University of Virginia Library

Scene I.

—The outskirts of a wood. Enter Otho wounded, and Marcus, meeting.
Otho.
Give me good news, or none.

Mar.
Then I'll be silent.

Otho.
Nay, man; let's have the worst.

Mar.
The day is lost.

Otho.
And many days to come! Where's the proconsul?

Mar.
Still trying the impossible,—to rally
Our routed troops. His prodigies of valor,
Example, voice, are all in vain. What folly
When we're outnumbered ten to one! You're wounded.

Otho.
Scratched a little.

Mar.
Shall I not aid you?

Otho.
No.
A little rest will serve. (Sits.)
Escape while yet
You may. Stay not for me. 'Tis my command.

Mar.
Unlucky day for Rome.

[Exit
Otho.
Was ever man
Precipitated from prosperity
Into perdition, that a woman was not
The mainspring of the mischief? Helen—Hector!
Antony—Cleopatra! Always—always,
It takes a woman, thoroughly to undo us.
Here was Octavian throned on fortune's summit!
He offends a woman—wounds her pride—and lo!
The summit is reversed—and he and all
Rome's dearly purchased power in Gaul are pitched
Into confusion! ... Here he comes! Chagrin
And desperation, writ in every feature!

(Enter with drawn sword, Octavian.)
Oct.
An utter rout! Not even my body-guard
Saved from dispersion! What a tale will this be
To tell in Rome! With every circumstance—
Norma's desertion—Adalgisa—O!
Can I endure the infamy? A province
Lost through my love-sick giddiness! An army
Sacrificed to prevent a girl's escape!
O! 'twill sound well. How like a froward boy,
Who doats upon his bane, and will possess it
At every hazard, have I borne myself.
I'll not survive my shame. (Voices.)
Ha! Voices? This
Shall put an end to a dishonored life,
And make Gaul's triumph less. Death! awful Power!
Be gracious, as self-doomed, self-blasted, thus
I rush into thy darkness!

(Kneels and puts sword to his breast.)
Otho.
(Rising and coming forward.)
Stop a moment!
Before you try that, let us hold a council
Of war about it.

Oct.
(Rising.)
Otho!

Otho.
You shall dine
Better than on cold steel.

Oct.
So well on that
I shall not crave another dinner.

Otho.
Death
Keeps a poor table.

Oct.
Nay, the best. Your only
Magnificent voluptuary he!
Wealth, beauty, grandeur—all are his purveyors
Kings and proconsuls cater for him only.
To-day the flower and splendor of my army
Are swept off in his forage. Life—what is it?
Death's scullion!

Otho.
Yet to seek him uninvited
May be to lose his hospitality.—
Give up thy coward purpose.

Oct.
Coward!

Otho.
Ay!
To fly from life at the first frown of fortune!

Oct.
Wert thou not wounded, I would smite thee now
That thou mightst slay me.

Otho.
Slay thee? Scold thee rather!
Cheer thee, man, cheer thee! Better times shall come.

Oct.
'Tis not reverse of fortune, Otho—not
This sudden outbreak and this overthrow—
Crushes all hope and makes life hideous. I
Could bear calamity, smile on disaster,
But that my own thrice execrable folly
Has brought them on my country!

Otho.
Live, and time
Shall help thee to repair the mischief.—Hark!
Voices—and of the enemy!—This way!

Oct.
'Twill cost them something ere they capture us—
Something in blood.

Otho.
Be wary. Small our chance!

[Exeunt
(Enter Gontran and Rudiger, with Soldiers.)
Gont.
(To soldiers.)
Go, scour the wood: some officers of rank,
It may be, lurk there yet. Secure all such
Alive, if possible.
[Exeunt Soldiers
Was ever rout
More sudden and complete!

Rud.
Our study now
Must be to hold what we have gained, nor let
The cheapness of the purchase mitigate
Our care to keep. This is a Druid triumph.

Gont.
That's doubtful. But for Norma's fiery words,
Her influence on the people, we had hardly
So quickly raised an army.

Rud.
But the Druids
Flocked foremost to her standard, seeing that
'Twas against Rome she raised it; and the Druids
Now must be reinstated—lifted to
Their old predominance in Gaul. If Norma
Refuse to aid in this—

Gont.
If?—

Rud.
She must die!

Gont.
Could she not sooner give thyself to death?
No questions would be asked then. But for her—
Who dare arrest her? I? Not I! My men?
Not one of them!

Rud.
You overestimate
The present bound of her authority.
Gontran, we have a party, and a large one,
Ready to throw the yoke off.

Gont.
'Tis because
She lays no yoke, her sway is what it is.
I've heard before these intimations, but
They never came to aught.

Rud.
We have a charge
Against her now will crush her. She has broken
Her vestal vow—is married.

Gont.
Ha!

Rud.
And, Gontran,
Her fall shall be thy rise. Thou shalt be chief,
Civil and military, over Gaul.
I do not grasp at phantoms: 'tis assured,
If thou'lt but lend us, at the needful time,
Thy countenance and aid.

Gont.
What you propose
Is sudden. I'll consider.

Rud.
And who, think you,
Is implicated with the priestess?

(A clashing of swords without.)
Gont.
Hark!
A skirmish! This way came the sounds! Halloo!

[Exeunt