His rank, his ancestors----

WALLENSTEIN.
              Ancestors! What?
He is a subject, and my son-in-law
I will seek out upon the thrones of Europe.

DUCHESS
O dearest Albrecht! Climb we not too high
Lest we should fall too low.

WALLENSTEIN.
               What! have I paid
A price so heavy to ascend this eminence,
And jut out high above the common herd,
Only to close the mighty part I play
In life's great drama with a common kinsman?
Have I for this----
        [Stops suddenly, repressing himself.
          She is the only thing
That will remain behind of me on earth;
And I will see a crown around her head,
Or die in the attempt to place it there.
I hazard all--all! and for this alone,
To lift her into greatness.
Yea, in this moment, in the which we are speaking
   [He recollects himself.
And I must now, like a soft-hearted father,
Couple together in good peasant fashion
The pair that chance to suit each other's liking--
And I must do it now, even now, when I
Am stretching out the wreath that is to twine
My full accomplished work--no! she is the jewel,
Which I have treasured long, my last, my noblest,
And 'tis my purpose not to let her from me
For less than a king's sceptre.

DUCHESS.
                 O my husband!
You're ever building, building to the clouds,
Still building higher, and still higher building,
And ne'er reflect, that the poor narrow basis
Cannot sustain the giddy tottering column.

WALLENSTEIN (to the COUNTESS).
Have you announced the place of residence
Which I have destined for her?

COUNTESS.
                No! not yet,
'Twere better you yourself disclosed it to her.

DUCHESS.
How? Do we not return to Carinthia then?

WALLENSTEIN.
                      No.

DUCHESS.
And to no other of your lands or seats?

WALLENSTEIN.
You would not be secure there.

DUCHESS.
                Not secure.
In the emperor's realms, beneath the emperor's
Protection?

WALLENSTEIN.
       Friedland's wife may be permitted
No longer to hope that.

DUCHESS.
             O God in heaven!
And have you brought it even to this!

WALLENSTEIN.
                    In Holland
You'll find protection.

DUCHESS
             In a Lutheran country?
What? And you send us into Lutheran countries?

WALLENSTEIN.
Duke Franz of Lauenburg conducts you thither.

DUCHESS.
Duke Franz of Lauenburg?
The ally of Sweden, the emperor's enemy.

WALLENSTEIN.
The emperor's enemies are mine no longer.

DUCHESS (casting a look of terror on the DUKE and the COUNTESS).
Is it then true? It is. You are degraded
Deposed from the command? O God in heaven!

COUNTESS (aside to the DUKE).
Leave her in this belief. Thou seest she cannot
Support the real truth.



SCENE V.

   To them enter COUNT TERZKY.

COUNTESS.
                Terzky!
What ails him? What an image of affright!
He looks as he had seen a ghost.

TERZKY (leading WALLENSTEIN aside).
Is it thy command that all the Croats----

WALLENSTEIN.
                     Mine!

TERZKY.
We are betrayed.

WALLENSTEIN.
         What?

TERZKY.
             They are off! This night
The Jaegers likewise--all the villages
In the whole round are empty.

WALLENSTEIN.
                Isolani!

TERZKY.
Him thou hast sent away. Yes, surely.

WALLENSTEIN.
                     I?

TERZKY.
No? Hast thou not sent him off? Nor Deodati?
They are vanished, both of them.



SCENE VI.

   To them enter ILLO.

ILLO.
Has Terzky told thee?

TERZKY.
            He knows all.

ILLO.
                   And likewise
That Esterhatzy, Goetz, Maradas, Kaunitz,
Kolatto, Palfi, have forsaken thee.

TERZKY.
Damnation!

WALLENSTEIN (winks at them).
Hush!

COUNTESS (who has been watching them anxiously from the distance and
   now advances to them).
Terzky! Heaven! What is it? What has happened?

WALLENSTEIN (scarcely suppressing his emotions).
Nothing! let us be gone!

TERZKY (following him).
             Theresa, it is nothing.

COUNTESS (holding him back).
Nothing? Do I not see that all the life-blood
Has left your cheeks--look you not like a ghost?
That even my brother but affects a calmness?

PAGE (enters).
An aide-de-camp inquires for the Count Terzky.

   [TERZKY follows the PAGE.

WALLENSTEIN.
Go, hear his business.
           [To ILLO.
            This could not have happened
So unsuspected without mutiny.
Who was on guard at the gates?

ILLO.
                'Twas Tiefenbach.

WALLENSTEIN.
Let Tiefenbach leave guard without delay,
And Terzky's grenadiers relieve him.
             [ILLO is going.
                   Stop!
Hast thou heard aught of Butler?

ILLO.
                 Him I met
He will be here himself immediately.
Butler remains unshaken,

   [ILLO exit. WALLENSTEIN is following him.

COUNTESS.
Let him not leave thee, sister! go, detain him!
There's some misfortune.

DUCHESS (clinging to him).
             Gracious Heaven! What is it?

