Like young Monsen. He made nothing of it; also like——I say no more. Had to give him up, you see; he had already developed his unhappy taste for spirits—— MONSEN. But you’ve forgotten what you were going to tell Mr. Stensgård about the Chamberlain. HEIRE. Oh, it’s a complicated business. When my father was in his glory, things were going downhill with the old Chamberlain—this one’s father, you understand; he was a Chamberlain too. BASTIAN. Of course; everything runs in families here. HEIRE. Including the social graces——I say no more. The conversion of the currency, rash speculations, extravagances he launched out into, in the year 1816 or thereabouts, forced him to sell some of his land. STENSGÅRD. And your father bought it? HEIRE. Bought and paid for it. Well, what then? I come into my property; I make improvements by the thousand—— BASTIAN. Of course. HEIRE. Your health, my young friend!—Improvements by the thousand, I say—thinning the woods, and so forth. Years pass; and then comes Master Reynard—the present one, I mean—and repudiates the bargain! STENSGÅRD. But, my dear Mr. Heire, you could surely have snapped your fingers at him. HEIRE. Not so easily! Some small formalities had been overlooked, he declared. Besides, I happened then to be in temporary difficulties, which afterwards became permanent. And what can a man do nowadays without capital? MONSEN. You’re right there, by God! And in many ways you can’t do very much _with_ capital either. That I know to my cost. Why, even my innocent children—— BASTIAN. [_Thumps the table._] Ugh, father! if I only had certain people here! STENSGÅRD. Your children, you say? MONSEN. Yes; take Bastian, for example. Perhaps I haven’t given him a good education? HEIRE. A threefold education! First for the University; then for painting; and then for—what is it?—it’s a civil engineer he is now, isn’t it? BASTIAN. Yes, that I am, by the Lord! MONSEN. Yes, that he is; I can produce his bills and his certificates to prove it! But who gets the town business? Who has got the local road-making—especially these last two years? Foreigners, or at any rate strangers—in short, people no one knows anything about! HEIRE.