Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 2).djvu/294

 barren woman will slay another's child, because she herself has none?

Ay, ay; but in that she does unwisely.

Unwisely?

Ay, for she gives the gift of sorrow to her whose child she slays.

Think you the gift of sorrow is a great good?

Yes, lord.

[Looks fixedly at him.] Methinks there are two men in you, Icelander. When you sit amid the household at the merry feast, you draw cloak and hood over all your thoughts; when one is alone with you, sometimes you seem to be of those among whom one were fain to choose his friend. How comes it?

When you go to swim in the river, my lord, you would scarce strip you where the people pass by to church; you seek a sheltered privacy.

True, true.

My soul has the like shamefastness; therefore I do not strip me when there are many in the hall.