With smiles his soft eyes ever gleamed,
 When God and country thinking;
With endless joy, his soul, it seemed,
 Faith, fatherland, was linking.
      His word, his song,
      Like springs flowed strong;
They fruitful made the valley long,
 And quickened all there drinking.

Poor people and poor homes among
 In wintry region saddest,
In Sunday's choir he always sung,
 Of all the world the gladdest:
     "The axis stout
     It turns about,
Falls not the poorest home without,
 For thus, O God, Thou badest."

With sickness came a heavy year
 And put to proof his singing,
While helpless children standing near
 His trust to test were bringing.
     But glad the more,
     As soft notes soar
When winds o'er hidden harp-strings pour,
His song his soul was winging.

His life foretold us that erelong
 With faith in God unshaken
Shall all our nation stand in song,
 And church, home, school, awaken,
     In Norway's song,
     In gladness' song,
In glory of the Lord's own song,
From life's low squalor taken.

Fair fatherland, do not forget,
 The children of his bower!
He, poor as is the rosebush, yet
 Gave gladness till death's hour—
     With failure's smart
     Let not depart
From this thy soil so glad a heart,—
His garden, let it flower!

Lift thou thine ancient yellow-blue!
 Aloft the front must show it.
The German's slow to take the cue,
 But seeing that he'll know it.

He'll know that greater danger's near
 Than ink on Bismarck's trousers;
That it will cost him doubly dear,
 Men, horses, bovine browsers;

That ten years' nonsense now is done,
 The daily quarrel dirty
Will soon become a war with one
 Who held his own for thirty;

The Northland's stubborn folk allied
 Their forces are uniting,
With glorious memories to guide,
 The Northern heavens lighting;

That great Gustavus once again
 To battle glad is riding,
But now against the Southern men
 With Christian Fourth is siding,—

With Haakon Earl the times of old
 Round Palnatoki gather;
Near Charles the Twelfth stands Tordenskjold,
 Placid, and smiling rather,—

That we, who have so well known how
 To fight against each other,
Shall not exactly scorn earn now,
 When brother stands with brother.

But forward thou the way must lead
 With stirring drum-beats' rattle,
Thy marching-step we all must heed,
 Thou 'rt known on fields of battle.

That ancient Swedish melody,
 Renowned in world-wide glory,
Not merely for the heart's deep plea
 In Jenny's travel-story,—

But for the solemn earnestness
 To Lützen's battle calling,
And for the daring strains no less,
 That rang at Narwa's falling,—

The song thou sang'st the North t' inspire
 With virtue and with power,
The three must with united choir
 Lift up this very hour!

It now must bear aloft a hymn,
 The call of God proclaiming;
Pictures of blood its lines shall limn,
 Drawn bold in letters flaming,—

Its name shall be: "The Free North's Hymn!"
 Of all the hymns thou voicest,
Whose glory time shall never dim,
 It shall be first and choicest.

Have thanks for all from our childhood's day,
 Our play together in woodland roaming.
I thought that play would go on for aye,
 Though life should pass to its gloaming.

I thought that play would go on for aye,
 From bowers leading of leafy birches
To where the Solbakke houses lay,
 And where the red-painted church is.

I sat and waited through evenings long
 And scanned the ridge with the spruces yonder;
But darkening mountains made shadows throng,
 And you the way did not wander.

I sat and waited with scarce a doubt:
 He'll dare the way when the sun's descended.
The light shone fainter, was nearly out,
 The day in darkness had ended.

My weary eye is so wont to gaze,
 To turn its look it is slow in learning;
No other landmark it seeks, nor strays,
 Beneath the brow sorely burning.

They name a place where I help may find,
 And fain to Fagerli church would guide me;
But try not thither to move my mind;
 He sits there ever beside me.

—But good it is, that full well I know,
 Who placed the houses both here and yonder,
Then cut a way through the woods so low
 And let my eye on it wander.

But good it is that full well I know,
 Who built the church and to pray invited,
And made them meeting in pairs to go
 Before the altar united.

With death's dark eye acquainted she had been made ere this,
When to her son, her first-born, she gave the farewell kiss,
And when afar she hastened beside her mother's bed,
It followed all her faring with warning fraught and dread;
It filled her with foreboding when standing by the bier:
More sheaves to gather hopeth the harvester austere.
So soon she saw her husband, that man of strength, succumb,
She said with sorrow stricken: « I knew that it would come!"
She thought that he was chosen by God from earth to go,
Would check, her hands upthrusting, the harsh behest of woe;
And with her slender body, too weak for such a strife,
Would ward her gallant consort,—and gave for him her life.

 She smiled, serene and blissful, as death's dark eye she braved;
Her sacrifice was given, her heart's proud hero saved.
Our love and admiration lifted a starry dome
Of happiness above her in life's last hour of gloam,
And snow-white pure she passed then to her eternal home.
Such tender love and holy to heaven's bounds can bear
The souls that it embraces in sacrifice and prayer.

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.

Hear us, O age-laden singer!
Streams of your tones are returning,
     Touching your heart!
Spirit of youth is their bringer,
Under your window with yearning
     Called by your art.
Now our soul's echoes abounding
     Soar in the blue,
In the sun-shimmering blue,
High where your silvery song-notes are sounding.

Smile on your labor now lightened,
You who in winter perfected
     Seeds to be sown!
All that your courage has brightened,
All that your pity protected,
     Now it is grown;
Over your shoulders upswinging,
     Folds round your frame,
Bringing in roses your name,
Joyous the sprite of your poetry bringing.

Onward our life is now marching,
Banner-like high thoughts are flying,
     Lifted to view.
One 'mid the foremost o'erarching
Leads where the pathway is lying,—
     It came from you!
Runes of our past with their warning
     Carved on its shaft,
Show us the spring you have quaffed,
Leading our land to the light of the morning.

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!

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.

OCCASION OF THEIR SILVER-WEDDING, SEPTEMBER 15, 1888)
          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.

(ON HIS FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY)
With friends you stalwart stand and fair,
To-day of fifty years the heir;
The past your works rejoicing praise,
But forward goes your gaze.
Your childlike faith, your spirit true,
Your hand that never weary grew,
A home's sweet music, love of wife,
Make ever young your life.

You dared believe with heart alive
That here in Norway art can thrive.
You forced the hardness of our stones
To harmony of tones.
You laid our wild world's secrets bare
And caught "The Hunter" near the lair.
Our nation's moods, of beauty born,
Your "Girl with Eggs" adorn.

As o'er a slope's snow-covered brow
A youth came swiftly flying now,
You saw him, raised your hand, and lo!
He stood there, chiseled snow.
But your "Ski-runner's" courage good,
It was your own, when forth you stood
Art's champion by the world unawed,
And with your faith in God.

You won your victory supreme
Through rock-like faith and will's full stream
While with unnumbered hours of rest
Your love has others blessed.
Were all now here from west and east
Whose hearts you own, oh, what a feast!
From Akershus the convicts e'en
Would bear a freeman's mien.

