Car. You are as strong as France, Eugenie, help me!
If e’er you held a dear head on your breast—
You have!—for you ’ve both son and husband! Ah,
I have no child. My lord is all to me.
O put your two in one and you will know
What now I plead for! By the kisses dropped
Upon your baby’s cheek, and by the hope
That you will see him grow up at your side,
Another self with heart-strings round your own,
I pray you, lady, soften that stone heart!
I kneel to you, an empress though my crown
Has fallen, as yours I pray will not,
And at your footstool beg my husband’s life!
(Eugenie rises)
By your child’s love, I beg you for one word!
Help me, Eugenie, or the day will come
When you will know a crown is but a band
Of metal cold, and one warm kiss more dear
Than all such circling glory! When you will grow
Mad with the longing but to touch the hand
Now lies in yours as it would never part,
Strain for the face whose beauty fed you once
Until your madness builds it out of air
To gaze with sweet unhuman pity on you
Yet come not near for kisses! O, even now
I look through sealed up time unto a night
When sleep will fly from your woe-drownéd eyes,
And you will cry to Heaven for blessed death
To lead you from the midnight desolation!
Eugenie, save thyself! For thy own sake
Show pity unto me, and in that hour
Receive the mercy that thou now dost give!
Eug. (Going) Help me! I ’m ill! (Her women assist her out)
Car. Gone! Gone? And yet a woman!
Ah, there ’s a God will suffer not this wrong!
... Napoleon—
Lou. Nay, madam, we ’ve said all.
I can not cast my country into war.
You but fatigue yourself.
Car. O Heaven! Fatigue!
Canst think of that when Maximilian
Is facing bayonets for honor’s sake?
Lou. Believe me, he is safe!
Car. I tell you no!
To-day the guns from Mont Valerien
Pealed out your glory! Your arm was in the arm
Of Prussia’s monarch, and Waterloo forgot!
You laughed with Austria’s chief, as though the duke
Of Reichstadt were not dead! The bloody snows
Of Moscow melt in Alexander’s smile!
Edward’s in France, St. Helena ’s a myth!
And all the world is trooping here to feed
Your monstrous vanity! But let the morn
Bring news of Maximilian’s death,
These kings will shudder from you as from plague,
The conscious earth refuse your feet a base
For shame to bear you! Then will begin your fall.
Down, down you ’ll creep to an unpitied death,
And winds that shriek around your exile bed
Will cry me prophetess!
Lou. (After a silence) Your audience
Is over. Pray go and rest. You need much sleep.