SONG
Song brings us light with the power of lending
Glory to brighten the work that we find;
Song brings us warmth with the power of rending
Rigor and frost in the swift-melting mind.
Song is eternal with power of blending
Time that is gone and to come in the soul,
Fills it with yearnings that flow without ending,
Seeking that sea where the light-surges roll.
Song brings us union, while gently beguiling
Discord and doubt on its radiant way;
Song brings us union and leads, reconciling
Battle-glad passions by harmony's sway,
Unto the beautiful, valiant, and holy
—Some can pass over its long bridge of light
Higher and higher to visions that solely
Faith can reveal to the spirit's pure sight.
Songs from the past of the past's longings telling,
Pensive and sad cast a sunset's red glow;
Present time's longings in sweet music dwelling,
Grateful the soul of the future shall know.
Youth of all ages in song here are meeting,
Sounding in tone and in word their desire;
—More than we think, from the dead bringing greeting,
Gather to-night in our festival choir.
ON THE DEATH OF N. F. S. GRUNDTVIG
(1872)
(See Note 57)
E'en as the Sibyl in Northland-dawn drew
Forth from the myth-billows gliding,
Told all the past, all the future so true,
Sank with the lands' last subsiding,—
Prophecies leaving, eternally new,
Still abiding
Thus goes his spirit the Northland before,—
Though, that he sank, we have tiding,—
Visions unfolding like sun-clouds, when o'er
Sea-circled lands they are riding,
Northern lands' future, till time is no more,
Ever guiding.
FROM THE CANTATA FOR N. F. S. GRUNDTVIG (1872)
His day was the greatest the Northland has seen,
It one was with the midnight-sun's wonders serene:
The light wherein he sat was the light of God's true peace,
And that has never morning, nor night when it must cease.
In light of God's peace shone the history he gave,
The spirit's course on earth that shall conquer the grave.
Might of God's pure peace thus our fathers' mighty way
Before us for example and warning open lay.
In light of God's peace he beheld with watchful eye
The people at their work and the spirit's strivings high.
In light of God's pure peace he would have all learning glow,
And where his word is honored the "Folk-High-Schools" must grow.
In light of God's peace stood 'mid sorrow and care
For Denmark's folk his comfort, a castle strong and fair;
In light of God's pure peace there shall once again be won
And thousand-fold increased, what seems lost now and undone.
In light of God's peace stands his patriarch-worth,
The sum and the amen of a manful life on earth.
In light of God's pure peace how his face shone, lifted up,
When white-haired at the altar he held th' atoning cup.
In light of God's peace came his word o'er the wave,
In light of God's pure peace sound the sweet psalms he gave.
In light of God's pure peace, as its sunbeam curtains fall
To hide him from us, stands now his memory for all.
AT A BANQUET FOR
PROFESSOR LUDV. KR. DAA
(See Note 58)
Youthful friends here a circle form,
Elder foes now surrender.
Feel among us in safety, warm,
Toward you our hearts are tender.
Once again on a hard-fought day
Hero-like you have led the way,
Smiting all that before you stood;—
But now be good!
With no hubbub, without champagne,
Dress-suit, and party-collar,
We would honor o'er viands plain
Grateful our "grand old scholar"!
When all quiet are wind and wave,
Seldom we see this pilot brave;—
When storm-surges our ship might whelm,
He takes the helm!
—Takes the helm and through thick and thin
(Clear are his old eyes burning),
Steers the course with his trusty "grin,"
Straight, where the others are turning!
Thanks gave to him I know not who,
For he scolded the skipper, too!—
Back he went to his home right soon:
We had the boon.
He has felt what it is to go
Hated, till truth gains the battle;
He has felt what it is to know
Blows that from both sides rattle.
He has felt what the cost is, so
Forward the present its path to show:
He, whose strength had such heights attained,
Stood all disdained.
Would that Norway soon grew so great
That it with justice rewarded
Heroes who its true weal create,
Who are no laggards sordid.
Shall we always so slowly crawl,
Split forever in factions small,
Idly counting each ill that ails?—
No! Set the sails!
Set the sails for the larger life,
Whereto our nation has power!
Daily life is with death but rife,
If there's not growth every hour.
Rally to war for the cause of right,
Sing 'neath the standard of honor bright,
Sail with faith in our God secure,
And strong endure
OH, WHEN WILL YOU STAND FORTH?
(See Note 59)
Oh, when will you stand forth, who with strength can bring aid,
To strike down the injustice and lies
That my house have beset, and with malice blockade
Every pathway I out for my powers have laid,
And would hidden means find
With deceit and with hate
To set watch on my mind
And defile every plate
In my beautiful home where defenseless we wait?
Oh, when will you stand forth? This detraction through years
For my people has made me an oaf,
Hides my poetry's fount in the fog of its fleers,
So it merely a pool of self-worship appears;
Like a clumsy troll I
Am contemned with affront,
Whom all "cultured" folk fly,
Or yet gather to hunt,
That their hunger of hate at a feast they may blunt.
When I publish a book: "It is half like himself;"
If I speak, 't is for vanity's sake.
What I build in the stage-world of fancy's free elf
Is but formed from my fatuous self.
When for faith I contend
And our land's ancient ways,
When the bridge I defend
From our fathers' great days,
'Tis because my poor breast no king's "Order" displays.
Oh, when will you stand forth, who shall sunder in twain
All this slander so stifling and foul,
And shall sink in the sea all the terror insane
That they have of heart-passion and will-wielding brain,—
And with love shall enfold
A soul's faith wide and deep,
That in want and in cold
Would its morning-watch keep
Undismayed, till the light all the host shall ensweep?
Come, thou Spirit of Norway, God-given of yore
In the stout giant-conquering Thor!
While the lightning thou ridest, thy answer's loud roar
Drowns the din that the dwarfs in defiance outpour;
Thou canst waken with might
All our longings to soar,
Thou canst strengthen in right
What united we swore,
When at Hafur thy standard in honor we bore.
Hail, thou Spirit of Norway! To think but of thee
Makes so small all the small things I felt.
To thy coming I hallow me, wholly to thee,
And I humbly look up to thy face, unto thee,
And I pray for a song
With thy tongue's stirring sound,
That I true may and strong
In the crisis be found,
To rouse heroes for thee on our forefathers' ground.
AT HANSTEEN'S BIER (1873) (See Note 60)
God, we thank Thee for the dower
Thou gavest Norway in his power,
Whom in the grave we now shall lay!
