And kept turning round as we travelled,

  And asked me if I was cold.

  God bless you, ugly old mother,—

  You were ever a kindly soul——!

  What’s hurting you now?

  ÅSE

  My back aches,

  Because of the hard, bare boards.

  PEER

  Stretch yourself; I’ll support you.

  There now, you’re lying soft.

  ÅSE [Uneasily.]

  No, Peer, I’d be moving!

  PEER

  Moving?

  ÅSE

  Ay, moving; ’tis ever my wish.

  PEER

  Oh, nonsense! Spread o’er you the bed-fur.

  Let me sit at your bedside here.

  There; now we’ll shorten the evening

  With many a lild and lay.

  ÅSE

  Best bring from the closet the prayer-book:

  I feel so uneasy of soul.

  PEER

  In Soria-Moria Castle

  The King and the Prince give a feast.

  On the sledge-cushions lie and rest you;

  I’ll drive you there over the heath——

  ÅSE

  But, Peer dear, am I invited?

  PEER

  Ay, that we are, both of us.

  [He throws a string round the back of the chair on which the cat is lying,

  takes up a stick, and seats himself at the foot of the bed.]

  Gee-up! Will you stir yourself, Black-boy?

  Mother, you’re not a-cold?

  Ay, ay; by the pace one knows it,

  When Granë begins to go!

  ÅSE

  Why, Peer, what is it that’s ringing——?

  PEER

  The glittering sledge-bells, dear!

  ÅSE

  Oh, mercy, how hollow it’s rumbling.

  PEER

  We’re just driving over a fiord.

  ÅSE

  I’m afraid! What is that I hear rushing

  And sighing so strange and wild?

  PEER

  It’s the sough of the pine-trees, mother,

  On the heath. Do you but sit still.

  ÅSE

  There’s a sparkling and gleaming afar now;

  Whence comes all that blaze of light.

  PEER

  From the castle’s windows and doorways.

  Don’t you hear, they are dancing?

  ÅSE

  Yes.

  PEER

  Outside the door stands St. Peter,

  And prays you to enter in.

  ÅSE

  Does he greet us?

  PEER

  He does, with honour,

  And pours out the sweetest wine.

  ÅSE

  Wine! Has he cakes as well, Peer?

  PEER

  Cakes? Ay, a heaped-up dish.

  And the dean’s wife34 is getting ready

  Your coffee and your dessert.

  ÅSE

  Lord, Lord! shall we two come together?

  PEER

  As freely as ever you will.

  ÅSE

  Oh, deary, Peer, what a frolic

  You’re driving me to, poor soul!

  PEER [Cracking his whip.]

  Gee-up; will you stir yourself, Black-boy!

  ÅSE

  Peer, dear, you’re driving right?

  PEER [Cracking his whip again.]

  Ay, broad is the way.

  ÅSE

  This journey,

  It makes me so weak and tired.

  PEER

  There’s the castle rising before us;

  The drive will be over soon.

  ÅSE

  I will lie back and close my eyes then,

  And trust me to you, my boy!

  PEER

  Come up with you, Granë, my trotter!

  In the castle the throng is great;

  They bustle and swarm to the gateway:

  Peer Gynt and his mother are here!

  What say you, Master Saint Peter?

  Shall mother not enter in?

  You may search a long time, I tell you,

  Ere you find such an honest old soul.

  Myself I don’t want to speak of;

  I can turn at the castle gate.

  If you’ll treat me, I’ll take it kindly;

  If not, I’ll go off just as pleased.

  I have made up as many flim-flams

  As the devil at the pulpit desk,

  And called my old mother a hen, too,

  Because she would cackle and crow.

  But her you shall honour and reverence,

  And make her at home indeed;

  There comes not a soul to beat her

  From the parishes nowadays.—

  Ho-ho; here comes God the Father!

  Saint Peter! you’re in for it now!

  [In a deep voice.]

  “Have done with these jack-in-office airs, sir;

  Mother Åse shall enter free!”

  [Laughs loudly, and turns towards his mother.]

  Ay, didn’t I know what would happen?

  Now they dance to another tune!

  [Uneasily.]

  Why, what makes your eyes so glassy?

  Mother! Have you gone out of your wits——?

  [Goes to the head of the bed.]

  You mustn’t lie there and stare so——!

  Speak, mother; it’s I, your boy!

  [Feels her forehead and hands cautiously; then throws the string on the

  chair, and says softly:]

  Ay, ay!—You can rest yourself, Granë;

  For e’en now the journey’s done.

  [Closes her eyes, and bends over her.]

