Scene 4.

Jakob Skomager. Jeppe.

=Jakob=--Welcome back from town! Did you get the soap for your wife?

=Jeppe=--Ay, you rascal, you must know what kind of people you are talking to! Off with your cap! for you are but an idiot compared to a fellow like me.

=Jakob=--I'd not stand such words from anyone else, Jeppe. But since you give my house a daily penny, I won't be too particular.

=Jeppe=--Off with your cap, you rascal!

=Jakob=--What has happened to you on the way, that you've got the big head?

=Jeppe=--You must know that I have been hanged since I spoke with you last.

=Jakob=--That is not so much to feel proud about. I don't envy you a bit. But listen, Jeppe, "where you have drunk your beer there you should show your spleen!" You become drunk at other places, but come into my house just to make a disturbance.

=Jeppe=--Quick, off with your cap, you rascal! Don't you hear that jingling in my pocket?

=Jakob= (with his hat under his arm)--Whew! Where did you get that money?

=Jeppe=--From my barony, Jakob. I'll tell you what has happened to me, but give me a glass of mead first; for I am too proud to drink Danish whiskey.

=Jakob=--Your health, Jeppe.

=Jeppe=--Now I shall tell you what has happened to me. When I left you I fell asleep; when I woke up again I was a baron, and got drunk again on canaille sack; when I got drunk of sack, I woke up on a dung-heap; when I woke up on the dung-heap, I lay down to sleep again, hoping that I would again become a baron, but I found that it doesn't always go like that; for my wife woke me up with Master Erik and dragged me in by the hair without having the least respect for such a man as I had been. When I came into the room I was kicked out head first, and saw myself surrounded by a lot of shysters, who sentenced me to death and killed me with poison; after I had been hanged I came to life again and got four Rixdollars. This is the whole story; but how such a thing could happen, I will let you imagine.

=Jakob=--Ha! Ha! Ha! It's a dream, Jeppe.

=Jeppe=--If I didn't have these four Rixdollars I'd think it was a dream, too. Give me another, Jakob, I'll not think more of that foolishness but have another good drink.

=Jakob=--Your health, Baron. Ha! Ha! Ha!

=Jeppe=--Perhaps you can't understand this, Jakob?

=Jakob=--Not if I stood on my head.

=Jeppe=--It might be true anyway, Jakob, for you are a dunce, and don't understand such things.