Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/451

Rh He. You are in a state to do that. You deserve indeed that I should lock you up in a hunger tower till you become tolerable.

She. Try to do so! He. Try to do so? Do you defy me?

She. Yes.

He. You look like it. You think perhaps that your friends, the witches of the Blocksberg, would come and help you. Or perhaps you are enough of a little witch yourself to escape by the chimney? Eh?

She. That may be, if you are my jailor. No, that would not do, I can tell you! If I turn very bad, you can get into a rage,—a downright rage,—just once or twice, in a year, but at the same time, and between whiles, you must be very good, very amiable. I must educate you, you see, poor Hercules! He. Educate me? Ha! ha! ha! Upon my honor! I thought it was I who was to educate you, and that— She. That is a great mistake. You are not so good as you fancy. You are a tyrant, and only desire to rule yourself, and that I must break you of.

He. Very pretty! But now if your scheme should succeed, and I should become as good, and as amiable as you wish, how will you be? When I am an old man and you are still a young woman, and I wish to sit quietly at home in an evening, then what will my little wife do with herself?

She. I? I shall draw your chair a little nearer to the fire, and then I shall order a little nice soup to be made for you, and then put on you your night-cap, and then—I shall drive to the theatre!