Why should you ask? The late Rip Van Winkle, anxious for the prosperity of his offspring, though too indolent to provide for their subsistence, persuaded my deceased father to form this alliance. KNICKERBOCKER. It’s a lie! Hum!— JUDGE. Restrain this violence! a court of justice must not be swayed by such proceedings. HERMAN. Behold! sir, a picture of their general effrontery. In a public tribunal to threaten those, who, in pleading their own rights, but advocate the cause of justice. LORRENNA. [_Comes down stage._] All my hopes vanish—bleak and dreary is the perspective. HERMAN. [_Advances._] At last I triumph! Now, lady, your hand or your inheritance. LORRENNA. My hand! never! Welcome were every privation to an union with one so base. JUDGE. It appears, then, that this signature is not denied by the defendant, and in that case the contract must stand in full force against her. LORRENNA. Oh, Alice, take me home: poverty, death, anything rather than wed the man I cannot love. [_She is led off by_ ALICE. KNICKERBOCKER. Why, damn it, Judge! JUDGE. Mr. Knickerbocker! KNICKERBOCKER. I beg pardon, I meant no disrespect to the court, but I had thought after— JUDGE. I have decided, Mr. Knickerbocker. KNICKERBOCKER. Oh! you have decided. Yes, and a damned pretty mess you’ve made of it. But I sha’n’t abide by your decision; I’ll appeal to a higher court. I am now a member of the Legislature, and if they allow such blocks as you on the bench, I’ll have a tax upon timber, sir—yes, sir, a tax upon timber. [_Exit, in a rage._ JUDGE. Twenty years and a day is the period within which the contract could be cancelled by the negature of Rip Van Winkle, and as he has rendered no opposition during this lengthened time— HERMAN. ’Tis not very probable, sir, that he will alter his intentions by appearing to do so within the few brief hours that will complete the day. Can the grave give up its inmates? No, no! Who dare pretend to dispute my rights? The only one who could do so has been dead these twenty years. _Enter_ GUSTAFFE _and_ RIP. GUSTAFFE. ’Tis false! Rip Van Winkle stands before you! OMNES. Rip Van Winkle! HERMAN. You, Rip Van Winkle! Van Winkle come back after such a lapse of time? Impossible! RIP. Nothing at all impossible in anything Rip Van Winkle undertakes, and, though all of you are in the same story, dat he has been gone so long, he is nevertheless back soon enough, to your sorrow, my chap. HERMAN. If this, indeed, be Rip Van Winkle, where has he hid himself for twenty years? JUDGE. What answer do you make to this? RIP. Why, dat I went up in de mountains last night, and got drunk mit some jolly dogs, and when I come back dis morning I found myself dead for twenty years. HERMAN. You hear him, sir. JUDGE.