Now we whose lives with good you filled
For you to-day a palace build,
On heights of heart's-ease lifting square
Its golden tower of prayer.
In peace you oft shall dwell in it,
Whene'er you need to rest a bit,
And feel through them who hold you dear
Yourself to heaven near.

Long since our country to you gave
The meed of thanks that most you crave;
It gave a maid with golden hair,
Its springtime's image fair.
She came from where the fairies dwell,
With nixie's charm and wood-nymph's spell,
With peace all holy, sweet, and calm,
To sing of life the psalm.

So may your life yet long endure
To light our gland, your home secure!
May all that from your heart you gave,
Still blossom on your grave!
May God's protecting mercy hold
Your spirit ever fresh and bold,—
May He to genius oft impart
Just such a mind and heart!

When Kattegat now or the Belt you sail,
       No more will you sight
The Danish proud frigate, no more will you hail
       The red and white;
No more will the ringing command be heard
       In Wessel's tongue,
No rollicking music, no jocund word,
       'Neath Dannebrog sung.
No dance will you see, no laughter meet,
       As the white sails shine,
From mast and from stern no garland you greet,
       Of arts the sign.
But all that we owned of the treasures on board
       The deeps now hold;
One sad winter night to the sea-waves were poured
       Our memories old.

It was that same night, when the frigate nigh
       To Norway's land
Distress-guns was firing, the surf running high
       With sea-weed and sand.
To help from the harbor men put out boats,
       But they turn back,…
The frigate toward Germany drifting floats,
       A broken wrack!
What once had been ours overboard was strown,
       Each kinship mark
Was quickly removed, to the sea it was thrown
       With curses stark!
The Northern lion, that figure-head gray,
       Now had to fall,
In pieces 'twas hewn, and the frigate lay
       Like a shattered wall.
             …
Repaired and refitted, its canvas it spread
       Near Germany's coast,
With black-yellow flag and an eagle dread
       In the lion's post.
When sailing we Kattegat sweep with our eyes,
       'T is still evermore.
But a German admiral's frigate lies
       Near Scania's shore.

For joys the hours of earth bestow
 With sorrow thou must pay.
Though many follow close, yet know,
 They're loaned but for a day.
With sighing in thy laughter's stead
 Shall come a time of grief,
The load of usury bow thy head,
 With loss of thy belief.
   Mary Anne, Mary Anne,
   Mary Anne, Mary Anne,
Hadst thou not smiled upon me, thou,
I were not weeping now.

May God help him who never can
 Give only half his soul;
The time comes surely for that man
 To take the sorrow whole.
May God help him who was so glad,
 That he cannot forget,
Help him who lost the all he had,
 But not his reason yet.
   Mary Anne, Mary Anne,
   Mary Anne, Mary Anne,
The flowers that my life had grown,
Died out when thou went gone.

When now my song selects and praises
Your forceful name, think not it raises
The rallying-flag for battle near;
The street-fight shall not reach us here.
 If sacred poetry's fair hill
Lies open to assassination,—
Is this the newer revelation,
Then I withdraw and hold me still.
Then I the words of Einar borrow,
When southern change of kings brought sorrow,
And Harald's hosts their ravage spread:
I follow rather Magnus dead
Than Harald living thus,—and then
I sail away with ships and men.
Nor therefore do I lift anew
The flag of song just now for you,
Because my spirit's deepest yearning
To you for new light now is turning.
No, where the greatest questions started,
Just there it is our ways were parted—
From where the deepest thought can reach,
To plan and goal of daily speech.
My childhood's faith unshaken stands,
And thence our equal rights deriving,
I for a people free am striving
And brotherhood in kindred lands.
Though both of us are Christian men,
So wide a gulf between us lies;
Though both are true Norwegian men,
We Norway see with different eyes.
If but to-day we victory gain,
We must to-morrow fight amain.
 But now I honor you in singing,
Because what ought just now to be
With strongest will you clearly see,
And foremost to the fight are springing.
When sinks the land 'neath heavy fogs
And no fair prospect cheers the eye,
The thickening air our breathing clogs,
Yes, all things dull in torpor lie,—
Then mounts your mind with freest motion,
Its thunder-wings the mist-banks driving,
Its lightning-talons cloud-walls riving,
Till sunlight spreads o'er land and ocean.
You are the freshening shower clean
Upon our sluggish day's routine.
You are the salt sea-current poured
Into each close and sultry fjord.
Your speech a mine-shaft is, deep-going
To where the veins of ore are showing.
And by your flashing eyes far-sighted
The past is for our future lighted.
So long as Sverre's sword you wield,
So long as you our hosts are heading,
We know we'll win on every field;
Foes flee, your battle trumpet dreading.
We see their struggling ranks soon rifted,
We see them set so many a snare:
Your head unharmed in thought's pure air
Above the waves of war is lifted.
We love you for this courage good,
That e'er before the banner stood,
We love the strength you boldly stored
In your self-forged and tempered sword.
Your vigilance we love and prize,
That sickness, slander, loss defies,
We love you, that at duty's call
You gave your peace, your future, all,
We love you still—hate cannot cleave!—
Because you dared in us believe.
 How can they hope that backward here
Our land shall go? No, year by year,
Forward in freedom and in song,
Forward the truly Norse disclosing.
What might can now avail, opposing
The travail of the centuries long?
People and power no more divided;
In peace to save or war to kill,
Our freedom with one guard provided,
One nation only and one will.
 The spirit of our nation's morn,
The unity of free gods dreaming,
And all things great to be great deeming,
Forever must the spurious scorn.
The spirit that impelled the viking
'Gainst kingly power for freedom striking,—
That, threatened, sailed to Iceland strong
With hero-fame and hero-song,
And further on through all the ages,—
That spirit never dwells in cages.
The spirit that at Hjörung broke
For thousand years the foreign yoke,
By might of king ne'er made to cower,
Defying e'en the papal power,—
The spirit that, to weakness worn,
Held free our soil with rights unshorn,
Held free, with tongue and hand combined,
'Gainst foreign host and foreign mind,—
By which our Holberg's wit was whetted,
And Wessel's sword and Wessel's pen,
And to whose silent forge indebted
The thoughts that armed our Eidsvold-men,—
The spirit that in faith so high
Through Odin could to God draw nigh,
As bridge the myth of Balder threw,
And almost found the free way new
To truth's fair home in radiant Gimle,
When this was closed and warded grimly
By monkish lies and papal speech,—
That threw a second bridge to reach
On freedom's lightly soaring arches
To heights whereon the free soul marches,—
So, when for Luther blood was shed,
The North but razed a fence instead,
—The spirit that, when men were deeming
True faith in all the world were dead,
Brun, Hauge, and their lineage spread,
From soul-springs in our nation streaming,—
Though pietism's fog now thickens,
Still guards the altar lights and quickens;—
Can this they make the fashion better,
By modern bishop-synod's letter?
Is this by politics provided,
When into "Chambers" 't is divided?
Can this into a box be juggled
And o'er the boundary be smuggled?

