Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 3).djvu/61

 Of our drought-flood-and-famine curse Has reach'd you, promptly loose your purse (If yet unloosen'd). Every sort Of contribution meets the case. Our store's nigh spent. Five fishes scant In the wide wilderness of Want Don't make a square meal nowadays.

Myriads, idolatrously given, Would lift the soul no nearer heaven.

It was not words I bade you share: They're barren when the belly's bare.

I can't believe that you recall What long and fierce calamities They've suffered:—famine, drought, disease. Men die, Brand

I perceive it all. Each livid-circled eye makes clear Who it is holds assizes here.

Yet there you stand, a very flint!

If life here ran its sluggish round Of common toil and common stint, Pity with me your pangs had found. Who homeward crawls with earth-set eyes, In him the sleeping beast will rise.