There is quite a royal flavour about our little gathering, then!
Here is the King's shipmate, and here is his tutor in jurisprudence--

Koll. You are forgetting yourself! You are the King's tutor's tutor, you
know--

The King. Were you Koll's tutor? Really?

Flink (with a laugh). Yes, I had that misfortune!

The King. You hadn't so great a misfortune in your pupil as he had in
his!

Koll. The King was a very apt pupil.

Flink (jestingly). He has shown traces of it in his reign, hasn't he!

Koll. Don't speak ill of the King, please.

Flink (ironically). Heaven forbid! (Takes a pinch of snuff.) I know
all about his talent--his great talent, his genial talent! (Offers his
snuff-box to the KING.)

Gran. But it was public opinion we were talking about, Flink; is it very
much like what we heard to-day?

Flink. I wouldn't say that; your opinions are rather advanced in these
parts.

The King. Is the tendency republican, rather than monarchical?

Flink. That depends how you look at it. The King has just been paying
some visits in the country districts; he is, so to speak, the commercial
traveller for his firm--as all kings and crown princes are. Of course he
was cheered everywhere. But go and ask the agricultural classes if
they set great store by the pomp and circumstance of royalty; they will
unanimously answer: "It costs an infernal lot to keep up!" Ha, ha, ha!

Gran. Your farmer is a realist.

Flink. A brutal realist! Ha, ha, ha! Self-government is cheaper. He has
it all at his fingers' ends, the scoundrel!

The King. He is not a republican by conviction, then

Flink. Not universally, no. At least, not _yet_. But things are moving
that way; and our reactionary government is helping the movement--that,
and the letter they get from America.

The King. The letters they get from America?

Koll. Letters from their relations in America.

Gran. There is scarcely a family in the country now that has not
relations in America.

The King. And they write home about self-government?--about republican
principles?

Flink. And republican institutions. That is the situation!

The King. Have you read any of these letters?

Flink. Lots!

The King. This is excellent champagne! (Drinks.)

Gran. Let me fill your glasses. (They all drink.)

Flink. It doesn't really agree with me.

The King. But suppose the King were to establish democratic government?
Suppose he were to live like an ordinary citizen in every way?