WALLENSTEIN.
Be tranquil! leave me, sister! dearest wife!
We are in camp, and this is naught unusual;
Here storm and sunshine follow one another
With rapid interchanges. These fierce spirits
Champ the curb angrily, and never yet
Did quiet bless the temples of the leader;
If I am to stay go you. The plaints of women
Ill suit the scene where men must act.

   [He is going: TERZKY returns.

TERZKY.
Remain here. From this window must we see it.

WALLENSTEIN (to the COUNTESS).
Sister, retire!

COUNTESS.
         No--never!

WALLENSTEIN.
               'Tis my will.

TERZKY (leads the COUNTESS aside, and drawing her attention
   to the DUCHESS).
Theresa!

DUCHESS.
     Sister, come! since he commands it.



SCENE VII.

   WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY.

WALLENSTEIN (stepping to the window).
What now, then?

TERZKY.
There are strange movements among all the troops,
And no one knows the cause. Mysteriously,
With gloomy silentness, the several corps
Marshal themselves, each under its own banners;
Tiefenbach's corps make threatening movements; only
The Pappenheimers still remain aloof
In their own quarters and let no one enter.

WALLENSTEIN.
Does Piccolomini appear among them?

TERZKY.
We are seeking him: he is nowhere to be met with.

WALLENSTEIN.
What did the aide-de-camp deliver to you?

TERZKY.
My regiments had despatched him; yet once more
They swear fidelity to thee, and wait
The shout for onset, all prepared, and eager.

WALLENSTEIN.
But whence arose this larum in the camp?
It should have been kept secret from the army
Till fortune had decided for us at Prague.

TERZKY.
Oh, that thou hadst believed me! Yester-evening
Did we conjure thee not to let that skulker,
That fox, Octavio, pass the gates of Pilsen.
Thou gavest him thy own horses to flee from thee.

WALLENSTEIN.
The old tune still! Now, once for all, no more
Of this suspicion--it is doting folly.

TERZKY.
Thou didst confide in Isolani too;
And lo! he was the first that did desert thee.

WALLENSTEIN.
It was but yesterday I rescued him
From abject wretchedness. Let that go by;
I never reckoned yet on gratitude.
And wherein doth he wrong in going from me?
He follows still the god whom all his life
He has worshipped at the gaming-table. With
My fortune and my seeming destiny
He made the bond and broke it, not with me.
I am but the ship in which his hopes were stowed,
And with the which, well-pleased and confident,
He traversed the open sea; now he beholds it
In eminent jeopardy among the coast-rocks,
And hurries to preserve his wares. As light
As the free bird from the hospitable twig
Where it had nested he flies off from me:
No human tie is snapped betwixt us two.
Yea, he deserves to find himself deceived
Who seeks a heart in the unthinking man.
Like shadows on a stream, the forms of life
Impress their characters on the smooth forehead,
Naught sinks into the bosom's silent depth:
Quick sensibility of pain and pleasure
Moves the light fluids lightly; but no soul
Warmeth the inner frame.

TERZKY.
             Yet, would I rather
Trust the smooth brow than that deep furrowed one.



SCENE VIII.

   WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY, ILLO.

ILLO (who enters agitated with rage).
Treason and mutiny!

TERZKY.
           And what further now?

ILLO.
Tiefenbach's soldiers, when I gave the orders.
To go off guard--mutinous villains!

TERZKY.
Well!

WALLENSTEIN.
    What followed?

ILLO.
They refused obedience to them.

TERZKY.
Fire on them instantly! Give out the order.

WALLENSTEIN.
Gently! what cause did they assign?

ILLO.
                   No other,
They said, had right to issue orders but
Lieutenant-General Piccolomini.

WALLENSTEIN (in a convulsion of agony).
What? How is that?

ILLO.
He takes that office on him by commission,
Under sign-manual from the emperor.

TERZKY.
From the emperor--hearest thou, duke?

ILLO.
                    At his incitement
The generals made that stealthy flight----

TERZKY.
                     Duke, hearest thou?

ILLO.
Caraffa too, and Montecuculi,
Are missing, with six other generals,
All whom he had induced to follow him.
This plot he has long had in writing by him
From the emperor; but 'twas finally concluded,
With all the detail of the operation,
Some days ago with the Envoy Questenberg.

   [WALLENSTEIN sinks down into a chair and covers his face.

TERZKY.
Oh, hadst thou but believed me!


SCENE IX.

   To them enter the COUNTESS.

COUNTESS.
              This suspense,
This horrid fear--I can no longer bear it.
For heaven's sake tell me what has taken place?

ILLO.
The regiments are falling off from us.

TERZKY.
Octavio Piccolomini is a traitor.

COUNTESS.
O my foreboding!

   [Rushes out of the room.

TERZKY.
         Hadst thou but believed me!
Now seest thou how the stars have lied to thee.

