continued, "that the book preaches Nihilism. Not at all.
It is not concerned to preach anything whatsoever. It merely points
to the ferment of Nihilism going on under the surface, at home as
elsewhere. A Pastor Manders will always goad one or other Mrs. Alving
to revolt. And just because she is a woman, she will, when once she has
begun, go to the utmost extremes."

Towards the end of January Ibsen wrote from Rome to Olaf Skavlan:
"These last weeks have brought me a wealth of experiences, lessons, and
discoveries. I, of course, foresaw that my new play would call forth a
howl from the camp of the stagnationists; and for; this I care no more
than for the barking of a pack of chained dogs. But the pusillanimity
which I have observed among the so-called Liberals has given me cause
for reflection. The very day after my play was published the _Dagblad_
rushed out a hurriedly-written article, evidently designed to purge
itself of all suspicion of complicity in my work. This was entirely
unnecessary. I myself am responsible for what I write, I and no one
else. I cannot possibly embarrass any party, for to no party do I
belong. I stand like a solitary franc-tireur at the outposts, and
fight for my own hand. The only man in Norway who has stood up freely,
frankly, and courageously for me is Bjoernson. It is just like him. He
has in truth a great, kingly soul, and I shall never forget his action
in this matter."

One more quotation completes the history of these stirring January
days, as written by Ibsen himself. It occurs in a letter to a Danish
journalist, Otto Borchsenius. "It may well be," the poet writes, "that
the play is in several respects rather daring. But it seemed to me
that the time had come for moving some boundary-posts. And this was an
undertaking for which a man of the older generation, like myself, was
better fitted than the many younger authors who might desire to do
something of the kind. I was prepared for a storm; but such storms one
must not shrink from encountering. That would be cowardice."

It happened that, just in these days, the present writer had frequent
opportunities of conversing with Ibsen, and of hearing from his own lips
almost all the views expressed in the above extracts. He was especially
emphatic, I remember, in protesting against the notion that the opinions
expressed by Mrs. Alving or Oswald were to be attributed to himself. He
insisted, on the contrary, that Mrs. Alving's views were m