INNKEEPER.
I greatly doubt that you will have applause! I hope, at any rate, that you have money? Or is it a part of the plot that you should pretend to be poor?
STRANGER.
You are very inquisitive, good friend.
INNKEEPER.
That’s part of my trade, sir, as any schoolboy will tell you. Old people must be old; Telephus must be a beggar; the slave must chatter in keeping with his rôle. You can look it up in the Ars poetica, to which I too am subject in my office as host.
STRANGER.
Thank you for this graceful frenzy; I have not found so rare a curiosity for a long time. Show me to my room.
(Exeunt.)
Ludwig Tieck.