SCENE I

A ROAD OUT OF VIENNA

[It is morning in early May. Rain descends in torrents, accompanied
by peals of thunder. The tepid downpour has caused the trees to
assume as by magic a clothing of limp green leafage, and has turned
the ruts of the uneven highway into little canals.

A drenched travelling-chariot is passing, with a meagre escort.
In the interior are seated four women: the ARCHDUCHESS MARIA
LOUISA, in age about eighteen; her stepmother the EMPRESS OF
AUSTRIA, third wife of FRANCIS, only four years older than the
ARCHDUCHESS; and two ladies of the Austrian Court. Behind come
attendant carriages bearing servants and luggage.

The inmates remain for the most part silent, and appear to be in a
gloomy frame of mind. From time to time they glance at the moist
spring scenes which pass without in a perspective distorted by the
rain-drops that slide down the panes, and by the blurring effect
of the travellers' breathings. Of the four the one who keeps in
the best spirits is the ARCHDUCHESS, a fair, blue-eyed, full-
figured, round-lipped maiden.]

MARIA LOUISA

Whether the rain comes in or not I must open the window. Please
allow me. [She straightway opens it.]

EMPRESS [groaning]

Yes—open or shut it—I don't care. I am too ill to care for
anything! [The carriage jolts into a hole.] O woe! To think that
I am driven away from my husband's home in such a miserable
conveyance, along such a road, and in such weather as this. [Peal
of thunder.] There are his guns!

MARIA LOUISA

No, my dear one. It cannot be his guns. They told us when we
started that he was only half-way from Ratisbon hither, so that he
must be nearly a hundred miles off as yet; and a large army cannot
move fast.

EMPRESS

He should never have been let come nearer than Ratisbon! The victory
at Echmuhl was fatal for us. O Echmuhl, Echmuhl! I believe he will
overtake us before we get to Buda.

FIRST LADY-IN-WAITING

If so, your Majesty, shall we be claimed as prisoners and marched
to Paris?

EMPRESS

Undoubtedly. But I shouldn't much care. It would not be worse than
this.... I feel sodden all through me, and frowzy, and broken!
[She closes her eyes as if to doze.]

MARIA LOUISA

It is dreadful to see her suffer so! [Shutting the window.] If
the roads were not so bad I should not mind. I almost wish we had
stayed; though when he arrives the cannonade will be terrible.

FIRST LADY-IN-WAITING

I wonder if he will get into Vienna. Will his men knock down all
the houses, madam?

MARIA LOUISA

If he do get in, I am sure his triumph will not be for long. My
uncle the Archduke Charles is at his heels! I have been told many
important prophecies about Bonaparte's end, which is fast nearing,
it is asserted. It is he, they say, who is referred to in the
Apocalypse. He is doomed to die this year at Cologne, in an inn
called “The Red Crab.” I don't attach too much importance to all
these predictions, but O, how glad I should be to see them come true!

SECOND LADY-IN-WAITING

So should we all, madam. What would become of his divorce-scheme
then?

MARIA LOUISA

Perhaps there is nothing in that report. One can hardly believe
such gossip.

SECOND LADY-IN-WAITING

But they say, your Imperial Highness, that he certainly has decided
to sacrifice the Empress Josephine, and that at the meeting last
October with the Emperor Alexander at Erfurt, it was even settled
that he should marry as his second wife the Grand-Duchess Anne.

MARIA LOUISA

I am sure that the Empress her mother will never allow one of the
house of Romanoff to marry with a bourgeois Corsican. I wouldn't
if I were she!

FIRST LADY-IN-WAITING

Perhaps, your Highness, they are not so particular in Russia, where
they are rather new themselves, as we in Austria, with your ancient
dynasty, are in such matters.

MARIA LOUISA

Perhaps not. Though the Empress-mother is a pompous old thing, as
I have been told by Prince Schwarzenberg, who was negotiating there
last winter. My father says it would be a dreadful misfortune for
our country if they were to marry. Though if we are to be exiled
I don't see how anything of that sort can matter much.... I hope
my father is safe!

[An officer of the escort rides up to the carriage window, which
is opened.]

EMPRESS [unclosing her eyes]

Any more misfortunes?

OFFICER

A rumour is a-wind, your Majesty,
That the French host, the Emperor in its midst,
Lannes, Massena, and Bessieres in its van,
Advancing hither along the Ratisbon road,
Has seized the castle and town of Ebersberg,
And burnt all down, with frightful massacre,
Vast heaps of dead and wounded being consumed,
So that the streets stink strong with frizzled flesh.—
The enemy, ere this, has crossed the Traun,
Hurling brave Hiller's army back on us,
And marches on Amstetten—thirty miles
Less distant from Vienna from before!

EMPRESS

The Lord show mercy to us! But O why
Did not the Archdukes intercept the foe?

OFFICER

His Highness Archduke Charles, your Majesty,
After his sore repulse Bohemia-wards,
Could not proceed with strength and speed enough
To close in junction with the Archduke John
And Archduke Louis, as was their intent.
So Marshall Lannes swings swiftly on Vienna,
With Oudinot's and Demont's might of foot;
Then Massena and all his mounted men,
And then Napoleon, Guards, Cuirassiers,
And the main body of the Imperial Force.

EMPRESS

Alas for poor Vienna!

OFFICER

Even so!
Your Majesty has fled it none too soon.

[The window is shut, and the procession disappears behind the
sheets of rain.]

SCENE II

THE ISLAND OF LOBAU, WITH WAGRAM BEYOND

[The northern horizon at the back of the bird's-eye prospect is
the high ground stretching from the Bisamberg on the left to the
plateau of Wagram on the right. In front of these elevations
spreads the wide plain of the Marchfeld, open, treeless, and with
scarcely a house upon it.16
In the foreground the Danube crosses the scene with a graceful
slowness, looping itself round the numerous wooded islands therein.
The largest of these, immediately under the eye, is the Lobau,
which stands like a knot in the gnarled grain represented by the
running river.

On this island can be discerned, closely packed, an enormous dark
multitude of foot, horse, and artillery in French uniforms, the
numbers reaching to a hundred and seventy thousand.

Lifting our eyes to discover what may be opposed to them we
perceive on the Wagram plateau aforesaid, and right and left in
front of it, extended lines of Austrians, whitish and glittering,
to the number of a hundred and forty thousand.

The July afternoon turns to evening, the evening to twilight.
A species of simmer which pervades the living spectacle raises
expectation till the very air itself seems strained with suspense.
A huge event of some kind is awaiting bi