Peter Nansen

“ There is nothing fairy-tale-like nor fantastic about Rough-Hill, but its beauty is real enough. It is a perfect smiling idyl. After all Rough-Hill does not lack greatness, for it has got its wonderful view.
I reach the pavilion, a yellow, wooden building, outside which a waiter and an army of sparrows are busy clearing away from the little tables the remnants of the picnic baskets. I look round and am overwhelmed by the beauty of the view. At my foot I see the entire town, and behind it the fjord, which, like a river clear as a mirror, winds in and out amongst hills and meadows. ”

“ But most heartbreaking of all is it to visit Greta's father. To be in the room which she filled with her grace and beauty, where my love mourns like a tortured animal for every step I tread, where the air still trembles with her death sigh, where the old man sits staring like blind folk with his empty eyes at the calamity he has wrought. What can he and I say to one another that will bring comfort ? He hardly listens to the reasonable remarks with which I greet his self-reproach and his bewildered words about Greta's accident being the revenge of the angry spirit of the mill. ”

“ To the God of Rough-Hill.
To the God of Rough-Hill, the God of peace, the God of our happiness, we will build our floral temple. Here we will sit together, gazing far out over the land and let the world go by in its noisy way ; we will hear the hurricane roar, and see the storm break round us, sheltered by our quiet tent of peace. Here we will sit, while we are young and roses grow in our hearts ; here we will sit when the old years come and the fragrance of memories are round us. ”

“ But my heart holds also another gratitude while I slowly, surrounded by the twittering of birds, the playing of wind in the trees, leave the peaceful, sweetly-scented garden of death. A gratitude for the old town's faithfulness, that has not allowed my mother's grave to lie forgotten, but has guarded and tended it. Is there ever such deep memory and constant faithfulness to be found in the big towns, where each day's news chases noisily along the streets, pushing out everything of the past. There Death is only remembered in the clamouring cries of the newspaper announcements. ”

“ They are old songs, sweetly sentimental, gaily gentle songs from our mothers' and grandmothers' days, that Greta sings. The old people are listening; these songs make strings long since untouched vibrate within them, and gradually all the old lips are moving, and the frilled caps are keeping time to Greta's song. The songs about love's joy and love's pain are those that find the most responsive echo. For every kiss on rosy lips happy smiles pass over the wrinkled faces, but, when pale cheeks are bathed in tears, tears also fill a hundred old eyes. ”

“ What value can a woman have for a man when he does not wish her to give him the fruit of their embrace. For after all this is the great wonder, the joy beyond all joy, in the embrace between man and woman, that there meets their love's longing for eternity, the longing to know them- selves united into a far future through the children, and again their children, and so on through the ages. If I lay in your arms and felt your love waver for fear of the child, I should feel it a deep shame. ”

“ From my earliest childhood and until we left the town Ann Marie came to our house every Thursday. If she was a little shadow in the street, she became a ray of sunshine in the house. She was always content, always full of gratitude for her happiness, and for everybody's kindness to her,— always smiling with her big, brown child's eyes. But it was only when she was alone with us children that she became talkative. Grown-up people frightened her a little with their seriousness and common sense. ”

“ When I meet the tingling sledge caravans with merry, fur-clad men and women, when I hear the gaily ringing laughter and the shouts from the children tobogganing down the snowy slopes of Rough-Hill, when I see the fjord black with skating figures, and when in the evening I hear songs and dance music pour out through the festively-ht windows, I remember the severe winter of many years ago. After the town had laboriously dug itself out of the snow, it went to the fjord and kept carnival through weeks and weeks. ”

“ Rough-Hill lies just outside the old town, and is its pleasure-haunt and its pride. Seldom has a town found such a pleasant spot for a park. A century ago a generous citizen laid out the hill, dividing it into terraces, staircases, and winding alleys, protecting it with pines and fir-trees, in the shelter of which beeches and shrubberies grew up, making powerless the west wind, and letting the sun reign, creating out of the bleak hill a fertile garden. Here come on summer afternoons the old town's inhabitants with their picnic-baskets. ”

