If that be,
You are no more a European power.--
I would point out to him that my resources
Are not confined to these my musters here;
My prisoners of war, in route for France,
Will see some marks of my resources there!
Two hundred thousand volunteers, right fit,
Will join my standards at a single nod,
And in six weeks prove soldiers to the bone,
Whilst you recruits, compulsion's scavengings,
Scarce weld to warriors after toilsome years.

But I want nothing on this Continent:
The English only are my enemies.
Ships, colonies, and commerce I desire,
Yea, therewith to advantage you as me.
Let me then charge your Emperor, my brother,
To turn his feet the shortest way to peace.--
All states must have an end, the weak, the strong;
Ay; even may fall the dynasty of Lorraine!

[The filing past and laying down of arms by the Austrian army
continues with monotonous regularity, as if it would never end.]

NAPOLEON [in a murmur, after a while]

Well, what cares England! She has won her game;
I have unlearnt to threaten her from Boulogne....

Her gold it is that forms the weft of this
Fair tapestry of armies marshalled here!
Likewise of Russia's drawing steadily nigh.
But they may see what these see, by and by.

SPIRIT OF THE YEARS

So let him speak, the while we clearly sight him
Moved like a figure on a lantern-slide.
Which, much amazing uninitiate eyes,
The all-compelling crystal pane but drags
Wither the showman wills.

SPIRIT IRONIC

And yet, my friend,
The Will itself might smile at this collapse
Of Austria's men-at-arms, so drolly done;
Even as, in your phantasmagoric show,
The deft manipulator of the slide
Might smile at his own art.

CHORUS OF THE YEARS [aerial music]

Ah, no: ah, no!
It is impassible as glacial snow.--
Within the Great Unshaken
These painted shapes awaken
A lesser thrill than doth the gentle lave
Of yonder bank by Danube's wandering wave
Within the Schwarzwald heights that give it flow!

SPIRIT OF THE PITIES

But O, the intolerable antilogy
Of making figments feel!

SPIRIT IRONIC

Logic's in that.
It does not, I must own, quite play the game.

CHORUS OF IRONIC SPIRITS [aerial music]

And this day wi