DEVEREUX.
Macdonald, we'll desert him.
BUTLER.
We'll desert him?
Full twenty thousand have done that already;
We must do more, my countrymen! In short-
We-we must kill him.
BOTH (starting back)
Kill him!
BUTLER.
Yes, must kill him;
And for that purpose have I chosen you.
BOTH.
Us!
BUTLER.
You, Captain Devereux, and thee, Macdonald.
DEVEREUX (after a pause).
Choose you some other.
BUTLER.
What! art dastardly?
Thou, with full thirty lives to answer for-
Thou conscientious of a sudden?
DEVEREUX.
Nay
To assassinate our lord and general--
MACDONALD.
To whom we swore a soldier's oath--
BUTLER.
The oath
Is null, for Friedland is a traitor.
DEVEREUX.
No, no! it is too bad!
MACDONALD.
Yes, by my soul!
It is too bad. One has a conscience too--
DEVEREUX.
If it were not our chieftain, who so long
Has issued the commands, and claimed our duty--
BUTLER.
Is that the objection?
DEVEREUX.
Were it my own father,
And the emperor's service should demand it of me,
It might be done perhaps-but we are soldiers,
And to assassinate our chief commander,
That is a sin, a foul abomination,
From which no monk or confessor absolves us.
BUTLER.
I am your pope, and give you absolution.
Determine quickly!
DEVEREUX.
'Twill not do.
MACDONALD.
'Twont do!
BUTLER.
Well, off then! and-send Pestalutz to me.
DEVEREUX (hesitates).
The Pestalutz--
MACDONALD.
What may you want with him?
BUTLER.
If you reject it, we can find enough--
DEVEREUX.
Nay, if he must fall, we may earn the bounty
As well as any other. What think you,
Brother Macdonald?
MACDONALD.
Why, if he must fall,
And will fall, and it can't be otherwise,
One would not give place to this Pestalutz.
DEVEREUX (after some reflection).
When do you purpose he should fall?
