(1813)
SCENE. -- The Master-tradesmen's Parlour at the Old
Ship Inn. Casterbridge. Evening.
- "Old Norbert with the flat blue cap--
- A German said to be--
- Why let your pipe die on your lap,
- Your eyes blink absently?"
- --"Ah! . . . Well, I had thought till my cheek was wet
- Of my mother--her voice and mien
- When she used to sing and piroutette,
- And tap the tambourine
- "To the march that yon street fiddler plies:
- She told me 'twas the same
- She heard from the trumpets, when the Allies
- Burst on her home like flame.
- "My father was one of the German Hussars,
- My mother of Leipzig; but he,
- Being quartered here, fetched her at close of the wars,
- And a Wessex lad reared me.
- "And as I grew up, again and again
- She'd tell, after trilling that air,
- Of her youth, and the battles on Leipzig plain
- And of all that was suffered there! . . .
- "--'Twas a time of alarms. Three Chiefs-at-arms
- Combined them to crush One,
- And by numbers' might, for in equal fight
- He stood the matched of none.
- "Carl Schwarzenberg was of the plot,
- And Blücher, prompt and prow,
- And Jean the Crown-Prince Bernadotte:
- Buonaparte was the foe.
- "City and plain had felt his reign
- From the North to the Middle Sea,
- And he'd now sat down in the noble town
- Of the King of Saxony.
- "October's deep dew its wet gossamer threw
- Upon Leipzig's lawns, leaf-strewn,
- Where lately each fair avenue
- Wrought shade for summer noon.
- "To westward two dull rivers crept
- Through miles of marsh and slough,
- Whereover a streak of whiteness swept--
- The Bridge of Lindenau.
- "Hard by, in the City, the One, care-tossed,
- Sat pondering his shrunken power;
- And without the walls the hemming host
- Waxed denser every hour.
- "He had speech that night on the morrow's designs
- With his chiefs by the bivouac fire,
- While the belt of flames from the enemy's lines
- Flared nigher him yet and nigher.
- "Three rockets then from the girdling trine
- Told, 'Ready!' As they rose
- Their flashes seemed his Judgment-Sign
- For bleeding Europe's woes.
- "'Twas seen how the French watch-fires that night
- Glowed still and steadily;
- And the Three rejoiced for they read in the sight
- That the One disdained to flee. . . .
- "--Five hundred guns began the affray
- On the next day morn at nine;
- Such mad and mangling cannon-play
- Had never torn human line.
- "Around the town three battles beat,
- Contracting like a gin;
- As nearer marched the million feet
- Of columns closing in.
- "The first battle nighed on the low Southern side;
- The second by the Western way;
- The nearing of the third on the North was heard;
- --The French held all at bay.
- "Against the first band did the Emperor stand;
- Against the second stood Ney;
- Marmont against the third gave the order-word:
- --Thus raged it throughout the day.
- "Fifty thousand sturdy souls on those trampled plains and knolls,
- Who met the dawn hopefully,
- And were lotted their shares in a quarrel not theirs,
- Dropt then in their agony.
- "'O,' the old folks said, 'ye Preachers stern!
- O so-called Christian time!
- When will men's swords to ploughshares turn?
- When come the promised prime?' . . .
- "--The clash of horse and man which that day began
- Closed not as evening wore;
- And the morrow's armies, rear and van,
- Still mustered more and more.
- "From the City towers the Confederate Powers
- Were eyed in glittering lines,
- And up from the vast a murmuring passed
- As from a wood of pines.
- "'Tis well to cover a feeble skill
- By numbers' might!' scoffed He;
- 'But give me a third of their strength, I'd fill
- Half Hell with their soldiery!'
- "All that day raged the war they waged,
- And again dumb night held reign,
- Save that ever upspread from the dank deathbed
- A miles-wide pant of pain.