Starlit paths of thoughts that awe us
His spirit found; his deeds now draw us
To deeds, as mighty magnets play.
He was the first to stand
A light in our free land;
Of our present the first fair crown,
The first renown,
At Norway's feet he laid it down.
We his shining honors sharing,
And humble now his body bearing,
Shall sing with all the world our praise.
God, who ever guides our nation,
Hath called us to a high vocation
And shown where He our goal doth raise.
People of Norway, glad
Go on, as God us bade!
God has roused you; He knows whereto,
Though we are few.
With Him our future we shall view.
RALLYING SONG FOR FREEDOM IN THE NORTH
TO "THE UNITED LEFT"
(Tirol, 1874)
(See Note 61)
Dishonored by the higher, but loved by all the low,—
Say, is it not the pathway that the new has to go?
By those who ought to guard it betrayed, oh yes, betrayed,—
Say, is it not thus truth ever progress has made?
Some summer day beginning, a murmur in the grain,
It grows to be a roaring through the forests amain,
Until the sea shall bear it with thunder-trumpets' tone,
Where nothing, nothing's heard but it alone, it alone.
With Northern allies warring we take the Northern
For God and for our freedom—is the watchword we bring.
That God, who gave us country and language, and all,
We find Him in our doing, if we hear and heed His call.
That doing we will forward, we many, although weak,
'Gainst all in fearless fighting, who the truth will not seek:—
Some summer day beginning, a murmur in the grain,
It goes now as a roaring through the forests amain.
'T will grow to be a storm ere men think that this can be,
With voice of thunder sweeping o'er the infinite sea.
What nation God's call follows, earth's greatest power shall show,
And carry all before it, though it high stand or low.
AT A BANQUET
GIVEN TO THE DEPUTATION OF THE SWEDISH RIKSDAG
TO THE CORONATION, IN TRONDHJEM, JULY 17, 1873
(See Note 62)
You chosen men we welcome here
From brothers near.
We welcome you to Olaf's town
That Norway's greatest mem'ries crown,
Where ancient prowess looking down
With searching gaze,
The question puts to sea and strand:
Are men now in the Northern land
Like yesterday's?
'T is well, if on the battlefield
Our "Yes" is sealed!
'T is well, if now our strength is steeled
To grasp our fathers' sword and shield
And in life's warfare lift and wield
For God and home!
For us they fought; 't is now our call
To raise for them a temple-hall,
Fair freedom's dome.
List to the Northern spirit o'er
Our sea and shore!
Here once high thoughts in word were freed,
In homely song, in homely deed;
And ever shall the selfsame need
That spirit sing:
Heed not things trivial, foreign, new;
Alone th' eternal, Northern, true
Can harvest bring.
O brother-band, this faith so dear
Has brought us here?
The spirit of the North to free,
Our common toil and prayer shall be,
Those greater days again to see,—
As once before,
Of home and trust a message strong
To send the warring world we long
Forevermore.
OPEN WATER!
Open water, open water!
All the weary winter's yearning
Bursts in restless passion burning.
Scarce is seen the blue of ocean,
And the hours seem months in motion.
Open water, open water!
Smiles the sun on ice defiant,
Eats it like a shameless giant:
Soon as mouth of sun forsakes it,
Swift the freezing night remakes it.
Open water, open water!
Storm shall be the overcomer
Sweeping on from others' summer
Billows free all foes to swallow,—
Crash and fall and sinking follow.
Open water, open water!
Mirrored mountains are appearing,
Boats with steam and sail are nearing,
Inward come the wide world's surges,
Outward joy of combat urges.
Open water, open water!
Fiery sun and cooling shower
Quicken earth to speak with power.
Soul responds, the wonder viewing:
Strength is here for life's renewing.
SONG OF FREEDOM
TO "THE UNITED LEFT"
(1877)
(See Note 63)
Freedom's father—power strong,
Freedom's mother—wrath and song.
Giant-stout, a youth self-taught,
Soon a giant's work he wrought.
Ever he, full of glee,
Thought and wit and melody,
Mighty, merry, made his way,—
Labor's toil or battle-fray.
Enemies whom none could tell
Lay in wait this foe to fell,
Found him waking all too stark,
Sought his sleeping hours to mark,
Tried their skill, bound him still;
When he wakened, they fared ill.
Glad he forward strode firm-paced,
Full of power, full of haste.
Bare fields blossom 'neath his feet,
Commerce swells about his seat,
From his fire gleam thought-rays bright,—
All things doubled are in might!
For the land law he planned,
Keeps it, guards with head and hand,
Of all rue and error quit,
Crushing him who injures it.
Freedom's God is God of light,
Not the bondsman's god of fright,—
God of love and brotherhood,
Springtime's hope and will for good.
To earth's ends peace He sends!
Heed the words His law commends:
"One your Lord, and I am He,
Have no other gods but Me!"
TO MOLDE
(See Note 64)
Molde, Molde,
True as a song,
Billowy rhythms whose thoughts fill with love me,
Follow thy form in bright colors above me,
Bear thy beauty along.
Naught is so black as thy fjord, when storm-lashes
Sea-salted scourge it and inward it dashes,
Naught is so mild as thy strand, as thine islands,
Ah, as thine islands!
Naught is so strong as thy mountain-linked ring,
Naught is so sweet as thy summer-nights bring.
Molde, Molde,
True as a song,
Murm'ring memories throng.
Molde, Molde,
Flower-o'ergrown,
Houses and gardens where good friends wander!
Hundreds of miles away,—but I'm yonder
'Mid the roses full-blown.
Strong shines the sun on that mountain-rimmed beauty,
Fast is the fight, let each man do his duty.
Friends, who your favor would never begrudge me,
Gently now judge me!—
Only with life ends the fight for the right.
Thought flees to you for a refuge in light.
Molde, Molde,
Flower-o'ergrown,
Childhood's memories' throne.
Oh, may at last
In thine embrace, life's fleeting
Conflict past,
Glad thine evening-glory greeting,
—Where life let thought awaken,—
My thought by death be taken!
+ PER BO (1878)
Once I knew a noble peasant
From a line of men large-hearted.
Light and strength were in his mind,
Lifted like a peak clear-lined
O'er the valley in spring sunshine,
First to feel the morning's beam,
First refreshed by cloud-born stream.
Wide the springtime spread its banner,
Waving in his will illumined,
Bright with promise, color-sound;
Heritage of toil its ground.
