LOKE (turns away as if to depart). She dwells there, does she?
BALDER (seizes him by the arm). Stay! who is the bride-groom?
Speak, reptile, speak! Who? When? Reply, thou traitor,
Or here thou diest!
LOKE. Spare me, sir, in mercy!
I faint with terror!
BALDER. Speak! by all the powers,
Thy smallest hair is sacred! I have promised.
Now, speak!
LOKE. I am an old and harmless creature.
BALDER. But Nanna's bridegroom?
LOKE. Truly, sir, I wonder,
That one like thee, a dweller 'mongst these mountains,
Should know him not, the noblest and the bravest
Of all the sons of earth.
BALDER. Ye gods of heaven!
And who? His name?
LOKE. One who is bold as Odin,
And strong as Thor, and beautiful as Balder.
BALDER. Ha! kill me not, but answer: name him.
LOKE (with a loud voice). Hother!
BALDER (with agitation). What! Who? The Leire King?
The Skioldung Hother?
LOKE. Who here is foster'd up by Nanna's father.
BALDER. Thou killest me! Thou see'st how I tremble!
Yet, that I never saw him here! Where is he?
LOKE. At Gevar's.
BALDER. By the gods, it overcomes me!
What, under Nanna's roof?
LOKE. At night-time only,
As I believe; for ere the east hills redden,
Upstarts he, lovely as a young spring morning,
And griping firm his lusty spear, he wanders
Among the rocks. Ah, master! thou hast seen him--
Withouten doubt thou hast. 'Tis true he hideth
For some time past his god-like form in wadmal, {1}
And rolls beneath a rugged cap his tresses--
I wonder, wherefore.
BALDER. Ha! thou flash of lightning,
Which clear'st all up at once! I, wretched madman!
How senseless was I, and by pride how blinded
To sons of earth my eyes I never lower'd.
Ah! is my proud solicitude thus baffled?
But she can only love the gods, I'm certain!
LOKE. Excuse me, sir, I do not understand thee.
She loves not Odin half so much as Hother.
BALDER. Fly, slave--begone! for Udgaard, Loke's poison,
Is on thy tongue! That foe of gods has sent thee:
Thou art his messenger, thou art--thou art, thou traitor!
Dost dare to linger? But thou art in safety,
For, worm, thy weakness and my oath protect thee.
Ha! I myself will fly before my fury. [He goes.
LOKE (he looks contemptuously after BALDER, then raises himself to his
full height, discards at once his assumed figure, and appears as LOKE).
My weakness, mighty Balder? Do not scorn it!
To dust and ashes, boaster, it shall crush thee.
Not Loke's messenger, but Loke, stung thee.
Already bellows the young god with torment:
Hear, Odin! hear thy lov'd one, hear him howling!
Delay thee not! enjoy his voice and feel it!
Harmonious is it to the ears of Loke.
Quick, quick! thou ne'er again, perchance, will hear it.
Survey him near: how swells each vein with poison,
Which I have poured into his breast with cunning!
Soon Odin, soon will thy beloved be silent;
Soon from thy sight will Balder flit for ever;
Then will it be thy turn to mourn, O tyrant!
It comes--the long-protracted day of vengeance!
It comes--the sigh'd-for hour of retribution!
How long hast thou not tortur'd Loke's bowels,
And fearless trampled 'neath thy feet his offspring?
Hear Hael and Fenris' Wolf, and Midgaard's Serpent--
Loud howl they!--hear them night and day proclaiming
Thy unmatched cruelty with frightful voices!
Each of them was a god, and fair as Balder,
But now to earth and heaven, and to myself, a horror:
Each is a monster, bow'd with chains of darkness.
The hour's at hand, the tardy hour of vengeance:
Already blow I in war's horn: to combat,
Up, up ye mighty gods, and rescue Balder!
There see I him, the hero youth, who only,
Arm'd with the tree of death by Odin's maidens,
Can be--so Fate decrees--this Balder's slayer.
And he shall be it: quickly shall he brandish
The life-destroying bough, if Asa Loke,
By mighty art and wonderful delusions,
Knows how to work the maidens to his purpose.
He comes! I will conceal myself, and listen.
HOTHER, and presently LOKE--the first dressed like a Norwegian peasant,
with a hunting-spear in his hand; the other undistinguished.
HOTHER (he comes down from the rocks and unbinds the skiers {2} from his
feet ere he steps forward on the scene).
Upon the oak's summit,
A squirrel at play
Deceives with a rustle
The hunter so gay;
He starts, and, low crouching,
His spear he grasps tight,
And, swelling up, boundeth
His hand with delight.
Now quick--be not daunted!
He's coming--take heed!
The bold bear, the old bear,
Doth hitherward speed.
Oh, sound the most pleasant
This ear ever knew!
He cometh--a bigger
This weapon ne'er slew.
Thou sovereign of forests!
Thou pride of thy race!
Oh, fortunate hunter--
Oh, glorious chase!
