[Two lovers enter.]

HE.

I say, my sweet life, do you hear the nightingale?

SHE.

I am not deaf, my good friend.

HE.

How my heart overflows with joyousness when I see all harmonious nature thus gathered about me, when every tone but reechoes the confession of my love, when all heaven bows down to diffuse its ether over me.

SHE.

You are raving, my dear!

HE.

Do not call the most natural emotions of my heart raving. (He kneels down.) See, I swear to you, here in the presence of glad heaven—­

HINZE (approaching them courteously).

Kindly pardon me—­would you not take the trouble to go somewhere else?  You are disturbing a hunt here with your lovely affection.

HE.

Be the sun my witness, the earth—­and what else?  Thou, thyself, dearer to me than earth, sun, and all the elements.  What is it, good friend?

HINZE.

The hunt—­I beg most humbly.

HE.

Barbarian, who are you, to dare to interrupt the oaths of love? 
You are not of woman born, you belong outside humanity.

HINZE.

If you would only consider, sir—­

SHE.

Then wait just a second, good friend; you see, I’m sure, that my lover, lost in the intoxication of the moment, is down on his knees.

HE.

Dost thou believe me now?

SHE.

Oh, didn’t I believe you even before you spoke a word? (She bends down to him affectionately.) Dearest!  I love you!  Oh, inexpressibly!

HE.

Am I mad?  Oh, and if I am not, why do I not become so immediately with excess of joy, wretched, despicable creature that I am?  I am no longer on the earth; look at me well, dearest, and tell me:  Am I not perhaps standing in the sun?

SHE.

You are in my arms, and they shall never release you either.

HE.

Oh, come, this open field is too narrow for my emotions, we must climb the highest mountain, to tell all nature how happy we are.

[Exit the lovers, quickly and full of delight.  Loud applause and bravos in the pit.]

WIESENER (clapping).

The lover thoroughly exhausted himself.  Oh, my,
I gave myself such a blow on the hand that it swelled right up.

NEIGHBOR.

You do not know how to restrain yourself when you are glad.

WIESENER.

Yes, I am always that way.

FISCHER.

Ah!—­that was certainly something for the heart; that makes one feel good again!

LEUTNER.

Really beautiful diction in that scene!

MUeLLER.

But I wonder whether it is essential to the whole?

SCHLOSS.

I never worry about the whole; if I cry, I cry—­that’s
enough; that was a divine passage.