  For all of your days I thank you,

  For beatings and lullabys!

  But see, you must thank me back, now—

  [Presses his cheek against her mouth.]

  There; that was the driver’s fare.35

  THE COTTAR’S WIFE [Entering.]

  What? Peer! Ah, then we are over

  The worse of the sorrow and need!

  Dear Lord, but she’s sleeping soundly—

  Or can she be——?

  PEER

  Hush; she is dead.

  [KARI weeps beside the body; PEER GYNT walks up and down the room

  for some time; at last he stops beside the bed.]

  PEER

  See mother buried with honour.

  I must try to fare forth from here.

  KARI

  Are you faring afar?

  PEER

  To seaward.

  KARI

  So far!

  PEER

  Ay, and further still.

  [He goes.]

  ACT FOURTH

  SCENE FIRST

  On the south-west coast of Morocco. A palm-grove. Under an awning, on ground covered with matting, a table spread for dinner. Further back in the grove hammocks are slung. In the offing lies a steam-yacht, flying the Norwegian and American colours. A jolly-boat drawn up on the beach. It is towards sunset.

  PEER GYNT, a handsome middle-aged gentleman, in an elegant travelling-dress, with a gold-rimmed double eyeglass hanging at his waistcoat, is doing the honours at the head of the table. MR. COTTON,36 MONSIEUR BALLON, HERR VON EBERKOPF, and HERR TRUMPETERSTRÅLE, are seated at the table finishing dinner.

  PEER GYNT

  Drink, gentlemen! If man is made

  For pleasure, let him take his fill then.

  You know ’tis written: Lost is lost,

  And gone is gone——. What may I hand you?

  TRUMPETERSTRÅLE. 37

  As host you’re princely, Brother Gynt!

  PEER

  I share the honour with my cash,

  With cook and steward——

  MR. COTTON

  Very well;38

  Let’s pledge a toast to all the four!

  MONSIEUR BALLON39

  Monsieur, you have a gout,40 a ton,41

  That nowadays is seldom met with

  Among men living en garçon,—42

  A certain—what’s the word——?

  VON EBERKOPF43

  A dash,

  A tinge of free soul-contemplation,

  And cosmopolitanisation,44

  An outlook through the cloudy rifts

  By narrow prejudice unhemmed,

  A stamp of high illumination,

  An Ur-Natur,45 with lore of life,

  To crown the trilogy, united.

  Nicht wahr,46 Monsieur, ’twas that you meant?

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  Yes, very possible; not quite

  So loftily it sounds in French.

  VON EBERKOPF

  Ei was47 That language is so stiff.—

  But the phenomenon’s final cause

  If we would seek——

  PEER

  It’s found already.

  The reason is that I’m unmarried.

  Yes, gentlemen, completely clear

  The matter is. What should a man be?

  Himself, is my concise reply.

  He should regard himself and his.

  But can he, as a sumpter-mule48

  For others’ woe and others’ weal?

  VON EBERKOPF

  But this same in-and-for-yourself-ness,

  I’ll answer for’t, has cost you strife——

  PEER

  Ah yes, indeed; in former days;

  But always I came off with honour.

  Yet one time I ran very near

  To being trapped against my will.

  I was a brisk and handsome lad,

  And she to whom my heart was given,

  She was of royal family——

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  Of royal——?

  PEER [Carelessly.]

  One of those old stocks,

  you know the kind——

  TRUMPETERSTRÅLE [Thumping the table.]

  Those noble-trolls.

  PEER [Shrugging his shoulders.]

  Old fossil Highnesses who make it

  Their pride to keep plebeian blots

  Excluded from their line’s escutcheon.

  MR. COTTON

  Then nothing came of the affair?

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  The family opposed the marriage?

  PEER

  Far from it!

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  Ah!

  PEER [With forbearance.]

  You understand

  That certain circumstances made for

  Their marrying us without delay.

  But truth to tell, the whole affair

  Was, first to last, distasteful to me.

  I’m finical in certain ways,

  And like to stand on my own feet.

  And when my father-in-law came out

  With delicately veiled demands

  That I should change my name and station,

  And undergo ennoblement,

  With much else that was most distasteful,

  Not to say quite inacceptable.—

  Why then I gracefully withdrew,

  Point-blank declined his ultimatum—

  And so renounced my youthful bride.

  [Drums on the table with a devout air.]

  Yes, yes; there is a ruling Fate!

  On that we mortals may rely;

  And ’tis a comfortable knowledge.

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  And so the matter ended, eh?

  PEER

  Oh no, far otherwise I found it;

  For busy-bodies mixed themselves,

  With furious outcries, in the business.

