FRU KIRSTEN.
Hvor gider I lytte til, hvad onde tunger kan spinde sammen. Ikke vil vi mere tænke på tvistighederne, som nu har varet ved siden jer stamfaders tid. Jeg mener, vore ætter har lidt tungt nok derunder, eders såvel som min. Se jer om, herr Arne! Er ikke lien her at ligne med de vildeste udmarker, og i vore fædres dage var her dog folksomt og rigt. En bro var lagt over elven, og vej gik der fra Guldvik til min faders hus. Men med ild og sværd drog de frem fra begge sider; de lagde øde alt, hvad de traf på, thi det tyktes dem, at de var hinanden for nære grander. Nu vokser der alleslags urter i alfarvejen, broen er brækket ned, og det er kun ulv og bjørn, som holder tilhuse herinde.
LADY KIRSTEN.
How can you listen to what evil tongues invent? No more will we think of our differences which have lasted since the days of your ancestors. I think our families have suffered enough these years, yours as well as mine. Look around you, Lord Arne! Is not the hillside here like the wildest of upland pastures? And yet in our fathers’ days it was a region much frequented and rich. A bridge there was across the river, and a highway from Guldvik to my father’s house. But with fire and sword they sallied forth from both sides; they laid everything waste that they came upon, for it seemed to them that they were too near neighbors. Now all sorts of weeds grow in the highway, the bridge is broken, and it is only the bear and the wolf that make their homes here.
