Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 1).pdf/133

 craving to know all that lies beyond the sea. But you have not understood what ailed you. At times you have thought it was the fate of your fatherland that filled you with all these restless broodings. You deceived yourself;—a maiden so young as you has other food for musing.Elina Gyldenlöve! Have you never had visions of an unknown power—a strong mysterious might, that binds together the destinies of mortals? When you dreamed of the many-coloured life far out in the wide world—when you dreamed of knightly jousts and joyous festivals—saw you never in your dreams a knight, who stood in the midst of the gayest rout, with a smile on his lips and with bitterness in his heart,—a knight that had once dreamed a dream as fair as yours, of a woman noble and stately, for whom he went ever a-seeking, and ever in vain?

Who are you, that have power to clothe my most secret thoughts in words? How can you tell me what I have borne in my inmost soul—yet knew it not myself? How know you?

All that I have told you, I have read in your eyes.

Never has any man spoken to me as you have spoken. I have understood you but dimly; and yet—all, all seems changed since