A Series of Plays in which it is attempted to delineate The Stronger Passions of the Mind, Volume Three/The Siege Act 1
THE SIEGE.
ACT I.
SCENE I.—A Grove near the Castle, with Part of the embattled Walls seen through the Trees: Enter Baron Baurchel and Walter Baurchel, speaking as they enter.
Bar. Have done, Brother? I can bear it no longer. Hadst thou been bred in a cave of Kamschatka, instead of a mansion of civilized Europe, this savage plainness had been endurrable: but
Walt. I call a turnip a turnip, indeed, when other people say it is a peach or a nectarine; I call a pig a pig too, though they swear it is a fawn or an antelope; and they look at me, I confess somewhat suspiciously, as if they expected to see a tail peeping from under my jerkin, or fur upon my hands like a bear.—You would have me civilized, would you? It is too late in the day now, good sooth!
Bar. Yes, the time is indeed gone by. This bachelor's life has brutified thee past all redemption. Why did you not marry, Brother?
Walt. Nay, you who have met with so many goddesses and creatures of perfection in the world, why did not you marry, Brother? I who could light upon nothing better than women—mere women; every one of them too with some fault or failing belonging to her, as obvious as those white hairs that now look from under your peruke, was it any marvel that I did not marry?
Bar. Had your wife possessed as many faults as you do wrinkles on your forehead, you would have been the better for her; she would have saved thee, as I said before, from brutification.
Walt. And yours would have saved you from dupification, dotification, and as many 'fications besides, as an old sentimental, hypocritical, greedy Dulcinea, can fasten on a rhyme-writing beau, who is stepping most unwillingly, with his lace-cloaked hose, over that ungracious line of division, that marks out his grand climacteric.
Bar. Hypocritical! greedy! you don't know the delicacy of her mind: nothing can be more tender, more refined, more disinterested than her attachment to me. You don't understand her.
Walt. Perhaps I don't understand the attachments of the fair sex now-a-days. An old rich neighbour of mine informed me the other night that he is going to marry his poor friend Spendall's youngest daughter, who has actually fallen in love with him; and nothing, as he tells me, almost in your own words, can be more tender, more disinterested than her attachment. Not understanding these matters, brother, I'll freely confess to you I did not give much credit to his story; but I may be wrong nevertheless. I dare say you believe it entirely.
Bar. Ridiculous! What proofs can the fool possibly receive of her attachment?
Walt. The very same which the Countess so condescendingly vouchsafes to yourself; she accepts of his presents.
Bar. The very same! No, no, Walter Baurchel; very different. Does not every smile of her countenance, every look of her eyes, involuntarily express her partiality for me?
Walt. Say, rather, every word of her tongue.
Bar. With what generous enthusiasm did she not praise my sonnet to Sensibility.
Walt. Aye, she is generous in what costs her little; for what are two or three lies, more or less, in the week's confession between her and Father Benedict? She'll scarcely eat a mouthful of partridge the less for it.
Bar. O heartless infidel! thou would'st mistrust the fond smiles of a mother caressing her rosy-faced infant.
Walt. By my faith, so I would, Baron, if that same infant brought a diamond necklace or a gold snuff-box in his hand for every kiss she bestowed upon him. Every sonnet you write costs you, one with another, a hundred louis d'ors. If all the money vanity filches from rich poets could be transferred to the pockets of poor ones, verse-making would be as good a business as shoemaking, or any other handicraft in the country.
Bar. Hold thy unhallowed tongue! These subjects are not for thy rude handling. What is all this grumbling intended for? Tell me what you want, and have done with it; you who pique yourself so much on your plain speaking.
Walt. Well, then, I want you to let the next six sonnets you write go unpraised, and give the money that should have paid for the praising of them, six hundred louis d'ors, as I reckon, to Antonio. Is it not a shame that your own ward and heir, in love with the Lady of this castle, as you very well know, cannot urge his suit with advantage, for want of the equipage and appendages becoming his rank; while this conceited Count, by means of his disinterested mother, drains your purse so freely; and is thereby enabled to ruin the pretensions of him whom you ought to support?
Bar. His pretensions are absurd, and cannot be supported.
Walt. Why absurd? Is he not as brave, as well born, as handsome, too, as his rival?
Bar. What signify all his good qualities? In the presence of his mistress he is an idiot.
Walt. It is true, he loses all possession of himself in that situation, and therefore she despises him, while the gay confidence of the other delights her; but he should be supported and encouraged.
Bar. How encouraged? Silly fellow!