 And that just now when beacons lighted
On all the mountain-tops are sighted,
And when our folk-high-school's young day
The Norse heart kindles with its ray,
Renewing mem'ries, courage bringing,
While they are hearing, trusting, singing;—
Just when the deep in billows surges,
Responsive to the tempest's might,
And over it the Northern Light
Of Youth's refulgent hope emerges;—
Just when the spirit everywhere,
While walls lie low as trumpets blare,
Is breaking from the ancient forms,
And will of youth the heights now storms.

 A battle-age,—and we are in it!
The greatest thing on earth: to be
Where powers that are bursting free,
Self-shaping seek their place and win it;—
Our fusing passion all to give,
To cast the statue that shall live,
To press the mold of our own form
On what shall be the future's norm,
Into the age's soul thus breathed
The spirit God to us bequeathed.

 'T was this that now I wished to say
To you, who late and early, aye
Within time's workshop great are going,
What is, what shall be, ever knowing;—
To you, who all our people's might
Have roused for freedom new to fight;—
To whom our people gave this power,
And sorrow, its eternal dower.

Our King is bereft of a trusty friend!
      And in dismay
We lower our banners and sad attend
      On his burial day.
But Denmark, in sorrow most deep thou waitest,
For fallen the life that was warmest, greatest,
      And fallen the tower
      Of mightiest power.
Bewailing the death of their kingly chief,
      Men voice their grief.

For Denmark's salvation the man was born
      Who now is dead.
When banished in youth from the court in scorn,
      To his people he fled.
There throve he right well, there grew he together
With peasants and sailors in foul and fair weather,
      While fullness of living
      Its schooling was giving;
When ready for Denmark was laid the snare,
      Then he was there!

Now soon it was plain, he was peasant-skulled
      For their tricks; and hence
The traitors' shrewd schemings were all annulled
      By his bit of sense.
He knew but one thing;—what his people thought them,
And therefore in danger he freedom brought them.
      The whole was his vision,
      He would no scission;
His words were but few, and of these the key:
      "It shall not be!"

He stood by the helm like a sailor good,
      In no storm remiss;
Of praise the tribute he never would,
      But he shall have this!
The ship to the North he unswerving directed,—
In storm or in fog, exposed or protected;—
      And fear allaying,
      All folk were saying:
"He isn't so stupid as people tell,
      For all goes well!"

"On deck every man!" was his last command,
      "There's storm again!"
When answered the cry from the mast-head: "Land!"
      Oh, then, just then,
Were loosed from the helm the true hands that were steering,
In death he sank down, while the ship began veering—
      No, never veering!
      To the course adhering!
Now, Denmark, united, with all thy force
      Hold straight his course!

He made it his honor, in line to stand,
      No rank to know;
But shoulder to shoulder to lend a hand,
      And pride forego.
They gather now fruit of his faithful training:
Well drilled, every man at his post is straining.
      The course is steady,
      For tried and ready
Is many a helmsman, and all their will
      Is "Northward still!"

Naught else can they do now, but with good cheer
      Hold out they must,
Stand guard in the darkness and have no fear,
      In God their trust.
It is sultry and silent, and yearning in sorrow
All breathless they listen and wait for the morrow,—
      'T is time for waiting,
      Till, night abating,
The eastern sky reddens and bright dawn speeds
      The day of deeds!

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.

(AT THE STUDENT MEETING OF 1869)

Thoughts toward one another coursing
 To their pole must run,
Hearts that meet, all bonds are forcing,
 Like the springtime sun.
Though to-day too heavy sorrow
 Dull the mind of youth,
Higher on the meeting's morrow
 Roll the tides of truth.

Though each man with courage fired
 Hundreds forward bore,
Though a thousand died inspired,
 There is need of more.
May a Northern Spring come blowing
 Over wood and field,
Wake the hundred thousands, knowing
 Meeting-hour revealed!

Hail! A Northern day is written
 In the brightening sky;
Darksome dread, that erst had smitten,
 Flees, now dawn is nigh.
After Gjallar-horn blasts hollow,
 Tears and shame and blood,
As so often, now shall follow
 Full the spirit's flood.

In our people's life deep-seated
 This is felt each day:
Who grows stronger when defeated,
 Victor stands for aye.
Our Spring-meeting's fullness swells now,
 Bearing prophecy
Of the Spring whose hope upwells now:
 Hail, the Northern three!

(IN RINGERIKE DURING THE STUDENT MEETING OF 1869)

We wander and sing with glee
Of glorious Norway, fair to see.
 Let sweetly the tones go twining
 In colors so softly shining
On mountain, forest, fjord, and shore,
'Neath heaven's azure arching o'er.

The warmth of the nation's heart,
The depth, the strength, its songs impart,
 Here opens its eyes to greet you,
 Rejoicing just now to meet you,
And giving, grateful for the chance,
In love a self-revealing glance.

Here wakened our history first,
Here Halfdan dreamed of greatness erst,
 In vision of hope beholding
 The kingdom's future unfolding,
And Nore stood and summons gave,
While forth to conquest called the wave.

Here singing we must unroll
Of our dear land the pictured scroll!
 Let calm turn to storm of wildness,
 Bring might into bonds of mildness:
Then Norsemen mustering, each shall see
This is our land's whole history.

To them first our way we wing,
The hundred harbors in the spring,
 Where follow fond love and yearning,
 When sea-ward the ships are turning.
For Norway's weal pure prayers exhale
From sixty thousand men that sail.

See sloping the skerried coasts,
With gulls and whales and fishing-posts,
 And vessels in shelter riding,
 While boats o'er the sea are gliding,
And nets in fjord and seines in sound,
And white with spawn the ocean's ground.

See Lofoten's tumult grand,
Where tow'ring cliffs in ocean stand,
 Whose summits the fogs are cleaving,
 Beneath them the surges heaving,
And all is darkness, mystery, dread,
But 'mid the tumult sails are spread.

Here ships of the Arctic sea;
Through snow and gloom their course must be;
 Commands from the masthead falling
 The boats toward the ice are calling;
And shot on shot and seal on seal,
And souls and bodies strong as steel.

On mountains we now shall guest,
When eventide to all brings rest,
 In dairy on highland meadow,
 On hay-field 'neath slanting shadow,
While to the alphorn's tender tone
Great Nature's voice responds alone.

But quickly we must away,
If a11 the land we would survey,—
 The mines of our metal treasures,
 The hills of our hunters' pleasures,
The foam-white river's rush and noise,
The timber-driver's foot-sure poise.

Returning, we linger here,
These valleys broad to us are dear,
 Whose men in their faithful living
 To Norway are honor giving;
Their fathers, strong in brain and brawn,
Lent luster to our morning-dawn.

We wander and sing with glee
Of glorious Norway fair to see.
 Our present to labor binds us,
 Each how of the past reminds us,
Our future shall be sure and bright,
As God we trust and do the right.

(WITH A SET OF ROMAN PEARLS)
Pray, take these pearls!—and my thanks for them
You lavished, the home of my youth to gem!
The thousands of hours of peaceful luster
Your spirit has filled, are pearls that cluster
         With beauty blest
         On my happy breast,
         And softly shining
         My brow are entwining
With thoughts whence the truth gleams: Thus gave his wife,
Who jeweled with tenderest love his life!

