“If he’d been a son of mine he would have got the stick,” said Jörgen.
“Aren’t they the sort of people who are making ready for the millennium? We’ve got a few of their sort here,” said Bjerregrav diffidently.
“D’you mean the poor devils who believe in the watchmaker and his ‘new time’? Yes, that may well be,” said Jeppe contemptuously. “I have heard they are quite wicked enough for that. I’m inclined to think they are the Antichrist the Bible foretells.”
“Ah, but what do they really want?” asked Baker Jörgen. “What is their madness really driving at?”
“What do they want?” Wooden-leg Larsen pulled himself together. “I’ve knocked up against a lot of people, I have, and as far as I can understand it they want to get justice; they want to take the right of coining money away from the Crown and give it to everybody. And they want to overthrow everything, that is quite certain.”
“Well,” said Master Andres, “what they want, I believe, is perfectly right, only they’ll never get it. I know a little about it, on account of Garibaldi.”
“But what do they want, then, if they don’t want to overthrow the whole world?”
“What do they want? Well, what do they want? That everybody should have exactly the same?” Master Andres was uncertain.
“Then the ship’s boy would have as much as the captain! No, it would be the devil and all!” Baker Jörgen smacked his thigh and laughed.
“And they want to abolish the king,” said Wooden-leg Larsen eagerly.