diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/7rchy10.txt | 15198 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/7rchy10.zip | bin | 0 -> 340653 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/8rchy10.txt | 15198 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/8rchy10.zip | bin | 0 -> 341024 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/8rchy10h.zip | bin | 0 -> 386619 bytes |
5 files changed, 30396 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/7rchy10.txt b/old/7rchy10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..063aef8 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/7rchy10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,15198 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth +by George Brandes + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth + +Author: George Brandes + +Release Date: May, 2005 [EBook #8160] +[This file was first posted on June 23, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH *** + + + + +E-text prepared by Eric Eldred, Tonya Allen, Charles Franks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +[Etext producer's note: Chapter sub-headings in SECOND LONGER STAY +ABROAD are misnumbered in the original hard copy, skipping from VII +to IX.] + + + + +RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH + +BY + +GEORGE BRANDES + +AUTHOR OF "WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE," ETC. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: DR. GEORGE BRANDES _From a Sketch by G. Rump_] + +DISCOVERING THE WORLD + +First Impressions--Going to Bed--My Name--Fresh Elements--School--The +King--Town and Country--The King's Gardens--The Friendly World--Inimical +Forces--The World Widens--The Theatre--Progress--Warlike Instincts-- +School Adventures--Polite Accomplishments--My Relations + + +BOYHOOD'S YEARS + +Our House--Its Inmates--My Paternal Grandfather--My Maternal Grandfather +--School and Home--Farum--My Instructors--A Foretaste of Life--Contempt +for the Masters--My Mother--The Mystery of Life--My First Glimpse of +Beauty--The Head Master--Religion--My Standing in School--Self-esteem +--An Instinct for Literature--Private Reading--Heine's _Buch der +Lieder_--A Broken Friendship + + +TRANSITIONAL YEARS + +School Boy Fancies--Religion--Early Friends--_Daemonic Theory_--A +West Indian Friend--My Acquaintance Widens--Politics--The Reactionary +Party--The David Family--A Student Society--An Excursion to Slesvig-- +Temperament--The Law--Hegel--Spinoza--Love for Humanity--A Religious +Crisis--Doubt--Personal Immortality--Renunciation + + +ADOLESCENCE + +Julius Lange--A New Master--Inadaption to the Law--The University Prize +Competition--An Interview with the Judges--Meeting of Scandinavian +Students--The Paludan-Muellers--Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson--Magdalene +Thoresen--The Gold Medal--The Death of King Frederik VII--The Political +Situation--My Master of Arts Examination--War--_Admissus cum laude +praecipua_--Academical Attention--Lecturing--Music--Nature--A Walking +Tour--In Print--Philosophical Life in Denmark--Death of Ludwig David-- +Stockholm + + +FIRST LONG SOJOURN ABROAD + +My Wish to See Paris--_Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_--A +Journey--Impressions of Paris--Lessons in French--Mademoiselle Mathilde +--Taine + + +EARLY MANHOOD + +Feud in Danish Literature--Riding--Youthful Longings--On the Rack--My +First Living Erotic Reality--An Impression of the Miseries of Modern +Coercive Marriage--Researches on the Comic--Dramatic Criticism--A Trip +to Germany--Johanne Louise Heiberg--Magdalene Thoresen--Rudolph Bergh-- +The Sisters Spang--A Foreign Element--The Woman Subject--Orla Lehmann-- +M. Goldschmidt--Public Opposition--A Letter from Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson-- +Hard Work + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +Hamburg--My Second Fatherland--Ernest Hello--_Le Docteur Noir_-- +Taine--Renan--Marcelin--Gleyre--Taine's Friendship--Renan at Home-- +Philarete Chasles' Reminiscences--_Le Theatre Francais_--Coquelin +--Bernhardt--Beginnings of _Main Currents_--The Tuileries--John +Stuart Mill--London--Philosophical Studies--London and Paris Compared-- +Antonio Gallenga and His Wife--Don Juan Prim--Napoleon III--London +Theatres--Gladstone and Disraeli in Debate--Paris on the Eve of War-- +First Reverses--Flight from Paris--Geneva, Switzerland--Italy--Pasquale +Villari--Vinnie Ream's Friendship--Roman Fever--Henrik Ibsen's +Influence--Scandinavians in Rome + + +FILOMENA + +Italian Landladies--The Carnival--The Moccoli Feast--Filomena's Views + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD _Continued_ + +Reflections on the Future of Denmark--Conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo--Frascati--Native Beauty--New Susceptibilities--Georges +Noufflard's Influence--The Sistine Chapel and Michael