Round that mountain music floated,
Songsters sweet of faith and hope
Nestled on its tree-clad slope.
Sometime, sometime all the valley
Like him shall with light be flooded;
Sometime all his faith and truth
Sunward grow in dewy youth,
And the dreams he dreamt too early
Live and make him leader be
For a race as true as he.
HAMAR-MADE MATCHES (1877) (See Note 65)
"Here your Hamar-made matches!"—
Of them these verses I sang;
A thought to which humor attaches,
But yet to my heart sparks sprang.
Sparks from the box-side flying
Sank deep in my memory,
Till in a light undying
Two eyes cast their spell on me,—
Light on the fire that's present,
When faith blazes forth in deed.
Know, that to every peasant
Those eyes sent a light in need.
Sent to souls without measure
The flame of love's message broad,
Gathering in one treasure
Fatherland, home, and God.
For it was Herman Anker
Took of his fathers' gold,
Loaned it as wisdom's banker,
Spread riches of thought untold,
Scattered it wide as living
Seed for the soil to enwrap;
Flowers spring from his giving
Over all Norway's lap.
Flowers spring forth, though stony
The ground where it fell, and cold.
Never did patrimony
Bear fruitage so many fold.
Heed this, Norwegian peasant,
Heed it, you townsman, too!
That fruit of love's seed may be present,
Our thanks must fall fresh as dew.
"Here your Hamar-made matches!"
My thanks kindle fast. And oh!
This song at your heart-strings catches,
That kindling your thanks may glow.
The matches hold them in hiding,—
Scratching one you will find
The light with a warmth abiding
Carries them to his mind.
"Here your Hamar-made matches!"
Only to strike one here,
Our thanks far-away dispatches,
With peace his fair home to cheer.
His matches in thousands of houses,
In great and in small as well!—
The light that thanksgiving arouses
Shall scatter the darkness fell.
His matches in thousands of houses!—
Some eve from his factory
He'll see how thanksgiving arouses
The land, and its love flames free.
He'll see in the eyes so tender,
Through gleams that his matches woke,
The thanks that his nation would render,
His glistening wreath of oak,—
He'll feel that Norway with double
The warmth of other lands glows;
The harvest must more be than trouble,
When faith in its future grows.
"Here your Hamar-made matches!"
No phosphorus-poison more!
The bearer of light up-catches
The work of the school before:—
From home all the poison taking,
Hastening the light's advance,
Longings to warm light waking,
That lay there and had no chance.
THEY HAVE FOUND EACH OTHER (FROM THE DRAMA THE KING, THIRD INTERLUDE)
Mute they wander,
Meeting yonder,
In the wondrous Spring new-born,
That though old as Time's first morn,
Brings fresh youth to all the living,
Now held fast, now far retreating,
But through hearts in oneness beating
Ever fullest bloom is giving.
Mute they wander. E'en the eye
Speaks no thought. For from on high
To their souls sweet strains have spoken
From the wide world's harmony,
Born of light, the darkness broken,
In the dawn of things to be.
Power crowned—
Earth around
Like a sun-song rolled the sound.
Mute they wander. Sweet strains ending—
Eye nor tongue dares yet the lending
Speech to thought.
But lo! quick blending,
All things speak! They sound and shimmer,
Bloom in fragrance, ring and glimmer,
Tint and tone combining, nearer,
Meet as one-with all their thinking
In one beauty, higher, clearer,—
Heaven itself to earth is sinking.
But in this great hour of trysting
Life is opened, its course brightened,
Growth eternal calls, enlisting
Every spirit-power heightened.
THE PURE NORWEGIAN FLAG
(Note: That is, without the mark of union with Sweden.)
(See Note 66)
I
Tri-colored flag, and pure,
Thou art our hard-fought cause secure;
Thor's hammer-mark of might
Thou bearest blue in Christian white,
And all our hearts' red blood
To thee streams its full flood.
Thou liftest us high when life's sternest,
Exultant, thou oceanward turnest;
Thy colors of freedom are earnest
That spirit and body shall never know dearth.—
Fare forth o'er the earth!
II
"The pure flag is but pure folly,"
You "wise" men maintain for true.
But the flag is the truth poetic,
The folly is found in you.
In poetry upward soaring,
The nation's immortal soul
With hands invisible carries
The flag toward the future goal.
That soul's every toil and trial,
That soul's every triumph sublime,
Are sounding in songs immortal,—
To their music the flag beats time.
We bear it along surrounded
By mem'ry's melodious choir,
By mild and whispering voices,
By will and stormy desire.
It gives not to others guidance,
Can not a Swedish word say;
It never can flaunt allurement:—
Clear the foreign colors away!
III
The sins and deceits of our nation
Possess in the flag no right;
The flag is the high ideal
In honor's immortal light.
The best of our past achievements,
The best of our present prayers,
It takes in its folds from the fathers
And bears to the sons and heirs;
Bears it all pure and artless,
By tokens that tempt us unmarred,
Is for our will's young manhood
Leader as well as guard.
IV
They say: "As by rings of betrothal
We are by the flag affied!"
But Norway is not betrothèd,
She is no one's promised bride.
She shares her abode with no one,
Her bed and her board to none yields,
Her will is her worthy bridegroom,
Herself rules her sea, her fields.
Our brother to eastward honors
This independence of youth.
He knows well that by it only
Our wreath can be won in truth.
When we from the flag are taking
His colors, he knows 't is no whim,
But merely because we are holding
Our honor higher than him.
And none who himself has honor
Will seek him a different friend;
Our life we can for him offer,
But naught of our flag can lend.
V
TO SWEDEN
Respectful I seek a hearing,
With trust in your temper sane,
And plead now our cause before you
In words that are calm and plain:
If, Sweden, you were the smaller,
Were young your freedom's renown,
Had your flag a mark of union
That pressed you still farther down
By saying that you, as little,
Were set at the greater's board
(For this is the mark's real meaning,
By no one on earth ignored),
Yes, if it were you,—and your freedom
Not hallowed by age, but young,
And a century's want and weakness
Still heavy in memory hung,
The soul of your nation harrowed
By old injustice and need,
By luckless labor and longing,
—And did you its meaning heed;
Yes, if it were you, whose duty
To teach your people were tried,
To honor their new-born freedom,
To find in their flag their guide:
Would longer you suffer it sundered,
Leave foreign a single field?
Would you not claim it unplundered,
Your independence to shield?
