ty; here one gains nothing without labor. Do you know what labor
is?--No! It is something very heavy; but it must be heavy the sweeter
the repose--Labor, Pehr, and be honest, but don't become a saint, for
then you would be vain, and it is not our virtues but our faults that
make us human. Listen well, you who stand behind the door--Life is not
such as you saw it in your youthful dreams. It is a desert, that is
true; but a desert which has its flowers; it is a stormy sea, but one
that has its ports by verdant isles. Heed, Pehr! If you want to go forth
into life now, then do it in earnest. But you will never be a _real_
man without a woman--Find her! And now, pay close attention, Pehr, for
I shall leave the word to Saint Laurence after dismissing you with the
sage's eternally young and eternally old exhortation--Know thyself!
Saint Laurence has the word. [Shadow vanishes.]

SAINT LAURENCE. [Presents his grill.] I am the holy Saint Laurence with
the grill, who, at Emperor Dicii's command was beaten with thongs seven
days in succession and afterwards was broiled on this grill by a slow
fire. There is no one who has suffered so much as I!

SAINT BARTHOLOMEW. What is that to speak of! I am the holy Saint
Bartholomew with the skin, who, at Emperor Pamphilii's command was
flayed alive clear down to the knees; and what miracles happened after
my death! You perhaps have never heard of the mysteries or of the devil
in woman shape and the prognostication about the volcano?

SAINT LAURENCE. What is that to speak of as compared with mine? I have
six miracles: The beam in the church, the crystal chalice, the Nun's
corpse--

PALL. [Rises up.] Oh, boast moderately of your sufferings. I am only a
pall, but for fifty years I have borne on my back so many corpses,
and have seen so much suffering--so many shattered hopes, so much
inconsolable grief, so many torn hearts that suffered in silence and
were thrust into oblivion without the solace of gilded statues--that you
would be silent had you seen one-half of it. Ah, life is so black, so
black, so black!

BROOM. [Raps on floor and rustles its straws.] What--you chatter about
life, old Pall, you who have seen only death? Life is black on one side
and white on the other. To-day I'm only a broom, but yesterday I stood
in the forest, so stout and trim, and wanted to be something great.
They all want to be great, you see, so it happened as it happened! Now
I think like this: What comes is b