Wilhelm. The fierce one.
Count. We will set him free, and wish it were the other.
Annabella. Papa! I am glad you are come back without your spurs.
Countess. Hush, child, hush.
Annabella. Why, mamma? Do not you remember how they tore my frock when I clung to him at parting? Now I begin to think of him again: I lose everything between that day and this.
Countess. The girl’s idle prattle about the spurs has pained you: always too sensitive; always soon hurt, though never soon offended.
Count. O God! O my children! O my wife! it is not the loss of spurs I now must blush for.
Annabella. Indeed, papa, you never can blush at all, until you cut that horrid beard off.
Countess. Well may you say, my own Ludolph, as you do; for most gallant was your bearing in the battle.
Count. Ah! why was it ever fought?