AMELIA. Do you think so? But this very day she tore my Adolph away from me, and now she has humiliated me still further by dressing me as a servant girl and making me do the work in the kitchen.
NEIGHBOUR. Patience!
AMELIA. Yes, so you say! Oh, I can understand deserved suffering, but to suffer without cause——
NEIGHBOUR. My dear child, the prisoners in the penitentiary are suffering justly, so there is no honour in that; but to be permitted to suffer unjustly, that's a grace and a trial of which steadfast souls bring home golden fruits.
AMELIA. You speak so beautifully that everything you say seems true to me.—Hush! There are the children—and I don't want them to see me dressed like this.
She and the NEIGHBOUR take up a position where they are hidden by a tall shrub.
ERIC and THYRA enter; the spot of light rests now on one of them and now on the other.
ERIC. Look at the sun spot!
THYRA. Oh, you beautiful sun! But didn't he go to bed a while ago?
ERIC. Perhaps he is allowed to stay up longer than usual because he has been very good all day.