I am damn glad we are to be off. Pottering about her pinned to petticoat tails--it does one no good, but blasted harm! ANOTHER GUEST The ball cannot go on, can it? Didn't the Duke know the French were so near? If he did, how could he let us run risks so coolly? LADY HAMILTON DALRYMPLE [to partner] A deep concern weights those responsible Who gather in the alcove. Wellington Affects a cheerfulness in outward port, But cannot rout his real anxiety! [The DUCHESS OF RICHMOND goes to her husband.] DUCHESS Ought I to stop the ball? It hardly seems right to let it continue if all be true. RICHMOND I have put that very question to Wellington, my dear. He says that we need not hurry off the guests. The men have to assemble some time before the officers, who can stay on here a little longer without inconvenience; and he would prefer that they should, not to create a panic in the city, where the friends and spies of Napoleon are all agog for some such thing, which they would instantly communicate to him to take advantage of. DUCHESS Is it safe to stay on? Should we not be thinking about getting the children away? RICHMOND There's no hurry at all, even if Bonaparte were really sure to enter. But he's never going to set foot in Brussels--don't you imagine it for a moment. DUCHESS [anxiously] I hope not. But I wish we had never brought them here! RICHMOND It is too late, my dear, to wish that now. Don't be flurried; make the people go on dancing. [The DUCHESS returns to her guests. The DUKE rejoins WELLINGTON, BRUNSWICK, MUFFLING, and the PRINCE OF ORANGE in the alcove.] WELLINGTON We need not be astride till five o'clock If all the men are marshalled well ahead. The Brussels citizens must not suppose They stand in serious peril... He, I think, Directs his main attack mistakenly; It should gave been through Mons, not Charleroi. MUFFLING The Austrian armies, and the Russian too, Will show nowhere in this. The thing that's done, Be it a historied feat or nine days' fizz, Will be done long before they join us here. WELLINGTON Yes, faith; and 'tis pity. But, by God, Blücher, I think, and I can make a shift To do the business without troubling 'em! Though I've an infamous army, that's the truth,-- Weak, and but ill-equipped,--and what's as bad, A damned unpractised staff! MUFFLING We'll hope for luck. Blücher concentrates certainly by now Near Ligny, as he says in his dispatch. Your Grace, I glean, will mass at Quatre-Bras? WELLINGTON Ay, now we are sure this move on Charleroi Is no mere feint. Though I had meant Nivelles. Have ye a good map, Richmond, near at hand? RICHMOND In the next room there's one. [Exit RICHMOND.]