“ My mother's grave lies far from the high road in a quiet corner, among hundreds of others. The invisible hand leads me along half-overgrown paths which wind in and out among the grassy mounds, and suddenly I stand in front of the small enclosure where mother rests with a child on either side, a large mound between two smaller. Fresh ivy covers all three and winds itself round the simple, marble cross, and over it a lilac-tree and a laburnum bend their heavy weight of blossoms. ”

“ TO-DAY Greta was laid to rest in the grave- XXXIX yard. In the small church of the Institution the service took place. All the old women sat round and wept tears of real sorrow for Greta, be- cause she, who had brought youth and beauty into their withered hearts, was taken from us in the midst of her youthful joy. On her coffin they had laid wreaths made by their own trembling hands, wreaths of ivy and moss, adorned with immortelles and simple farewell inscriptions in black and white beads. ”

“ It seems to be nature's bridal song which sings about us. Do you not hear it too ? ' 'I hear nature call to a festival: spring out, ye flowers, sing out, ye birds, unfold, trees ! Awake, adorn thyselves, and hasten lest ye be too late. Spring is already here, and when May-day dawns the princess of Rough-Hill will be a bride. I hear nature chant your wedding hymn.'
We are stopped in our walk by a river, which ordinarily is a shallow stream amongst big stones, but which the spring rains have filled to over- flowing, only here and there a stone stands out. ”

“ Why won't they all, on some beautiful summer morn, jump out of bed with the firm resolution to cease fighting, to lay down their weapons, cool their feverish brows in the resh morning air, fill their bitter hearts with nature's sweet joy, and cleanse themselves from all envy and hatred, and make peace all along the line on the simple basis that we are all human creatures who don't want to hurt one another. ”

“ Happiness for me? Happiness for any one else? Scarcely the last, and certainly not the first. When now, of my own free will, I give up the position I have won—and which many have envied me—it is with a sincere feeling of its hopeless insecurity.
What in heaven's name do we fight for? Why do we pursue each other, suspect and ill-treat each other, always armed to the teeth, always ready for attack? Perhaps far, far away there is a goal to reach—a higher justice, a better distribution of the boons of existence. Perhaps our children's children may experience a new social revolution. ”

“ She is afraid because I am old and blind ; she fears I cannot any longer take care of myself, and that an accident might happen. Greta is a good daughter and takes such care of me that I don't like to upset her. But if I had any- thing to do I am sure I should find my way on Rough-Hill and in the mill as well as any young person with two strong eyes.'
On the whole his mind dwells in an unhealthy fashion on the mill. It is not only when he talks in his sleep at night, to which Greta has sometimes listened, but in broad daylight, that his thoughts hover about it. ”

“ I prefer to think of her as the goddess of pro- found peace, the goddess I worship. Here on Rough-Hill stands her temple, and of the mill I make her high-altar. She calls up here, to blessed peace in nature's unsullied kingdom, he, who weary seeks a haven away from life's daily dust and drab. ”

“ But there again the raven sat on my shoulder : ' Why, young monk, let your eyes rest longingly on the tree behind the wall ? Stay where you are. Nobody waits for you when darkness falls over the monastery. In the garden all the nightingales are silent, and in the old tree only the raven builds his nest. ”

“ But after all will it make mankind happier when that goal is reached, or will they press on with restless hearts and unsatisfied desires to fight and hate onwards towards a new goal? Surely. No, it is an empty illusion that happiness is to be won by strife. Only in peace, peace with oneself, peace with the world is happiness found. ”

“ Old and young, children and lovers, worthy men and matrons, yes, even the poor and the crippled, must all climb to Rough-Hill to greet the Spring.
Spring meets them, throwing golden sunshine on every side,and the happy people from the town point out exultantly to each other his wondrous deeds. ”

“ When from the wood I reached the crest of the hill, I saw Greta standing near the mill between the wings, just as I saw her that first day I came to Rough-Hill. I thought to myself, ' Then the work- men have not come yet ; but it was perhaps too early.' And I thought further that Greta had probably gone up to the mill to say good-bye. She did not see me ; she gazed out over the fjord. ”

“ We walk through the wood drinking the strong wine of spring, which the sun draws out of a thousand intoxicating essences. I see the blood mount in Greta's cheeks, I feel it throb in her hand as I hold it in mine. The wine of spring is in us, its enchanting drowsiness pours through our veins. ”

