Yourself you never have been at all;—

  Then what does it matter, your dying right out?

  PEER

  Have I not been——? I could almost laugh!

  Peer Gynt, then, has been something else, I suppose!

  No, Button-moulder, you judge in the dark.

  If you could but look into my very reins,

  You’d find only Peer there, and Peer all through,—

  Nothing else in the world, no, nor anything more.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  It’s impossible. Here I have got my orders.

  Look, here it is written: Peer Gynt shalt thou summon.

  He has set at defiance his life’s design;

  Clap him into the ladle with other spoilt goods.

  PEER

  What nonsense! They must mean some other person.

  Is it really Peer? It’s not Rasmus, or Jon?

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  It is many a day since I melted them.

  So come quietly now, and don’t waste my time.

  PEER

  I’ll be damned if I do! Ay, ’twould be a fine thing

  If it turned out to-morrow some one else was meant.

  You’d better take care what you’re at, my good man!

  Think of the onus you’re taking upon you——

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  I have it in writing——

  PEER

  At least give me time.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  What good would that do you?

  PEER

  I’ll use it to prove

  That I’ve been myself all the days of my life:

  And that’s the question that’s in dispute.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  You’ll prove it? And how?

  PEER

  Why, by vouchers and witnesses.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  I’m sadly afraid Master will not accept them.

  PEER

  Impossible! However, enough for the day106—!

  My dear man, allow me a loan of myself;

  I’ll be back again shortly. One is born only once,

  And one’s self, as created, one fain would stick to.

  Come, are we agreed?

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  Very well then, so be it.

  But remember, we meet at the next cross-roads.

  [PEER GYNT runs off.]

  SCENE EIGHTH

  A further point on the heath.

  PEER [Running hard.]

  Time is money, as the Scripture says.

  If I only knew where the cross-roads are;—

  They may be near and they may be far.

  The earth burns beneath me like red-hot iron.

  A witness! A witness! Oh, where shall I find one?

  It’s almost unthinkable here in the forest.

  The world is a bungle! A wretched arrangement,

  When a right must be proved that is patent as day!

  An OLD MAN, bent with age, with a staff in his hand and a bag on his back, is trudging in front of him.

  THE OLD MAN [Stops.]

  Dear, kind sir—a trifle to a houseless soul!

  PEER

  Excuse me; I’ve got no small change in my pocket——

  OLD MAN

  Prince Peer! Oh, to think we should meet again——!

  PEER

  Who are you?

  THE OLD MAN

  You forget the Old Man in the Rondë?

  PEER

  Why, you’re never——?

  THE OLD MAN

  The King of the Dovrë, my boy!

  PEER

  The Dovrë-King? Really? The Dovrë-King?

  Speak!

  THE OLD MAN

  Oh, I’ve come terribly down in the world——!

  PEER

  Ruined?

  THE OLD MAN

  Ay, plundered of every stiver

  Here am I tramping it, starved as a wolf.

  PEER

  Hurrah! Such a witness doesn’t grow on the trees.

  THE OLD MAN

  My Lord Prince, too, has grizzled a bit since we met.

  PEER

  My dear father-in-law, the years gnaw and wear one.—

  Well well, a truce to all private affairs,—

  And pray, above all things, no family jars.

  I was then a sad madcap——

  THE OLD MAN

  Oh yes; oh yes;—

  His Highness was young; and what won’t one do then?

  But his Highness was wise in rejecting his bride.

  He saved himself thereby both worry and shame

  For since then she’s utterly gone to the bad——

  PEER

  Indeed!

  THE OLD MAN

  She has led a deplorable life;107

  And, just think,—she and Trond are now living together.

  PEER

  Which Trond?

  THE OLD MAN

  Of the Valfjeld.

  PEER

  It’s he? Aha;

  It was he I cut out with the sæter-girls.

  THE OLD MAN

  But my grandson has shot up both stout and tall,

  And has flourishing children all over the land——

  PEER

  Now, my dear man, spare us this flow of words;—

  I’ve something quite different troubling my mind.—

  I’ve got into rather a ticklish position,

  And am greatly in need of a witness or voucher;—

  That’s how you could help me best, father-in-law,

  And I’ll find you a trifle to drink my health.

  THE OLD MAN

  You don’t say so; can I be of use to his Highness?

  You’ll give me a character, then, in return?