- "Hard had striven brave Ney, the true Bertrand,
- Victor, and Augerau,
- Bold Poniatowski, and Lauriston,
- To stay their overflow;
- "But, as in the dream of one sick to death
- There comes a narrowing room
- That pens him, body and limbs and breath,
- To wait a hideous doom,
- "So to Napoleon, in the hush
- That held the town and towers
- Through these dire nights, a creeping crush
- Seemed borne in with the hours.
- "One road to the rearward, and but one,
- Did fitful Chance allow;
- 'Twas where the Pleiss' and Elster run--
- The Bridge of Lindenau.
- "The nineteenth dawned. Down street and Platz
- The wasted French sank back,
- Stretching long lines across the Flats
- And on the bridgeway track:
- "When there surged on the sky an earthen wave,
- And stones, and men, as though
- Some rebel churchyard crew updrave
- Their sepulchres from below.
- "To Heaven is blown Bridge Lendenau:
- Wrecked regiments reel therefrom;
- And rank and file in masses plough
- The sullen Elster-Strom.
- "A gulf was Lindenau; and dead
- Were fifties, hundreds, tens;
- And every current rippled red
- With Marshal's blood and men's.
- "The smart Macdonald swam therein,
- And barely won the verge
- Bold Poniatowski plunged him in
- Never to re-emerge.
- "Then stayed the strife. The remnants wound
- Their Rhineward way pell-mell;
- And thus did Leipzig City sound
- An Empire's passing bell;
- "While in cavalcade, with band and blade,
- Came Marshals, Princes, Kings;
- And the town was theirs. . . . Ay, as simple maid,
- My mother saw these things!
- "And whenever those notes in the street begin,
- I recall her, and that far scene,
- And her acting of how the Allies marched in,
- And her tap of the tambourine!"
"Si le maréchal Grouchy avait été rejoint par l'officier
que Napoléon lui
avait expédié la veille à dix heures du soir, toute
question eût disparu. Mais cet officier n'était point
parvenu à sa destination, ainsi que le maréchal n'a
cessé de l'affirmer toute sa vie, et il faut l'en croire, car
autrement il n'aurait eu aucune raison pour hésiter. Cet
officier avait-il été pris? avait-il passé à
l'ennemi? C'est ce qu'on a toujours ignoré."
--THEIRS, Histoire de l'Empire, "Waterloo."
- Good Father! . . . It was eve in middle June
- And war was waged anew
- By great Napoleon, who for years had strewn
- Men's bones all Europe through.
- Three nights ere this, with columned corps he'd cross'd
- The Sambre at Charleroi,
- To move on Brussels, where the English host
- Dallied in Parc and Bois.
- The yestertide we'd heard the gloomy gun
- Growl through the long-sunned day
- From Quatre-Bras and Ligny; till the dun
- Twilight suppressed the fray;
- Albeit therein--as lated tongues bespoke--
- Brunswick's high heart was drained,
- And Prussia's Line and Landwehr, though unbroke,
- Stood cornered and constrained.
- And at next noon-time Grouchy slowly passed
- With thirty thousand men:
- We hoped thenceforth no army, small or vast,
- Would trouble us again.
- My hut lay deeply in a vale recessed,
- And never a soul seemed nigh
- When, reassured at length, we went to rest--
- My children, wife and I.
- But what was this that broke our humble ease?
- What noise, above the rain,
- Above the dripping of the poplar trees
- That smote along the pane?
- --A call of mastery, bidding me arise,
- Compelled me to the door,
- At which a horseman stood in martial guise--
- Splashed--sweating from every pore.
- Had I seen Grouchy! Yes? What track took he?
- Could I lead thither on?
- Fulfilment would ensure much gold for me,
- Perhaps more gifts anon.
- "I bear the Emperor's mandate," then he said,
- "Charging the Marshal straight
- To strike between the double host ahead
- Ere they cooperate,
- "Engaging Blücher till the Emperor put
- Lord Wellington to flight,
- And next the Prussians. This to set afoot
- Is my emprise tonight."
- I joined him in the mist; but, pausing, sought
- To estimate his say.