Yes, we love this land that towers
 Where the ocean foams;
Rugged, storm-swept, it embowers
 Many thousand homes.
Love it, love it, of you thinking,
 Father; mother dear,
And that night of saga sinking
 Dreamful to us here.

This the land that Harald guarded
 With his hero-throng,
This the land that Haakon warded,
 Hailed by Eyvind's song.
Olaf here the cross erected,
 While his blood he shed;
Sverre's word this land protected
 'Gainst the Roman dread.

Peasants whetted axes carried,
 Broke th' invader's blow;
Tordenskjold flashed forth and harried,
 Lighted home the foe.
Women oft to arms were leaping,
 Manlike in their deed;
Others' lot was naught but weeping,
 Tears that brought their meed.

Many truly were we never,
 But we did suffice,
When in times of testing ever
 Worthy was the prize.
For we would the land see burning,
 Rather than its fall;
Memory our thoughts is turning
 Down to Fredrikshald!

Harder times we bore that tried us
 Were cast off in scorn;
In that crisis was beside us
 Blue-eyed freedom born.
That gave father-strength for bearing
 Famine-need and sword,
Honor death itself outwearing,
 And it gave accord.

Far our foe his weapons flinging
 Up his visor raised;
We in wonder to him springing
 On our brother gazed.
Both by wholesome shame incited
 Southward made our way;
Brothers three, in heart united,
 We shall stand for aye!

Men of Norway, high or lowly,
 Give to God the praise!
He our land's Defender Holy
 In its darkest days!
All our fathers here have striven
 And our mothers wept,
Hath the Lord His guidance given,
 So our right we kept.

Yes, we love this land that towers
 Where the ocean foams;
Rugged, storm-swept, it embowers
 Many thousand homes.
As our fathers' conflict gave it
 Vict'ry at the end,
Also we, when time shall crave it,
 Will its peace defend.

I read once of a flower that lonely grew,
Apart, with trembling stem and pale of hue;
The mountain-world of cold and strife
          Gave little life
          And less of color.

A botanist the flower chanced to see
And glad exclaimed: Oh, this must sheltered be,
Must seed produce, renewing birth,
          In sun-warmed earth
          Become a thousand.

But as he dug and drew it from the ground,
Strange glitterings upon his hands he found;
For to its roots clung dust of golden hue;
          The flower grew
          On golden treasure!

And from the region wide came all the youth
To see the wonder; they divined the truth:
Here lay their country's future might;
          A ray of light
          From God that flower!—

This I recall now even while I mourn;
The Lord of life has lifted him and borne
From mountain-cold and wintry air
          To fruitage fair
          In warmth eternal.

For where the roots were of that life replete,
What gleams and glitters! See, they ran to meet
The shafts of wisdom's goodly mines,
          The gold that shines
          In veins of God's thought.

Now he is lifted up, to light are brought
The riches he to guard so faithful sought.
The treasures of our past are there,
          And glintings rare
          Of future riches.

Come, Norway's youth! Unearth to use the hoard
That round this heaven-borne flower's roots was stored!
To you his message! Hear and heed!
          Achieve in deed
          His dream and longing!

Norwegian seamen are
A folk grown strong 'neath sail and spar;
Where boats can find a way,
The best men there are they.
On high seas or at home,
In calm or when the storm-waves comb,
To God their prayer they make,
Their lives they gladly stake.

Incessant is their strife,
They wage with death a war for life,
And dear their souls they sell
In conflicts none can tell.
All that is commonplace
In history seldom leaves its trace,
And often none is there,
The tidings home to bear.

But fishing-boats in need
Have shown so many a daring deed
Of courage fine and skill,
Though unrecorded still.
And many a seaman's head
A wreath of sea-weed wore when dead,
Whose name should shine in gold
Among great heroes bold.

Saint Olaf's Cross's praise
Would on that pilot fitly blaze
Who saved a hundred men,
And hundred once again.
To many a boy so young,
Who riding home to boat's keel clung,
His father set on board,
We honor should accord.

In Norway's mountain-coast
Our land's own mother-breast we boast,
With food for us and tears
For sons whom danger nears.
In it each deed has lot,
And there no brave son is forgot,
From Hafurfjord's great day
To the last castaway.

This each one felt and found
Who homeward came and looked around;
This each one felt who went,
In the last look he sent.
They felt the ocean o'er:
Their ships our country's fortune bore;
Honor and power it sought,—
And these the white sails brought.

Hurrah for them to-day
Who the Norwegian flag display!
Hurrah for pilots true
Who forth to meet them flew!
Hurrah for them who ply
Their fishing-boats 'twixt sea and sky!
Hurrah for all our boast,
Our skerry-skirted coast!

Many forms belong to greatness.
He who now has left us bore it
As a doubt that made him sleepless,
But at last gave revelation,—
As a sight-enhancing power,
That gave visions joined with anguish
Over all beyond our seeing,—
As a flight on labor's pinions
From the thought unto the certain,
Thence aloft to intuition,—
Restless haste and changeful ardor,
God-inspired and unceasing,
Through the wide world ever storming,
Took its load of thoughts and doubtings,
Bore them, threw them off,—and took them,
Never tired, never listless.

 Still! for he had one haven of rest:
   Family-life peace-bestowing!
 Powers of light gave repose to his breast,
   Calm 'mid the strife of his knowing.

 Softly with music his wife led him in
   Unto the sweet-smelling birches!
 Unto the flowers and still deeper in
   Under the fir-forest's churches!

 Daughters drew near him in love secure
   Cooling his forehead's hot fever;
 Gently their message of innocence pure
   Made him a childlike believer.

 Or he joined glad in their light-hearted game,
   Colors and music surrounding,—
 Gone were the clouds, in the heavens came
   Sparkling of star-light abounding.

But as in an autumn evening
Silent, dreamy, dark, sheet-lightning
Wakens thought and feeling stormward,—
Or as in a boat a sudden
Stroke when gliding as in slumber
On between the cliffs that tower
In a quiet, balmy spring night,—
But a single stroke and soft, then
Echo takes it up and tosses
To and fro 'mid walls of mountains,
Thrush and grouse send forth their wood-calls
Deer rise up and listen keenly,
Stones are rolling, all are up now,
Dogs are barking, bells are clanging,
Ushering in the strife of daytime,—
Thus could oft a recollection
Down-light falling in that playtime,
Waken all his thought and doubting!

 Then it roved the wide world over,
Then it hottest burned within him,—
But it lavished light for others!

 Rise of races, spread of language,
Birth of names, all laws' close kinship,
Small and great in equal passion,
Equal haste and doubting goal-ward!—
There where others stones saw only,
He saw precious gems that glistened,
Sunk his shaft the mine to deepen.
And where others thought the treasure
Sure and safe for years a hundred,
Doubt possessed him as he burrowed
Day and night — and saw it vanish!
But the unrest that gave power
Made him oft the goal pass over;
While to others he gave clearness,
Intuitions new deceived him.
Therefore: where he once had striven,
Thither he would turn him never,
Changed his ground and shifted labor,
From his own thought-conquests fleeing.
But his thoughts pursued, untiring,
Followed, growing, as the fire,
Kindled in Brazilian forests,
Storm-wind makes and storm-wind follows!
Where before no foot had trodden,
Ways were burned for many millions!

