Eric

ACT Four

Swegn’s fastness in the hills.

Scene 1

Swegn, Hardicnut, with soldiers.

SWEGN
Fight on, fight always, till the Gods are tired.
In all this dwindling remnant of the past
Desires one man to rest from virtue, cease
From desperate freedom?

HARDICNUT
No man wavers here.

SWEGN
Let him depart unhurt who so desires.

HARDICNUT
Why should he go and whither? To Eric’s sword
That never pardoned? If our hearts were vile,
Unworthily impatient of defeat,
Serving not harassed right but chance and gain,
Eric himself would keep them true.

SWEGN
Not thine,
My second soul. Yet could I pardon him
Who faltered, for the blow transcends! And were
King Eric not in Yara where he dwells,
I would have seen his hand in this defeat,
Whose stroke is like the lightning’s, silent, straight,
Not to be parried.

HARDICNUT
Sigurd smote, perhaps,
But Eric’s brain was master of his stroke.

SWEGN
The traitor Sigurd! For young Eric’s part
In Olaf’s death, he did a warrior’s act
Avenging Yarislaf and Hacon slain,
And Fate, not Eric slew. But he who, trusted, lured
Into death’s ambush, when the rebel seas
Rejoicing trampled down the royal head
They once obeyed, him I will some day have
At my sword’s mercy.

(to Ragnar who enters)

Ragnar, does it come,
The last assault, death’s trumpets?

RAGNAR
Rather peace,
If thou prefer it, Swegn. An envoy comes
From Eric’s army.

SWEGN
Ragnar, bring him in.
Ragnar goes out.
He treats victorious? When his kingdom shook,
His party faltered, then he did not treat
Nor used another envoy than his sword.
(to Gunthar who enters, escorted by Ragnar)
Earl Gunthar, welcome,—welcome more wert thou
When loyal.

GUNTHAR
Ragnar, Swegn and Hardicnut,
Revolting Earls, I come from Norway’s King
With peace, not menace.

SWEGN
Where then all these days
Behind you lurked the Northerner?

GUNTHAR
Thou art
In his dread shadow and in your mountain lair
Eric surrounds you.

SWEGN (contemptuously)
I will hear his words.

GUNTHAR
Eric, the King, the son of Yarislaf,
To Swegn, the Earl of Trondhjem. “I have known
The causes and the griefs that raise thee still
Against my monarchy. Thou knowest mine
That raised me against thy father,—Hacon’s death,
My mother’s brother, butchered shamefully
And Yarislaf by secret sentence slain.
Elected by our peers I seized his throne.
But thou, against thy country’s ancient laws
Rebelling, hast preferred for judge the sword.
Respect then the tribunal of thy choice
And its decision. Why electest thou
In thy drear fastness on the wintry hills
To perish? Trondhjem’s earldom shall be thine,
And honours and wealth and state, if thou accept
The offer of thy lenient gods. Consider,
O Swegn, thy country’s wounds, perceive at last
Thy good and ours, prolong thy father’s house.”
I expect thy answer.

SWEGN
I return to him
His proffered mercy. Let him keep it safe
For his own later use.

GUNTHAR
Thou speakest high.
What help hast thou? what hope? what god concealed?

SWEGN
I have the snow for friend and, if it fails,
The arms of death are broad enough for Swegn,
But not subjection.

GUNTHAR
For their sake thou lov’st,
Thy wife’s and sister’s, yield.

RAGNAR
Thou art not wise.
This was much better left unsaid.

SWEGN
It seems
Your pastime to insult the seed of Kings. Yet why
Am I astonished if triumphant mud
Conceives that the pure heavens are of its stuff
And nature? To the upstart I shall yield,
The fortune-fed adventurer, the boy
Favoured by the ironic Gods? Since fell
By Sigurd’s treachery and Eric’s fate
In resonant battle on the narrow seas
Olaf, his children had convinced the world,
I thought, of their great origin. Men have said,
“Their very women have souls too great to cry
For mercy even from the Gods.” His Fates
Are strong indeed when they compel our race
To hear such terms from his! Go, tell thy King,
Swegn of the ancient house rejects his boons.
Not terms between us stand, but wrath, but blood.
I would have flayed him on a golden cross
And kept his women for my household thralls,
Had I prevailed. Can he not do as much
That he must chaffer and market Norway’s crown?
These are the ways of Kings, strong, terrible
And arrogant, full of sovereignty and might.
Force in a King’s his warrant from the Gods.
By force and not by bribes and managements
Empires are founded! But your chief was born
Of huckstering earls who lived by prudent gains.
How should he imitate a royal flight
Or learn the leap of Kings upon their prey?

GUNTHAR
Swegn Olafson, thou speakest fatal words.
Where lodge thy wife and sister? Dost thou know?

HARDICNUT
Too far for Eric’s reach.

GUNTHAR
Earl, art thou sure?

SWEGN
What means this question?

GUNTHAR
That the Gods are strong
Whom thou in vain despisest, that they have dragged
From Sweden into Eric’s dangerous hands
Hertha and Aslaug, that the evil thou speakst
Was fatally by hostile Powers inspired.

SWEGN
Thou liest! They are safe and with the Swede.

GUNTHAR
I pardon thy alarm the violent word.
Earl Swegn, canst thou not see the dreadful Gods
Have chosen earth’s mightiest man to do their will?
What is that will but Norway’s unity
And Norway’s greatness? Canst thou do the work?
Look round on Norway by a boy subdued,
The steed that even Olaf could not tame
See turn obedient to an unripe hand.
Behold him with a single petty pace
Possessing Sweden. Sweden once subdued,
Thinkst thou the ships that crowd the Northern seas
Will stay there? Shall not Britain shake, Erin
Pray loudly that the tempest rather choose
The fields of Gaul? Scythia shall own our yoke,
The Volga’s frozen waves endure our march,
Unless the young god’s fancy rose-ensnared
To Italian joys attracted amorously
Should long for sunnier realms or lead his high
Exultant mind to lord in eastern Rome.
What art thou but a pebble in his march?
Consider, then, and change thy fierce response.

HARDICNUT
Deceives the lie they tell, thy reason, Swegn?
Earl Gunthar may believe, who even can think
That Yarislaf begot a god!

SWEGN
Gunthar,
I have my fortune, thou thy answer. Go.

GUNTHAR
I pity, Swegn, thy rash and obstinate soul.
He goes out.

SWEGN
Aslaug would scorn me yielding, even now
And even for her. He has unnerved my will,
The subtle tyrant! O, if this be true,
My Fate has wandered into Eric’s camp,
My soul is made his prisoner. Friends, prepare
Resistance; he’s the thunderbolt that strikes
And threatens only afterwards. It is
Our ultimate battle.

HARDICNUT
On the difficult rocks
We will oppose King Eric and his gods.

Scene 2

Swegn with his earls and followers in flight.

SWEGN
Swift, swift into the higher snows, where Winter
Eternal can alone of universal things
Take courage against Eric to defend
His enemies. O you little remnant left
Of many heroes, save yourselves for Fate.
She yet may need you when she finds the man
She lifts perpetually, too great at last
Even for her handling.

HARDICNUT
Ragnar, go with him,
While I stand here to hinder the pursuit
Or warn in time. Fear not for me, assailed.
Leave, Ragnar, leave me; I am tired at last.
All go out upward except Hardicnut.
Here then you reach me on these snows. O if my death
Could yet persuade indignant Heaven to change
[Scene incomplete]