[They go out to the left. FALK, who has been
continuously watching STRAWMAN and his wife,
remains behind alone in the garden. It is
now dark; the house is lighted up.
FALK.
All is as if burnt out;—all desolate, dead—!
So thro' the world they wander, two and two;
Charred wreckage, like the blackened stems that strew
The forest when the withering fire is fled.
Far as the eye can travel, all is drought.
And nowhere peeps one spray of verdure out!
[SVANHILD comes out on to the verandah with a
flowering rose-tree which she sets down.
Yes one—yes one—!
SVANHILD.
Falk, in the dark?
FALK.
And fearless!
Darkness to me is fair, and light is cheerless.
But are not you afraid in yonder walls
Where the lamp's light on sallow corpses falls—
SVANHILD.
Shame!
FALK [looking after STRAWMAN who appears at the window].
He was once so brilliant and strong;
Warred with the world to win his mistress; passed
For Custom's doughtiest iconoclast;
And pored forth love in paeans of glad song—!
Look at him now! In solemn robes and wraps,
A two-legged drama on his own collapse!
And she, the limp-skirt slattern, with the shoes
Heel-trodden, that squeak and clatter in her traces,
This is the winged maid who was his Muse
And escort to the kingdom of the graces!
Of all that fire this puff of smoke's the end!
Sic transit gloria amoris, friend.
SVANHILD.
Yes, it is wretched, wretched past compare.
I know of no one's lot that I would share.
FALK [eagerly].
Then let us two rise up and bid defiance
To this same order Art, not Nature, bred!