Walt. He feels too sensibly his disadvantages, and they depress him. He feels that he is not entitled to pretend to Livia, but as the probable heir of your estates; while your fantastical fondness for this woman and her son makes it a doubtful matter whether you may not be temptedBut hush! here she comes with her new-ruddled face, bearing her morning's potation of flattery with her, for a stomach of most wonderful digestion.
Enter Countess Valdemere, who, after slightly noticing Walter, runs up caressingly to the Baron.
Countess. How do you do, my dear Baron? I hope you have passed the night in sweet repose.—Yet, why do I hope it? You scarcely deserve that I should.
Bar. And why so, Belinda?
Walt. (aside, making a lip at them.) Belinda, too! Sweet innocents!
Bar. Why should you not hope that I have passed the night in repose?
Countess. Because I am vindictive, and would be revenged upon you for making me pass a very sleepless one.
Walt. (aside.) Will she make love to him before one's very face!
Bar. Then I am a culprit indeed, but an innocent one. What kept you awake?
Countess. O, those verses of yours! those dear provoking verses! they haunted me the whole night. (Baron bows.) But don't think I am going to talk to you of their beauties—those tender easy graces which they possess, in common with every thing that comes from your pen: I am going to tell you of their defects. You know well my friendship for you, my dear Baron, makes me sometimes severe.
Bar. (aside to Walt.) There now, you churl, do you call this flattery? (Aloud.) My dear Countess, your severity is kindness.
Countess. Receive it then as such; for indeed I must be very severe on the two last lines of the second stanza, which have disturbed me exceedingly. In the verses of an ordinary poet I should not find fault with them; but in a work where every thing besides is easy, harmonious, and correct, the slightest defect is conspicuous; and I must positively insist on your altering them, though you should hate me for being so fastidious.
Bar. (aside to Walt.) There now, ungracious canker-tongue, do you call this hypocrisy? (Aloud.) Madam, I kiss the rod in so fair and so friendly a hand. Nay, it is a sceptre, to which I bow with devotion.
Countess. (to Walt.) You see, good Sir, I take great liberties with the Baron, as, I doubt not, with the privilege of a brother, you yourself sometimes do.
Walt. Yes, Madam, but my way of finding fault with him is somewhat different from yours.
Countess. Yet you still find his generous spirit, I am sure, submissive to the rod.
Walt. I can't say I do, Madam.
Countess. You are unfortunate enough, perhaps, to use it unskilfully.
Walt. I am fortunate at present, however, in receiving so good a lesson from you, Madam.
Countess. O no! there is no skill with me. There are persons to whom one cannot say one-half of what one really thinks, without being deemed a flatterer.
Walt. In this, however, I have been more fortunate than you, Madam; for I have said to him what I have really thought for these forty years past, and have entirely escaped that imputation.
Bar. Aye, flattery is a sin thou wilt never do penance for. Thou can'st rub the side of a galled jade with any tender-hearted innocent in Christendom, and be mighty surprised withal that the poor devil should be so unreasonable as to winch at it.
Countess. Nay, nay, Baron! say not this of so good a brother, the shrewdness and penetration of whose mind are tempered, I am sure, with many amiable qualities.
Walt. Nay, pray, Madam, spare me, and deal with but one of us at a time. Such words will intoxicate a poor younger brother like myself, who is scarcely able to get a fowl for his pot, or new facings for his doublet, and cannot therefore be supposed to be accustomed to them.
Countess. Sir, I understand not your insinuation.
Bar. Regard him not, Madam: how should a mind, noble and delicate as your own, comprehend the unworthy thoughts of contemptible meanness?—Let me conduct you to company more deserving of you. Our fair hostess, I suppose, is already in her grotto.
Countess. No, she and my son are to follow me. But you must not go to the grotto with me now: nobody is to see it till the evening.
Bar. (offering to lead her out.) A step or two only.
Countess. O, not a step for the world.
[Exit, Baron kissing her hand as she goes off.
Bar. (turning fiercely upon Walt.) Thy unmannerly meanness is intolerable. Still hinting at the presents she receives. Greedy as thou call'st her, she never asked a gift from me in her life, excepting my picture in miniature, which could only be valuable to her as she prized the original.
Walt. Say rather, as her jeweller shall prize the goodly brilliants that surround it.
Bar. What do you mean?
Walt. What I should have told you before, if she had not interrupted us; that her trinket-broker is this very morning coming secretly, by appointment, to the castle, to treat with her for certain things of great value which she wishes to dispose of; and if your picture be not amongst them, I'll forfeit my head upon it.
Bar. It is false.
Walt. Here comes one who will confirm what I say.
Enter Dartz.
Walt. I'm glad to see you, Chevalier, for you can bear evidence to a story of mine that will not be believed else.
Dart. This is a better reason for being so than most of my friends have to give.