WALLENSTEIN.
The stars lie not; but we have here a work
Wrought counter to the stars and destiny.
The science is still honest: this false heart
Forces a lie on the truth-telling heaven,
On a divine law divination rests;
Where nature deviates from that law, and stumbles
Out of her limits, there all science errs.
True I did not suspect! Were it superstition
Never by such suspicion to have affronted
The human form, oh, may the time ne'er come
In which I shame me of the infirmity.
The wildest savage drinks not with the victim,
Into whose breast he means to plunge the sword.
This, this, Octavio, was no hero's deed
'Twas not thy prudence that did conquer mine;
A bad heart triumphed o'er an honest one.
No shield received the assassin stroke; thou plungest
Thy weapon on an unprotected breast--
Against such weapons I am but a child.



SCENE X.

   To these enter BUTLER.

TERZKY (meeting him).
Oh, look there, Butler! Here we've still a friend!

WALLENSTEIN (meets him with outspread arms and embraces him with warmth).
Come to my heart, old comrade! Not the sun
Looks out upon us more revivingly,
In the earliest month of spring,
Than a friend's countenance in such an hour.

BUTLER.
My general; I come----

WALLENSTEIN (leaning on BUTLER'S shoulder).
           Knowest thou already
That old man has betrayed me to the emperor.
What sayest thou? Thirty years have we together
Lived out, and held out, sharing joy and hardship.
We have slept in one camp-bed, drank from one glass,
One morsel shared! I leaned myself on him,
As now I lean me on thy faithful shoulder,
And now in the very moment when, all love,
All confidence, my bosom beat to his
He sees and takes the advantage, stabs the knife
Slowly into my heart.

   [He hides his face on BUTLER's breast.

BUTLER.
            Forget the false one.
What is your present purpose?

WALLENSTEIN.
                Well remembered!
Courage, my soul! I am still rich in friends,
Still loved by destiny; for in the moment
That it unmasks the plotting hypocrite
It sends and proves to me one faithful heart.
Of the hypocrite no more! Think not his loss
Was that which struck the pang: Oh, no! his treason
Is that which strikes the pang! No more of him!
Dear to my heart, and honored were they both,
And the young man--yes--he did truly love me,
He--he--has not deceived me. But enough,
Enough of this--swift counsel now beseems us.
The courier, whom Count Kinsky sent from Prague,
I expect him every moment: and whatever
He may bring with him we must take good care
To keep it from the mutineers. Quick then!
Despatch some messenger you can rely on
To meet him, and conduct him to me.

          [ILLO is going.

BUTLER (detaining him).
My general, whom expect you then?

WALLENSTEIN.
                  The courier
Who brings me word of the event at Prague.

BUTLER (hesitating).
Hem!

WALLENSTEIN.
   And what now?

BUTLER.
           You do not know it?

WALLENSTEIN.
Well?

BUTLER.
From what that larum in the camp arose?

WALLENSTEIN.
From what?

BUTLER.
      That courier----

WALLENSTEIN (with eager expectation).
               Well?

BUTLER.
                   Is already here.

TERZKY and ILLO (at the same time).
Already here?

WALLENSTEIEN.
        My courier?

BUTLER.
               For some hours.

WALLENSTEIN.
And I not know it?

BUTLER.
          The sentinels detain him
In custody.

ILLO (stamping with his foot).
       Damnation!

BUTLER.
             And his letter
Was broken open, and is circulated
Through the whole camp.

WALLENSTEIN.
             You know what it contains?

BUTLER.
Question me not.

TERZKY.
         Illo! Alas for us.

WALLENSTEIN.
Hide nothing from me--I can bear the worst.
Prague then is lost. It is. Confess it freely.

BUTLER.
Yes! Prague is lost. And all the several regiments
At Budweiss, Tabor, Braunau, Koenigingratz,
At Brunn, and Znaym, have forsaken you,
And taken the oaths of fealty anew
To the emperor. Yourself, with Kinsky, Terzky,
And Illo have been sentenced.

   [TERZKY and ILLO express alarm and fury. WALLENSTEIN remains
   firm and collected.

WALLENSTEIN.
'Tis decided! 'Tis well! I have received a sudden cure
From all the pangs of doubt: with steady stream
Once more my life-blood flows! My soul's secure!
In the night only Friedland stars can beam.
Lingering irresolute, with fitful fears
I drew the sword--'twas with an inward strife,
While yet the choice was mine. The murderous knife
Is lifted for my heart! Doubt disappears!
I fight now for my head and for my life.

   [Exit WALLENSTEIN; the others follow him.



SCENE XI.

COUNTESS TERZKY (enters from a side room).
I can endure no longer. No!
              [Looks around her.
               Where are they!
No one is here. They leave me all alone,
Alone in this sore anguish of suspense.
And I must wear the outward show of calmness
Before my sister, and shut in within me
The pangs and agonies of my crowded bosom.
It is not to be borne. If all should fail;
If--if he must go over to the Swedes,
An empty-handed fugitive, and not
As an ally, a covenanted equal,
A proud commander with his army following,
If we must wander on from land to land,
Like the Count Palatine, of fallen greatness
An ignominious monument. But no!
That day I will not see! And could himself
Endure to sink so low, I would not bear
To see him so low sunken.



SCENE XII.

   COUNTESS, DUCHESS, THEKLA.

THEKLA (endeavoring to hold back the DUCHESS)
Dear mother, do stay here!

