The Dynasts : Parts First And Second

THE DYNASTS ACT iv
about Bonaparte's end, which is fast nearing, it is asserted. It is he, they say, who is referred to in the Apocalypse. He is doomed to die this year at Cologne, in an inn called " The Red Crab." I don't attach too much importance to all these predictions, but O, how glad I should be to see them come true !
SECOND LADY-IN-WAITING
So should we all, madam. What would become of his divorce-scheme then ?
MARIA LOUISA
Perhaps there is nothing in that report. One can hardly believe such gossip.
SECOND LADY-IN-WAITING
But they say, your Imperial Highness, that he certainly has decided to sacrifice the Empress Josephine, and that at the meeting last October with the Emperor Alexander at Erfurt, it was even settled that he should marry as his second wife the Grand-Duchess Anne.
MARIA LOUISA
I am sure that the Empress her mother will never allow one of the house of Romanoff to marry with a bourgeois Corsican. I wouldn't if I were she!
FIRST LADY-IN-WAITING
Perhaps, your Highness, they are not so particular in Russia, where they are rather new themselves, as we in Austria, with your ancient dynasty, are in such matters.
MARIA LOUISA
Perhaps not. Though the Empress-mother is a pompous old thing, as I have been told by Prince
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