Love and Intrigue

Love and Intrigue, by Frederich
Schiller

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Title: Love and Intrigue A Play
Author: Frederich Schiller
Release Date: October 25, 2006 [EBook #6784]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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INTRIGUE ***

Produced by Tapio Riikonen and David Widger

LOVE AND INTRIGUE.
A TRAGEDY.
By Frederich Schiller

DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
PRESIDENT VON WALTER, Prime Minister in the Court of a
German Prince. FERDINAND, his son; a Major in the Army; in love
with Louisa Miller. BARON VON KALB, Court Marshal (or
Chamberlain). WORM, Private Secretary to the President. MILLER,
the Town Musician, and Teacher of Music. MRS. MILLER, his wife.
LOUISA, the daughter of Miller, in love with Ferdinand. LADY
MILFORD, the Prince's Mistress. SOPHY, attendant on Lady Milford.
An old Valet in the service of the Prince. Officers, Attendants, etc.

ACT I.
SCENE I.
MILLER--MRS. MILLER.
MILLER (walking quickly up and down the room). Once for all! The
affair is becoming serious. My daughter and the baron will soon be the
town-talk--my house lose its character--the president will get wind of it,
and--the short and long of the matter is, I'll show the younker the door.
MRS MILLER. You did not entice him to your house--did not thrust
your daughter upon him!
MILLER. Didn't entice him to my house--didn't thrust the girl upon
him! Who'll believe me? I was master of my own house. I ought to
have taken more care of my daughter. I should have bundled the major
out at once, or have gone straight to his excellency, his papa, and
disclosed all. The young baron will get off merely with a snubbing, I
know that well enough, and all the blame will fall upon the fiddler.
MRS MILLER (sipping her coffee). Pooh! nonsense! How can it fall
upon you? What have people to do with you? You follow your
profession, and pick up pupils wherever you can find them.

MILLER. All very fine, but please to tell me what will be the upshot of
the whole affair? He can't marry the girl--marriage is out of the
question, and to make her his--God help us! "Good-by t'ye!" No,
no--when such a sprig of nobility has been nibbling here and there and
everywhere, and has glutted himself with the devil knows what all, of
course it will be a relish to my young gentleman to get a mouthful of
sweet water. Take heed! Take heed! If you were dotted with eyes, and
could place a sentinel for every hair of your head, he'll bamboozle her
under your very nose; add one to her reckoning, take himself off, and
the girl's ruined for life, left in the lurch, or, having once tasted the
trade, will carry it on. (Striking his forehead.) Oh, horrible thought!
MRS MILLER. God in his mercy protect us!
MILLER. We shall want his protection. You may well say that. What
other object can such a scapegrace have? The girl is handsome--well
made--can show a pretty foot. How the upper story is furnished matters
little. That's blinked in you women if nature has not played the niggard
in other respects. Let this harum-scarum but turn over this chapter--ho!
ho! his eyes will glisten like Rodney's when he got scent of a French
frigate; then up with all sail and at her, and I don't blame him for it--
flesh is flesh. I know that very well.
MRS MILLER. You should only read the beautiful billy-doux which
the baron writes to your daughter. Gracious me! Why it's as clear as the
sun at noonday that he loves her purely for her virtuous soul.
MILLER. That's the right strain! We beat the sack, but mean the ass's
back. He who wishes to pay his respects to the flesh needs only a kind
heart for a go-between. What did I myself? When we've once so far
cleared the ground that the affections cry ready! slap! the bodies follow
their example, the appetites are obedient, and the silver moon kindly
plays the pimp.
MRS MILLER. And then only think of the beautiful books that the
major has sent us. Your daughter always prays out of them.
MILLER (whistles). Prays! You've hit the mark. The plain, simple food

of nature is much too raw and indigestible for this maccaroni
gentleman's stomach. It must be cooked for him artificially in the
infernal pestilential pitcher of your novel-writers. Into the fire with the
rubbish! I shall have the girl taking up