is not one that would do it--not a
single one! (Sees OLAF coming up to the house.) Ah, thank Heaven, here
he is, safe and sound. (OLAF, with a fishing-line in his hand, comes
running up the garden and in through the verandah.)

Olaf: Uncle Hilmar, I have been down and seen the steamer.

Bernick: Have you been down to the quay again?

Olaf: No, I have only been out in a boat. But just think, Uncle Hilmar,
a whole circus company has come on shore, with horses and animals; and
there were such lots of passengers.

Mrs. Rummel: No, are we really to have a circus?

Rorlund: We? I certainly have no desire to see it.

Mrs. Rummel: No, of course I don't mean we, but--

Dina: I should like to see a circus very much.

Olaf: So should I.

Hilmar: You are a duffer. Is that anything to see? Mere tricks. No, it
would be something quite different to see the Gaucho careering over the
Pampas on his snorting mustang. But, Heaven help us, in these wretched
little towns of ours.

Olaf (pulling at MARTHA'S dress): Look, Aunt Martha! Look, there they
come!

Mrs. Holt: Good Lord, yes--here they come.

Mrs. Lynge: Ugh, what horrid people!

(A number of passengers and a whole crowd of townsfolk, are seen coming
up the street.)

Mrs. Rummel: They are a set of mountebanks, certainly. Just look at
that woman in the grey dress, Mrs. Holt--the one with a knapsack over
her shoulder.

Mrs. Holt: Yes--look--she has slung it on the handle of her parasol.
The manager's wife, I expect.

Mrs. Rummel: And there is the manager himself, no doubt. He looks a
regular pirate. Don't look at him, Hilda!

Mrs. Holt: Nor you, Netta!

Olaf: Mother, the manager is bowing to us.

Bernick: What?

Mrs. Bernick: What are you saying, child?

Mrs. Rummel: Yes, and--good Heavens--the woman is bowing to us too.

Bernick: That is a little too cool--

Martha (exclaims involuntarily): Ah--!

Mrs. Bernick: What is it, Martha?

Martha: Nothing, nothing. I thought for a moment--

Olaf (shrieking with delight): Look, look, there are the rest of them,
with the horses and animals! And there are the Americans, too! All the
sailors from the "Indian Girl"! (The strains of "Yankee Doodle," played
on a clarinet and a drum, are heard.)

Hilmar (stopping his ears): Ugh, ugh, ugh!

Rorlund: I think we ought to withdraw ourselves from sight a little,
ladies; we have nothing to do with such goings on. Let us go to our
work again.

Mrs. Bernick: Do