Once, though, I was allowed to go to see a comedy. Mr. Voltelen gave me
a ticket for some students' theatricals at the Court Theatre, in which
he himself was going to appear. The piece was called _A Spendthrift_,
and I saw it without suffering for it. There was a young, flighty man in
it who used to throw gold coins out of the window, and there was an ugly
old hag, and a young, beautiful girl as well. I sat and kept a sharp
lookout for when my master should come on, but I was disappointed; there
was no Mr. Voltelen to be seen.

Next day, when I thanked him for the entertainment, I added: "But you
made game of me. You were not in it at all." "What? I was not in it? Did
you not see the old hag? That was I. Didn't you see the girl? That was
I." It was incomprehensible to me that anyone could disguise himself so.
Mr. Voltelen must most certainly have "acted well." But years
afterwards, I could still not understand how one judged of this. Since
plays affected me exactly like real life, I was, of course, not in a
position to single out the share the actors took.


XV.

The war imbued my tin soldiers with quite a new interest. It was
impossible to have boxes enough of them. You could set them out in
companies and battalions; they opened their ranks to attack, stormed,
were wounded, and fell. Sometimes they lay down fatigued and slept on
the field of battle. But a new box that came one day made the old ones
lose all value for me. For the soldiers in the new box were proper
soldiers, with chests and backs, round to the touch, heavy to hold. In
comparison with them, the older ones, profile soldiers, so small that