Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 1).pdf/267



[To herself.] Oh, torture, to have to endure it all.

How goes it, I pray, with your sister dear?

Right well, I thank you.

They said she was here With you.

She has been here ever since we—

She came, now three years since, to Solhoug with me.

Ere long she'll be here, her friend to greet.

Well I mind me of Signë's nature sweet. No guile she dreamed of, no evil knew. When I call to remembrance her eyes so blue I must think of the angels in heaven. But of years there have passed no fewer than seven; In that time much may have altered. Oh, say If she, too, has changed so while I've been away?

She too? Is it, pray, in the halls of kings That you learn such courtly ways, Sir Knight? To remind me thus of the change time brings—