Part 3 - Act 3 - Scene 2. The Same. The City And The Battlefield

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_ PART THIRD. ACT THIRD. SCENE II.

[Leipzig is viewed in aerial perspective from a position above the south suburbs, and reveals itself as standing in a plain, with rivers and marshes on the west, north, and south of it, and higher ground to the east and south-east.

At this date it is somewhat in she shape of the letter D, the straight part of which is the river Pleisse. Except as to this side it is surrounded by armies--the inner horseshoe of them being the French defending the city; the outer horseshoe being the Allies about to attack it.

Far over the city--as it were at the top of the D--at Lindenthal, we see MARMONT stationed to meet BLUCHER when he arrives on that side. To the right of him is NEY, and further off to the right, on heights eastward, MACDONALD. Then round the curve towards the south in order, AUGEREAU, LAURISTON (behind whom is NAPOLEON himself and the reserve of Guards), VICTOR (at Wachau), and PONIATOWSKI, near the Pleisse River at the bottom of the D. Near him are the cavalry of KELLERMANN and MILHAUD, and in the same direction MURAT with his, covering the great avenues of approach on the south.

Outside all these stands SCHWARZENBERG'S army, of which, opposed to MACDONALD and LAURISTON, are KLEINAU'S Austrians and ZIETEN'S Prussians, covered on the flank by Cossacks under PLATOFF. Opposed to VICTOR and PONIATOWSKI are MEERFELDT and Hesse-Homburg's Austrians, WITTGENSTEIN'S Russians, KLEIST'S Prussians, GUILAY'S Austrians, with LICHTENSTEIN'S and THIELMANN'S light troops: thus reaching round across the Elster into the morass on our near left--the lower point of the D.]

SEMICHORUS I OF RUMOURS (aerial music)

This is the combat of Napoleon's hope,
But not of his assurance! Shrunk in power
He broods beneath October's clammy cope,
While hemming hordes wax denser every hour.

SEMICHORUS II

He knows, he knows that though in equal fight
He stand s heretofore the matched of none,
A feeble skill is propped by numbers' might,
And now three hosts close round to crush out one!

DUMB SHOW

The Leipzig clocks imperturbably strike nine, and the battle which is to decide the fate of Europe, and perhaps the world, begins with three booms from the line of the allies. They are the signal for a general cannonade of devastating intensity.

So massive is the contest that we soon fail to individualize the combatants as beings, and can only observe them as amorphous drifts, clouds, and waves of conscious atoms, surging and rolling together; can only particularize them by race, tribe, and language. Nationalities from the uttermost parts of Asia here meet those from the Atlantic edge of Europe for the first and last time. By noon the sound becomes a loud droning, uninterrupted and breve-like, as from the pedal of an organ kept continuously down.

CHORUS OF RUMOURS

Now triple battle beats about the town,
And now contracts the huge elastic ring
Of fighting flesh, as those within go down,
Or spreads, as those without show faltering!

It becomes apparent that the French have a particular intention, the Allies only a general one. That of the French is to break through the enemy's centre and surround his right. To this end NAPOLEON launches fresh columns, and simultaneously OUDINOT supports VICTOR against EUGENE OF WURTEMBERG'S right, while on the other side of him the cavalry of MILHAUD and KELLERMAN prepares to charge. NAPOLEON'S combination is successful, and drives back EUGENE. Meanwhile SCHWARZENBERG is stuck fast, useless in the marshes between the Pleisse and the Elster.

By three o'clock the Allied centre, which has held out against the assaults of the French right and left, is broken through by cavalry under MURAT, LATOUR-MAUBOURG, and KELLERMANN.

The bells of Leipzig ring.

CHORUS OF THE PITIES

Those chimings, ill-advised and premature!
Who knows if such vast valour will endure?

The Austro-Russians are withdrawn from the marshes by SCHWARZENBERG. But the French cavalry also get entangled in the swamps, and simultaneously MARMONT is beaten at Mockern.

Meanwhile NEY, to the north of Leipzig, having heard the battle raging southward, leaves his position to assist it. He has nearly arrived when he hears BLUCHER attacking at the point he came from, and sends back some of his divisions.

BERTRAND has kept open the west road to Lindenau and the Rhine, the only French line of retreat.

Evening finds the battle a drawn one. With the nightfall three blank shots reverberate hollowly.

SEMICHORUS I OF RUMOURS

They sound to say that, for this moaning night,
As Nature sleeps, so too shall sleep the fight;
Neither the victor.

SEMICHORUS II

But, for France and him,
Half-won is losing!

CHORUS

Yea, his hopes drop dim,
Since nothing less than victory to-day
Had saved a cause whose ruin is delay!

The night gets thicker and no more is seen. _

Read next: Part 3: Act 3: Scene 3. The Same, From The Tower Of The Pleissenburg

Read previous: Part 3: Act 3: Scene 1. Leipzig. Napoleon's Quarters In The Reudnitz Suburb

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