DUCHESS.
              No! Here is yet
Some frightful mystery that is hidden from me.
Why does my sister shun me? Don't I see her
Full of suspense and anguish roam about
From room to room? Art thou not full of terror?
And what import these silent nods and gestures
Which stealthwise thou exchangest with her?

THEKLA.
                       Nothing
Nothing, dear mother!

DUCHESS (to the COUNTESS).
            Sister, I will know.

COUNTESS.
What boots it now to hide it from her? Sooner
Or later she must learn to hear and bear it.
'Tis not the time now to indulge infirmity;
Courage beseems us now, a heart collect,
And exercise and previous discipline
Of fortitude. One word, and over with it!
Sister, you are deluded. You believe
The duke has been deposed--the duke is not
Deposed--he is----

THEKLA (going to the COUNTESS),
         What? do you wish to kill her?

COUNTESS.
The duke is----

THEKLA (throwing her arms round her mother).
        Oh, stand firm! stand firm, my mother!

COUNTESS.
Revolted is the duke; he is preparing
To join the enemy; the army leave him,
And all has failed.



SCENE XIII.

   A spacious room in the Duke of Friedland's palace.

WALLENSTEIN (in armor).
Thou hast gained thy point, Octavio! Once more am I
Almost as friendless as at Regensburg.
There I had nothing left me but myself;
But what one man can do you have now experience.
The twigs have you hewed off, and here I stand
A leafless trunk. But in the sap within
Lives the creating power, and a new world
May sprout forth from it. Once already have I
Proved myself worth an army to you--I alone!
Before the Swedish strength your troops had melted;
Beside the Lech sank Tilly, your last hope;
Into Bavaria, like a winter torrent,
Did that Gustavus pour, and at Vienna
In his own palace did the emperor tremble.
Soldiers were scarce, for still the multitude
Follow the luck: all eyes were turned on me,
Their helper in distress; the emperor's pride
Bowed itself down before the man he had injured.
'Twas I must rise, and with creative word
Assemble forces in the desolate camps.
I did it. Like a god of war my name
Went through the world. The drum was beat; and, to
The plough, the workshop is forsaken, all
Swarm to the old familiar long loved banners;
And as the wood-choir rich in melody
Assemble quick around the bird of wonder,
When first his throat swells with his magic song,
So did the warlike youth of Germany
Crowd in around the image of my eagle.
I feel myself the being that I was.
It is the soul that builds itself a body,
And Friedland's camp will not remain unfilled.
Lead then your thousands out to meet me--true!
They are accustomed under me to conquer,
But not against me. If the head and limbs
Separate from each other, 'twill be soon
Made manifest in which the soul abode.

   (ILLO and TERZKY enter.)

Courage, friends! courage! we are still unvanquished;
I feel my footing firm; five regiments, Terzky,
Are still our own, and Butler's gallant troops;
And an host of sixteen thousand Swedes to-morrow.
I was not stronger when, nine years ago,
I marched forth, with glad heart and high of hope,
To conquer Germany for the emperor.



SCENE XIV.

   WALLENSTEIN, ILLO, TERZKY.

   (To them enter NEUMANN, who leads TERZKY aside,
   and talks with him.)

TERZKY.
What do they want?

WALLENSTEIN.
          What now?

TERZKY.
                Ten cuirassiers
From Pappenheim request leave to address you
In the name of the regiment.

WALLENSTEIN (hastily to NEUMANN).
               Let them enter.
                    [Exit NEUMANN.
                        This
May end in something. Mark you. They are still
Doubtful, and may be won.



SCENE XV.

   WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY, ILLO, ten CUIRASSIERS (led by an ANSPESSADE
   [4], march up and arrange themselves, after the word of command,
   in one front before the DUKE, and make their obeisance. He takes
   his hat off, and immediately covers himself again).

ANSPESSADE.
Halt! Front! Present!

WALLENSTEIN (after he has run through them with his eye, to the
   NSPESSADE).
I know thee well. Thou art out of Brueggen in Flanders:
Thy name is Mercy.

ANSPESSADE.
          Henry Mercy.

WALLENSTEIN. Thou were cut off on the march, surrounded by the Hessians,
and didst fight thy way with an hundred and eighty men through their
thousand.

ANSPESSADE. 'Twas even so, general!

WALLENSTEIN. What reward hadst thou for this gallant exploit?

ANSPESSADE. That which I asked for: the honor to serve in this corps.

WALLENSTEIN (turning to a second). Thou wert among the volunteers that
seized and made booty of the Swedish battery at Altenburg.

SECOND CUIRASSIER. Yes, general!

WALLENSTEIN. I forget no one with whom I have exchanged words.
(A pause.) Who sends you?

ANSPESSADE. Your noble regiment, the cuirassiers of Piccolomini.

WALLENSTEIN. Why does not your colonel deliver in your request according
to the custom of service?

ANSPESSADE. Because we would first know whom we serve.

WALLENSTEIN. Begin your address.

ANSPESSADE (giving the word of command). Shoulder your arms!

