SCENE IV
A FETE AT VAUXHALL
[It is the Vitoria festival at Vauxhall. The orchestra of the
renowned gardens exhibits a blaze of lamps and candles arranged
in the shape of a temple, a great artificial sun glowing at the
top, and under it in illuminated characters the words “Vitoria”
and “Wellington.” The band is playing the new air “The Plains
of Vitoria.”
All round the colonnade of the rotunda are to be read in the
illumination the names of Peninsular victories, underneath them
figuring the names of British and Spanish generals who led at
those battles, surmounted by wreaths of laurel The avenues
stretching away from the rotunda into the gardens charm the eyes
with their mild multitudinous lights, while festoons of lamps
hang from the trees elsewhere, and transparencies representing
scenes from the war.
The gardens and saloons are crowded, among those present being the
KING’S sons—the DUKES OF YORK, CLARENCE, KENT, and CAMBRIDGE—
Ambassadors, peers, and peeresses, and other persons of quality,
English and foreign.
In the immediate foreground on the left hand is an alcove, the
interior of which is in comparative obscurity. Two foreign
attachés enter it and sit down.]
FIRST ATTACHE
Ah—now for the fireworks. They are under the direction of Colonel
Congreve.
[At the end of an alley, purposely kept dark, fireworks are
discharged.]
SECOND ATTACHE
Very good: very good.—This looks like the Duke of Sussex coming in,
I think. Who the lady is with him I don’t know.
[Enter the DUKE OF SUSSEX in a Highland dress, attended by several
officers in like attire. He walks about the gardens with LADY
CHARLOTTE CAMPBELL.]
FIRST ATTACHE
People have been paying a mighty price for tickets—as much as
fifteen guineas has been offered, I hear. I had to walk up to the
gates; the number of coaches struggling outside prevented my driving
near. It was as bad as the battle of Vitoria itself.
SECOND ATTACHE
So Wellington is made Field-Marshal for his achievement.
FIRST ATTACHE
Yes. By the by, you have heard of the effect of the battle upon
the Conference at Reichenbach?—that Austria is to join Russia and
Prussia against France? So much for Napoléon’s marriage! I wonder
what he thinks of his respected father-in-law now.
SECOND ATTACHE
Of course, an enormous subsidy is paid to Francis by Great Britain
for this face-about?
FIRST ATTACHE
Yes. As Bonaparte says, English guineas are at the bottom of
everything!—Ah, here comes Caroline.
[The PRINCESS OF WALES arrives, attended by LADY ANNE HAMILTON
and LADY GLENBERVIE. She is conducted forward by the DUKE OF
GLOUCESTER and COLONEL ST. LEDGER, and wears a white satin train
with a dark embroidered bodice, and a green wreath with diamonds.
Repeated hurrahs greet her from the crowd. She bows courteously.]
SECOND ATTACHE
The people are staunch for her still!... You heard, sir, what
Austrian Francis said when he learnt of Vitoria?—“A warm climate
seems to agree with my son-in-law no better than a cold one.”
FIRST ATTACHE
Ha-ha-ha!
Marvellous it is how this loud victory
Has couched the late blind Europe’s Cabinets.
Would I could spell precisely what was phrased
’Twixt Bonaparte and Metternich at Dresden—
Their final word, I ween, till God knows when!—
SECOND ATTACHE
I own to feeling it a sorry thing
That Francis should take English money down
To throw off Bonaparte. ’Tis sordid, mean!
He is his daughter’s husband after all.
FIRST ATTACHE
Ay; yes!... They say she knows not of it yet.
SECOND ATTACHE
Poor thing, I daresay it will harry her
When all’s revealed. But the inside o’t is,
Since Castlereagh’s return to power last year
Vienna, like Berlin and Petersburg,
Has harboured England’s secret emissaries,
Primed, purse in hand, with the most lavish sums
To knit the league to drag Napoléon down....
[More fireworks.] That’s grand.—Here comes one Royal item more.
[The DUCHESS OF YORK enters, attended by her ladies and by the
HON. B. CRAVEN and COLONEL BARCLAY. She is received with signals
of respect.]
FIRST ATTACHE
She calls not favour forth as Caroline can!
SECOND ATTACHE
To end my words:—Though happy for this realm,
Austria’s desertion frankly is, by God,
Rank treachery!
FIRST ATTACHE
Whatever it is, it means
Two hundred thousand swords for the Allies,
And enemies in batches for Napoléon
Leaping from unknown lairs.—Yes, something tells me
That this is the beginning of the end
For Emperor Bonaparte!
[The PRINCESS OF WALES prepares to leave. An English diplomatist
joins the attachés in the alcove. The PRINCESS and her ladies go
out.]
DIPLOMATIST
I saw you over here, and I came round. Cursed hot and crowded, isn’t
it?
SECOND ATTACHE
What is the Princess leaving so soon for?
DIPLOMATIST
Oh, she has not been received in the Royal box by the other members
of the Royal Family, and it has offended her, though she was told
beforehand that she could not be. Poor devil! Nobody invited her
here. She came unasked, and she has gone unserved.
FIRST ATTACHE
We shall have to go unserved likewise, I fancy. The scramble at the
buffets is terrible.
DIPLOMATIST
And the road from here to Marsh Gate is impassable. Some ladies have
been sitting in their coaches for hours outside the hedge there. We
shall not get home till noon to-morrow.
A VOICE [from the back]
Take care of your watches! Pickpockets!
FIRST ATTACHE
Good. That relieves the monotony a little.
[Excitement in the throng. When it has subsided the band strikes
up a country dance, and stewards with white ribbons and laurel
leaves are seen bustling about.]
SECOND ATTACHE
Let us go and look at the dancing. It is “Voulez-vous danser”—no,
it is not,—it is “Enrico”—two ladies between two gentlemen.
[They go from the alcove.]
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
From this phantasmagoria let us roam
To the chief wheel and capstan of the show,
Distant afar. I pray you closely read
What I reveal—wherein each feature bulks
In measure with its value humanly.
[The beholder finds himself, as it were, caught up on high, and
while the Vauxhall scene still dimly twinkles below, he gazes
southward towards Central Europe—the contorted and attenuated
ecorche of the Continent appearing as in an earlier scene, but
now obscure under the summer stars.]
Three cities loom out large: Vienna there,
Dresden, which holds Napoléon, over here,
And Leipzig, whither we shall shortly wing,
Out yonderwards. ’Twixt Dresden and Vienna
What thing do you discern?
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
Something broad-faced,
Flat-folded, parchment-pale, and in its shape
Rectangular; but moving like a cloud
The Dresden way.
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
Yet gaze more closely on it.
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
The object takes a letter’s lineaments
Though swollen to mainsail measure,—magically,
I gather from your words; and on its face
Are three vast seals, red—signifying blood
Must I suppose? It moves on Dresden town,
And dwarfs the city as it passes by.—
You say Napoléon’s there?
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
The document,
Sized to its big importance, as I told,
Bears in it formal declaration, signed,
Of war by Francis with his late-linked son,
The Emperor of France. Now let us go
To Leipzig city, and await the blow.
[A chaotic gloom ensues, accompanied by a rushing like that of a
mighty wind.]