Would not to yourself you say then:
"If one has high lineage long,
If greater his colors' glory,
The more alluring his song.
Oh, tempt not him who from trouble
Is rising with new found might;
With pure marks direct him, rather,
To honor's exalted height."
Thus you would speak, elder hero,
If you in our home abode;
Your wont is the way of honor,
You fare on the forward road.
From eighteen hundred and fourteen,
And down to the latest day,
So oft for our independence
We stood like the stag at bay,
Brave men have risen among you,
And scorning the strife that swelled
Have talked for our cause high-minded,
Like Torgny to them of eld.
VI ANSWER TO THE AGED RIDDERSTAD
You say, it is "knightly duty,"
The fight for the flag to share,—
I hold you full high in honor,
But—that is our own affair!
For just because we encounter
The storm-blasts of slander stark,
It's "knightly duty" to free now
The flag from the marring mark.
The "parity" that mark preaches
Flies false over all the seas;
A pan-Scandinavian Sweden
Can never our nation please.
From "knightly duty" the smaller
Must say: I am not a part;
The mark of my freedom and honor
Is whole for my mind and heart.
From "knightly duty" the greater
Must say: A falsehood's fair sign
Can give me no special honor,
No longer shall it be mine.
For both it is "knightly duty,"
With flags that are pure, to be
A warring world's bright example
Of peoples at peace, proud and free.
TO MISSIONARY SKREFSRUD IN SANTALISTAN
(See Note 67)
I honor you, who, though refused, affronted,
Have heard the voice, and victory have won;
I honor you, who still by malice hunted,
Show miracles of faith and power done.
I honor you, God-thirsting soul so driven,
'Mid scorn and need the spirit's war to wage;
I honor you, by Gudbrand's valley given,
And of her sons the foremost in this age.
I do not share your faith, your daring dreaming;
This parts us not, the spirit's paths are broad.
For, all things great and noble round us streaming,
I worship them, because I worship God.
POST FESTUM
(See Note 68)
A man in coat of ice arrayed
Stood up once by the Arctic Ocean;
The whole earth shook with proud emotion
And honor to the giant paid.
A king came, to him climbing up,
An Order in his one hand bearing:
"Who great become, this sign are wearing."
—The growling giant said but "Stop!"
The frightened king fell down again,
Began to weep with features ashen:
"My Order is in this rude fashion
Refused by just the greatest men.
"My dear man, take it, 't is but fit,
Of your king's honor be the warder;
On your breast greater grows the Order,
And we who bear it, too, by it."—
The Arctic giant was too good,—
A foible oft ascribed to giants,
Who foolish trust in little clients,—
He took it,—while we mocking stood.
But all the kings crept to him then,
And each his Order brought, to know it
Thereby renewed and greater, so it
Gave rank to needy noblemen.
Honi soit … and all the rest;
Soon Orders covered all his breast.
But oh! they greater grew no tittle,
And he grew so confounded little.
ROMSDAL
(See Note 69)
Come up on deck! The morning is clear,—
Memory wakes, as the landmarks appear.
How many the islands, green and cheery,
The salt-licking skerries, weed-wound, smeary!
On this side, on that side, they frolic before us,
Good friends, but wild,—in frightened chorus
Sea-fowl shriek round us, a flying legion.
We are in a region
Of storms historic, unique for aye.
We fare the fishermen's venturesome way!
Far out the bank and the big fish shoaling,
The captain narrates; and just now unrolling
Sails run to shore a swift racing match;—
Good is the catch.
Yes, yes,—I recognize them again,
Romsdal's boats' weather-beaten men.
They know how to sail, when need's at hand.
But I'm forgetting to look towards land!
— — — It whelms the sight
Like lightning bright,—
In memory graven, but not so great.
Wherever I suffer my eyes to wander,
Stand mountain-giants, both here and yonder,
The loin of one by the other's shoulder,
Naught else to where earth and sky are blending.
The dread of a world's din daunts the beholder;
The silence vastens the vision unending.
Some are in white and others in blue,
With pointed tops that emulous tower;
Some mass their power,
In marching columns their purpose pursue.
Away, you small folk!—In there "The Preacher"
In high assembly the service intoning
Of magnates primeval, their patriarch owning!
Of what does he preach, my childhood's teacher?
So often, so often to him I listened,
In eager worship, devout and lowly;
My songs were christened
In light that fell from his whiteness holy.
— How great it is! I can finish never.
Great thoughts that in life and legend we treasure
Stream towards the scene in persistent endeavor,
The mighty impression to grasp and measure,—
Dame's hell, India's myth-panorama,
Shakespeare's earth-overarching drama,
Aeschylus' thunders that purge and free,
Beethoven's powerful symphony,—
They widen and heighten, they cloud and brighten
—Like small ants scrambling and soft-cooing doves,
They tumble backward and flee affrighted;—
As if a dandy in dress-coat and gloves
The mountains approached and to dance invited.
No, tempt them not! Their retainer be!
You'll learn then later,
How life with the great must make you greater.
If you are humble, they'll say it themselves,
That something is greater than e'en their greatest.
Look how the little river that delves
High in the notch within limits straitest,
Through ice first burrowed and stone, a brook,
Slowly the giants asunder wearing!
Unmoved before, their face now and bearing
They had to change 'mid the spring-flood's laughter;
Millions of years have followed thereafter,
Millions of years it also took.
In stamps the fjord now to look on their party,
Lifts his sou'-wester, gives greeting to them.
Whoever at times in their fog could view them
Has seen him near to their very noses;—
The fjord's not famed for his well-bred poses.
Towards him hurry, all white-foam-faced,
Brooks and rivers in whirling haste,
All of his family, frolicsome, naughty.
If ever the mountains the fjord would immure,
Their narrows press nigher, a prison sure;—
His water-hands then with a gesture haughty
Seize the whole saucy pass like a shell;
Set to his mouth, he begins to blow it
With western-gale-lungs,—and then you may know it,
Loud is the noise, and the swift currents swell.
Forcing the coast, a big fjord, black and gray,
Breaks us our way;
Waterfalls rushing on both sides rumble.
Sponge-wet and slow,
Cloud-masses over the mountain-flanks fumble;
The sun and mist, lo,
Symbol of struggle eternal show.
This is my Romsdal's unruly land!
Home-love rejoices.
All things I see, have eyes and have voices.
The people? I know them, each man understand,
Though never I saw him nor with him have spoken;
I know this folk, for the fjord is their token.