WALLENSTEIN (turning to a third). Thy name is Risbeck; Cologne is thy
birthplace.

THIRD CUIRASSIER. Risbeck of Cologne.

WALLENSTEIN. It was thou that broughtest in the Swedish colonel Duebald,
prisoner, in the camp at Nuremberg.

THIRD CUIRASSIER. It was not I, general.

WALLENSTRIN. Perfectly right! It was thy elder brother: thou hadst a
younger brother, too: where did he stay?

THIRD CUIRASSIER. He is stationed at Olmutz, with the imperial army.

WALLENSTEIN (to the ANSPESSADE). Now then--begin.

ANSPESSADE.
There came to hand a letter from the emperor
Commanding us----

WALLENSTEIN (interrupting him).
         Who chose you?

ANSPESSADE.
                 Every company
Drew its own man by lot.

WALLENSTEIN.
             Now! to the business.

ANSPESSADE.
There came to hand a letter from the emperor
Commanding us, collectively, from thee
All duties of obedience to withdraw,
Because thou wert an enemy and traitor.

WALLENSTEIN.
And what did you determine?

ANSPESSADE.
               All our comrades
At Braunau, Budweiss, Prague, and Olmutz, have
Obeyed already; and the regiments here,
Tiefenbach and Toscano, instantly
Did follow their example. But--but we
Do not believe that thou art an enemy
And traitor to thy country, hold it merely
For lie and trick, and a trumped-up Spanish story!
   [With warmth.
Thyself shall tell us what thy purpose is,
For we have found thee still sincere and true
No mouth shall interpose itself betwixt
The gallant general and the gallant troops.

WALLENSTEIN.
Therein I recognize my Pappenheimers.

ANSPESSADE.
And this proposal makes thy regiment to thee:
Is it thy purpose merely to preserve
In thine own hands this military sceptre,
Which so becomes thee, which the emperor
Made over to thee by a covenant!
Is it thy purpose merely to remain
Supreme commander of the Austrian armies?
We will stand by thee, general! and guarantee
Thy honest rights against all opposition.
And should it chance, that all the other regiments
Turn from thee, by ourselves we will stand forth
Thy faithful soldiers, and, as is our duty,
Far rather let ourselves be cut to pieces
Than suffer thee to fall. But if it be
As the emperor's letter says, if it be true,
That thou in traitorous wise wilt lead us over
To the enemy, which God in heaven forbid!
Then we too will forsake thee, and obey
That letter----

WALLENSTEIN.
        Hear me, children!

ANSPESSADE.
                  Yes, or no,
There needs no other answer.

WALLENSTEIN.
               Yield attention.
You're men of sense, examine for yourselves;
Ye think, and do not follow with the herd:
And therefore have I always shown you honor
Above all others, suffered you to reason;
Have treated you as free men, and my orders
Were but the echoes of your prior suffrage.

ANSPESSADE.
Most fair and noble has thy conduct been
To us, my general! With thy confidence
Thou has honored us, and shown us grace and favor
Beyond all other regiments; and thou seest
We follow not the common herd. We will
Stand by thee faithfully. Speak but one word--
Thy word shall satisfy us that it is not
A treason which thou meditatest--that
Thou meanest not to lead the army over
To the enemy; nor e'er betray thy country.

WALLENSTEIN.
Me, me are they betraying. The emperor
Hath sacrificed me to my enemies,
And I must fall, unless my gallant troops
Will rescue me. See! I confide in you.
And be your hearts my stronghold! At this breast
The aim is taken, at this hoary head.
This is your Spanish gratitude, this is our
Requital for that murderous fight at Luetzen!
For this we threw the naked breast against
The halbert, made for this the frozen earth
Our bed, and the hard stone our pillow! never stream
Too rapid for us, nor wood too impervious;
With cheerful spirit we pursued that Mansfeldt
Through all the turns and windings of his flight:
Yea, our whole life was but one restless march:
And homeless, as the stirring wind, we travelled
O'er the war-wasted earth. And now, even now,
That we have well-nigh finished the hard toil,
The unthankful, the curse-laden toil of weapons,
With faithful indefatigable arm
Have rolled the heavy war-load up the hill,
Behold! this boy of the emperor's bears away
The honors of the peace, an easy prize!
He'll weave, forsooth, into his flaxen locks
The olive branch, the hard-earned ornament
Of this gray head, grown gray beneath the helmet.

ANSPESSADE.
That shall he not, while we can hinder it!
No one, but thou, who has conducted it
With fame, shall end this war, this frightful war.
Thou leadest us out to the bloody field
Of death; thou and no other shalt conduct us home,
Rejoicing, to the lovely plains of peace--
Shalt share with us the fruits of the long toil.

