s wink, raise but a finger, and my bullet
finds its way to your heart! You may readily imagine that I attach no
great value to your life when I thus lightly risk my own.

THE BAPTIZED. Oh woe! You press my hand like a vice of steel. What is it
you wish me to do?

THE MAN. Appear to the crowd as if I were an acquaintance--treat me as a
newly arrived friend.

What kind of a dance is that?

THE BAPTIZED. The dance of a free people.

Men and woman dance, leap, and sing round the gallows.

THEIR CHORUS. Bread! meat! work! wood in winter, rest in summer! Hurrah!
hurrah!

God had no compassion upon us: Hurrah! hurrah!

Kings had no compassion upon us: Hurrah! hurrah!

The nobles had no compassion upon us: Hurrah! hurrah!

We renounce God, kings, and nobles: Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!

THE MAN (_to a maiden_). I am glad to see you look so gay, so blooming.

THE MAIDEN. I am sure we have waited quite long enough for such a day as
this! I have washed dishes and cleaned knives and forks all my life,
without ever having heard a kind word spoken to me: it is high time I
too should begin to eat, to dance, to make merry. Hurrah! hurrah!

THE MAN. Dance, citizeness!

THE BAPTIZED. For God's sake, be cautious, count! You may be recognized;
let us go!

THE MAN. If any one should recognize me, you are lost. We will mingle
with the throng.

THE BAPTIZED. A crowd of servants are sitting under the shade of this
oak.

THE MAN. Let us approach them.

FIRST SERVANT. I have just killed my first master.

SECOND SERVANT. And I am on the search for my baron. Your health,
citizens!

VALET DE CHAMBRE. In the sweat of our brows, in the depths of
humiliation, licking the dust from the boots of our masters, and
prostrate before them, we have yet always felt our rights as men: let us
drink the health of our present society!

CHORUS OF SERVANTS. Here's to the health of our citizen President! one
of ourselves, he will lead us to glory!

VALET DE CHAMBRE. Thanks, citizens, thanks!

CHORUS OF SERVANTS. Out of dark kitchens, dressing rooms, and
antechambers, our prisons of old, we rush together into freedom: Hurrah!

We know the ridiculous follies, peevishness, and perversity of our
masters; we have been behind the shows and shams of glittering halls:
Hurrah!

THE MAN. Whose voices are those I hear so harsh and wild from that
little mound on our left?

THE BAPTIZED. The butchers are singing a chorus.

CHORUS OF THE BUTCH