Angelo--Raphael's +Loggias--A Radiant Spring + + + + +RECOLLECTIONS OF + +MY CHILDHOOD + +AND YOUTH + + + + +DISCOVERING THE WORLD + +First Impressions--Going to Bed--My Name--Fresh Elements--School--The +King--Town and Country--The King's Gardens--The Friendly World--Inimical +Forces--The World Widens--The Theatre--Progress--Warlike Instincts-- +School Adventures--Polite Accomplishments--My Relations. + + +I. + +He was little and looked at the world from below. All that happened, +went on over his head. Everyone looked down to him. + +But the big people possessed the enviable power of lifting him to their +own height or above it. It might so happen that suddenly, without +preamble, as he lay on the floor, rummaging and playing about and +thinking of nothing at all, his father or a visitor would exclaim: +"Would you like to see the fowls of Kjoege?" And with the same he would +feel two large hands placed over his ears and the arms belonging to them +would shoot straight up into the air. That was delightful. Still, there +was some disappointment mingled with it. "Can you see Kjoege now?" was a +question he could make nothing of. What could Kjoege be? But at the other +question: "Do you see the fowls?" he vainly tried to see something or +other. By degrees he understood that it was only a phrase, and that +there was nothing to look for. + +It was his first experience of empty phrases, and it made an impression. + +It was just as great fun, though, when the big people said to him: +"Would you like to be a fat lamb? Let us play at fat lamb." He would be +flung over the man's shoulder, like a slaughtered lamb, and hang there, +or jump up and ride with his legs round the man's hips, then climb +valiantly several steps higher, get his legs round his shoulders, and +behold! be up on the giddy height! Then the man would take him round the +waist, swing him over, and after a mighty somersault in the air, he +would land unscathed on his feet upon the floor. It was a composite kind +of treat, of three successive stages: first came the lofty and +comfortable seat, then the more interesting moment, with a feeling, +nevertheless, of being on the verge of a fall, and then finally the +jump, during which everything was upside down to him. + +But, too, he could take up attitudes down on the floor that added to his +importance, as it were, and obliged the grown-up people to look at him. +When they said: "Can you stand like the Emperor Napoleon?" he would draw +himself up, bring one foot a little forward, and cross his arms like the +little figure on the bureau. + +He knew well enough just how he had to look, for when his stout, broad- +shouldered Swedish uncle, with the big beard and large hands, having +asked his parents about the little fellow's accomplishments, placed +himself in position with his arms crossed and asked: "Who am I like?" he +replied: "You are like Napoleon's lackey." To his surprise, but no small +delight, this reply elicited a loud exclamation of pleasure from his +mother, usually so superior and so strict, and was rewarded by her, who +seldom caressed, with a kiss. + + +II. + +The trying moment of the day was when he had to go to bed. His parents +were extraordinarily prejudiced about bedtime, just when he was enjoying +himself most. When visitors had arrived and conversation was well +started--none the less interesting to him because he understood +scarcely half of what was said--it was: "Now, to bed!" + +But there were happy moments after he was in bed, too. When Mother came +in and said prayers with him, and he lay there safely fenced in by the +tall trellis-work, each bar of which, with its little outward bend in +the middle, his fingers knew so well, it was impossible to fall out +through them. It was very pleasant, the little bed with its railing, and +he slept in it as he has never slept since. + +It was nice, too, to lie on his back in bed and watch his parents +getting ready to go to the theatre, Father in a shining white shirt and +with his curly hair beautifully parted on one side Mother with a crepe +shawl over her silk dress, and light gloves that smelled inviting as she +came up to say goodnight and good-bye. + + +III. + +I was always hearing that I was pale and thin and small. That was the +impression I made on everyone. Nearly thirty years afterwards an +observant person remarked to me: "The peculiarity about your face is its +intense paleness." Consequently I looked darker than I was; my brown +hair was called black. + +Pale and thin, with thick brown hair, difficult hair. That was what the +hairdresser said--Mr. [Footnote: Danish _Herre_.] Alibert, who +called Father Erre: "Good-morning, Erre," "Good-bye, Erre." And all his +assistants, though as Danish as they could be, tried to say the same. +Difficult hair! "There is a little round place on his crown where the +hair will stand up, if he does not wear