WALLENSTEIN.
What! Think you then at length in late old age
To enjoy the fruits of toil? Believe it not.
Never, no never, will you see the end
Of the contest! you and me, and all of us,
This war will swallow up! War, war, not peace,
Is Austria's wish; and therefore, because I
Endeavored after peace, therefore I fall.
For what cares Austria how long the war
Wears out the armies and lays waste the world!
She will but wax and grow amid the ruin
And still win new domains.
   [The CUIRASSIERS express agitation by their gestures.
              Ye're moved--I see
A noble rage flash from your eyes, ye warriors!
Oh, that my spirit might possess you now
Daring as once it led you to the battle
Ye would stand by me with your veteran arms,
Protect me in my rights; and this is noble!
But think not that you can accomplish it,
Your scanty number! to no purpose will you
Have sacrificed you for your general.
   [Confidentially.
No! let us tread securely, seek for friends;
The Swedes have proffered us assistance, let us
Wear for a while the appearance of good-will,
And use them for your profit, till we both
Carry the fate of Europe in our hands,
And from our camp to the glad jubilant world
Lead peace forth with the garland on her head!

ANSPESSADE.
'Tis then but mere appearances which thou
Dost put on with the Swede! Thou'lt not betray
The emperor? Wilt not turn us into Swedes?
This is the only thing which we desire
To learn from thee.

WALLENSTEIN.
           What care I for the Swedes?
I hate them as I hate the pit of hell,
And under Providence I trust right soon
To chase them to their homes across their Baltic.
My cares are only for the whole: I have
A heart--it bleeds within me for the miseries
And piteous groanings of my fellow-Germans.
Ye are but common men, but yet ye think
With minds not common; ye appear to me
Worthy before all others, that I whisper thee
A little word or two in confidence!
See now! already for full fifteen years,
The war-torch has continued burning, yet
No rest, no pause of conflict. Swede and German,
Papist and Lutheran! neither will give way
To the other; every hand's against the other.
Each one is party and no one a judge.
Where shall this end? Where's he that will unravel
This tangle, ever tangling more and more
It must be cut asunder.
I feel that I am the man of destiny,
And trust, with your assistance, to accomplish it.



SCENE XVI.

   To these enter BUTLER.

BUTLER (passionately).
General! this is not right!

WALLENSTEIN.
               What is not right?

BUTLER.
It must needs injure us with all honest men.

WALLENSTEIN.
But what?

BUTLER.
      It is an open proclamation
Of insurrection.

WALLENSTEIN.
         Well, well--but what is it?

BUTLER.
Count Terzky's regiments tear the imperial eagle
From off his banners, and instead of it
Have reared aloft their arms.

ANSPESSADE (abruptly to the CUIRASSIERS).
                Right about! March!

WALLENSTEIN.
Cursed be this counsel, and accursed who gave it!
   [To the CUIRASSIERS, who are retiring.
Halt, children, halt! There's some mistake in this;
Hark! I will punish it severely. Stop
They do not hear. (To ILLO). Go after them, assure them,
And bring them back to me, cost what it may.

   [ILLO hurries out.

This hurls us headlong. Butler! Butler!
You are my evil genius, wherefore must you
Announce it in their presence? It was all
In a fair way. They were half won! those madmen
With their improvident over-readiness--
A cruel game is Fortune playing with me.
The zeal of friends it is that razes me,
And not the hate of enemies.



SCENE XVII.

   To these enter the DUCHESS, who rushes into the chamber;
   THEKLA and the COUNTESS follow her.

DUCHESS.
              O Albrecht!
What hast thou done?

WALLENSTEIN.
           And now comes this beside.

COUNTESS.
Forgive me, brother! It was not in my power--
They know all.

DUCHESS.
        What hast thou done?

COUNTESS (to TERZKY).
Is there no hope? Is all lost utterly?

TERZKY.
All lost. No hope. Prague in the emperor's hands,
The soldiery have taken their oaths anew.

COUNTESS.
That lurking hypocrite, Octavio!
Count Max. is off too.

TERZKY.
            Where can he be? He's
Gone over to the emperor with his father.

   [THEKLA rushes out into the arms of her mother, hiding her face
   in her bosom.

DUCHESS (enfolding her in her arms).
Unhappy child! and more unhappy mother!

WALLENSTEIN (aside to TERZKY).
Quick! Let a carriage stand in readiness
In the court behind the palace. Scherfenberg,
Be their attendant; he is faithful to us.
To Egra he'll conduct them, and we follow.
   [To ILLO, who returns.
Thou hast not brought them back?

ILLO.
               Hear'st thou the uproar?
The whole corps of the Pappenheimers is
Drawn out: the younger Piccolomini,
Their colonel, they require: for they affirm,
That he is in the palace here, a prisoner;
And if thou dost not instantly deliver him,
They will find means to free him with the sword.

   [All stand amazed.

TERZKY.
What shall we make of this?

WALLENSTEIN.
               Said I not so?
O my prophetic heart! he is still here.
He has not betrayed me--he could not betray me.
I never doubted of it.

COUNTESS.
            If he be
Still here, then all goes well; for I know what
   [Embracing THEKLA.
Will keep him here forever.

TERZKY.
               It can't be.
His father has betrayed us, is gone over
To the emperor--the son could not have ventured
To stay behind.

THEKLA (her eye fixed on the door).
         There he is!



SCENE XVIII.

   To these enter MAX. PICCOLOMINI.

