The Dynasts: An Epic-Drama of the War with Napoleon Part 8

SPIRIT OF THE YEARS

I'll humour thee, Though my unpa.s.sioned essence could not change Did I incarn in moulds of all mankind!

SPIRIT IRONIC

'Tis enough to make every little dog in England run to mixen to hear this Pitt sung so strenuously! I'll be the third of the incarnate, on the chance of hearing the tune played the other way.

SPIRIT SINISTER

And I the fourth. There's sure to be something in my line toward, where politicians gathered together!

[The four Phantoms enter the Gallery of the House in the disguise of ordinary strangers.]

SHERIDAN [rising]

The Bill I would have leave to introduce Is framed, sir, to repeal last Session's Act, By party-scribes int.i.tuled a Provision For England's Proper Guard; but elsewhere known As Mr. Pitt's new Patent Parish Pill. [Laughter.]

The ministerial countenances, I mark, Congeal to dazed surprise at my straight motion-- Why, pa.s.ses sane conjecture. It may be That, with a haughty and unwavering faith In their own battering-rams of argument, They deemed our buoyance whelmed, and sapped, and sunk To our hope's sheer bottom, whence a miracle Was all could friend and float us; or, maybe, They are amazed at our rude disrespect In making mockery of an English Law Sprung sacred from the King's own Premier's brain!

--I hear them snort; but let them wince at will, My duty must be done; shall be done quickly By citing some few facts.

An Act for our defence!

It weakens, not defends; and oversea Swoln France's despot and his myrmidons This moment know it, and can scoff thereat.

Our people know it too--those who can peer Behind the scenes of this poor painted show Called soldiering!--The Act has failed, must fail, As my right honourable friend well proved When speaking t'other night, whose silencing By his right honourable _vis a vis_ Was of the genuine Governmental sort, And like the catamarans their sapience shaped All fizzle and no harm. [Laughter.] The Act, in brief, Effects this much: that the whole force of England Is strengthened by--eleven thousand men!

So sorted that the British infantry Are now eight hundred less than heretofore!

In Ireland, where the glamouring influence Of the right honourable gentleman Prevails with magic might, ELEVEN men Have been ama.s.sed. And in the Cinque-Port towns, Where he is held in absolute veneration, His method has so quickened martial fire As to bring in--one man. O would that man Might meet my sight! [Laughter.] A Hercules, no doubt, A G.o.d-like emanation from this Act, Who with his single arm will overthrow All Buonaparte's legions ere their keels Have sc.r.a.ped one pebble of our fortless sh.o.r.e!...

Such is my motion, sir, and such my mind.

[He sits down amid cheers. The candle-snuffers go round, and Pitt rises. During the momentary pause before he speaks the House a.s.sumes an attentive stillness, in which can be heard the rustling of the trees without, a horn from an early coach, and the voice of the watch crying the hour.]

PITT

Not one on this side but appreciates Those mental gems and airy pleasantries Flashed by the honourable gentleman, Who s.h.i.+nes in them by birthright. Each device Of drollery he has laboured to outshape, [Or treasured up from others who have shaped it,]

Displays that are the conjurings of the moment, [Or mellowed and matured by sleeping on]-- Dry h.o.a.rdings in his book of commonplace, Stored without stint of toil through days and months-- He heaps into one ma.s.s, and light and fans As fuel for his flaming eloquence, Mouthed and maintained without a thought or care If germane to the theme, or not at all.

Now vain indeed it were should I a.s.say To match him in such sort. For, sir, alas, To use imagination as the ground Of chronicle, take myth and merry tale As texts for prophecy, is not my gift Being but a person primed with simple fact, Unprinked by jewelled art.--But to the thing.

The preparations of the enemy, Doggedly bent to desolate our land, Advance with a sustained activity.

They are seen, they are known, by you and by us all.

But they evince no clear-eyed tentative In furtherance of the threat, whose coming off, Ay, years may yet postpone; whereby the Act Will far outstrip him, and the thousands called Duly to join the ranks by its provisions, In process sure, if slow, will ratch the lines Of English regiments--seasoned, cool, resolved-- To glorious length and firm prepotency.

And why, then, should we dream of its repeal Ere profiting by its advantages?

Must the House listen to such wilding words As this proposal, at the very hour When the Act's gearing finds its ordered grooves And circles into full utility?

The motion of the honourable gentleman Reminds me aptly of a publican Who should, when malting, mixing, mas.h.i.+ng's past, Fermenting, barrelling, and spigoting, Quick taste the brew, and shake his sapient head, And cry in acid voice: The ale is new!