One is the fjord in the storm's battle-fray,
Another is he when the sunbeams play
In midsummer's splendor,
And radiant, happy his heart is tender.
Whatever has form,
He bears on his breast with affection warm,
Mirrors it, fondles it,—
Be it so bare as the mossy gray rubble,
Be it so brief as a brook's fleeting bubble.
Oh, what a brightness! Beauty, soul-ravishing,
Shines from his prayer, that now he be shriven
Of all the past! And penitence lavishing,
All he confesses; with glad homage given
Mirrors and masses
Deep the mountains' high peaks and passes.
The old giants think now: He's not really bad;
In greater degree he's wrathful and glad
Than others perchance; is false not at all,
But reckless, capricious,—true son of Romsdal.
Right are the mountains! This race-type keeping,
They saw men creeping
Over the ridges, scant fodder reaping.
They saw men eager
Toil on the sea, though their take was meager,
Plow the steep slope and trench the bog-valley,
To bouts with the rock the brown nag rally.
Saw their faults flaunted,—
Buck-like they bicker,
Love well their liquor,—
But know not defeat,—hoist the sail undaunted!
Different the districts; but all in all:
Spirits vivacious, with longings that spur them,
Depths full of song, with billows that stir them,
Folk of the fjord and the sudden squall.
Viking-abode, I hail you with wonder!
High-built the wall, broad sea-floor thereunder,
Hall lit by sun-bows on waterfall vapors,
Hangings of green,—your dwellers the drapers.
Viking-born race,—'t is you I exalt!
It costs in under so high a vault
A struggle long unto lordship stable;
Not all who have tried to succeed, were able.
It costs to recover the wealth of the fjord
From wanton waste and in power to hoard.
It costs;—but who conquers is made a man.
I know there are that can.
HOLGER DRACHMANN
(See Note 70)
Spring's herald, hail! You've rent the forest's quiet?
Your hair is wet, and you are leaf-strewn, dusty …
With your powers lusty
Have you raised a riot?
What noise about you of the flood set free,
That follows at your heels,—turn back and see:
It spurts upon you! —Was it that you fought for?
You were in there where stumps and trunks are rotting
Where long the winter-graybeards have been plotting
To prison safe that which a lock they wrought for.
But power gave you Pan, the ancient god!
They cried aloud and cursed your future lot?
Your gallant feat they held a robber's fraud?
—Each spring it happens; but is soon forgot.
You cast you down beside the salt sea's wave.
It too is free; dances with joy to find you.
You know the music well; for Pan resigned you
His art one evening by a viking's grave.
But while on nature's loving lap you lie,
The tramp of battle on the land you hear,
You see the steamers as they northward steer
With freedom's flag;—of your name comes a cry.
And so is torn between the two your breast:—
Freedom's bold fighters, who now proudly rally,
In nature's life and legend dreamy rest;
The former chide, the latter lures to dally.
Your songs sound, some as were a war-horn braying,
Some softly purl like streams on reedy strand.
Half nature-sprite and half as man you stand,
The two not yet one law of life obeying.
But as you seem and as yourself you are
(The faun's love that the viking's longing tinges),
We welcome you, no lock is left nor bar,—
You bring along the door and both the hinges.
Just this it is that we are needing now:
The spring, the spring! These stifling fumes we bear
Of royal incense and of monkish snuff,
Of corpses in romantic cloak and ruff,
Are bad for morals and for lungs: Fresh air!
Rather a draught of Songs Venetian, cheerful,
With southern wantonness and color-wonders,—
Rather "Two Shots" (although they make us fearful)
Against our shallow breeding and its blunders.
Spring's herald, hail! come from the forest's choir,
From ocean's roar, from armèd hosts and grim!
Though sometimes carelessly you struck the lyre,—
Where rich growth is, one can the rank shoots trim.
The small trolls jeer the gestures of a giant,
I love you so,—unique and self-reliant.
+
A MEETING
(See Note 71)
… O'er uplands fresh swift sped my sleigh …
A light snow fell; along the way
Stood firs and birches slender.
The former pondered deep, alone,
The latter laughed, their white boughs shone;—
All brings a picture tender.
So light and free is now the air;
Of all its burdens stripped it bare
The snow with playful sally.
I glimpse behind its veil so thin
A landscape gay, and high within
A snow-peak o'er the valley.
But from the border white and brown,
Where'er I look, there's peeping down
A face … but whose, whose is it?
I bore my gaze 'neath cap and brim
And see the snowflakes swarm and swim;—
Will some one here me visit?
A star fell on my glove … right here …
And here again … its unlike peer; …
They will with riddles pose me.
And smiles that in the air abound
From eyes so good … I look around …
'T is memory besnows me.
The stars spin fine their filigree,
Can hidden spirits in it be?
There haunts me something awing …
You finer birch, you snow unstained,
You purer air,—a soul you've gained?
Who is it here now drawing
His features dear in nature's face,
In all this fascinating grace,
In falling stars that cheat me,—
In these white gleams that finely glance,
In all this silent rhythmic dance? …
Hans Brecke!—comes to meet me.
THE POET
(See Note 72)
The poet does the prophet's deeds;
In times of need with new life pregnant,
When strife and suffering are regnant,
His faith with light ideal leads.
The past its heroes round him posts,
He rallies now the present's hosts,
The future opes
Before his eyes,
Its pictured hopes
He prophesies.
Ever his people's forces vernal
The poet frees,—by right eternal.
He turns the people's trust to doubt
Of heathendom and Moloch-terror;
'Neath thought of God, cold-gray with error,
He sees grow green each fresh, new sprout.
Set free, these spread abroad, above,
Bear fruit of power and of love
In each man's soul,
And make it warm
And make it whole,
In wrath transform,
Till light and courage fill the nation:
In life is God's best revelation.
Away the kingly cloak he tears
And on the people's shoulder places,
So it no more need make grimaces
To borrowed clothes some highness wears,
But be itself its majesty
In right of spirit-dynasty,
In saga's light
On heart and brain,
In men of might
From its loins ta'en,
In will unbiased and unbroken,
In manly deed and bold word spoken.
His songs the nation's sins chastise,
He hates a lie, as truth's high teacher
(No Sunday-, but a weekday-preacher,
Who, suffering, still the wrong defies).
Against false peace he plies his lance,
'Gainst cowardice and ignorance,—
No bribe he knows
From nation's hand
Nor king's command;
But his way goes.