MAX.
Yes, here he is! I can endure no longer
To creep on tiptoe round this house, and lurk
In ambush for a favorable moment:
This loitering, this suspense exceeds my powers.

   [Advancing to THEKLA, who has thrown herself into her mother's arms.

Turn not thine eyes away. O look upon me!
Confess it freely before all. Fear no one.
Let who will hear that we both love each other.
Wherefore continue to conceal it? Secrecy
Is for the happy--misery, hopeless misery,
Needeth no veil! Beneath a thousand suns
It dares act openly.

   [He observes the COUNTESS looking on THEKLA with expressions
   of triumph.

           No, lady! No!
Expect not, hope it not. I am not come
To stay: to bid farewell, farewell forever.
For this I come! 'Tis over! I must leave thee!
Thekla, I must--must leave thee! Yet thy hatred
Let me not take with me. I pray thee, grant me
One look of sympathy, only one look.
Say that thou dost not hate me. Say it to me, Thekla!

               [Grasps her hand.

O God! I cannot leave this spot--I cannot!
Cannot let go this hand. O tell me, Thekla!
That thou dost suffer with me, art convinced
That I cannot act otherwise.

   [THEKLA, avoiding his look, points with her hand to her father.
   MAX. turns round to the DUKE, whom he had not till then perceived.

Thou here? It was not thou whom here I sought.
I trusted never more to have beheld thee,
My business is with her alone. Here will I
Receive a full acquittal from this heart;
For any other I am no more concerned.

WALLENSTEIN.
Think'st thou that, fool-like, I shall let thee go,
And act the mock-magnanimous with thee?
Thy father is become a villain to me;
I hold thee for his son, and nothing more
Nor to no purpose shalt thou have been given
Into my power. Think not, that I will honor
That ancient love, which so remorselessly
He mangled. They are now passed by, those hours
Of friendship and forgiveness. Hate and vengeance
Succeed--'tis now their turn--I too can throw
All feelings of the man aside--can prove
Myself as much a monster as thy father!

MAX (calmly).
Thou wilt proceed with me as thou hast power.
Thou knowest I neither brave nor fear thy rage.
What has detained me here, that too thou knowest.
   [Taking THEKLA by the hand.
See, duke! All--all would I have owed to thee,
Would have received from thy paternal hand
The lot of blessed spirits. That hast thou
Laid waste forever--that concerns not thee.
Indifferent thou tramplest in the dust
Their happiness who most are thine. The god
Whom thou dost serve is no benignant deity,
Like as the blind, irreconcilable,
Fierce element, incapable of compact.
Thy heart's wild impulse only dost thou follow. [5]

WALLENSTEIN.
Thou art describing thy own father's heart.
The adder! Oh, the charms of hell o'erpowered me
He dwelt within me, to my inmost soul
Still to and fro he passed, suspected never.
On the wide ocean, in the starry heaven
Did mine eyes seek the enemy, whom I
In my heart's heart had folded! Had I been
To Ferdinand what Octavio was to me,
War had I ne'er denounced against him.
No, I never could have done it. The emperor was
My austere master only, not my friend.
There was already war 'twixt him and me
When he delivered the commander's staff
Into my hands; for there's a natural
Unceasing war twixt cunning and suspicion;
Peace exists only betwixt confidence
And faith. Who poisons confidence, he murders
The future generations.

MAX.
             I will not
Defend my father. Woe is me, I cannot!
Hard deeds and luckless have taken place; one crime
Drags after it the other in close link.
But we are innocent: how have we fallen
Into this circle of mishap and guilt?
To whom have we been faithless? Wherefore must
The evil deeds and guilt reciprocal
Of our two fathers twine like serpents round us?
              Why must our fathers'
Unconquerable hate rend us asunder,
Who love each other?

WALLENSTEIN.
           Max., remain with me.
Go you not from me, Max.! Hark! I will tell thee----
How when at Prague, our winter quarters, thou
Wert brought into my tent a tender boy,
Not yet accustomed to the German winters;
Thy hand was frozen to the heavy colors;
Thou wouldst not let them go.
At that time did I take thee in my arms,
And with my mantle did I cover thee;
I was thy nurse, no woman could have been
A kinder to thee; I was not ashamed
To do for thee all little offices,
However strange to me; I tended thee
Till life returned; and when thine eyes first opened,
I had thee in my arms. Since then, when have
Altered my feelings toward thee? Many thousands
Have I made rich, presented them with lands;
Rewarded them with dignities and honors;
Thee have I loved: my heart, my self, I gave
To thee; They all were aliens: thou wert
Our child and inmate. [6] Max.! Thou canst not leave me;
It cannot be; I may not, will not think
That Max. can leave me.

MAX.
             Ob, my God!

WALLENSTEIN
                   I have
Held and sustained thee from thy tottering childhood.
What holy bond is there of natural love,
What human tie that does not knit thee to me?
I love thee, Max.! What did thy father for thee,
Which I too have not done, to the height of duty?
Go hence, forsake me, serve thy emperor;
He will reward thee with a pretty chain
Of gold; with his ram's fleece will he reward thee;
For that the friend, the father of thy youth,
For that the holiest feeling of humanity,
Was nothing worth to thee.