Brew old, you varlets; cast this slop away! [Cheers.]

But gravely, sir, I would conclude to-night, And, as a serious man on serious things, I now speak here.... I pledge myself to this: Unprecedented and magnificent As were our strivings in the previous war, Our efforts in the present shall transcend them, As men will learn. Such efforts are not sized By this light measuring-rule my critic here Whips from his pocket like a clerk-o'-works!...

Tasking and toilsome war's details must be, And toilsome, too, must be their criticism,-- Not in a moment's stroke extemporized.

The strange fatality that haunts the times Wherein our lot is cast, has no example.

Times are they fraught with peril, trouble, gloom; We have to mark their lourings, and to face them.

Sir, reading thus the full significance Of these big days, large though my lackings be, Can any hold of those who know my past That I, of all men, slight our safeguarding?

No: by all honour no!--Were I convinced That such could be the mind of members here, My sorrowing thereat would doubly shade The shade on England now! So I do trust All in the House will take my tendered word, And credit my deliverance here to-night, That in this vital point of watch and ward Against the threatenings from yonder coast We stand prepared; and under Providence Shall fend whatever hid or open stroke A foe may deal.

[He sits down amid loud ministerial cheers, with symptoms of great exhaustion.]

WINDHAM

The question that compels the House to-night Is not of differences in wit and wit, But if for England it be well or no To null the new-fledged Act, as one inept For setting up with speed and hot effect The red machinery of desperate war.-- Whatever it may do, or not, it stands, A statesman' raw experiment. If ill, Shall more experiments and more be tried In stress of jeopardy that stirs demand For sureness of proceeding? Must this House Exchange safe action based on practised lines For yet more ventures into risks unknown To gratify a quaint projector's whim, While enemies hang grinning round our gates To profit by mistake?

My friend who spoke Found comedy in the matter. Comical As it may be in parentage and feature, Most grave and tragic in its consequence This Act may prove. We are moving thoughtlessly, We squander precious, brief, life-saving time On idle guess-games. Fail the measure must, Nay, failed it has already; and should rouse Resolve in its progenitor himself To move for its repeal! [Cheers.]

WHITBREAD

I rise but to subjoin a phrase or two To those of my right honourable friend.

I, too, am one who reads the present pinch As pa.s.sing all our risks heretofore.

For why? Our bold and reckless enemy, Relaxing not his plans, has treasured time To ma.s.s his monstrous force on all the coigns From which our coast is close a.s.sailable.

Ay, even afloat his concentrations work: Two vast united squadrons of his sail Move at this moment viewless on the seas.-- Their whereabouts, untraced, unguessable, Will not be known to us till some black blow Be dealt by them in some undreamt-of quarter To knell our rule.

That we are reasonably enfenced therefrom By such an Act is but a madman's dream....

A commonwealth so situate cries aloud For more, far mightier, measures! End an Act In Heaven's name, then, which only can obstruct The fabrication of more trusty tackle For building up an army! [Cheers.]

BATHURST

Sir, the point To any sober mind is bright as noon; Whether the Act should have befitting trial Or be blasphemed at sight. I firmly hold The latter loud iniquity.--One task Is theirs who would inter this corpse-cold Act-- [So said]--to bring to birth a subst.i.tute!

Sir, they have none; they have given no thought to one, And this their deeds incautiously disclose Their cloaked intention and most secret aim!

With them the question is not how to frame A finer trick to trounce intrusive foes, But who shall be the future ministers To whom such trick against intrusive foes, Whatever it may prove, shall be entrusted!

They even ask the country gentlemen To join them in this job. But, G.o.d be praised, Those gentlemen are sound, and of repute; Their names, their attainments, and their blood, [Ironical Opposition cheers.]

Safeguard them from an onslaught on an Act For ends so sinister and palpable! [Cheers and jeerings.]

FULLER

I disapprove of censures of the Act.-- All who would entertain such hostile thought Would swear that black is white, that night is day.

No honest man will join a reckless crew Who'd overthrow their country for their gain! [Laughter.]

TIERNEY

It is inc.u.mbent on me to declare In the last speaker's face my censure, based On grounds most clear and const.i.tutional.-- An Act it is that studies to create A standing army, large and permanent; Which kind of force has ever been beheld With jealous-eyed disfavour in this House.

It makes for sure oppression, binding men To serve for less than service proves it worth Conditioned by no hampering penalty.

For these and late-spoke reasons, then, I say, Let not the Act deface the statute-book, But blot it out forthwith. [Hear, hear.]