Reiss. I know the country and the people.
Sell. To please you, I attached myself to the Privy Counsellor; but his vanity is such that I cannot hold out with him any longer. He has this very day told me that I learned nothing.
Reiss. There we have it.--
Sell. That I did not know my own language; that I made a motion in court so ridiculous the other day, that every one laughed at me; nay, he told me to my face that I attempted to assume an air of importance that I was not entitled to.
Reiss. I am shocked at it, do you know? Your dear father, who is now no more, was a man who--
Sell. Was Privy Counsellor! But that is nothing in his eyes. Such an upstart will press forward, and people of our consequence must render homage not only to him, but even to the carpenter's family.
Reiss. Pray, were not you to marry his sister?
Sell. No, no! yet, in the state of subjection he kept me, he might at last have brought me to it. He would, as he calls it, correct my writings, and then he would, by way of making it up, sometimes nod his head by way of approbation.
Reiss. As I see that the fellow does not deserve what I have done for him, all shall be altered in future: attach yourself to me.
Sell. Good God! I will with both my hands.