  PEER

  Most gladly. I’m somewhat hard pressed for cash,

  And must cut down expenses in every direction.

  Now hear what’s the matter. No doubt you remember

  That night when I came to the Rondë a-wooing——

  THE OLD MAN

  Why, of course, my Lord Prince!

  PEER

  Oh, no more of the Prince!

  But no matter. You wanted, by sheer brute force,

  To bias my sight, with a slit in the lens,

  And to change me about from Peer Gynt to a troll.

  What did I do then? I stood out against it,—

  Swore I would stand on no feet but my own;

  Love, power, and glory at once I renounced,

  And all for the sake of remaining myself.

  Now this fact, you see, you must swear to in Court——

  THE OLD MAN

  No, I’m blest if I can.

  PEER

  Why, what nonsense is this?

  THE OLD MAN

  You surely don’t want to compel me to lie?

  You pulled on the troll-breeches, don’t you remember,

  And tasted the mead——

  PEER

  Ay, you lured me seductively;—

  But I flatly declined the decisive test,

  And that is the thing you must judge your man by.

  It’s the end of the ditty that all depends on.

  THE OLD MAN

  But it ended, Peer, just in the opposite way.

  PEER

  What rubbish is this?

  THE OLD MAN

  When you left the Rondë,

  You inscribed my motto upon your escutcheon.108

  PEER

  What motto?

  THE OLD MAN

  The potent and sundering word.

  PEER

  The word?

  THE OLD MAN

  That which severs the whole race of men

  From the troll-folk: Troll! To thyself be enough!

  PEER [Recoils a step.]

  Enough!

  THE OLD MAN

  And with every nerve in your body,

  You’ve been living up to it ever since.

  PEER

  What, I? Peer Gynt?

  THE OLD MAN [Weeps.]

  It’s ungrateful of you!

  You’ve lived as a troll, but have still kept it secret.

  The word I taught you has shown you the way

  To swing yourself up as a man of substance;—

  And now you must needs come and turn up your nose

  At me and the word you’ve to thank for it all.

  PEER

  Enough! A hill-troll! An egoist!

  This must be all rubbish; that’s perfectly certain.

  THE OLD MAN [Pulls out a bundle of old newspapers.]

  I daresay you think we don’t take in the papers?

  Wait; here I’ll show you in red and black109

  How the “Bloksberg Post” eulogises you;

  And the “Heklefjeld Journal” has done the same

  Ever since the winter you left the country.—

  Do you care to read them? You’re welcome Peer.

  Here’s an article, look you, signed “Stallion-hoof.”

  And here too is one: “On Troll-Nationalism.”

  The writer points out and lays stress on the truth

  That horns and a tail are of little importance,

  So long as one has but a strip of the hide.

  “Our enough,” he concludes, “gives the hallmark of trolldom

  To man,”—and proceeds to cite you as an instance.

  PEER

  A hill-troll? I?

  THE OLD MAN

  Yes, that’s perfectly clear.

  PEER

  Might as well have stayed quietly where I was?

  Might have stayed in the Rondë in comfort and peace?

  Saved my trouble and toil and no end of shoe-leather?

  Peer Gynt—a troll? Why, it’s rubbish! It’s stuff!

  Good-bye! There’s a halfpenny to buy you tobacco.

  THE OLD MAN

  Nay, my good Prince Peer!

  PEER

  Let me go! You’re mad,

  Or else doting. Off to the hospital with you!

  THE OLD MAN

  Oh, that is exactly what I’m in search of.

  But, as I told you, my grandson’s offspring

  Have become overwhelmingly strong in the land,

  And they say that I only exist in books.

  The saw says: One’s kin are unkindest of all;

  I’ve found to my cost that that saying is true.

  It’s cruel to count as mere figment and fable——

  PEER

  My dear man, there are others who share the same fate.

  THE OLD MAN

  And ourselves we’ve no Mutual Aid Society,

  No alms-box or Penny Savings Bank;—

  In the Rondë, of course, they’d be out of place.

  PEER

  No, that curs’d: To thyself be enough was the word there!

  THE OLD MAN

  Oh, come now, the Prince can’t complain of the word.

  And if he could manage by hook or by crook——

  PEER

  My man, you have got on the wrong scent entirely;

  I’m myself, as the saying goes, fairly cleaned out110——

  THE OLD MAN

  You surely can’t mean it? His Highness a beggar?

