Robes.—Ha! did they so?—but when the engine rattled,
And the axe fell, didst thou perceive him shudder?
St. Just.—He turn'd his face to the descending steel,
And calmly smil'd. A low and ominous murmur
Spread through the vast assemblage—then, in peace,
They all dispers'd.
Robes.—I did not wish for this.
St. Just.—No man, since Louis Capet——
Robes.—Say no more
My worthy friend—the friend of France and freedom—
Hasten to guard our interest in yon junto
Of fools and traitors, who, like timid sheep,
Nor fight nor fly, but huddle close together,
Till the wolves come to gorge themselves among them—
And in the evening, you and all my friends
Will meet me here, deliberate, and decide
To advance, or to recede. Be still, we cannot;
And hear me, dear St. Just—A man like you,
Firm and unflinching through so many trials,
Who sooner would behold this land manured
With carcases and moistened with their blood,
Than yielding food for feudal slaves to eat,
True to your party and to me your brother—
For so I would be term'd—has the best claim
That man can have to name his own reward
When France is all our own. Bethink you then
What post of honor or of profit suits you,
And tell me early, that I may provide,
To meet your views, a part in this great drama.
St. Just.—Citizen Robespierre—my hearty thanks;
Financial Minister, by any name
Or trumpery title that may suit these times,
Is what I aim at—gratify me there
And I am yours through more blood than would serve
To float the L'Orient.1
1 A French line of battle ship. Burnt at the battle of Aboukir.
Robes.—'Tis well, St. Just,
But wherefore citizen me? I have not used
The term to you—we are not strangers here.
St. Just.—Pardon me, sir, (or Sire, even as you please)
The cant of Jacobins infects my tongue,
I had no meaning farther. One word more
Before we part—now Danton is cut off,
We may be sure that all his partisans
And personal friends are our most deadly foes,
And it were politic and kind in us
To spare their brains unnumbered schemes of vengeance
And seize at once the power to silence them.
To give them time were ruin; some there are
Whose love of gold is such that were it wet
With Danton's blood they would not less receive it.
These may be brib'd to league with us. Farewell.
Robes. (solus.) Blood on its base—upon its every step—
Yea, on its very summit—still I climb:
But thickest darkness veils my destiny,
And standing as I do on a frail crag
Whence I must make one desperate spring to power,
To safety, honor, and unbounded wealth,
Or be as Danton is, why do I pause?
Why do I gaze back on my past career,
Upon those piles of headless, reeking dead?
Those whitening sculls? those streams of guiltless blood
Still smoking to the skies?—why think I hear
The shrieks, the groans, the smothered execrations
That swell the breeze, or seem as if I shrank
Beneath the o'ergrown, yet still accumulating,
Curse of humanity that clings around me?
Is not my hate of them as fixed, intense,
And all unquenchable as theirs of me?
But they must tremble in their rage while I
Destroy and scorn them.
(reads a letter.)