THE GRAND DUCHESS. Are you sure they will not rally to mine?

STRAMMFEST. Oh, if only you were a man and a soldier!

THE GRAND DUCHESS. Suppose I find you a man and a soldier?

STRAMMFEST [rising in a fury]. Ah! the scoundrel you eloped with!
You think you will shove this fellow into an army command, over
my head. Never.

THE GRAND DUCHESS. You promised everything. You swore anything.
[She marches as if in front of a regiment.] I know that this man
alone can rouse the army to enthusiasm.

STRAMMFEST. Delusion! Folly! He is some circus acrobat; and you
are in love with him.

THE GRAND DUCHESS. I swear I am not in love with him. I swear I
will never marry him.

STRAMMFEST. Then who is he?

THE GRAND DUCHESS. Anybody in the world but you would have
guessed long ago. He is under your very eyes.

STRAMMFEST [staring past her right and left]. Where?

THE GRAND DUCHESS. Look out of the window.