"You have before you," said Herr Dremmel, endeavouring to be patient, "an entirely natural process, as natural as going to sleep at night and waking up next morning."
"It may be as natural," said Ingeborg, "but I don't believe it's as nice. I'd like some chloroform."
"What! Not nice? When it is going to introduce you to the supreme—"
"Y'es, I know. But I—I have a feeling it's going to introduce me rather roughly. I'd like some chloroform."
"God," said Herr Dremmel solemnly, "has arranged these introductions Himself, and it is not for us to criticise."
"That's the first time," said Ingeborg, "that you've talked like a bishop. You might be a bishop."
"When it comes to the highest things," said Herr Dremmel severely, "and this is the holiest, most exalted act a human being can perpetrate, all men are equally believers."
"I expect they are," said Ingeborg. "But the others—the ones who're not men—they'd like some chloroform."
"No healthy, normally built woman needs it," said Herr Dremmel, greatly irritated by this persistence. "No doctor would give it. Besides, there will not be a doctor, and the midwife may not administer it. Why, I do not recognise my little wife, my little intelligent wife who must know that nothing is being required of her but that which is done by other women every day."
"I don't see what being intelligent has to do with this," said Ingeborg, "and I'd like some chloroform."