  The juniors of the clan were worst;

  With seven of them I fought a duel.

  That time I never shall forget,

  Though I came through it all in safety.

  It cost me blood; but that same blood

  Attests the value of my person,

  And points encouragingly towards

  The wise control of Fate aforesaid.

  VON EBERKOPF

  Your outlook on the course of life

  Exalts you to the rank of thinker.

  Whilst the mere commonplace empiric

  Sees separately the scattered scenes,

  And to the last goes groping on,

  You in one glance can focus all things.

  One norm to all things you apply.

  You point each random rule of life,

  Till one and all diverge like rays

  From one full-orbed philosophy.—

  And you have never been to college?

  PEER

  I am, as I’ve already said,

  Exclusively a self-taught man.

  Methodically naught I’ve learned;

  But I have thought and speculated,

  And done much desultory reading.

  I started somewhat late in life,

  And then, you know, it’s rather hard

  To plough ahead through page on page,

  And take in all of everything.

  I’ve done my history piecemeal;

  I never have had time for more.

  And, as one needs in days of trial

  Some certainty to place one’s trust in,

  I took religion intermittently.

  That way it goes more smoothly down.

  One should not read to swallow all,

  But rather see what one has use for.

  MR. COTTON

  Ay, that is practical!

  PEER [Lights a cigar.]

  Dear friends

  Just think of my career in general.

  In what case came I to the West?

  A poor young fellow, empty-handed;

  I had to battle sore for bread;

  Trust me, I often found it hard.

  But life, my friends, ah, life is dear,

  And, as the phrase goes, death is bitter.

  Well! Luck, you see, was kind to me;

  Old Fate, too, was accommodating.

  I prospered; and, by versatility,

  I prospered better still and better.

  In ten years’ time I bore the name

  Of Crœsus ’mongst the Charleston shippers.

  My fame flew wide from port to port,

  And fortune sailed on board my vessels——

  MR. COTTON

  What did you trade in?

  PEER

  I did most

  In negro slaves for Carolina,

  And idol-images for China.

  MONSIEUR BALLON

  Fi donc!49

  TRUMPETERSTRÅLE

  The devil, Uncle Gynt!

  PEER

  You think, no doubt, the business hovered

  On the outer verge of the allowable?

  Myself I felt the same thing keenly.

  It struck me even as odious.

  But, trust me, when you’ve once begun,

  It’s hard to break away again.

  At any rate it’s no light thing,

  In such a vast trade-enterprise,

  That keeps whole thousands in employ,

  To break off wholly, once for all.

  That “once for all” I can’t abide,

  But own, upon the other side,

  That I have always felt respect

  For what are known as consequences;

  And that to overstep the bounds

  Has ever somewhat daunted me.

  Besides, I had begun to age.

  Was getting on towards the fifties;—

  My hair was slowly growing grizzled;

  And, though my health was excellent,

  Yet painfully the thought beset me:

  Who knows how soon the hour may strike,

  The jury verdict be delivered

  That parts the sheep and goats asunder?

  What could I do? To stop the trade

  With China was impossible.

  A plan I hit on—opened straightway

  A new trade with the self-same land.

  I shipped off idols every spring,

  Each autumn sent forth missionaries,

  Supplying them with all they needed,

  As stockings, Bibles, rum, and rice——

  MR. COTTON

  Yes, at a profit?

  PEER

  Why, of course.

  It prospered. Dauntlessly they toiled.

  For every idol that was sold

  They got a coolie well baptized,

  So that the effect was neutralised.

  The mission-field lay never fallow,

  For still the idol-propaganda

  The missionaries held in check.

  MR. COTTON

  Well, but the African commodities?

  PEER

  There, too, my ethics won the day.

  I saw the traffic was a wrong one

  For people of a certain age.

  One may drop off before one dreams of it.

  And then there were the thousand pitfalls

  Laid by the philanthropic camp;

  Besides, of course, the hostile cruisers,

  And all the wind-and-weather risks.

  All this together won the day.

  I thought: Now, Peter, reef your sails!

  See to it you amend your faults!

  So in the South I bought some land,

  And kept the last meat-importation,

  Which chanced to be a superfine one.

  They throve so, grew so fat and sleek,

  That ’twas a joy to me, and them too.

  Yes, without boasting, I may say

  I acted as a father to them,—

  And found my profit in so doing.

  I built them schools, too, so that virtue

  Might uniformly be maintained at

  A certain general niveau,50

  And kept strict watch that never its

  Thermometer should sink below it.

  Now, furthermore, from all this business

  I’ve beat a definite retreat;—