 Northward stretches Scandinavia
'Mid the fog that dims the Ice-sea,
Darkness of the months of winter
Lays its weight on sea and mountain.
Like our lands are too our peoples.
Their beginnings prehistoric
Stretch afar in fog and darkness.
But as through the fog a lighthouse,
Or as Northern Lights o'er darkness,
Gleamed his thought with light and guidance.
When with filial fond remembrance
Tenderly he sought and questioned,
Searching for his people's pathways—
Names and graves and rusty weapons,
Stones and tools their answer gave him.
Through primeval Asian forests,
Over steppes and sands of deserts,
'Neath a thousand years that moldered,
Saw he caravan-made footsteps
Seek a new home in the Northland.
And as they the rivers followed,
Followed them his thought abundant,
Into Nature's All full-flowing.—

 See his restless soul's creation!
Harmony of truth he yearned for,
Found it not, but wonder-working
New discoveries and pathways,
—Like those alchemists aforetime
Who, though gold was all their seeking,
Found not that, but mighty forces,
Which to-day the world are moving.—

            **

 Deepest ground of all his being
Was the polar power of contrast,
For his thought, to music wakened
By the touch of Northern Saga,
Vibrated melodious longing,
Toward the South forever tending.
In his eye the lambent fire,
Of his thought the glint, showed kinship
With the free improvisator
In the land of warmth and vineyards.
And his swiftly changing feeling
And his all-consuming ardor,
That could toil the livelong winter
Till caprice the fruit discarded,—
That immeasurable richness
Wherein thoughts and moods and music,
Joy and sorrow, jest and earnest,
Gleamed and played without cessation,—
All a Southern day resembled!

 Therefore was his life a journey,
Towards the South in constant movement,—
Through the mists of intuition,
From the darker to the brighter,
From the colder to the warmer,—
On the bridge of ceaseless labor
Bearing over sea and mountain!

 Oh, the time with wife beside him
And his bonny playmate-sisters
(Gladsome children, winsome daughters),
When he stood, where evening sunshine
Glowed on Capitol and Forum,—
Stood where from the great world-city,
As from history's very fountain,
Knowledge wells in streams of fullness;—
Where a clearness large and cloudless
Falls upon the bygone ages
That have laid them down to rest here;—
Where to him, the Northern searcher,
It would seem, he had been straying
Too long lost in history's fogland,
Rowing round the deep fjords' surface;—
Stood where dead men burst the earth-clods
And themselves come forth for witness
In their heavy marble togas;—
Where the goddesses of Delos
In the frescoed halls are dancing,
As two thousand years before now;—
Pantheon and Coliseum
In their spacious fate have sheltered
All the world's swift evolution;—
Where a Hermes from that corner
Saw the footsteps firm of Cato,
Pontifex in the procession,—
Saw then Nero as Apollo
Lifted up take sacrifices,
Saw then Gregory, the wrathful,
Riding forth to rule in spirit
Over all the known world's kingdoms,—
Saw then Cola di Rienzi

Homage pay to freedom's goddess
'Mid the Roman people's paeans,—
Saw Pope Leo and his princes
Choose instead of the Lord Jesus
Aristotle dead and Plato;-
Saw again how stouter epochs
Raised the Church of Papal power,
Till the Frenchman overthrew it
And exalted Nature's Godhead;
Saw anew then wonted custom
In its pious, still processions
With a Lamb the great world's ruler!—
All this saw the little Hermes
On the corner near the temple,
And the wise man from the Northland
Saw that Hermes and his visions.

 Yes, when over Rome he stood there
In that high, historic clearness,
And his eye the mountain-ridges
Followed toward the red of evening,—
Then all beams of longing focused
In a blessed intuition,
And — he saw a church before him
Greater far than that of nature,
And he felt a peace descending,
Larger far than all the present.

 When the second time he came there,
After days and nights of labor,
Hard as were it for redemption,—
Then the Lord Himself gave welcome,
Led him gently thither, saying:
"Peace be with thee! Thou hast conquered!"

 But to us with sorrow stricken
Turned the Lord with comfort, saying:
"When I call, who then dares murmur,
That the called man had not finished?"

 Whoso dies, he here had finished!
Spite our sorrow we believe it,
Hold that He, who unrest giveth
(The discoverer's disquiet,
That drove Newton, drove Columbus),
Also knows when rest is needed.

 But we question, while reviewing
All that mighty thought-armada
Now disbanded, home-returning:
Who again shall reunite it?

 For when he cut his war-arrow,
Lords and liegemen soon were mustered,
And to aid from Sweden, Denmark,
England, France, swift-flying vessels
Coursed the sea-ways toward his standard.

 Royal was that fleet and mighty,
By our shore at anchor lying;
We were wont to see it near us
Or to hear the wondrous tidings
Of its cruises and its conquests.

 What it won we own forever;
But the fleet is sailing homeward.
Here we stand the last sail watching
As it sinks on the horizon.
Then we turn and breathe the question:
Who again shall reunite it?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

Now, brothers, sing out our song,
Whose train of light shall follow long!
 With love are its measures beating
 And victory's joyous greeting,
While round about it flower-seeds
In will of youth shall grow to deeds!

Our song has gone far and. wide,
Bright mem'ries on our way abide,
 In flags flying, friends that love us,
 In wreaths from fair hands above us,
In feasts where youth's full spirits stream,
Our nation's past, our nation's dream.

At Hald on a sunny day
That shot-torn flag of many a fray
 Was waving above our singing,
 Soul-fire to our music bringing,
The ardor of that glorious band,
Who died as heroes for our land.

To Arendal our summer-way
"For might and fame!"—remember aye!
 The fleet on the bay was riding,
 Our singer-ship through it gliding.
Our merchant-ships shall rule the wave!
This joyous hoisting-song we gave.

We gathered in Bergen town
Of ancient and of new renown.
 The horns of our fathers greet us,
 King Sverre comes forth to meet us;
But fresh and full the present spoke
In heartfelt song from all its folk.

Upsala, Copenhagen, Lund,
In each our song its garland won,
 Fair fetters of music winding,
 Harmonious the Northland binding;
Our mighty choral theme shall be
The Northern races' unity.

With courage, then, onward roam!
Where echo answers is our home.
 Our past that we sing draws nearer,
 Our future in song grows clearer,
E'en while we wander hand in hand
And summer sing into our land.

(ON HIS SIXTIETH BIRTHDAY)
Our glasses we lift now and drink to our host!
              "Hurrah!"
Give heed to our ditty, we sing you our toast!
              "Aha!"
The first thing appearing is what he was nearing,
When uproar not fearing he came for a hearing
             'Fore skerry-bred eagle
             And Wergeland regal.
                 Oh! Ha!

He came like an innocent spring-lambkin ewe-born,
             Oh, woe!
So neat and so fine in his guilelessness new-born
             Like snow.
The flesh so delicious was chopped up to farce-meat,
And later by Wergeland found for a farce meet,
             And gayly 't was swallowed,
             And all the bones hollowed
                 And strown.