And when he wavers, sorrow scourges
His heart and free of passion purges.
He is a brother of the small,
Of women, as of all who suffer,
The new and weak, when waves grow rougher,
He steers, till fairer breezes fall.
Greater he grows without his will
By deeds his calling to fulfil,
And near the tomb
To God he sighs,
That soon may rise
A richer bloom
To deck his people's soul with flowers
Of beauty far beyond his powers.
PSALMS
I
I seem to be
Sundered from Thee,
Thou Harmony of all creation.
Am I disowned
For talents loaned
And useless hid in vain probation?
Now powerless,
In weariness,
Now in despair a beggar humble
For help, for cheer,
A voice, an ear,
To hear and guide, while on I stumble.
God, let me be.
Of use to Thee!
If vain my purpose and my powers,
Then sinks from sight
My star,—and night
Henceforth my steps enfolding lowers.
Then break and bind
My ravaged mind
The terrors dread of doubt and anguish.
I know the pack,
I drove them back;—
Only to-day does courage languish.
Oh, come now, peace!
Come faith's increase,
That life's strong chain shall ever bind me!
That not in vain
I strive and strain
Myself to seek until I find me!
II
Honor the springtide life ever adorning,
That all things has made!
Things smallest have some resurrectional morning,
The forms alone fade.
Life begets life,
Potencies higher surprise.
Kind begets kind,
Heedless of time as it flies.
Worlds pass away and arise.
Nothing so small but there's something still smaller,
No one can see.
Nothing so great but there's something still greater
Beyond it can be.
Worms in the earth—
Mountains to make they essay.
Dust without worth,
Sands with which sea-billows play,—
Founders of kingdoms were they.
Infinite all, where the smallest and greatest
Oneness unfold.
No one has seen what was first,—and the latest
None shall behold.
Laws underlie,
Order the all they maintain.
Need and supply
Bring one another; our bane
Boots to the general gain.
Eternity's offspring and germ are we all now.
Thoughts have their true
Roots in our race's first morning; they fall now,
Query and clue,
Freighted with seed
Into eternity's soil;
Joy be your meed,
That your brief life's fleeting toil
Fruit for eternity bears.
Join in the joy of all life, every being,
Brief bloom of its spring!
Honor th' eternal, our human lot freeing
From fetters that cling!
Adding your mite,
With the eternal unite!
Though you decay,
Breathe as a moment you may,
Air of eternity's day!
III
CHORUS
Who art Thou, whom a thousand names trace
Through all times that are gone and each tongue?
Thou wert infinite yearning's embrace,
Thou wert hope when the yoke heavy hung,
Thou wert darkening death-terror's guest,
Thou wert sun that with life-gladness blessed.
Still Thine image we changefully fashion,
And each form we would call revelation;
Each man holds his for true with deep passion,—
Till it crumbles in poignant negation.
SOLO
Who Thou art, none can tell.
But I know Thou dost dwell
As the limitless search in my soul—it is Thou!—
After justice and light,
After victory's right
For the new that's revealed, it is Thou, it is Thou!
Every law that we see
Or believe there may be,
Though we never can knowledge attain, it is Thou!—
As my armor and aid
Round my life they are laid,
And with joy I avow, it is Thou, it is Thou!
CHORUS
Since we never Thine essence can know,
We have thought mediators of Thee;—
But the ages their impotence show,
We stand still, while no way we can see.
If in sickness for succor we thirst,
Is there balm in the dreams that have burst?
Stars of hope and of longing eternal,
That we saw o'er life's sorrows arisen,
Shall they sink in death's terrors nocturnal,
Only turn into worms in our prison?
SOLO
He that liveth in me,
Needeth no one to be
Mediator; I own Him indeed: it is Thou!
Is eternal hope prized
As from Him; is baptized
By His spirit my own,—is it Thou, is it Thou —:
Shall not I, who am dust,
His eternity trust?
I take humbly my law; for I know, it is Thou!
Was I worth Thy word: Live!
Let Thy life power give,
When Thou wilt, as Thou wilt,—it is Thou, it is Thou!
QUESTION AND ANSWER
THE CHILD
Father! Within the forest's bound
No bird I found,
No sound of song the woods around.
THE FATHER
The bird that glad his song us gave,
Flies o'er the wave;
Perhaps he there will find his grave.
THE CHILD
But why does he not wait till later?
THE FATHER
He goes where light and warmth are greater
THE CHILD
Father! It selfish seems to me,
Far off to flee,
When all we others here must be.
THE FATHER
With new-born spring comes new-born song;
By instinct strong
The better new he'll bring erelong.
THE CHILD
But if in death the cold waves swallow—?
THE FATHER
Others will come; his kin will follow.
SUNG FOR NORWAY'S RIFLEMEN
(1881)
(See Note 73)
Fly the banner, fly the banner!
For our freedom fight!
'Neath the banner, 'neath the banner,
Riflemen unite!
Graybeard in the Storting
Gives his vote for right and truth,
Rifle-voice supporting
Of our armèd youth.
Music runeful
Ring out tuneful
Bullets sent point-blank,
Fiery coursing,
Freedom forcing
Way to royal rank;
They from silent valleys
To the Storting's rallies
Bring the clear "Rah! Rah!"
And there clamors o'er us
Loud the rifle chorus,
Piercing and repeated: "Rah! Rah!
Rah-rah, rah-rah, rah-rah, rah-rah."
As the lingering echo rattles,
Listens sure our Mother Norway,
That her sons can go the war-way,
Fight her freedom's future battles.
WORKMEN'S MARCH
(See Note 74)
Left foot! Right foot! Lines unbroken!
Keeping time is power's token.
That makes one of many, many,
That makes bold, if fear daunts any,
That makes small the load and lighter,
That makes near the goal and brighter,
Till it greets us gained with laughter,
And we seek the next one after.
Left foot! Right foot! Lines unbroken!
Keeping time is power's token.
Marching, marching of few hundreds,
No one heeds it, never one dreads;
Marching, marching of few thousands,
Here and there wakes some to hearing;
Marching, marching hundred thousands,—
All will mark that thunder nearing.
Left foot! Right foot! Lines unbroken!
Keeping time is power's token.
Let us march all, never weaken
Time from Vardö down to Viken,
Vinger up to Bergen's region,—
Let us make one marching legion,
Then we'll rout some wrong from Norway,
Open wide to right the doorway.