MAX.
              O God! how can I
Do otherwise. Am I not forced to do it,
My oath--my duty--my honor----

WALLENSTEIN.
               How? Thy duty?
Duty to whom? Who art thou? Max.! bethink thee
What duties may'st thou have? If I am acting
A criminal part toward the emperor,
It is my crime, not thine. Dost thou belong
To thine own self? Art thou thine own commander?
Stand'st thou, like me, a freeman in the world,
That in thy actions thou shouldst plead free agency?
On me thou art planted, I am thy emperor;
To obey me, to belong to me, this is
Thy honor, this a law of nature to thee!
And if the planet on the which thou livest
And hast thy dwelling, from its orbit starts.
It is not in thy choice, whether or no
Thou'lt follow it. Unfelt it whirls thee onward
Together with his ring, and all his moons.
With little guilt steppest thou into this contest;
Thee will the world not censure, it will praise thee,
For that thou held'st thy friend more worth to thee
Than names and influences more removed
For justice is the virtue of the ruler,
Affection and fidelity the subject's.
Not every one doth it beseem to question
The far-off high Arcturus. Most securely
Wilt thou pursue the nearest duty: let
The pilot fix his eye upon the pole-star.



SCENE XIX.

   To these enter NEUMANN.

WALLENSTEIN.
What now?

NEUMANN.
      The Pappenheimers are dismounted,
And are advancing now on foot, determined
With sword in hand to storm the house, and free
The count, their colonel.

WALLENSTEIN (to TERZKY).
              Have the cannon planted.
I will receive them with chain-shot.
                [Exit TERZKY.
Prescribe to me with sword in hand! Go, Neumann!
'Tis my command that they retreat this moment,
And in their ranks in silence wait my pleasure.

   [NEUMANN exit. ILLO steps to the window.

COUNTESS.
Let him go, I entreat thee, let him go.

ILLO (at the window).
Hell and perdition!

WALLENSTEIN.
           What is it?

ILLO.
They scale the council-house, the roof's uncovered,
They level at this house the cannon----

MAX.
                    Madmen

ILLO.
They are making preparations now to fire on us.

DUCHESS and COUNTESS.
Merciful heaven!

MAX. (to WALLENSTEIN).
         Let me go to them!

WALLENSTEIN.
                   Not a step!

MAX. (pointing to THEKLA and the DUCHESS).
But their life! Thine!

WALLENSTEIN.
            What tidings bringest thou, Terzky?



SCENE XX.

   To these TERZKY returning.

TERZKY.
Message and greeting from our faithful regiments.
Their ardor may no longer be curbed in.
They entreat permission to commence the attack;
And if thou wouldst but give the word of onset
They could now charge the enemy in rear,
Into the city wedge them, and with ease
O'erpower them in the narrow streets.

ILLO.
                    Oh come
Let not their ardor cool. The soldiery
Of Butler's corps stand by us faithfully;
We are the greater number. Let us charge them
And finish here in Pilsen the revolt.

WALLENSTEIN.
What? shall this town become a field of slaughter,
And brother-killing discord, fire-eyed,
Be let loose through its streets to roam and rage?
Shall the decision be delivered over
To deaf remorseless rage, that hears no leader?
Here is not room for battle, only for butchery.
Well, let it be! I have long thought of it,
So let it burst then!
           [Turns to MAX.
            Well, how is it with thee?
Wilt thou attempt a heat with me. Away!
Thou art free to go. Oppose thyself to me,
Front against front, and lead them to the battle;
Thou'rt skilled in war, thou hast learned somewhat under me,
I need not be ashamed of my opponent,
And never hadst thou fairer opportunity
To pay me for thy schooling.

COUNTESS.
               Is it then,
Can it have come to this? What! Cousin, cousin!
Have you the heart?

MAX.
The regiments that are trusted to my care
I have pledged my troth to bring away from Pilsen
True to the emperor; and this promise will I
Make good, or perish. More than this no duty
Requires of me. I will not fight against thee,
Unless compelled; for though an enemy,
Thy head is holy to me still,

   [Two reports of cannon. ILLO and TERZKY hurry to the window.

WALLENSTEIN.
What's that?

TERZBY.
       He falls.

WALLENSTEIN.
             Falls! Who?

ILLO.
                    Tiefenbach's corps
Discharged the ordnance.

WALLENSTEIN.
             Upon whom?

ILLO.
                   On--Neumann,
Your messenger.

WALLENSTEIN (starting up).
         Ha! Death and hell! I will----

TERZKY.
Expose thyself to their blind frenzy?

DUCHESS and COUNTESS.
                    No!
For God's sake, no!

ILLO.
           Not yet, my general!
Oh, hold him! hold him!

WALLENSTEIN.
             Leave me----

MAX.
                   Do it not;
Not yet! This rash and bloody deed has thrown them
Into a frenzy-fit--allow them time----

WALLENSTEIN.
Away! too long already have I loitered.
They are emboldened to these outrages,
Beholding not my fa