But swift as Thor's he-goats to life again skipping,
             He sprang
Whole skinned together, and gave them a whipping
             That rang.
This made him seem worthy to join the gay party,
At once they received him in fellowship hearty!
             And soon was no other
             More loved as a brother
                 Than Dahl.

The light from his shop spread afar and made brighter
             Our day.
His drawing-room gathered so many a fighter
             In play.
Our taste there was made and our critical passion,
The shop was a power, new Norway to fashion.
             Though little, its story
             Shall some time in glory
                  Be writ.

For what you have kindled, endured, and aspired,
             Our thanks!
For hearts you have gladdened and souls you have fired,
             Our thanks!
For all your good faith in your fervor and ranting,
Yes, for your whole-heartedness free from all canting,
             You whimsical, queer one,
             Old fellow, you dear one,
                  Our thanks!

(WHEN DYBBÖL WAS CAPTURED)
Dannebrog of old was seeming
 Snow-white, rosy red,
Through the mists of ages beaming,
 Heaven's gift outspread,
Rich as fruits of Denmark's planting,
Grand as song of heroes chanting,
Spirit-winged to deeds of daring
 O'er the wide world faring.

Dannebrog, thou now art seeming
 Death-pale, bloody red,
Like a dying sea-gull gleaming
 White with blood o'erspread.
Purple tides the wounds are showing
From thy faith in justice flowing;
Denmark, bear the cross, thy burden
 Honor is thy guerdon!

Broad the sails o'er the North Sea go;
High on deck in the morning glow
Erling Skjalgsson from Sole
Scans all the sea toward Denmark:
"Cometh never Olaf Trygvason?"

Six and fifty the ships are there,
Sails are let down, toward Denmark stare
Sun-reddened men;—then murmur:
"Where is the great Long Serpent?
Cometh never Olaf Trygvason?"

When the sun in the second dawn
Cloudward rising no mast had drawn,
Grew to a storm their clamor:
"Where is the great Long Serpent?
Cometh never Olaf Trygvason?"

Silent, silent that moment bound,
Stood they all; for from ocean's ground
Sighed round the fleet a muffled:
"Taken the great Long Serpent,
Fallen is Olaf Trygvason."

Ever since, through so many a year,
Norway's ships must beside them hear,
Clearest in nights of moonshine:
"Taken the great Long Serpent,
Fallen is Olaf Trygvason."

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.

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.

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.

Norröna-race's longing,
 It was the sea's free wave,
And fight of heroes thronging,
 And honor that it gave;
Their thoughts and deeds upspringing
 From roots in Surtr's fire,
With branches topward swinging
 To Yggdrasil aspire.

His course alone each guided,
 Oft brother-harm was done;
Our vict'ries were divided,
 The honor gained was one.
Each heard his call time-fated,
 First Norway, Denmark, came,
The Swede the longest waited,
 But greatest grew his fame.

In eastern, western regions
 The Danish dragons shone,
To Norway's roving legions
 Jerusalem was known.
From sparks the Swedish spirit
 Struck forth in Poland's night,
Through Lützen must inherit
 Full half the world its light.

First Norseman, Dane, agreeing
 In trying times were found,
But Saga's will far-seeing
 By little men was bound;
Then Norseman, Swede, agreeing,
 Time in its fullness found,
And Saga's will far-seeing
 Shall nevermore be bound.

There is prophetic power
 In longing hearts of men,
Foretells our union's hour '
 For great deeds once again.
Each festival so glorious
 To solemn vows us draws:
Forever be victorious
 Our blood's, our race's cause!

High memories with power
 Shine through the wintry North
On every peak's white tower,
 On Kattegat so swarth.
All is so still and spacious, `
 The Northern Lights flow free,
Creating bright and gracious
 A day of memory.

Each deed the North defending,
 Each thought for greater might,
A star-like word is sending
 Down through the frosty night!
To hope they call and boldness,
 And call with double cheer
To him, defying coldness,
 On guard the Eider near.

No anxious shadows clouding,
 No languid, lukewarm mist
Our heaven of mem'ries shrouding,
 This eve of battle-tryst!
May, as of yore, while ringing
 The bells unseen loud swelled,
Come leaders vict'ry bringing,
 Whom th' army ne'er beheld.

(With an album containing portraits of all those who at the time of
his birth were leaders in the intellectual and political world.)

Here hast thou before thee that constellation
 Whereunder was born thy light;
These stars in the vault of high thoughts' mutation
 Will fashion thy life with might.
Their prophecy, little one, we cannot know,
They light up the way that, unknown, thou shalt go
And kindle the thoughts that within shall glow.
      Thou first shalt them gather,
      Then choose thine own,—
      So canst thou the rather
      Grope on alone.

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.

Silent I'm biding,
    While softly gliding
Sink the still hours to eternity's sleep.
    My fancies roaming
    List in the gloaming:—
Will she the trysting now keep?

    Winter is dreaming,
    Bright stars are beaming,
Smiling their light through its cloud-veil they pour,
    Summer foretelling
    Sweet love compelling;—
Dare she not meet me here more?

    'Neath the ice lying,
    Longing and sighing,
Ocean would wander and warmer lands woo.
    Anchored ships swinging,
    Sail-thoughts outflinging;—
Come we together, we two!

    Whirling and fallings
    Pictures enthralling,
Fairy-light made in the forest the snow;
    Wood-folk are straying,
    Shadows are playing;—
Was it your footstep? Oh, no!

    Courage is failing,
    Hoar frost assailing
Boughs of your longing surrounds with its spell.
    But I dare enter,
    Break to the center,
Where in dream-fetters you dwell.

Good-morning, sun, 'mid the leaves so green —
Mind of youth in the dales' deep reaches,
Smile that brightens their somber speeches,
Heaven's gold on our earth-dust seen!

Good-morning, sun, o'er the royal tower!
Kindly thou beckonest forth each maiden;
Kindle each heart as a star light-laden,
Twinkling so clear, though a sad night lower!

Good-morning, sun, o'er the mountain-side!
Light the land that still sleep disguises
Till it awakens and fresh arises
For yonder day in thy warmth's full tide!

Oh, what was it he meant
By his question as he went?
 "I am making a loom,
'T will be up in April's bloom;
 If you think it may be,
   Spin for me!"

 Oh, what shall I believe?
Does he think himself to weave?
 And the yarn that I spin,
Lo, he thinks to weave it in?
 And so soon as the Spring
   Flowers shall bring?

 And he laughed when he'd done;
Oh, he is so full of fun.
 Dare I trust all my skein
To so young and wild a swain?—
 May God help to bind in
   All I spin!

She wandered so young on the shore around,
Her thoughts were by naught on earth now bound.
Soon came there a painter, his art he plied
           Above the tide,
           In shadow wide,—
He painted the shore and herself beside.

More slowly she wandered near him around,
Her thoughts by a single thing were bound.
And this was his picture wherein he drew
           Herself so true,
           Herself so true,
Reflected in ocean with heaven's blue.

All driven and drawn far and wide around
Her thoughts now by everything were bound.
Far over the ocean,—and yet most dear
           The shore right here,
           The man so near,
Did ever the sunshine so bright appear!

