CHARLES. When I, was but a boy-it was my darling thought to live like him, like him to die-(with suppressed grief.) It was a boyish thought!
GRIMM. It was, indeed.
CHARLES. There was a time-(pressing his hat down upon his face). I would be alone, comrades.
SCHWARZ. Moor! Moor! Why, what the deuce! How his color changes.
GRIMM. By all the devils! What ails him? Is he ill?
CHARLES. There was a time when I could not have slept had I forgotten my evening prayers.
GRIMM. Are you beside yourself? Would you let the remembrances of your boyish years school you now?
CHARLES (lays his head upon the breast of GRIMM). Brother! Brother!
GRIMM. Come! Don't play the child-I pray you
CHARLES. Oh that I were-that I were again a child!
GRIMM. Fie! fie!
SCHWARZ. Cheer up! Behold this smiling landscape-this delicious evening!
CHARLES. Yes, friends, this world is very lovely-
SCHWARZ. Come, now, that was well said.
CHARLES. This earth so glorious!-
GRIMM. Right-right-I love to hear you talk thus.
CHARLES. (sinking back). And I so hideous in' this lovely world- a monster on this glorious earth!
GRIMM. Oh dear! oh dear!
CHARLES. My innocence! give me back my innocence! Behold, every living thing is gone forth to bask in the cheering rays of the vernal sun-why must I alone inhale the torments of hell out of the joys of heaven? All are so happy, all so united in brotherly love, by the spirit of peace! The whole world one family, and one Father above-but He not my father! I alone the outcast, I alone rejected from the ranks of the blessed-the sweet name of child is not for me-never for me the soul-thrilling glance of her I love-never, never the bosom friend's embrace-(starting back wildly)-surrounded by murderers-hemmed in by hissing vipers- riveted to vice with iron fetters-whirling headlong on the frail reed of sin to the gulf of perdition-amid the blooming flowers of a glad world, a howling Abaddon !
SCHWARZ (to the others). How strange! I never saw him thus before.
CHARLES (with melancholy). Oh, that I might return again to my mother's womb. That I might be born a beggar! I should desire no more,-no more, oh heaven!-but that I might be like one of those poor laborers! Oh, I would toil till the blood streamed down my temples-to buy myself the luxury of one guiltless slumber-the blessedness of a single tear.
GRIMM (to the others). A little patience-the paroxysm is nearly over.
CHARLES. There was a time when my tears flowed so freely. Oh, those days of peace! Dear home of my fathers-ye verdant halcyon vales! O all ye Elysian scenes of my childhood!-will you never return?-will your delicious breezes never cool my burning bosom? Mourn with me, Nature, mourn! They will never return! never will their delicious breezes cool my burning bosom! They are gone! gone! irrevocably gone!
Enter SCHWEITZER with water in his hat.
SCHWEITZER (offering him water in his hat). Drink, captain; here is plenty of water, and cold as ice.
SCHWARZ. You are bleeding! What have you been doing?
SCHWEITZER. A bit of a freak, you fool, which had well-nigh cost me two legs and a neck. As I was frolicking along the steep sandbanks of the river, plump, in a moment, the whole concern slid from under me, and I after it, some ten fathoms deep;-there I lay, and, as I was recovering my five senses, lo and behold, the most sparkling water in the gravel! Not so much amiss this time, said I to myself, for the caper I have cut. The captain will be sure to relish a drink.
CHARLES (returns him the hat and wipes his face). But you are covered with mud, Schweitzer, and we can't see the scar which the Bohemian horseman marked on your forehead-your water was good, Schweitzer-and those scars become you well.
SCHWEITZER. Bah! There's room for a score or two more yet.
CHARLES. Yes, boys-it was a hot day's work-and only one man lost. Poor Roller! he died a noble death. A marble monument would be erected to his memory had he died in any other cause than mine. Let this suffice. (He wipes the tears from his eyes.) How many, did you say, of the enemy were left on the field?
SCHWEITZER. A hundred and sixty huzzars, ninety-three dragoons, some forty chasseurs-in all about three hundred.
CHARLES. Three hundred for one! Every one of you has a claim upon this head. (He bares his head.) By this uplifted dagger! As my Soul liveth, I will never forsake you!
SCHWEITZER. Swear not! You do not know but you may yet be happy, and repent your oath.
CHARLES. By the ashes of my Roller! I will never forsake you.
Enter KOSINSKY.
KOSINSKY (aside). Hereabouts, they say, I shall find him. Ha! What faces are these? Should they be-if these-they must be the men! Yes, 'tis they,'tis they! I will accost them.
SCHWARZ. Take heed! Who goes there?
KOSINSKY. Pardon, sirs. I know not whether I am going right or wrong.
CHARLES. Suppose right, whom do you take us to be?
KOSINSKY. Men!
SCHWEITZER. I wonder, captain, whether we have given any proof of that?
KOSINSKY. I am in search of men who can look death in the face, and let danger play around then like a tamed snake; who prize liberty above life or honor; whose very names, hailed by the poor and the oppressed, appal the boldest, and make tyrants tremble.
SCHWEITZER (to the Captain). I like that fellow. Hark ye, friend! You have found your men.
KOSINSKY. So I should think, and I hope soon to find them brothers. You can direct me to the man I am looking for. 'Tis your captain, the great Count von Moor.
SCHWEITZER (taking him warmly by the hand). There's a good lad. You and I must be chums.
CHARLES (coming nearer). Do you know the captain?
KOSINSKY. Thou art he!-in those features-that air-who can look at thee, and doubt it? (Looks earnestly at him for some time). I have always wished to see the man with the annihilating look, as he sat on the ruins of Carthage.* That wish is realized.
*[Alluding to Caius Marius. See Plutarch's Lives.]
SCHWEITZER. A mettlesome fellow!-
CHARLES. And what brings you to me?
KOSINSKY. Oh, captain! my more than cruel fate. I have suffered shipwrecked on the stormy ocean of the world; I have seen all my fondest hopes perish; and nought remains to me but a remembrance of the bitter past, which would drive me to madness, were I not to drown it by directing my energies to new objects.
CHARLES. Another arraignment of the ways of Providence! Proceed.
KOSINSKY. I became a soldier. Misfortune still followed me in the army. I made a venture to the Indies, and my ship was shivered on the rocks-nothing but frustrated hopes! At last, I heard tell far and wide of your valiant deeds, incendiarisms, as they called them, and I came straightway hither, a distance of thirty leagues, firmly resolved to serve under you, if you will deign to accept my services. I entreat thee, noble captain, refuse me not!
SCHWEITZER (with a leap into the air). Hurrah! Hurrah! Our Roller replaced ten hundred-fold! An out-and-out brother cut-throat for our troop.
CHARLES. What is your name?
KOSINSKY. Kosinsky.
CHARLES. What? Kosinsky! And do you know that you are but a thoughtless boy, and are embarking on the most weighty passage of your life as heedlessly as a giddy girl? You will find no playing at bowls or ninepins here, as you probably imagine.