MOORE
Are the French beaten, Colborne, or repulsed?
Alas! you see what they have done too me!
COLBORNE
I do, Sir John: I am more than sad thereat!
In brief time now the surgeon will be here.
The French retreat—pushed from Elvina far.
MOORE
That’s good! Is Paget anywhere about?
COLBORNE
He’s at the front, Sir John.
MOORE
Remembrance to him!
[Enter two surgeons.]
Ah, doctors,—you can scarcely mend up me.—
And yet I feel so tough—I have feverish fears
My dying will waste a long and tedious while;
But not too long, I hope!
SURGEONS [after a hasty examination]
You must be borne
In to your lodgings instantly, Sir John.
Please strive to stand the motion—if you can;
They will keep step, and bear you steadily.
MOORE
Anything.... Surely fainter ebbs that fire?
COLBORNE
Yes: we must be advancing everywhere:
Colbert their General, too, they have lost, I learn.
[They lift him by stretching their sashes under the blanket, and
begin moving off. A light waggon enters.]
MOORE
Who’s in that waggon?
HARDINGE
Colonel Wynch, Sir John.
He’s wounded, but he urges you to take it.