Page:Wallenstein, a drama in 2 parts - Schiller (tr. Coleridge) (1800).djvu/33

Rh Would pare the soldier's bread, and cross his reckoning!

My life long will it anger me to think, How when I went to court seven years ago, To see about new horses for our regiment, How from one antichamber to another They dragg'd me on, and left me by the hour To kick my heels among a croud of simpering, Feast-fatten'd slaves, as if I had come thither A mendicant suitor for the crumbs of favor That fall beneath their tables. And, at last, Whom should they send me but a Capuchin! Straight I began to muster up my sins For absolution—but no such luck for me! This was the man, this Capuchin, with whom I was to treat concerning th' army horses. And I was forc'd at last to quit the field, The business unaccomplish'd. Afterwards The Duke procur'd me in three days, what I Could not obtain in thirty at Vienna.

Yes, yes! your travelling bills soon found their way to us: Too well I know we have still accounts to settle.

War is violent trade; one cannot always Finish one's work by soft means; every trifle Must not be blacken'd into sacrilege. If we should wait till you, in solemn council, With due deliberation had selected The