"But tell me, then, dear father," she said at length, breaking the long silence, "do you think it possible, as it was asserted when you were away, that King Waldemar's grandson, the foolhardy Duke Waldemar, really aspires to the crown, after the king's death?"
"Silence, child! Do not speak thus! It may cost us our lives," replied the father, anxiously, and looking round him. "It is mere silly talk. But those who bring such reports into circulation ought never more to see the light. Do not listen to such conversation, my dear, good Ingé, and give no heed to things you cannot understand. Discreet young damsels should not busy themselves with state affairs, but attend to their looms and household matters: I have often told you so. I rebuke you needfully, my good child; for your discourse frequently makes me anxious and uneasy."
"But when it concerns the country and kingdom, my father, we young damsels are as much Danes as the young knights and swains; and it is not the first time that Danish women have been obliged to think on affairs of equal importance. Had the Lady Ingé, and the proud Ingefried, not dared to think on something more than their looms and kitchens, they had not bored Swain Grathé's fleet, and sank it to the bottom; and then, perhaps, the great Waldemar had not been King of Denmark."
"Where get you these stories, my dearest child? Whom have you heard repeat these silly old tales that you have always at the tip of your tongue? You have never heard them from me--that I know."
"Ah, my mother related them to me when I was very young; and she, also, it was who taught me so many of our pretty old ballads."
"Ballads! There we have it! All ballads and chronicles lie, my child. They are but fables and superstitions, which people invent who have nothing to do but to please fools and children. When do you hear me relate stories or sing ballads? People who have serious matters in their heads, have other things to think about than such silly trifles."
"Truly, father, never have I heard you sing ballads or tell tales; but my mother loved the old songs much, and delighted to sing them, and to recite the pretty tales. If there were no true ballads, and if our wild young maidens did not sing about our old kings and heroes, and our true noble women, no great man or woman would be remembered longer than a lifetime. Then it were not worth living in the world, when the most glorious events that happen among us were mere passing show. What avails it that we are rich and powerful, if we perform nothing that deserves to be remembered when we are dead? and what to posterity would be the lives of the greatest of mankind, if people had not a pleasure in preserving their names and their exploits in songs and chronicles?"
"Ah, child, dearest child! this is only enthusiasm and superstition. Whatever is worth being preserved is remembered well enough without writing chronicles and singing songs about it; and in our times, people should have something better to think of than such trifles and old stories. Yet sing, in God's name, as much as you please, about old kings and warriors: it will do no greater harm than it has done; only, leave alone what happens in our own times. There is nothing in these worth singing or talking about. 'No one is happy until he is laid in his grave,' said a wise man; and it is a true saying. In these unsettled times, my child, one cannot be too cautious: a thoughtless word may do greater mischief than you dream of. Look out once more, and see, by the banner, how the wind lies."
Ingé rose, and looked, from the little round window, into the court-yard of the castle, where, over the arched gateway, waved a lofty banner, adorned with the two royal lions.
"The wind is gone towards the east," said Ingé, carelessly, again sitting down; "you expect some one from Scania, to-night, perhaps?"