Walt. Is not Hovelberg, the jeweller, coming secretly to the castle to-day to confer with the Countess?
Dart. Yes, he told me so himself; and added, with a significant smile, that she had some of her old ware to dispose of.
Walt. Do you hear that, brother? It was as much as so say, she had often had such truckings with him before. Aye, you are not the only man who has thought his own dear resemblance lapped warmly behind the stomacher of his mistress, while, stripped of its jewels, it has been tossed into the drawer of some picture-monger, to be changed into a General of the last century, or one of the Grand-dukes of Austria. As for you, brother, they'll put a black velvet cap on your head, and make you a good sombre doctor of theology.
Bar. You shall not, however, make me the credulous man you think of, Walter Baurchel, with all your contrivances.
Walt. And you don't believe us then?
Bar. Are you fool enough to imagine I do?
Walt. That were foolish enough, I grant you; for though an old lover has generally a strong vein of credulity about him, the current of his belief always sets one way, carrying withered nosegays, tattered billet-doux, broken posies, and all kinds of trumpery along with it at fifteen knots by the hour.
Bar. Walter Baurchel! Walter Baurchel! flesh and blood cannot endure the offensive virulence of thy tongue.
Dart. He is indeed too severe with you, Baron; but what he tells you of Hovelberg is, nevertheless, very true.
Bar. I'll believe neither of you: you are both hatching a story to deceive me.
[Exit in anger.
Walt. (shrugging his shoulders and casting up his eyes.) What strong delusion we poor mortals may be blinded withal! That poor brother of mine believes, that the woman who refused to marry him when he was young and poor, yet smiles upon him, praises him, accepts presents from him when he is old and rich, must certainly entertain for him a most delicate, disinterested attachment; and you might as well overturn the walls of that castle with one stroke of your foot, as beat this absurdity out of him.
Dart. But you are too violent: it will not be beat out; it must be got out as it got in, with craft and discretion.
Walt. Then devil take me for attempting it! for craft I have none, and discretion is a thing
Dart. You will never have any thing to do with, I believe.
Walt. What then is to be done? If it were not that I cannot brook to see the conceited overbearing son of this Jezebel, carrying off the mistress of Antonio, I would even let the old fool sit under the tickling of her thievish fingers, and make as great a noodle of himself as he pleases.—But it must not be.—Fie upon it, Dartz! thou hast a good head for invention, while I, heaven help me! have only a good tongue for railing; do thou contrive some plot or other to prevent the disgrace of thy friend.
Dart. Plots are not easily contrived.
Walt. I know this, else I should have tried it myself.
Dart. Are you well acquainted with the Count?
Walt. I am but just come to the castle, where I have thrust myself in, though an unwelcome guest, to look after the interest of De Bertrand; and should be glad to know something more of the man who has so much intoxicated the gay Livia. What kind of a being is he?
Dart. It would puzzle me as much as the contriving of your plot to answer that question. There is nothing real in him. He is a mere package of pretences, poorly held together with sense and capacity enough, were it not for one defect in his nature, to make him all that he affects to be. He is a thing made up of seemings.
Walt. Made up of seemings!
Dart. Even so; for what in other men is reckoned the sincerest part of their character, his very self-conceit, is assumed.
Walt. And what is the defect you hinted at?
Dart. It has been whispered to me by an old school-fellow of his, that he is deplorably deficient in personal courage; which accounts for his mother's having placed him in the regiment of a superannuated General, and also, for the many complaints he makes of the inactivity of his commander. It is a whisper I am inclined to credit; and, if we must have a plot, it shall hinge upon this.
Walt. My dear fellow! nothing can be better. Give it a turn or two in thy brains, and I'll warrant thou drawest it out again, shaped into an admirable plot. Direct all thyself, and I'll work under thee as a journeyman conspirator; for, as I said before, I have a ready tongue, but a head of no invention.
Dart. We must speak of this another time. See who approaches.
Walt. Ha! the man we are speaking of, and the deluded Livia. By my faith he has a specious appearance! and the young fool looks at him too, as she would not look at a worthier man, whose merit might be tarnished with a few grains of modesty.
Enter Valdemere and Livia, followed by Jeanette carrying a basket filled with fiowers.
Dart. (to Liv.) Permit me, Madam, to pay you my profound homage.
Liv. You are welcome here, Chevalier: what accident procures me this pleasure? (aside to Count.) He'll make one more at our midnight revel in the grotto.
Vald. (aside with some chagrin.) Are there not enow of us?
Dart. Being in this part of the country on military duty, I could not resist the pleasure of paying my respects at the castle: and I honestly confess I had a secondary motive for my visit, expecting to find amongst your guests, my old friend and school-fellow Antonio.