THE LAND THAT SHALL BE
(DEDICATED TO HERMAN ANKER AND M. ANKER ON THE
OCCASION OF THEIR SILVER-WEDDING, SEPTEMBER 15, 1888)
(See Note 75)
Land that shall be
Thither, when thwarted our longings, we sail,—
Sighs to the clouds, that we breathe when we fail,
Form a mirage of rich valley and mead
Over our need,—
Visions revealing the future until
Faith shall fulfil,—
The land that shall be.
Land that shall be!
All of our labor to sow seeds of gain
Grows in the ages when our names shall wane,
Gathered with others', 't is stored in the true
Will to renew.
This then shall carry our labor within,
Safely within
The land that shall be.
Land that shall be!
Tears that are shed over evil's foul blight,
Blood-sweat in conflict to win higher right,
Hallow the will unto victory's cost.
Let us be lost,
Rooting out wrong, that the good we may sow,
Soon overgrow
The land that shall be.
Land that shall be!
Looming in beauty of colors and song,
Golden in sunlight that glad makes and strong,
Present in children's eyes, looking to-day
Down when you pray.
Winning good victories gives us the power
To own a brief hour
The land that shall be.
YOUNG MEN AND WOMEN, STRONG AND SOUND
Young men and women, strong and sound,
Adorn with beautiful excess
Of play and song and flower-dress
Our fatherland's ancestral ground.
They dream great deeds of ages older,
They long to lead to battles bolder.
Young men and women, strong and sound,
Our nation's honor are, in whom
Our whole life has its better bloom,
Rebirth upon our fathers' ground
Of them of yore. Anew there flower
The old in young folks' summer-power.
Young men and women, strong and sound,
Can doubly do our deeds and fill
With higher hope for all we will,—
Are growth in character's deep ground,
To larger life drawn by the spirit
They from our forefathers inherit.
NORWAY, NORWAY
(See Note 76)
Norway, Norway,
Rising in blue from the sea's gray and green,
Islands around like fledglings tender,
Fjord-tongues with slender,
Tapering tips in the silence seen.
Rivers, valleys,
Mate among mountains, wood-ridge and slope
Wandering follow. Where the wastes lighten,
Lake and plain brighten
Hallow a temple of peace and hope.
Norway, Norway,
Houses and huts, not castles grand,
Gentle or hard,
Thee we guard, thee we guard,
Thee, our future's fair land.
Norway, Norway,
Glistening heights where skis swiftly go,
Harbors with fishermen, salts, and craftsmen,
Rivers and raftsmen,
Herdsmen and horns and the glacier-glow.
Moors and meadows,
Runes in the woodlands, and wide-mown swaths,
Cities like flowers, streams that run dashing
Out to the flashing
White of the sea, where the fish-school froths.
Norway, Norway,
Houses and huts, not castles grand,
Gentle or hard,
Thee we guard, thee we guard,
Thee, our future's fair land.
MASTER OR SLAVE
Lo, this land that lifts around it
Threatening peaks, while stern seas bound it,
With cold winters, summers bleak,
Curtly smiling, never meek,
'Tis the giant we must master,
Till he work our will the faster.
He shall carry, though he clamor,
He shall haul and saw and hammer,
Turn to light the tumbling torrent,—
All his din and rage abhorrent
Shall, if we but do our duty,
Win for us a realm of beauty.
IN THE FOREST
List to the forest-voice murmuring low:
All that it saw when alone with its laughter,
All that it suffered in times that came after,
Mournful it tells, that the wind may know.
WHEN COMES THE MORNING?
(FROM IN GOD'S WAY)
(See Note 77)
When comes the real morning?
When golden, the sun's rays hover
Over the earth's snow-cover,
And where the shadows nestle,
Wrestle,
Lifting lightward the root enringèd
Till it shall seem an angel wingèd,
Then it is morning,
Real, real morning.
But if the weather is bad
And my spirit sad,
Never morning I know.
No.
Truly, it's real morning,
When blossom the buds winter-beaten,
The birds having drunk and eaten
Are glad as they sing, divining
Shining
Great new crowns to the tree-tops given,
Cheering the brooks to the broad ocean riven.
Then it is morning,
Real, real morning.
But if the weather is bad
And my spirit sad,
Never morning I know.
No.
When comes the real morning?
When power to conquer parries
Sorrow and storm, and carries
Sun to the soul, whose burning
Yearning
Opens in love and calls to others:
Good to be unto all as brothers.
Then it is morning,
Real, real morning.
Greatest power you know
—And most dangerous, lo!—
Will you this then possess?
Yes.
MAY SEVENTEENTH (1883) (See Note 78)
Wergeland's statue on May seventeenth
Saw the procession. And as its rear-guard,
Slow marching masses,
Strong men, and women with flower-decked presence;
Come now the peasants, come now the peasants.
Österdal's forest's magnificent chieftain
Bore the old banner. Soon as we see it
Blood-red uplifted,
Greet it the thousands in thought of its story:
That is our glory, that is our glory!
Never that lion bore crown that was foreign,
Never that cloth was by Dannebrog cloven.
I saw the future,
When with that banner by Wergeland's column
Peasants stood solemn, peasants stood solemn.
Most of our loss in the times that have vanished,
Most of our victories, most of our longing,
Most that is vital:
Deeds of the past and the future's bold daring
Peasants are bearing, peasants are bearing.
Sorely they suffered for sins once committed,
But they arise now. Here in the Storting
Stalwart they prove it,
All, as they come from our land's every region,
Peasants Norwegian, peasants Norwegian.
Hold what they won, with a will to go farther;
Whole we must have independence and honor!
All of us know it:
Wergeland's summer bears soon its best flower,—
Power in peasants, peasants in power.
FREDERIK HEGEL
(See Note 79)
I DEDICATION
You never came here; but I go
Here often and am met by you.
Each room and road here must renew
The thought of you and your form show
Standing with helpful hand extended,
As when long since in trust and deed
My home you from my foes defended.
…
So often, while I wrote this book,
The light shone from your genial eye;
Then we were one, both you and I
And what in silence being took;
So here and there the book possesses
Your spirit and your heart's fresh faith,
And therefore now your name it blesses.
I love the air, when growing colder
It, clear and high,
The purer sky
Broadens with sense of freedom bolder.
I find in forests joy the keenest
In autumn days
When fancy plays,
And not when they are young and greenest.
I knew a man: in autumn clearness
His even course,—
His heart's fine force
Like autumn sky in soft-hued sheerness.