Now quick! be not daunted,
He comes--be prepared!
Where is he, the savage?
His bellow, who heard?
No more on the oak-top
The squirrel doth play;
Deceived has a rustle
The hunter so gay;
No sound as he listens
His hearing assails,
Save the pattering of leaves
That are moved by the gales.
There comes he--where? Oh, what a foolish stripling
Am I, who here about four days have wandered
In quest of a mere phantom! Surely, Nanna,
Thou dost deceive me--dost but prove thy lover;
And think'st thou, virtuous one, that if a godhead
Came down in light effulgent, and before thee
Knelt and laid heaven at thy feet--Ha! think'st
Thou that fear, base doubt of Nanna's faith and
Honour, would sully Hother's breast? I know thou
Lovest me--thou hast avowed it: what shall then
This wooer avail--this wooer who must not be
Anger'd? Why the deception?
LOKE. Hail, thou son of Hothbrod!
HOTHER (astonished). Ha! scarcely do I know myself!
By Odin,
I look more like a rugged elf than Hother.
And who art thou, that knowest me? who art thou?
LOKE. My name is Vanfred! When thy mother bore thee
I was at hand and swore unto thee friendship.
HOTHER. Grim is thy visage, and thine eye doth promise,
But little good. What dost thou seek?
LOKE. Whom, Skolding,
Whom fearest thou? Why hide in yonder vestments?
HOTHER. I fear? thou warlock! Wise thou wert in speaking
Of friendship!
LOKE. Spare thy wrath my youthful warrior!
Reserve it for thy foes!
HOTHER. They shall not miss it!
LOKE. And yet 'tis plain thou hidest thee from some one.
HOTHER. It was Nanna bade me. Ha! I blush by heaven!
When Nanna spake I always blindly listen'd.
She has disguised me, as thou see'st, stranger;
She plagues me with her fears; the dreamer would not--
Would really not--for all the wide world's riches,
That the wood goblin, or perhaps some lover
Invisible, should know me.
LOKE. Pretty folly!
Balder invisible! the handsome half-god!
HOTHER. What! Balder, son of Odin? He her lover?
O heaven! Say, where is he? where?
LOKE. With Nanna.
HOTHER. There? Now? (After some refection.) She drove me out.
LOKE. Perhaps, thou see'st
That she has rid herself of thee by cunning.
HOTHER. I simply thought the Alf had caus'd thy terror;
But Balder, false one, he shall soon experience
That I fear no one. [About to go.
LOKE. Softly, prince! be cautious!
I see thy courage; but thy foe is mighty.
HOTHER. Is my arm weak?
LOKE. It is against a half-god;
Yet he can die. I know a spear which slayeth.
HOTHER. Thou dreamest!
LOKE. Spare thy doubts. That spear or nothing
Can wound his breast.--But see, the sun is rising,
And I must fly to subterranean places;
But I'll forsake thee not. This horn I give thee,
And when thy need is greatest, then, O Hother!
Blow strongly in that horn, and turning westward,
Call thrice aloud on Vanfred--Vanfred! Vanfred!
[The two last times he cries it with a hollow voice, after having
disappeared among the rocks, and the last time of all evidently farther
away than the other. Immediately thereupon a noise is heard among the
rocks, as of distant thunder.
HOTHER, and presently NANNA.
HOTHER (casts away the horn). Accurs'd be thou, thy horn, and all thy
magic!
Is Hother fearful? Does he crave in battle
The aid of warlocks and of arts ignoble?
Is not my arm sufficient? Ha! I'll show thee!
[He is going; but NANNA meets him at the entrance of the scene.
NANNA. Where now?
HOTHER. I go to dare the wrath of Balder.
NANNA (affrighted). Ah!
HOTHER. His stern look may teach me how to tremble.
NANNA. O Heaven!
HOTHER. Hold me not!
NANNA (anxiously and affectionately). Where now, my Hother?
HOTHER. I soon shall find him!
[He goes in spite of NANNA'S endeavour to detain him.
NANNA. Ah! he goes--he rages;
And Balder yells with wrath. Some serpent surely
Has breath'd to-day his poison in their bosoms.
They hate, they seek each other! Who asunder
Will hold the raging bears. Ah! who will soften
The foaming ones? I have this hour expected,
And long by art have I delay'd its coming;
But now is art, and prayer, and all else useless:
E'en now they meet in conflict. I am powerless!
What can my tears avail? Alas! blood only
Will satiate them and Heaven: thine must trickle,
My Hother. What art thou against a half-god?
When thy fire, Ourath, but glimmers,
Tears can quench it instantly;
But it flames, and now 'twere wonder
Could the weak drops keep it under.
Ah! thy blazes fierce and cruel
In the lov'd one's grief find fuel,
And are fann'd by plaintive cry.
Tear, with which mine eye is swelling,
Thou canst not remove the ill;
O keep in thou fruitless wailing,
Let my bosom hide thee still. [She goes.