Liv. Baron de Bertrand, you mean. He was here yesterday, but I really forget whether he went away or remained in the evening. (Affecting to yawn.) Is he with us, or not, Count?
Walt. (aside to Dart.) Meet me by-and-by in my chamber. My tongue is unruly, and I had better go while I can keep it between my teeth.
[Exit.
Liv. Does not his amiable relation there, who steals from us so quietly, know where he is?
Vald. If you are in quest of your friend, Chevalier, had you not better enquire at some of the peasants' houses in the neighbourhood? There may be some beauty in the village, perhaps, whose august presence a timid man may venture to approach, particularly if her charms should be somewhat concealed behind the friendly flax of her distaff.
Dart. Pardon me, Count; I thought my friend had aspired to a beauty, whose charms would have pleased him, indeed, behind the flax of a distaff but will not, I trust, entirely intimidate him from the more brilliant situation in which fortune has placed them. Aye; that glance in your eye, and that colour in your cheek, charming Livia, tell me, I am right.
Liv. They speak at random then; for it would puzzle a much wiser head than I wear on my shoulders to say what are his pretensions. He visits me, it is true, but suddenly takes his leave again, and the very next day, perhaps, as suddenly returns.
Vald. Like poor puss with roasted chesnuts before her, who draws back her burnt paw every time she attempts them, but will not give up the attack. He may, however, after some more of those hasty visits, find courage for it at last.
Dart. There is one attack, however, for which he never lacks courage, when the enemies of his country are before him.
Vald. True, he is brave in the field, but he is fortunate also. He serves under an active commander, while I waste my ardour in listless inactivity.
Dart. Cheer up then, noble Count, I have good news to tell you upon this score.
Vald. On this score! Is any change to take place? (In a feeble voice.)
Dart. (after a pause.) You are too well bred to be impatient for an answer.
Vald. O no; you mistake me; I am very impatient; I am on fire to hear it.
Dart. Expand then your doughty breast at thoughts of the glorious fields that are before you: your old General is set aside, and the most enterprising man in the service, Counthimself is now your Commander. (After a momentary pause, and eyeing him keenly.) Silent joy, they say, is most sincere; you are, I perceive, considerately and profoundly glad.
Vald. (assuming suddenly great animation.) O, immeasurably so. Great news indeed!—Strange—I mean very admirable news, if one could be sure it were true.
Dart. True! Who doubts what delights him?
Vald. I thought the regiment was promised to another person; I was not prepared to hear it.
Dart. So it appeared.
Vald. But I am delighted— I can't express it:—I am glad to a folly. Tol de rol—tol de rol—
(Singing and skipping about affectedly.)
Liv. Cruel creature! to sing at what, perhaps, will make others weep.
Vald. Weep!—No, I don't weep. I am happy to a folly, but I don't weep. (Skipping about again.) Tol lol de rol!—Plague take these stones! this ground is abominably rough.
Dart. Fie upon it! any ground is smooth enough for a happy man to skip upon.
Liv. You smile, Dartz; your news is of your own invention.
Dart. Not absolutely, Madam; there was such a rumour.
Vald. (eagerly.) A rumour! only a rumour! Why did you say it was true?
Dart. To give you a moment's pleasure, Valdemere. If you have enjoyed it, you are a gainer; and the disappointment, I hope, will not break your heart.
Vald. It is cruel indeed. But who can feel disappointment in this fair presence? (Bowing to Liv.) Let us go to the grotto, charming Livia; we waste our time here with folly.—Give me thy basket, child, (to Jean.) I'll dispose of every chaplet it contains to admiration. I'll hang them all up with mine own hand.
Liv. Don't be so very active: you positively shan't follow me to the grotto: I told you so before.
Vald. Positive is a word of no positive meaning when it enforces what we dislike. However, since you forbid it, I will not follow you; I'll go by your side, which is far better, and support your fair hand on my arm. (Putting Livia's arm in his with conceited confidence.)
Liv. What a sophistical explanation of my words! a heretical theologian is a joke to you.
Vald. (casting a triumphant look behind him to Dartz, as he leads her off.) Good morning, Chevalier, you go in quest of your friend, I suppose. Pray tell him to take courage, and be less diffident of his own good parts, and he may at last be promoted, perhaps, to the good graces of his Quarter-master's daughter.
Dart. Nobody at least, who sees Count Valdemere in his present situation, will think of recommending modesty to him.
[Exeunt Vald. and Liv. followed by Jean.
Dart. Impudent puppy! his triumph shall be short. Blind woman! are flattery and impudence so necessary in gaining your favour, that all other qualities, without them, are annihilated? He shall this very night pay dearly for his presumption.[Exit.