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.

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.

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.

Ingerid Sletten of Sillejord
 Neither gold nor silver did own,
 But a little hood of gay wool alone,
Her mother had given of yore.

A little hood of gay wool alone,
 With no braid nor lining, was here;
 But parent love made it ever dear,
And brighter than gold it shone.

She kept the hood twenty years just so:
 "Be it spotless," softly she cried,
 "Until I shall wear it once as bride,
When I to the altar go."

She kept the hood thirty years just so:
 "Be it spotless," softly she cried,
 "Then wear it I will, a gladsome bride,
When it to our Lord I show."

She kept the hood forty years just so,
 With her mother ever in mind.
 "Little hood, be with me to this resigned,
That ne'er to the altar we'll go."

She steps to the chest where the hood has lain,
 And seeks it with swelling heart;
 She guides her hand to its place apart,—
But never a thread did remain.

Mood of youth,
          Mood of youth,
Eagle-like must seek the blue,
Dauntlessly its course pursue,
All the mountain-heights must view.
          Blood of youth,
          Blood of youth,
Steam-like puts full-speed to sea,
E'en though storm and ice there be,
Makes its way and romps in glee.
          Dream of youth,
          Dream of youth,
Rogue-like stealing sets its snare
In the maiden's morning-prayer;
All the springtime, fragrant, glowing,
In its airy waves is flowing.
         Joy of youth,
         Joy of youth,
Waterfall-like foams in truth,
Laughing, rainbow-gifts forth flashing,
Even while to death 't is dashing.
         Joy of youth,
         Dream of youth,
         Blood of youth,
         Mood of youth,
Clothe the world with colors golden,
Singing songs that never olden.

Be glad when danger presses
Each power your soul possesses!
   In greater strain
   Your strength shall gain,
Till greater vict'ry blesses!
Supports may break in pieces,
Your friends may have caprices,
   But you shall see,
   The end will be,
Your need of crutches ceases.
   —'T is clear,
   Whom God makes lonely,
To him He comes more near.

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.

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!

Though she depart, a vision flitting,
 If I these thoughts in words exhale:
I love you, you blonde maiden, sitting
 Within your pure white beauty's veil.
   I love you for your blue eyes dreaming,
     Like moonlight moving over snow,
   And 'mid the far-off forests beaming
     On something hid I may not know.

I love this forehead's fair perfection
 Because it stands so starry-clear,
In flood of thought sees its reflection
 And wonders at the image near.
   I love these locks in riot risen
     Against the hair-net's busy bands;
   To free them from their pretty prison
     Their sylphs entice my eyes and hands.

I love this figure's supple swinging
 In rhythm of its bridal song,
Of strength and life-joy daily singing
 With youthful yearnings deep and long.
   I love this foot so lightly bearing
     The glory of sure victory
   Through youth's domain of merry daring
     To meet first-love that hers shall be.

I love these hands, these lips enchanting,
 With them the God of love's allied,
With them the apple-prize is granting,
 But guards them, too, lest aught betide.
   I love you and must say it ever,
     Although you heed not what you've heard,
   But flee and answer: maidens never
     May put their trust in poet's word.

I passed by the house one summer day,
Morning sunshine upon it lay;
Toward the windows that blood-red burned
Flaming my soul was turned, was turned.
 There spring had found me
 And captive bound me
 To lissome hands and soft lips enthralling,
 To smiles now stained by the teardrops falling.

Till the view from my vision dies,
To it backward I send my eyes;
All that was becomes new and near,
The forgotten grows warm and dear;
 Mem'ries wander,
 While this I ponder,
 And from the springtime all love's sweet dreaming
 Forward and back in my soul is streaming.

Joyous that time and joyous now,
Sorrow that time and .sorrow now.
Sun on meadows bedewed appears,
Soul in mem'ries of smiles and tears.
 When they waking
  Their bounds are breaking,
 When streams their ebbing with sinking power,
 The soul bears poetry's bud and flower.

The white rose and the red rose,
So sisters two were named, yes, named.
The white one was so quiet,
The red one laughed and flamed.
But different was their doing, yes,
When came the time of wooing, yes.
The white one turned so red, so red,
The red one turned so white.

For him the red one favored,
Him father would not bless, not bless.
But him the white one favored,
He got at once his "Yes."
The red one now was paling, yes,
With sorrow, psalms, and wailing, yes.
The white one turned so red, so red,
The red one turned so white.

Then father grew so fearful
And had to give his "Yes," oh, yes!
With songs and music cheerful
The wedding rang, oh, yes!
And soon sprang children rosen, yes,
In shoes and little hosen, yes.
The red one's, they were white,—and oh,
The white one's, they were red.

The first fond meeting holy
Is like the woodbirds' trilling,
Is like a sea-song thrilling,
When red the sun sinks slowly,—
Is like a horn on mountain,
That wakes time's sleep thereunder
And summons to life's fountain
To meet in nature's wonder.

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.

CHORUS
    (Behind the scenes)
        Farewell, farewell,
From friends, from all, from fatherland!
Your soul's calm power is from us riven,
Your words, your song, to spirit's praise
In art's glad temple given.

       CHORUS OF MEN
We thank you that with youthful fire
You came the doubting to inspire,
Who anxious stood with strength untried!


      CHORUS OF WOMEN
We thank you that in morning-dawn
Your woman's tact and aid were drawn
Our boisterous youthful art to guide!

            ALL
Thanks for the spring of your life's year,
Thanks for the tones so sweet and clear,
Thanks for the tints of pearly hue,
That colored all you touched anew.
For all your noble life on earth,
            Thanks, thanks!
And that you gave our calling worth,
            Thanks, thanks!

          EPILOGUE
 'T is but a short time since we saw pass by
A picture drawn from life, austere and dark,
A soul in servitude to strong desires;
And all its life in prison-labor spent.
Although religion prays and sings its hymns,
And poetry and art their sunshine spread,
That soul in slavery toils, till white the hair.

 She, in whose memory we gather here,
Was early made to feel by hard conditions,
That clouded life and rudely barred her soul,—
How men and women live as toiling slaves!
And she rebelled against this servitude;
Great powers have birth to longings for the light;
Freedom she craved, that others she might free!
With restless spirit outward went her quest
To people, books; but thoughtful she became,
As one whose search was vain; reserved and shy,
As one whose courage fails;—until one day
He, who from fairy-tale and hero-legend
That wondrous bow received of magic might,
Stood up and to the vale and mountain played:
"Come forth, come from our nation's heart-deep forth,
Creative might, that in our nation's morning
Didst lift its image up to dread, to greatness,
In myths of Asas fair and giants grim!
As mountain-walls lean o'er their own reflection,
In that thought-ocean we our life could see,
With spring, with winter, and with spring again.
Thou gav'st our image oft in song and story,
In times of darkness and in times of light;
Our image meets us wheresoe'er we go,—
But yet our nation sees it not, nor looks
Up from its toiling thoughts and dull routine!—
Oh, wake it, lift it, make it see itself!
Then shall it put to use the powers it owns!"

