Might as well have stayed quietly where I was? Might have stayed in the Rondë in comfort and peace? Saved my trouble and toil and no end of shoe-leather? Peer Gynt—a troll? Why, it’s rubbish! It’s stuff! Good-bye! There’s a halfpenny to buy you tobacco. THE OLD MAN. Nay, my good Prince Peer! PEER. Let me go! You’re mad, Or else doting. Off to the hospital with you! THE OLD MAN. Oh, that is exactly what I’m in search of. But, as I told you, my grandson’s offspring Have become overwhelmingly strong in the land, And they say that I only exist in books. The saw says: One’s kin are unkindest of all; I’ve found to my cost that that saying is true. It’s cruel to count as mere figment and fable—— PEER. My dear man, there are others who share the same fate. THE OLD MAN. And ourselves we’ve no Mutual Aid Society, No alms-box or Penny Savings Bank;— In the Rondë, of course, they’d be out of place. PEER. No, that curs’d: _To thyself be enough_ was the word there! THE OLD MAN. Oh, come now, the Prince can’t complain of the word. And if he could manage by hook or by crook—— PEER. My man, you have got on the wrong scent entirely; I’m myself, as the saying goes, fairly cleaned out[137]—— THE OLD MAN. You surely can’t mean it? His Highness a beggar? PEER. Completely. His Highness’s ego’s in pawn. And it’s all your fault, you accursed trolls! That’s what comes of keeping bad company. THE OLD MAN. So there came my hope toppling down from its perch again! Good-bye! I had best struggle on to the town—— PEER. What would you do there? THE OLD MAN. I will go to the theatre. The papers are clamouring for national talents—— PEER. Good luck on your journey; and greet them from me. If I can but get free, I will go the same way. A farce I will write them, a mad and profound one; Its name shall be: “Sic transit gloria mundi.” [_He runs off along the road; the OLD MAN shouts after him._ SCENE NINTH. [_At a cross-road._] PEER GYNT. Now comes the pinch, Peer, as never before! This Dovrish _Enough_ has passed judgment upon you. The vessel’s a wreck; one must float with the spars. All else; but to go to the scrap-heap—no, no!