  PEER

  Completely. His Highness’s ego’s in pawn.

  And it’s all your fault, you accursëd trolls!

  That’s what comes of keeping bad company.

  THE OLD MAN

  So there came my hope toppling down from its perch again!

  Good-bye! I had best struggle on to the town——

  PEER

  What would you do there?

  THE OLD MAN

  I will go to the theatre.

  The papers are clamouring for national talents——

  PEER

  Good luck on your journey; and greet them from me.

  If I can but get free, I will go the same way.

  A farce I will write them, a mad and profound one;

  It’s name shall be: “Sic transit gloria mundi.”

  [He runs off along the road; the OLD MAN shouts after him.]

  SCENE NINTH

  [At a cross-road.]

  PEER GYNT

  Now comes the pinch, Peer, as never before!

  This Dovrish Enough has passed judgment upon you.

  The vessel’s a wreck; one must float with the spars.

  All else; but to go to the scrap-heap—no, no!

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER [At the cross-road.]

  Well now, Peer Gynt, have you found your voucher?

  PEER

  Is this, then, the cross-road? Well, that is short work!

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  I can see on your face, as it were on a signboard,

  The gist of the paper before I have read it.

  PEER

  I got tired of the hunt;—one might lose one’s way——

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  Yes; and what does it lead to, after all?

  PEER

  True enough; in the wood, and by night as well——

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  There’s an old mail, though, trudging. Shall we call him here?

  PEER

  No, let him go. He is drunk, my dear fellow!

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  But perhaps he might——

  PEER

  Hush; no—let him alone!

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  Well, shall we begin then?

  PEER

  One question—just one:

  What is it, at bottom, this “being oneself ”?

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  A singular question, most odd in the mouth

  Of a man who but now——

  PEER

  Come, a straightforward answer.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  To be oneself is: to slay oneself.

  But on you that answer is doubtless lost;

  And therefore we’ll say: to stand forth everywhere

  With Master’s intention displayed like a sign-board.

  PEER

  But suppose a man never has come to know

  What Master meant with him?

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  He must divine it.

  PEER

  But how oft are divinings beside the mark,—

  Then one’s carried “ad undas”111 in middle career.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  That is certain. Peer Gynt; in default of divining

  The cloven-hoofed gentleman finds his best hook.

  PEER

  This matter’s excessively complicated.—

  See here! I no longer plead being myself;—

  It might not be easy to get it proven.

  That part of my case I must look on as lost.

  But just now, as I wandered alone o’er the heath,

  I felt my conscience-shoe pinching me;

  I said to myself: After all, you’re a sinner——

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  You seem bent on beginning all over again——

  PEER

  No, very far from it; a great one I mean;

  Not only in deeds, but in words and desires.

  I’ve lived a most damnable life abroad——

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  Perhaps; I must ask you to show me the schedule!

  PEER

  Well well, give me time; I will find out a parson,

  Confess with all speed, and then bring you his voucher.

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  Ay, if you can bring me that, then it is clear

  You may yet escape from the casting-ladle.

  But Peer, I’d my orders——

  PEER

  The paper is old;

  It dates no doubt from a long past period;—

  At one time I lived with disgusting slackness,

  Went playing the prophet, and trusted in Fate.

  Well, may I try?

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  But——!

  PEER

  My dear, good man,

  I’m sure you can’t have so much to do.

  Here, in this district, the air is so bracing,

  It adds an ell to the people’s ages.

  Recollect what the Justedal parson wrote:

  “It’s seldom that any one dies in this valley.”

  THE BUTTON-MOULDER

  To the next cross-roads then; but not a step further.

  PEER

  A priest I must catch, if it be with the tongs.

  [He starts running.]

  SCENE TENTH

  A heather-clad hillside with a path following the windings of the ridge.

  PEER

  This may come in useful in many ways,

  Said Esben as he picked up a magpie’s wing.

  Who could have thought one’s account of sins

  Would come to one’s aid on the last night of all?

  Well, whether or no, it’s a ticklish business;

  A move from the frying-pan112 into the fire;—

  But then there’s a proverb of well-tried validity

  Which says that as long as there’s life there is hope.

  A LEAN PERSON in a priest’s cassock, kilted-up high, and with a birdingnet over his shoulder, comes hurrying along the ridge.