The Piccolomini: A Play

SCENE IV.

      To them enter BUTLER from a second table.

   BUTLER.
                 Don't disturb yourselves;
   Field-marshal, I have understood you perfectly.
   Good luck be to the scheme; and as to me,
                  [With an air of mystery.
   You may depend upon me.

   ILLO (with vivacity).
                May we, Butler?

   BUTLER.
   With or without the clause, all one to me!
   You understand me! My fidelity
   The duke may put to any proof—I'm with him
   Tell him so! I'm the emperor's officer,
   As long as 'tis his pleasure to remain
   The emperor's general! and Friedland's servant,
   As soon as it shall please him to become
   His own lord.

   TERZKY.
           You would make a good exchange.
   No stern economist, no Ferdinand,
   Is he to whom you plight your services.

   BUTLER (with a haughty look).
   I do not put up my fidelity
   To sale, Count Terzky! Half a year ago
   I would not have advised you to have made me
   An overture to that, to which I now
   Offer myself of my own free accord.
   But that is past! and to the duke, field-marshal,
   I bring myself, together with my regiment.
   And mark you, 'tis my humor to believe,
   The example which I give will not remain
   Without an influence.

   ILLO.
               Who is ignorant,
   That the whole army looks to Colonel Butler
   As to a light that moves before them?

   BUTLER.
                       Ay?
   Then I repent me not of that fidelity
   Which for the length of forty years I held,
   If in my sixtieth year my good old name
   Can purchase for me a revenge so full.
   Start not at what I say, sir generals!
   My real motives—they concern not you.
   And you yourselves, I trust, could not expect
   That this your game had crooked my judgment—or
   That fickleness, quick blood, or such like cause,
   Has driven the old man from the track of honor,
   Which he so long had trodden. Come, my friends!
   I'm not thereto determined with less firmness,
   Because I know and have looked steadily
   At that on which I have determined.

   ILLO.
                      Say,
   And speak roundly, what are we to deem you?

   BUTLER.
   A friend! I give you here my hand! I'm yours
   With all I have. Not only men, but money
   Will the duke want. Go, tell him, sirs!
   I've earned and laid up somewhat in his service,
   I lend it him; and is he my survivor,
   It has been already long ago bequeathed to him;
   He is my heir. For me, I stand alone
   Here in the world; naught know I of the feeling
   That binds the husband to a wife and children.
   My name dies with me, my existence ends.

   ILLO.
   'Tis not your money that he needs—a heart
   Like yours weighs tons of gold down, weighs down millions!

   BUTLER.
   I came a simple soldier's boy from Ireland
   To Prague—and with a master, whom I buried.
   From lowest stable duty I climbed up,
   Such was the fate of war, to this high rank,
   The plaything of a whimsical good fortune.
   And Wallenstein too is a child of luck:
   I love a fortune that is like my own.

   ILLO.
   All powerful souls have kindred with each other.

   BUTLER.
   This is an awful moment! to the brave,
   To the determined, an auspicious moment.
   The Prince of Weimar arms, upon the Maine,
   To found a mighty dukedom. He of Halberstadt,
   That Mansfeldt, wanted but a longer life
   To have marked out with his good sword a lordship
   That should reward his courage. Who of these
   Equals our Friedland? There is nothing, nothing
   So high, but he may set the ladder to it!

   TERZKY.
   That's spoken like a man!

   BUTLER.
   Do you secure the Spaniard and Italian—
   I'll be your warrant for the Scotchman Lesly.
   Come to the company!

   TERZKY.
   Where is the master of the cellar? Ho!
   Let the best wines come up. Ho! cheerly, boy!
   Luck comes to-day, so give her hearty welcome.

              [Exeunt, each to his table.