“ Everybody has been kind to her, and done all in their power to amuse her, but all the time she had longed for Rough-Hill till she had grown pale from longing and loneliness.'
The old man stopped talking, and sat for a while in deep thought. Then he added, ' Well, I suppose the time will come when she will have to leave — when I am dead. Unless she married a man who would live with her here. But of course I cannot say that Rough-Hill is rich in young men, and as far as I know, Greta has never worried her head much about such things. ”

“ Peace is only for the happy people ; for the unhappy work is a solace.
Besides, let me admit it. When of late 1 have now and again for a little diversion entered one of the cafes in the town to look through a newspaper my fingers itched to once more take up my petij to defend or attack what I read. I understood that as far as my mill was concerned it only needed a very light wind to set it again in motion. It also seemed to me that I understood Greta's father better. It was he himself, and not the spirit of the mill, that needed to hear the noise of the wheels and the swish of the wings. ”

“ But when, in the lonely night, the picture of your beloved stands clear in your soul, you see her with eyes of cold deceit and with an ironical smile that stiffens your heart. What does it matter that she meets you the following day more lovingly than ever. You may imagine you are safe for a day, a week, or a month, but the worm has bitten its venom into your happiness. ”

“ The landmark my life has gained does not lead me in any new direction. I only follow now a straighter road with more resolution.
On your death-bed, Greta, you reproached your- self that you died a virgin in my arms. I never doubted your willing generosity. Virgin or wife you would have been the same, and I can dream of no greater joy than to have rested by your side — your bridegroom. But you, my virgin bride, have taught me the hitherto unknown joy of renuncia- tion. You have taught me the joy of being on the road to happiness, even if one never reaches the goal.
Again I set my mill moving. ”

“ There are others who in attempted cynicism insist that security kills happiness. There is only one happiness, to be at peace in happiness. To know that the day rises with the same sun that set yesterday, to desire nothing, to fear nothing, not to wish any day over again or any day different, because each day is equally happy. ”

“ I should feel like one standing at the source of purity who sees it defiled by mirroring his picture.
When once more I sit in my room with her roses in front of me, I suddenly long to show her how much her friendship means to me. I fasten one of the roses on a sheet of paper and write underneath, ' From one, whom it has made sane.' I huny up through the wood to the miller's house and place it over the door. ”

“ I hurry to the window, but at the same moment the door of father's study is flung open and I am pulled back by a strong hand. 'Pull down the blinds, no one must look out,' father says, pale and moved. 'The Germans are here.' An uncanny silence reigns in the room, and, frightened, I crouch against mother's skirts, while the clattering noise of many horses comes nearer. It stops just outside our windows. We only hear some quick, loud words which sound like scolding, then a whimper, new oaths, curses and rattling of arms, restless stamping of horses, and at last a terrified shriek in Danish. ”

“ But first and foremost I enjoy watching Greta's delight over the children. With radiant eyes she follows their gracefully clumsy tumblings about, and she finds them equally fascinating whether they are chattering and laughing, or whether they 328 'GOD'S PEACE'
suddenly start a despairing howl. But most of all, she loves the tiny babies who lie in their carriages looking out into the world with big, astonished eyes. It happened to-day that we saw a young mother take up her tiny baby and lay it at her full, white bosom, which it sucked with greedy mouth and grasped with eager, little hands. ”

“ We try to make death gentle and sweet with the rich offerings of summer. But in winter death stands in all his sinister majesty, spreads out his sombre cloak and fastens his cross- bone mark to every tree in the graveyard.
I walk with Greta through the winter-dark graveyard, but the horror of death does not frighten me. I walk in league with the great Lord of Life, and it seems to me, that Death with- draws as we walk forward.
We sit down on the bench at the grave, and Greta says, ' Though you have often talked to me about your mother, you have never told me what she looked like. ”

“ But within a very short time the happiness she desires will blossom again, the empty place will be taken by a new lover, who, though he may be different, will have just as many advantages. Her bitterness towards me will vanish, and when in after years we meet again, we will greet each other pleasantly like two friends who have never gone through life's seriousness together, who have scarcely had moments together worthy remembrance or forgetfulness. ”