His memory is, as—when a-swarming
The cold blasts first
Of winter burst—
The gentle flame my room first warming.
When all our outward longings falter,
And summer's mind
Within we find,
Is friendship's feast round autumn's altar.
OUR LANGUAGE (1900) (See Note 80)
Thou, who sailest Norse mountain-air,
And Denmark's songs by the cradle singest,
Who badest in Hald the war-flames flare,
And, heard in our children's joy, gently ringest,—
Thou treasure of treasures,
Our mother-tongue,
In pains as in pleasures
Our home and our tower,
With God our power,—
We hallow thee!
Whispering secrets that Holberg stored,
Thou borest him home to a brighter morning,
Didst serve him with armor and whet his sword
For satire's assaults and for laughter's warning.
Thou spirit all knowing,
Our mother-tongue,
The ages foregoing,
The future now growing,
The present glowing,—
We hallow thee!
Kierkegaard thou to the deeps didst bring,
Where life's full currents in God he sounded.
For Wergeland wert thou the eagle's wing,
That lifted him sunward to heights unbounded.
Thou treasure of treasures,
Our mother-tongue,
In pain as in pleasures
Our home and our tower,
With God our power,—
We hallow thee!
Radiant warmth of a May-day
Thou to the spring of our freedom gavest.
In thy clearness our Norse flags aye
With song and honor afar thou wavest.
Thou spirit all knowing,
Our mother-tongue,
The ages foregoing,
The future now growing,
The present glowing,—
We hallow thee!
O'er the ocean unrollest thou
Thy carpet of flowers, a bridge that nigher
Can bring dear friends to meet even now,—
While faith grows greater and heaven higher.
Thou treasure of treasures,
Our mother-tongue,
In pain as in pleasures
Our home and our tower,
With God our power,—
We hallow thee!
Best of friends that I found wert thou;
Thou waitedst for me in the eyes of mother.
And leave me last of them all wilt thou,
Who knewest me better than any other.
Thou spirit all knowing,
Our mother-tongue,
The ages foregoing,
The future now growing,
The present glowing,—
We hallow thee!
NOTES
PREFATORY
Björnstjerne Björnson was born in 1832 and died in 1909. The last edition of his Poems and Songs in his lifetime is the fourth, dated 1903. It is a volume of two hundred pages, containing one hundred and forty-one pieces, arranged in nearly chronological order from 1857, or just before, to 1900. Of these almost two-thirds appeared in the first edition (1870), ending with Good Cheer and including ten pieces omitted in the other editions, eight poems and two lyrical passages from the drama King Sverre; the second edition (1880) added the contents in order through Question and Answer and inserted earlier The Angels of Sleep; the third (1900) extended the additions to include Frederik Hegel.
This translation presents in the same order the contents of the fourth edition, with the exception of the following ten pieces:
Bryllupsvise Nr. I.
Bryllupsvise Nr. II.
Bryllupsvise Nr. III.
Bryllupsvise Nr. IV.
Bryllupsvise Nr. V.
De norske studenter til fru Louise Heiberg.
De norske studenters hilsen med fakkeltog til deres kgl. höiheder
kronprins Frederik og kronprinsesse Louise.
Til sorenskriver Mejdells sölvbryllup.
Nytaarsrim til rektor Steen.
Til maleren Hans Gudes og frues guldbryllup.
Nine of these are occasional longs in the narrowest sense, with little or no general interest, and showing hardly any of the author's better qualities: five Wedding Songs, a Betrothal Song, a Silver-Wedding Song, a Golden-Wedding Song, and a Students' Song of Greeting to Mrs. Louise Heiberg. The tenth, a characteristic, rather long poem of vigor and value, New Year's Epistle in Rhyme to Rector Steen, is extremely difficult to render into English verse.
The translator has thought it best not to include any of Björnson's lyric productions not contained in the collection published with his sanction during his life, the other lyrics in his tales, dramas. and novels, many occasional short poems in periodicals and newspapers which were abandoned by their author to their fugitive fate, two noble lyrical cantatas, and a few fine poems written after the year 1900.
The translation aims to reproduce as exactly as possible the verse-form, meter, and rhyme of the original. This has been judged desirable because music has been composed for so many of these songs and poems, and each of them is, as it were, one with its musical setting. But such reproduction seems also, on the whole, to be most faithful and satisfactory, when the translator is not endowed with poetic genius equal to that of the author. The very numerous double (dissyllabic) rhymes of the Norwegian are not easy to render in English. Recourse to the English present participle has been avoided as much as possible. If it still seems to be too frequent, the translator asks some measure of indulgence in view of the fact that the use here of the English present participle is formally not so unlike that of the inflectional endings and of the post-positive article Norwegian.
The purpose of the Notes is to assist the better understanding and appreciation of the contents of the book, by furnishing the necessary historical and biographical information. Of the persons referred to it is essential to know their dates, life-work, character, influence, and relation to Björnson. The Notes have been drawn from the accessible encyclopedias, biographical dictionaries, bibliographies, and histories. The notes of Julius Elias to his edition of German translations of Björnson's poems made by various writers and published in 1908 have been freely and gratefully used.
The Introduction is designed not so much to offer new and original criticism as to present the opinions generally held in Scandinavia, and, of course, chiefly in Norway. The lyric poetry of Björnson has been excellently discussed by Christian Collin in Björnstjerne Björnson. Hans Barndom og Ungdom by Henrik Jaeger in Illustreret norsk literaturhistorie, and by various authors, including Swedes and Danes, in articles of Björnstjerne Björnson. Festskrift I anledning af hans 70 aars födelsdag. To all of these special indebtedness is here acknowledged.
New Haven, Connecticut, June, 1915
Note 1 NILS FINN. "There has hardly been written later so excellent a continuation of the old Norwegian humorous ballad as this poem (from the winter of 1856-57),written originally in the Romsdal dialect with which Björnson wished 'to astonish the Danes.'" (Collin, ii, 147.)
Note 2. VENEVIL. Midsummer Day=sanktehans=Saint John's (Feast), on June 24, next to Christmas the chief popular festival in Norway; the time when nature and human life have fullest light and power.
Note 3. OVER THE LOFTY MOUNTAINS. "Really Björnson's first patriotic song. … Describes one of the main motive forces in all the history of the Norwegian people, the inner impulse to expansion and the adventurous longing for what is great and distant. … Written in the narrow, hemmed-in Eikis valley." (Collin, ii, 308, 309)