(Jeppe is lying in the baron's bed with a cloth-of-gold
dressing-gown on a chair beside him. He wakes up, ruts his eyes,
looks about, and becomes frightened; he rubs them again, puts a hand
to his head, and finds a gold-embroidered nightcap on it; he
moistens his fingers and wipes out his eyes, then rubs them again,
turns the nightcap around and looks at it, looks at the fine shirt
he is wearing, at the dressing-gown and the other fine things in the
room, making strange faces. Meanwhile, soft music begins to play,
and Jeppe clasps his hands and weeps. When the music stops, he
speaks.)

JEPPE. What is all this? What splendor! How did I get here? Am I
dreaming, or am I awake? I certainly am awake. Where is my wife,
where are my children, where is my house, and where is Jeppe?
Everything is changed, and I am, too--Oh, what does it all mean?
What does it mean? (He calls softly in a frightened voice.) Nille!
Nille! Nille!--I think I'm in heaven--Nille!--and I don't
deserve to be a bit. But is this myself? I think it is, and then I
think it isn't. When I feel my back, which is still sore from the
last beating I got, when I hear myself speak, when I stick my tongue
in my hollow tooth, I think it is myself. But when I look at my
nightcap, my shirt, and all the splendor before my eyes, when I hear
the delicious music, then the devil split me if I can get it through
my head that it is myself. No, it is not me, I'm a thousand times a
low dog if it is. But am I not dreaming? I don't think I am. I'll
try and pinch my arm; if it doesn't hurt, I'm dreaming. Yes, I feel
it; I'm awake, sure enough; no one could argue that, because if I
weren't awake, I couldn't... But how can I be awake, now that I come
to think it over? There is no question that I am Jeppe of the Hill;
I know that I'm a poor peasant, a bumpkin, a scoundrel, a cuckold, a