OLD BAUMERT

[_A little intimidated, coaxingly._] I was bringin' you a chicken, Gustav. I thought it would make a drop o' soup for mother.

OLD HILSE

[_Embarra.s.sed, almost friendly._] Well, you can tell mother yourself.

MOTHER HILSE

[_Who has been making efforts to hear, her hand at her ear, motions them off._] Let me alone. I don't want no chicken soup.

OLD HILSE

That's right, mother. An' I want none, an' least of all that sort. An'

let me say this much to you, Baumert: The devil stands on his head for joy when he hears the old ones jabberin' and talkin' as if they was infants. An' to you all I say--to every one of you: Me and you, we've got nothing to do with each other. It's not with my will that you're here. In law an' justice you've no right to be in my house.

A VOICE

Him that's not with us is against us.

JAEGER

[_Roughly and threateningly._] You're on the wrong track, old chap, I'd have you remember that we're not thieves.

A VOICE

We're hungry men, that's all.

FIRST YOUNG WEAVER

We wants to _live_--that's all. An' so we've cut the rope we was hung up with.

JAEGER

And we was in our right! [_Holding his fist in front of the old man's face_.] Say another word, and I'll give you one between the eyes.

BECKER

Come, now, Jaeger, be quiet. Let the old man alone.--What we say to ourselves, father Hilse, is this: Better dead than begin the old life again.

OLD HILSE

Have I not lived that life for sixty years an' more?

BECKER

That doesn't help us--there's _got_ to be a change.

OLD HILSE

On the Judgment Day.

BECKER

What they'll not give us willingly we're goin' to take by force.

OLD HILSE

By force. [_Laughs._] You may as well go an' dig your graves at once.

They'll not be long showin' you where the force lies. Wait a bit, lad!

JAEGER

Is it the soldiers you're meanin'? We've been soldiers too. We'll soon do for a company or two of 'em.

OLD HILSE

With your tongues, maybe. But supposin' you did--for two that you'd beat off, ten'll come back.

VOICES

[_Call through the window._] The soldiers are comin! Look out!

[_General, sudden silence. For a moment a faint sound of fifes and drums is heard; in the ensuing silence a short, involuntary exclamation:_ "The devil! I'm off!" _followed by general laughter._

BECKER

Who was that? Who speaks of runnin' away?

JAEGER

Which of you is it that's afraid of a few paltry helmets? You have me to command you, and I've been in the trade. I knows their tricks.

OLD HILSE

An' what are you goin' to shoot with? Your sticks, eh?

FIRST YOUNG WEAVER

Never mind that old chap; he's wrong in the upper storey.

SECOND YOUNG WEAVER

Yes, he's a bit off his head.

GOTTLIEB

[_Has made his way unnoticed among the rioters; catches hold of the speaker._] Would you give your impudence to an old man like him?