He has gone wrong!----I would have given everything to be able to spare your boundless love.----A terrified woman came to me this morning, scarcely able to control her speech, with this letter in her hand----a letter to her fifteen-year-old daughter. She had opened it simply out of curiosity; the girl was not at home.----In the letter Melchior explains to the fifteen-year-old girl that his manner of acting left him no peace, that he had sinned against her, etc., etc., and that naturally he would answer for it. She must not fret herself even if she felt results. He was already on the road after help; his expulsion made it easier for him. The previous false step could still lead to her happiness----and more of such irrational nonsense. FRAU GABOR. Impossible! HERR GABOR. The letter is forged. It's a cheat. Somebody is trying to take advantage of his generally known expulsion. I have not yet spoken to the lad about it----but please look at this hand! See the writing! FRAU GABOR. An unprecedented, shameless bit of knavery! HERR GABOR. That's what I'm afraid! FRAU GABOR. No, no----never, never! HERR GABOR. It would be so much the better for us.----The woman, wringing her hands, asked me what she should do. I told her she should not leave her fifteen-year-old daughter lying about a haymow. Fortunately she left me the letter.----If we send Melchior to another grammar school, where he is not under parental supervision, in three weeks we shall have the same result.----A new expulsion----his joyful heart will get used to it after awhile.----Tell me, Fanny, where shall I send the lad? FRAU GABOR. To the House of Correction---- HERR GABOR. To the?---- FRAU GABOR. House of Correction! HERR GABOR. He will find there, in the first place, that which has been wrongfully withheld from him at home, parental discipline, principles, and a moral constraint to which he must submit under all circumstances.----Moreover, the House of Correction is not a place of terror, as you think it. The greatest weight is laid in the establishment upon the development of Christian thought and sensibility. The lad will learn at last to follow good in place of desire and not to follow his natural instincts, but to observe the letter of the law.----A half hour ago I received a telegram from my brother that confirms the woman's statement. Melchior has confided in him and begged him for 200 marks in order to fly to England---- FRAU GABOR. (_Covering her face._) Merciful heavens! SCENE FOURTH. _The House of Correction.--A corridor.--Diethelm, Rheinhold, Ruprecht, Helmuth, Gaston and Melchior._ DIETHELM. Here is a twenty pfennig piece! RHEINHOLD. What shall we do with it? DIETHELM. I will lay it on the floor. Arrange yourselves about it. Who can get it can keep it. RUPRECHT. Won't you join us, Melchior? MELCHIOR. No, thank you. HELMUTH.