The Baptized (aside). Oh woe!—(Aloud.) How do you mean to conduct the siege, citizen general?
Bianchetti. Although you are my brother in freedom, you are not my confidant in strategy. After the capitulation of the castle, my plans will be made public.
The Man (to the Baptized). Take my advice, Jew, and strike him dead, for such is the beginning of all aristocracies.
A Weaver. Curses! curses! curses!
The Man. Poor fellow! what are you doing under this tree, and why do you look so pale and wild?
The Weaver. Curses upon the merchants and manufacturers! All the best years of my life, years in which other men love maidens, meet in wide plains, or sail upon vast seas, with free air and open space around them, I have spent in a narrow, dark, gloomy room, chained like a galley slave to a silk loom!
The Man. Take some food! Empty the full cup which you hold in your hand!
Weaver. I have not strength enough left to carry it to my lips! I am so tired; I could scarcely crawl up here—it is the day of freedom! but a day of freedom is not for me—it comes too late, too late!—(He falls, and gasps out:) Curses upon the manufacturers who make silks! upon the merchants, who buy them! upon the nobles, who wear them! Curses! curses! curses!
He writhes on the ground and dies.
The Baptized. What a ghastly corpse!