There is one woman here,
One woman and a child....
And war, they tell me, is a noble thing.
It is the mother of heroic deeds,
The nurse of honour, manhood.
Second Soldier.
God, a speech!
Nanko (who is hugging his Christmas-tree near the fire again).
Certainly, Rada! You will not deny
That life’s a battle.
Rada.
You hear, drunk as you are,
Up to your necks in blood, you hear this fool,
This poor old fool, piping his dreary cry.
And through his lips, and through his softening brain,
The men that use you, cheat you, drive you out
To slaughter and be slaughtered, teach the world
That this black vampire, sucking at our breasts,
Is good. Men! Men! The pestilence of your dead
Is murdering you by legions. All the trains
Of quicklime that your Emperor sends behind you
Can never eat its way through all that flesh—
Three hundred miles of dead! Your dead!
First Soldier.
Hoch! Hoch!
A speech!