ÅSE
[tossing about her arms, and tearing her hair]
All things are against me with wrathful might!
Heaven, and the waters, and the grisly mountains!
Fog-scuds from heaven roll down to bewilder him!
The treacherous waters are lurking to murder him!
The mountains would crush him with landslip and rift!—
And the people too! They’re out after his life!
God knows they shan’t have it! I can’t bear to lose him!
Oh, the oaf! to think that the fiend should tempt him!
[Turning to SOLVEIG.]
Now isn’t it clean unbelievable this?
He, that did nought but romance and tell lies;—
he, whose sole strength was the strength of his jaw;
he, that did never a stroke of true work;—
he —! Oh, a body could both cry and laugh!—
Oh, we clung closely in sorrow and need.
Ay, you must know that my husband, he drank,
loafed round the parish to roister and prate,
wasted and trampled our gear under foot.
And meanwhile at home there sat Peerkin and I—
the best we could do was to try to forget;
for ever I’ve found it so hard to bear up.
It’s a terrible thing to look fate in the eyes;
and of course one is glad to be quit of one’s cares,
and try all one can to keep thought far away.
Some take to brandy, and others to lies;
and we — why we took to fairy-tales
of princes and trolls and of all sorts of beasts;
and of bride-rapes as well. Ah, but who could have dreamt
that those devil’s yarns would have stuck in his head?
[In a fresh access of terror.]
Hu! What a scream! It’s the nixie or droug!
Peer! Peer!— Up there on that hillock —!
[She runs to the top of a little rise, and looks out over the tarn. SOLVEIG’S FATHER and MOTHER come up.]