You cannot gaze into this glass at night, But all your race will gibber at your back! Look--in the gloom--that shade is Mad Johanna, And yonder Thing, that moves so deathly slow, Is the pale sovereign in his crystal coffin.
No! 'Tis the radiant pallor of my Father!
Yonder, recoiling, Rudolph and his lions!
The clash of steeds and weapons! 'Tis the Consul!
Lo! in a noisome crypt one fashions gold.
Aha! Here's Charles the Fifth, with hair cropped close, Dying for having sought self-burial!
The Escurial! Grisly phantoms And frowning walls!
Ah, hither! smiling visions: Compiègne and Malmaison!
Roll, drums of Arcola, and drown his voice!
[_Twisting his wrist loose, but still holding the chandelier._]
[_Hurling the chandelier into the mirror._]
'Tis shattered! Not one remains! Not one!
[_Pointing at the_ DUKE _with a terrible gesture._]
No, no! It is not I! Not I!--My Father!--Help!
[Illustration: decoration of five torches with a hand for the flame.]
_The Park at Schönbrunn. Ruins of a Roman Arch in the centre, in front of which is a fountain. Entrances on the right and on the left. Towards the right, in front, is a pile of stones, parts of columns, a head of Neptune, a broken urn, the whole covered with ivy and shrubs. Orange-trees in boxes, bearing fruit and blossom, are dotted about, with lamps hanging in their foliage. At the rise of the curtain a gay throng of_ LORDS _and_ LADIES _in dominos and other disguises are moving about the stage._
All is uncertain, tremulous, and vague-- Our hearts, the music, moonbeams, and the water.
And so, dear Attaché of the French Embassy, Here I've contrived half-darkness and half-silence, And yonder in the music and the light The ball--
Dear friend, I'm prouder of this little ball, Of having mingled all these courtly perfumes With the wild odors of the midnight woods, Than ever of the Congress of Verona. That is the vestiary and the way out So that in leaving you may find at once Your Polish mantle or your overcoat. Lastly, the theatre which I've contrived On yonder bowling-green, near Cupid's fountain, Where, in a set-piece made of natural foliage, Some princely amateurs will play "Michel And"--I don't know--some dainty little piece By a French author: Eugène--what's-his-name?