 And living echoes answered! Lo, there swarmed
Elves of the Stage about him, as he played!
They made the lamps to burn, and reared the grotto,
They brought and brushed the costumes Holberg knew,
And in them played their pranks 'neath powdered wigs,—
Roamed on the mountains of a summer night
And stole the saeter-maiden while she slept,
And filled with mortal fear the aged wooer!
They danced the goblin-dance in dusk of winter,
Played hide-and-seek with their own shadows;
They snared the hypocrite in his own sighs,
In his own web the pettifogger bound;
They scattered wide the hoard a miser gathered,
They tripped and threw the petty parish-pope
They saved the tears of innocence seduced
And on the altar laid as lustrous pearls;
They melted hatred in the ice-hard breast,
It fell as rain upon the enemy's fields;
They bound the slanderer, Mazeppa-like,
Upon the back of his wild calumnies;—
The crafty man of stealthy selfishness
They set afloat within an open boat;—
But one who freely gave himself, his all,
They bore to heaven upon their joyous laughter.
They drew the magic ring round those who loved,
And to the altar led the blushing pair.
They brought heroic forms from barrows old
To tower in might among the teeming present.
—There was not one could longer rest in peace;
Himself, his folly, all our country's need,
Wholeness victorious, halfness doomed to fail,
The power of honest faith, the wreck of doubt,—
All this our nation saw in its own image,
When strongly lighted on the Stage 't was set.—

 And she was part of this! The first full tone
Thrilled her breast too and woke a thousand mem'ries
Of something that she ne'er before had known!
On that first evening, when the curtain rose,
With timid step one clad in white came forth
And begged for Norway's art, for our young drama
A home in Norway,—but with so great fear,
The gentle voice was trembling, dim the eyes;
Yet from the voice, the eyes, the form, the bearing
Was heard a promise in sweet modesty;
For she who spoke those first words on this Stage,
That maiden dark with eyes so deep and true,
Lo, it was she!

              And soon her art shone clear
And softly radiant through the evening hours.—
With fairy lightness fell its magic gleams
On hidden longings, sorrows half-concealed,—
But gently, tenderly. If joy she touched,
'T was always softly. But we all could feel
A stream of power so full, that if she had
In an unguarded hour let it flow free
With all its deep and swelling tide sincere,
It would have borne herself from earth away.

 In truth, the calmness of her course through life
Was never weakness, but was strength controlled;
Was never fear, but veneration deep
For those whose souls are great: a model she
For noble women as for forceful men,—
This wreath we weave for her pure memory.

 But what she thus had early taught herself,
She taught to others. When upon the stage
She stood, depicting woman's painful conflict
With rudeness, violence, and wild desire,
Then,—though she wielded but a woman's weapons,
Her silent dignity, her subtle smile,
Her light derision, all-subduing laughter,—
A spirit-dawn gleamed from their flashing play,
To usher in a day of victory.
She barriers raised around the woman weak
(Down-trodden in a half-built social order),
She stood forth here so many an evening-hour
And talked to thousands of a woman's worth.
though her call was not fully to free
All that a woman's heart may hope and dream,
She shielded it secure in all its beauty.

This conflict made her reticent, severe;—
But sometimes in a song her spirit could
Send forth glad tidings, messages of freedom,
Her large free soul revealing. Then we heard
Such longing after full, unbroken peace,
Our thoughts were captive held by sad foreboding.—

 'T is now come true!—The crape of mourning droops
About her name, the tolling bell is still.
Her final summons gather us once more
Before her stage, and here our thanks we utter
For what she gave us. So as she had given,
Has no one given. She gave of her sorrow,
With bleeding heart beneath her winsome smile.
She shared with us the tears her conflict brought,
The radiant glory of her victory.

 Thanks, prayer-borne thanks, you noble soul,
From all your brothers, from your sisters all!
From Norway's youthful art enduring thanks!
From women to their pure interpreter
Farewell and thanks!—From all those whom you lifted
On pinions of the spirit high to beauty
Once more a wreath is brought,—it is the last.

       (Laying it before the bust)
Now God in His bright heaven makes you glad,
And we will make you glad with good remembrance.

               CHORUS
       (Behind the scenes, softly)
        Farewell, farewell!
        Now in your grave
        No want is known;
        But what you gave,
        We ever own.
        Your spirit's seed
        Shall blossom here,
        Bear fruit in deed,
        And sad hearts cheer.

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.

Sin and Death, those sisters two,
       Two, two,
Sat together while dawned the morning.
Sister, marry! Your house will do,
       Do, do,
For me, too, was Death's warning.

Sin was wedded, and Death was pleased,
       Pleased, pleased,
Danced about them the day they married;
Night came on, she the bridegroom seized,
       Seized, seized,
And away with her carried.

Sin soon wakened alone to weep,
       Weep, weep.
Death sat near in the dawn of morning:
Him you love, I love too and keep,
       Keep, keep.
He is here, was Death's warning.

It was such a lovely sunshine-day,
 The house and the yard couldn't hold me;
I roved to the woods, on my back I lay,
 In cradle of fancy rolled me;
But there were ants, and gnats that bite,
The horse-fly was keen, the wasp showed fight.

 "Dear me, don't you want to be out in this fine
weather?" —said mother, who sat on the steps and sang.

It was such a lovely sunshine-day,
 The house and the yard couldn't hold me;
A meadow I found, on my back I lay,
 And sang what my spirit told me;
Then snakes came crawling, a fathom long,
To bask in the sun,—I fled with my song.

 "In such blessed weather we can go barefoot,"—said mother,
as she pulled off her stockings.

It was such a lovely sunshine-day,
 The house and the yard couldn't hold me;
I loosened a boat, on my back I lay,
 While blithely the current bowled me;
But hot grew the sun, and peeled my nose;
Enough was enough, and to land I chose.

 "Now these are just the days to make hay in,"— said mother,
as she stuck the rake in it.

It was such a lovely sunshine-day,
 The house and the yard couldn't hold me;
I climbed up a tree, oh, what bliss to play,
 As cooling the breeze consoled me;
But worms soon fell on my neck, by chance,
And jumping, I cried: "'T is the Devil's own dance!"

 "Yes, if the cows aren't sleek and shiny to-day, they'll
never be so,"—said mother, gazing up the hillside.

It was such a lovely sunshine-day,
 The house and the yard couldn't hold me;
I dashed to the waterfall's endless play,
 There only could peace enfold me.
The shining sun saw me drown and die,—
If you made this ditty, 't was surely not I.

 "Three more such sunshine-days, and everything will
be in,"—said mother, and went to make my bed.

Lord! Oh, hold in Thy hand my child,
 Guard by the river its playing!
Send Thou Thy Spirit as comrade mild,
 Lest it be lost in its straying!
Deep is the water and false the ground.
Lord, if His arms shall the child surround,
 Drowned it shall not be, but living,
 Till Thou salvation art giving.

Mother, whom loneliness befalls,
 Knowing not where it is faring,
Goes to the door, and its name there calls;
 Breezes no answer are bearing.
This is her thought, that everywhere
He and Thou for it always care;
 Jesus, its little brother,
 Follows it home to mother.