The Dynasts. Томас Харди

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СКАЧАТЬ Review proceeds in dumb show; and the din of many bands

       mingles with the cheers. The turf behind the saluting-point

       is crowded with carriages and spectators on foot.]

      A SPECTATOR

       And you've come to the sight, like the King and myself? Well, one

       fool makes many. What a mampus o' folk it is here to-day! And what

       a time we do live in, between wars and wassailings, the goblin o'

       Boney, and King George in flesh and blood!

      SECOND SPECTATOR

       Yes. I wonder King George is let venture down on this coast, where

       he might be snapped up in a moment like a minney by a her'n, so near

       as we be to the field of Boney's vagaries! Begad, he's as like to

       land here as anywhere. Gloucester Lodge could be surrounded, and

       George and Charlotte carried off before he could put on his hat, or

       she her red cloak and pattens!

      THIRD SPECTATOR

       'Twould be so such joke to kidnap 'em as you think. Look at the

       frigates down there. Every night they are drawn up in a line

       across the mouth of the Bay, almost touching each other; and

       ashore a double line of sentinels, well primed with beer and

       ammunition, one at the water's edge and the other on the

       Esplanade, stretch along the whole front. Then close to the

       Lodge a guard is mounted after eight o'clock; there be pickets

       on all the hills; at the Harbour mouth is a battery of twenty

       four-pounders; and over-right 'em a dozen six-pounders, and

       several howitzers. And next look at the size of the camp of

       horse and foot up here.

      FIRST SPECTATOR

       Everybody however was fairly gallied this week when the King went

       out yachting, meaning to be back for the theatre; and the eight or

       nine o'clock came, and never a sign of him. I don't know when 'a

       did land; but 'twas said by all that it was a foolhardy pleasure

       to take.

      FOURTH SPECTATOR

       He's a very obstinate and comical old gentleman; and by all account

       'a wouldn't make port when asked to.

      SECOND SPECTATOR

       Lard, Lard, if 'a were nabbed, it wouldn't make a deal of difference!

       We should have nobody to zing, and play singlestick to, and grin at

       through horse-collars, that's true. And nobody to sign our few

       documents. But we should rub along some way, goodnow.

      FIRST SPECTATOR

       Step up on this barrow; you can see better. The troopers now passing

       are the York Hussars—foreigners to a man, except the officers—the

       same regiment the two young Germans belonged to who were shot four

       years ago. Now come the Light Dragoons; what a time they take to

       get all past! Well, well! this day will be recorded in history.

      SECOND SPECTATOR

       Or another soon to follow it! [He gazes over the Channel.] There's

       not a speck of an enemy upon that shiny water yet; but the Brest

       fleet is zaid to have put to sea, to act in concert with the army

       crossing from Boulogne; and if so the French will soon be here; when

       God save us all! I've took to drinking neat, for, say I, one may

       as well have innerds burnt out as shot out, and 'tis a good deal

       pleasanter for the man that owns 'em. They say that a cannon-ball

       knocked poor Jim Popple's maw right up into the futtock-shrouds at

       the Nile, where 'a hung like a nightcap out to dry. Much good to

       him his obeying his old mother's wish and refusing his allowance

       o' rum!

       [The bands play and the Review continues till past eleven o'clock.

       Then follows a sham fight. At noon precisely the royal carriages

       draw off the ground into the highway that leads down to the town

       and Gloucester Lodge, followed by other equipages in such numbers

       that the road is blocked. A multitude comes after on foot.

       Presently the vehicles manage to proceed to the watering-place, and

       the troops march away to the various camps as a sea-mist cloaks the

       perspective.]

      SCENE V

       THE SAME. RAINBARROW'S BEACON, EGDON HEATH

       [Night in mid-August of the same summer. A lofty ridge of

       heathland reveals itself dimly, terminating in an abrupt slope,

       at the summit of which are three tumuli. On the sheltered side

       of the most prominent of these stands a hut of turves with a

       brick chimney. In front are two ricks of fuel, one of heather

       and furze for quick ignition, the other of wood, for slow burning.

       Something in the feel of the darkness and in the personality of

       the spot imparts a sense of uninterrupted space around, the view

       by day extending from the cliffs of the Isle of Wight eastward

       to Blackdon Hill by Deadman's Bay westward, and south across the

       Valley of the Froom to the ridge that screens the Channel.

       Two men with pikes loom up, on duty as beacon-keepers beside the

       ricks.]

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