- Grouchy had made for Wavre; and yet, on thought,
- I did not lead that way.
- I mused: "If Grouchy thus and thus be told,
- The clash comes sheer hereon;
- My farm is stript. While as for gifts of gold,
- Money the French have none.
- "Grouchy unwarned, moreo'er the English win,
- And mine is left to me--
- They buy, not borrow."--Hence did I begin
- To lead him treacherously.
- And as we edged Joidoigne with cautious view
- Dawn pierced the humid air;
- And still I easted with him, though I knew
- Never marched Grouchy there.
- Near Ottignies we passed, across the Dyle
- (Lim'lette left far aside),
- And thence direct toward Pervez and Noville
- Through green grain, till he cried:
- "I doubt thy conduct, man! no track is here--
- I doubt thy gagèd word!"
- Thereat he scowled on me, and prancing near,
- He pricked me with his sword.
- "Nay, Captain, hold! We skirt, not trace the course
- Of Grouchy," said I then:
- "As we go, yonder went he, with his force
- Of thirty thousand men."
- --At length noon nighed; when west, from Saint-John's-Mound,
- A hoarse artillery boomed,
- And from Saint-Lambert's upland, chapel-crowned,
- The Prussian squadrons loomed.
- Then leaping to the wet wild path we had kept,
- "My mission fails!" he cried;
- "Too late for Grouchy now to intercept,
- For, peasant, you have lied!"
- He turned to pistol me. I sprang, and drew
- The sabre from his flank,
- And 'twixt his nape and shoulder, ere he knew,
- I struck, and dead he sank.
- I hid him deep in nodding rye and oat--
- His shroud green stalks and loam;
- His requiem the corn-blade's husky note--
- And then I hastened home. . . .
- --Two armies writhe in coils of red and blue,
- And brass and iron clang
- From Goumont, past the front of Waterloo,
- To Pap'lotte and Smohain.
- The Guard Imperial wavered on the height;
- The Emperor's face grew glum;
- "I sent," he said, "to Grouchy yesternight,
- And yet he does not come!"
- ' Twas then, Good Father, that the French espied,
- Streaking the summer land,
- The men of Blucher. But the Emperor cried,
- Grouchy is now at hand!'
- And meanwhile Vand'leur, Vivian, Maitland, Kempt,
- Met d'Erlon, Friant, Ney;
- But Grouchy--mis-sent, blamed, yet blame-exempt--
- Grouchy was far away.
- By even, slain or struck, Michel the strong,
- Bold Travers, Dnop, Delord,
- Smart Guyot, Reil-le, l'Heriter, Friant,
- Scattered that champaign o'er.
- Fallen likewise wronged Duhesme, and skilled Lobau
- Did that red sunset see;
- Colbert, Legros, Blancard!. . . And of the foe
- Picton and Ponsonby;
- With Gordon, Canning, Blackman, Ompteda,
- L'Estrange, Delancey, Packe,
- Grose, D'Oyly, Stables, Morice, Howard, Hay,
- Von Schwerin, Watzdorf, Boek,
- Smith, Phelips, Fuller, Lind and Battersby,
- And hosts of ranksmen round. . . .
- Memorials linger yet to speak to thee
- Of those that bit the ground!
- The Guards' last column yielded; dykes of dead
- Lay between vale and ridge,
- As, thinned yet closing, faint yet fierce, they sped
- In packs to Genappe Bridge.
- Safe was my stock; my capple cow unslain;
- Intact each cock and hen;
- But Grouchy far at Wavre all day had lain,
- And thirty thousand men.
- O Saints, had I but lost my earing corn
- And saved the cause once prized!
- O Saints, why such false witness had I borne
- When late I'd sympathized!. . .
- So now, being old, my children eye askance
- My slowly dwindling store,
- And crave my mite; till, worn with tarriance,
- I care for life no more.
- To Almighty God henceforth I stand confessed,
- And Virgin-Saint Marie;
- O Michael, John, and Holy Ones in rest,
- Entreat the Lord for me!