The Man and his wife pass through the ballroom. The Man has grown grey, but still seems strong and full of life; the wife is still pretty. The Man is followed by his friends and his enemies. His friends have good countenances and his enemies look horrible and evil. And as they pass the guests vie with each other in praises of the Man and his wife, with applause for the friends and hisses for the enemies. When they have passed through to supper, the guests begin to grow anxious lest they have been forgotten, and when at last they begin to grow convinced of this, one of them says, “I cannot understand, I must frankly own, why we came to a house with such a reputation. One should choose one’s acquaintances more carefully.” At that moment a man in a gorgeous livery enters and announces that the Man and his wife beg their honoured guests to come to supper. The guests all file off, saying in chorus, “What a livery! What music! How gorgeous! How rich! What an honour! What an honour!” The next scene is the misfortune of the Man. He has lost his money, he has sold all his possessions, even his books. His one servant, an old woman, tells this, and how there is nothing left in the large house but rats; and how a fresh misfortune had just happened. The Man’s child went for a walk, and some wicked person threw a stone at him and broke open his head, and now he is lying sick and in danger of life. The doctor comes and tells the anxious Man and his wife, who are now old and worn (for the candle the grey figure still holds in his hands is almost burnt down to its socket), that their son is asleep and will probably get better. The Man looks at his drawing-table. “Look,” he says to his wife, “I began to draw this when our boy was still well; I stopped at this line and thought ‘I will rest and go on later.’ Look what a simple and quiet line! And yet it is terrible to look upon, for it may be the last line which I drew when my boy was still alive.” Then he finds his son’s toys on the table; their presence there used to make his work easier. They were bought in the days of the Man’s poverty; a little wooden horse without a tail, and a squeaking clown. The Man remembers how he used to talk to his little boy playing with the gee-gee. “Where are you galloping to, gee-gee?” “Over the hills and far away, papa, to kill the dragon because I’m a knight.” Then the Man and his wife kneel and pray that their son may not die. Anything else, but not that. The mother says, “Let my son live.” And the Man’s prayer is as follows:--