s uncle, as
guardian, as father, to give me to you.

MAJ. T.
Ah! dear lady, why did you not read my letter? Why would you not read
it?

MIN.
Your letter! Oh! yes, I remember you sent me one. What did you do with
that letter, Franziska? Did we, or did we not read it? What was it you
wrote to me, dear Tellheim?

MAJ. T.
Nothing but what honour commands me.

MIN.
That is, not to desert an honourable woman who loves you. Certainly
that is what honour commands. Indeed, I ought to have read your
letter. But what I have not read, I shall hear, shall not I?

MAJ. T.
Yes, you shall hear it.

MIN.
No, I need not even hear it. It speaks for itself. As if you could be
guilty of such an unworthy act, as not to take me! Do you know that I
should be pointed at for the rest of my life? My countrywomen would
talk about me, and say. "That is she, that is the Fraulein von
Barnhelm, who fancied that because she was rich could marry the noble
Tellheim; as if such men were to be caught with money." That is what
they would say, for they are all envious of me. That I am rich, they
cannot deny; but they do not wish to acknowledge that I am also a
tolerably good girl, who would prove herself worthy of her husband. Is
that not so, Tellheim?

MAJ. T.
Yes, yes, Madam, that is like your countrywomen. They will envy you
exceedingly a discharged officer, with sullied honour, a cripple, and
a beggar.

MIN.
And are you all that? If I mistake not, you told me something of the
kind this forenoon. Therein is good and evil mixed. Let us examine
each charge more closely. You are discharged? So you say. I thought
your regiment was only drafted into another. How did it happen that a
man of your merit was not retained?

MAJ. T.
It has happened, as it must happen. The great ones are convinced that
a soldier does very little through regard for them, not much more from
a sense of duty, but everything for his own advantage. What then can
they think they owe him? Peace has made a great many, like myself
superfluous to them; and at last we shall all be superfluous.

MIN.
You talk as a man must talk, to whom in return the great are quite
superfluous. And never were they more so than now. I return my best
thanks to the great ones that they have given up their claims to a man
whom I would very unwillingly have shared with them. I am your
sovereign, Tel