Page:Plays by Jacinto Benavente - Second series (IA playsbyjacintobe00bena).pdf/62

 Suavia this very day without respite of one hour at Court upon any pretext whatsoever. The Crown Council which was set for this afternoon is suspended. Was there business of importance to attend to?

. The new law of Social Reform.

. A proper occasion for its promulgation! Are we to become public laughing-stocks? Shall I pretend to reform society when my own house, my own family, are in the state which all the world sees? Is there anything else?

. Nothing of importance. Oh, your signature to a decree conferring a pension upon our national poet.

. National poet? Poets, philosophers, authors are to blame! They unsettle men's minds, they turn the world upside down. Undisciplined fools—madmen, all of them! Do not talk to me about poets. Ah! By the way, that student's song about the Princess, her amours… Better suppress it. Do you happen to have heard it by any chance? What does it say?

. I don't remember; it has no merit. It advises the Princess to forsake the Court and courtiers, and devote her attention to students and true lovers—to form a court of love. There is nothing in it.

. Certainly not. What does it say about me?

. Nothing that I recall. Ah, yes! there is a refrain:

.

Good! That will do for to-day; you may retire. I need rest, to recuperate… Keep close watch on the press. It has been allowed too much liberty of late.