"Of course I listened to it, it was on their account I perched myself in this confounded cherry-tree. But now come here Monsieur Rudolph. Will you, all your life long, never again go into the pulpit and preach a sermon?"
"No, never again."
"Will you get up at four o'clock in the morning, and three o'clock in the summer-time, and give out fodder grain?"
"Always, at the very hour."
"Will you learn how to plough and harrow and mow properly, and to reap and bind sheaves, that is, with a band,--there is no art in using a rope?"
"Yes," said Rudolph.
"Will you promise never to sit over the punch-bowl, at the Thurgovian ale-house, when your wagons are already gone, and then ride madly after them?"
"I will never do it," said Rudolph.
"Will you also never in your life--Mining, see that beautiful larkspur, the blue, I mean, just bring it to me, and let me smell it--will you," he continued, when she was gone, "never entangle yourself with the confounded farm-girls?"
"Herr Inspector, what do you take me for?" said Rudolph angrily, turning away.