Peter Stockmann. My hat and stick, if you please. (DR. STOCKMANN takes off the hat and lays it on the table with the stick. PETER STOCKMANN takes them up.) Your authority as mayor has come to an untimely end.
Dr. Stockmann. We have not got to the end yet. (To HOVSTAD.) Then it is quite impossible for you to print my article in the "People's Messenger"?
Hovstad. Quite impossible—out of regard for your family as well.
Mrs. Stockmann. You need not concern yourself about his family, thank you, Mr. Hovstad.
Peter Stockmann (taking a paper from his pocket). It will be sufficient, for the guidance of the public, if this appears. It is an official statement. May I trouble you?
Hovstad (taking the paper). Certainly; I will see that it is printed.
Dr. Stockmann. But not mine. Do you imagine that you can silence me and stifle the truth! You will not find it so easy as you suppose. Mr. Aslaksen, kindly take my manuscript at once and print it as a pamphlet—at my expense. I will have four hundred copies—no, five or six hundred.
Aslaksen. If you offered me its weight in gold, I could not lend my press for any such purpose, Doctor. It would be flying in the face of public opinion. You will not get it printed anywhere in the town.
Dr. Stockmann. Then give it me back.
Hovstad (giving him the MS.). Here it is.