Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 4).djvu/266

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Peer.

And where is he now, this remarkable man?

An Elderly Man.

He fared over seas to a foreign land;
It went ill with him there, as one well might foresee;—
It's many a year now since he was hanged.

Peer.

Hanged! Ay, ay! Why, I thought as much;
Our lamented Peer Gynt was himself to the last.

[Bows.

 Good-bye,—and best thanks for to-day's merry meeting.

 [Goes a few steps, but stops again.

 You joyous youngsters, you comely lasses,— Shall I pay my shot with a traveller's tale? Several Voices. Yes; do you know any? Peer. Nothing more easy.—

[He comes nearer; a look of strangeness comes over him.


I was gold-digging once in San Francisco.
There were mountebanks swarming all over the town.
One with his toes could perform on the fiddle;
Another could dance a Spanish halling[1] on his knees;
A third, I was told, kept on making verses
While his brain-pan was having a hole bored right through it.

  1. See footnotes, pp. 29 and 30.