BUGBEAR.
I will do that too.
[He changes into a mouse. HINZE leaps after him, the Bugbear flees into another room, HINZE after him.]
HINZE (coming back).
Freedom and Equality! The Law is devoured! Now indeed the
Tiers—Etat! Gottlieb will surely secure the government.
SCHLOSS.
Why, a revolutionary play after all? Then for heaven's sake, you surely shouldn't stamp!
[The stamping continues, WIESENER and several others applaud, HINZE creeps into a corner and finally even leaves the stage. The playwright is heard quarreling behind the scenes and then enters.]
PLAYWR.
What am I to do? The play will be over directly—everything would perhaps have run smoothly—now just in this moral scene I had expected so much applause. If this were only not so far away from the king's palace, I would fetch the peacemaker; he explained to me at the end of the second act all the fables of Orpheus—but am I not a fool? I became quite confused—why, this is the theatre here, and the peacemaker must be somewhere behind the scenes—I will look for him—I must find him—he shall save me! (Exit, returns again quickly.) He is not there, Sir Peacemaker! An empty echo mocks me—he has deserted me, his playwright. Ha! there I see him—he must come forward.