EMPRESS
See the glorious red flame! See the beautiful eddying smoke. It is bright within my palace for the last time. And I see them too, those noble souls, mounting ever higher and higher in the dark whirling spirals of smoke!
SOLDIERS [Singing in the flames]
Ten thousand years! Ten thousand years.
EMPRESS [To the SOLDIERS]
Go, my brave men!——Soar up on high, fly to the heaven of your ancestors, ascend to the god of the clouds.
SOLDIERS [More feebly]
Ten thousand years, ten thousand years!
[The TARTAR'S gong is heard ever closer and closer.]
EMPRESS [To the SOLDIERS]