[WALLENSTEIN betrays a sudden agitation.]

Thou canst not hear it named, and wilt thou do it? 
O, turn back to thy duty!  That thou canst
I hold it certain.  Send me to Vienna: 
I’ll make thy peace for thee with the Emperor. 
He knows thee not.  But I do know thee.  He
Shall see thee, Duke, with my unclouded eye,
And I bring back his confidence to thee.

WALLENST.

It is too late!  Thou knowest not what has happen’d.

MAX.

Were it too late, and were things gone so far,
That a crime only could prevent thy fall,
Then—­fall! fall honorably, even as thou stood’st! 
Lose the command.  Go from the stage of war,
Thou canst with splendor do it—­do it too
With innocence.  Thou hast lived much for others,
At length live thou for thy own self.  I follow thee;
My destiny I never part from thine.

WALLENST.

It is too late!  Even now, while thou art losing
Thy words, one after the other are the milestones
Left fast behind by my post couriers
Who bear the order on to Prague and Egra.

[MAX stands as convulsed, with a gesture and countenance expressing the most intense anguish.]

Yield thyself to it.  We act as we are forced.
I cannot give assent to my own shame
And ruin. Thou—­no—­thou canst not forsake me! 
So let us do what must be done, with dignity,
With a firm step.  What am I doing worse
Than did famed Caesar at the Rubicon,
When he the legions led against his country,
The which his country had delivered to him? 
Had he thrown down the sword he had been lost,
As I were if I but disarm’d myself. 
I trace out something in me of this spirit;
Give me his luck, that other thing I’ll bear.

[MAX quits him abruptly.  WALLENSTEIN startled and overpowered, continues looking after him and is still in this posture when TERZKY enters.]

SCENE III

WALLENSTEIN, TERZKY

TERZKY.

Max Piccolomini just left you?

WALLENSTEIN.

Where is Wrangel?

TERZKY.

He is already gone.

WALLENSTEIN.

In such a hurry?

TERZKY.

It is as if the earth had swallow’d him. 
He had scarce left thee when I went to seek him. 
I wish’d some words with him—­but he was gone. 
How, when, and where, could no one tell me.  Nay,
I half believe it was the devil himself;
A human creature could not so at once
Have vanish’d.

ILLO (enters).

Is it true that thou wilt send
Octavio?

TERZKY.

How, Octavio!  Whither send him?

WALLENST.

He goes to Frauenburg, and will lead hither
The Spanish and Italian regiments.