the Angel of the Lord to us;
We'll march with you to death or victory! [Shouts.]

[At this moment a howling dog crosses in front of them with a
cockade tied to its tail. The soldiery of both sides laugh
loudly.

NAPOLEON forms both bodies of troops into one column. Peasantry
run up with buckets of sour wine and a single glass; NAPOLEON
takes his turn with the rank and file in drinking from it. He
bids the whole column follow him to Grenoble and Paris. Exeunt
soldiers headed by NAPOLEON. The scene shuts.]

SCENE IV

SCHONBRUNN

[The gardens of the Palace. Fountains and statuary are seen
around, and the Gloriette colonnade rising against the sky on
a hill behind.

The ex-EMPRESS MARIE LOUISE is discovered walking up and down.
Accompanying her is the KING OF ROME--now a blue-eye, fair-haired
child--in the charge of the COUNTESS OF MONTESQUIOU. Close by is
COUNT NEIPPERG, and at a little distance MENEVAL, her attendant
and Napoleon's adherent.

The EMPEROR FRANCIS and METTERNICH enter at the other end of the
parterre.]

MARIE LOUISE [with a start]

Here are the Emperor and Prince Metternich.
Wrote you as I directed?

NEIPPERG

Promptly so.
I said your Majesty had not part
In this mad move of your Imperial spouse,
And made yourself a ward of the Allies;
Adding, that you had vowed irrevocably
To enter France no more.

MARIE LOUISE

Your worthy zeal
Has been a trifle swift. My meaning stretched
Not quite so far as that.... And yet--and yet
It matters little. Nothing matters much!

[The EMPEROR and METTERNICH come forward. NEIPPERG retires.]

FRANCIS

My daughter, you did not a whit too soon
Voice your repudiation. Have you seen
What the allies have papered Europe with?

MARIE LOUISE

I have seen nothing.

FRANCIS

Please you read it, Prince.

METTERNICH [taking out a paper]

"The Powers assembled at the Congress here
Owe it to their own troths and dignities,
And to the furtherance of social order,
To make a solemn Declaration, thus:
By breaking the convention as to Elba,
Napoleon Bonaparte forthwith destroys
His only legal title to exist,
And as a consequence has hurled himself
Beyond the pale of civil intercourse.
Disturber of the tranquillity of the world,
There can be neither p