There were the world and its woes forgot
In the burning joys of our blissful lot.
GUDMUND.
Margit! Margit!
MARGIT. [Ever more wildly.]
At midnight's hour
Sweet were our sleep in my lonely bower;--
And if death should come with the dawn, I trow
'Twere sweet to die so;--what thinkest thou?
GUDMUND.
You are sick!
MARGIT. [Bursting into laughter.]
Ha, ha!--Let me laugh! 'Tis good
To laugh when the heart is in laughing mood!
GUDMUND.
I see that you still have the same wild soul
As of old--
MARGIT. [With sudden seriousness.]
Nay, let not that vex your mind,
'Tis only at midnight it mocks control;
By day I am timid as any hind.
How tame I have grown, you yourself must say,
When you think on the women in lands far away--
Of that fair Princess--ah, she was wild!
Beside her lamblike am I and mild.
She did not helplessly yearn and brood,
She would have acted; and that--
GUDMUND.
'Tis good
You remind me; Straightway I'll cast away
What to me is valueless after this day--
[Takes out the phial.
MARGIT.
The phial! You meant--?
GUDMUND.
I thought it might be
At need a friend that should set me free
Should the King's men chance to lay hands on me.
But from to-night it has lost its worth;
Now will I fight all the kings of earth,
Gather my kinsfolk and friends to the strife,
And battle right stoutly for freedom and life.
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