Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906)

Peer Gynt

Translated by Robert Farquharson Sharp

Act V

Scene 8

(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 man must prove a right that’s as 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—

THE 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 Ronde?

PEER. Why, you’re never—?

THE OLD MAN. The King of the Dovre, my boy!

PEER. The Dovre-King? Really? The Dovre-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; 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 saeter-girls.

THE OLD MAN. But my grandson has flourished—grown both stout and great, and has strapping children all over the country—

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 with.

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 Ronde 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 Ronde, you inscribed my motto upon your ’scutcheon.

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 (falls back a step). Enough!

THE OLD MAN. And with every nerve in your body, you’ve being 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 that we’ve no newspapers? Wait; here I’ll show you in red and black, how the Bloksberg Post eulogises you; and the Heklefield 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 “Stallionhoof.” 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 hall-mark 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 stopped in the Ronde 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 Ronde, of course, they’d be out of place.

PEER. No, that cursed “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 out—

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 accursed 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; its name shall be: “Sic transit gloria mundi.”

(He runs off along the road; the old man shouts after him.)

Act V Scene 7

Act V Scene 9