Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 4).djvu/212

 So now, for a change, I've become an Egyptian;
 * but Egyptian on the basis of the Gyntish I.
 * To Assyria next I will bend my steps.
 * To begin right back at the world's creation
 * would lead to nought but bewilderment.
 * I will go round about all the Bible history;
 * its secular traces I'll always be coming on;
 * and to look, as the saying goes, into its seams,
 * lies entirely outside both my plan and my powers.
 * [Sits upon a stone.]
 * Now I will rest me, and patiently wait
 * till the statue has sung its habitual dawn-song.
 * When breakfast is over, I'll climb up the pyramid;
 * if I've time, I'll look through its interior afterwards.
 * Then I'll go round the head of the Red Sea by land;
 * perhaps I may hit on King Potiphar's grave.-
 * Next I'll turn Asiatic. In Babylon I'll seek for
 * the far-renowned harlots and hanging gardens,-
 * that's to say, the chief traces of civilisation.
 * Then at one bound to the ramparts of Troy.
 * From Troy there's a fareway by sea direct
 * across to the glorious ancient Athens;-
 * there on the spot will I, stone by stone,
 * survey the Pass that Leonidas guarded.
 * I will get up the works of the better philosophers,
 * find the prison where Socrates suffered, a martyr-;
 * oh no, by-the-bye-there's a war there at present-!
 * Well then, my Hellenism must even stand over.
 * [Looks at his watch.]
 * It's really too bad, such an age as it takes
 * for the sun to rise. I am pressed for time.