in pursuit of his prey doth fly;
Pauses, and, fearless of danger,
Scans the far coasts of the stranger.

"The apple-tree, whose thoughts ne'er fly
Over the lofty mountains,
Leaves, when the summer days draw nigh,
Patiently waits for the time when high
The birds in its boughs shall be swinging,
Yet will know not what they are singing.

"He who has yearned so long to go
Over the lofty mountains--
He whose visions and fond hopes grow
Dim, with the years that so restless flow--
Knows what the birds are singing,
Glad in the tree-tops swinging.

"Why, oh bird, dost thou hither fare
Over the lofty mountains?
Surely it must be better there,
Broader the view and freer the air;
Com'st thou these longings to bring me;
These only, and nothing to wing me?

"Oh, shall I never, never go
Over the lofty mountains!
Must all my thoughts and wishes so
Held in these walls of ice and snow
Here be imprisoned forever?
Till death shall I flee them never?

"Hence! I will hence! Oh, so far from here,
Over the lofty mountains!
Here 't is so dull, so unspeakably drear;
Young is my heart and free from fear--
Better the walls to be scaling
Than here in my prison lie wailing.

"One day, I know, shall my soul free roam
Over the lofty mountains.
Oh, my God, fair is thy home,
Ajar is the door for all who come;
Guard it for me yet longer,
Till my soul through striving grows stronger."

At the age of eleven Bjoernson's school days began at Molde, and were
continued at Christiania in a famous preparatory school, where he had
Ibsen for a comrade. He entered the university in his twentieth year,
but his career was not brilliant from a scholastic point of view, and
he was too much occupied with his own intellectual concerns to be a
model student. From his matriculation in 1852, to the appearance of his
first book in 1857, he was occupied with many sorts of literary
experiments, and became actively engaged in journalism. The theatre,
in particular, attracted him, for the theatre was one of the chief foci
of the intellectual life of his country (as it should be in every
country), and he plunged into dramatic criticism as the avowed partisan
of Norwegian ideals, holding himself, in some sort, the successor of
Wergeland, Who had died about ten years earlier. Before becoming a
dramatic critic, he had essayed dramatic authors