it rather long," said Mr. +Alibert. + +I was forever hearing that I was pale and small, pale in particular. +Strangers would look at me and say: "He is rather pale." Others remarked +in joke: "He looks rather green in the face." And so soon as they began +talking about me the word "thin" would be uttered. + +I liked my name. My mother and my aunts said it in such a kindly way. +And the name was noteworthy because it was so difficult to pronounce. No +boy or girl smaller than I could pronounce it properly; they all said +_Gayrok_. + +I came into the world two months too soon, I was in such a hurry. My +mother was alone and had no help. When the midwife came I had arrived +already. I was so feeble that the first few years great care had to be +taken of me to keep me alive. I was well made enough, but not strong, +and this was the source of many vexations to me during those years when +a boy's one desire and one ambition is to be strong. + +I was not clumsy, very agile if anything; I learnt to be a good high +jumper, to climb and run well, was no contemptible wrestler, and by +degrees became an expert fighter. But I was not muscularly strong, and +never could be compared with those who were so. + + +IV. + +The world, meanwhile, was so new, and still such an unknown country. +About that time I was making the discovery of fresh elements. + +I was not afraid of what I did not like. To overcome dislike of a thing +often satisfied one's feeling of honour. + +"Are you afraid of the water?" asked my brisk uncle from Fuenen one day. +I did not know exactly what there was to be afraid of, but answered +unhesitatingly: "No." I was five years old; it was Summer, consequently +rainy and windy. + +I undressed in the bathing establishment; the old sailor fastened a cork +belt round my waist. It was odiously wet, as another boy had just taken +it off, and it made me shiver. Uncle took hold of me round the waist, +tossed me out into the water, and taught me to take care of myself. +Afterwards I learnt to swim properly with the help of a long pole +fastened to the cork belt and held by the bathing-man, but my +familiarity with the salt element dated from the day I was flung out +into it like a little parcel. Without by any means distinguishing myself +in swimming, any more than in any other athletic exercise, I became a +very fair swimmer, and developed a fondness for the water and for +bathing which has made me very loth, all my life, to miss my bath a +single day. + +There was another element that I became acquainted with about the same +time, and which was far more terrifying than the water. I had never seen +it uncontrolled: fire. + +One evening, when I was asleep in the nursery, I was awaked by my mother +and her brother, my French uncle. The latter said loudly: "We must take +the children out of bed." + +I had never been awaked in the night before. I opened my eyes and was +thrilled by a terror, the memory of which has never been effaced. The +room was brightly illuminated without any candle having been lighted, +and when I turned my head I saw a huge blaze shoot up outside the +window. Flames crackled and sparks flew. It was a world of fire. It was +a neighbouring school that was burning. Uncle Jacob put his hand under +my "night gown," a long article of clothing with a narrow cotton belt +round the waist, and said laughing: "Do you have palpitations of the +heart when you are afraid?" I had never heard of palpitations of the +heart before. I felt about with my hand and for the first time found my +heart, which really was beating furiously. Small though I was, I asked +the date and was told that it was the 25th of November; the fright I had +had was so great that I never forgot this date, which became for me the +object of a superstitious dread, and when it drew near the following +year, I was convinced that it would bring me fresh misfortune. This was +in so far the case that next year, at exactly the same time, I fell ill +and was obliged to spend some months in bed. + + +V. + +I was too delicate to be sent to school at five years old, like other +boys. My doctor uncle said it was not to be thought of. Since, however, +I could not grow up altogether in ignorance, it was decided that I +should have a tutor of my own. + +So a tutor was engaged who quickly won my unreserved affection and made +me very happy. The tutor came every morning and taught me all I had to +learn. He was a tutor whom one could ask about anything under the sun +and he would always know. First, there was the ABC. That was mastered in +a few lessons. I could read before I knew how to spell. Then came +writing and arithmetic and still more things. I was soon so far advanced +that the tutor could read _Frithiof's Saga_ aloud to me in Swedish +and be tolerably well understood; and, indeed, he could even take a +short German extract, and explain that I must say _ich_ and not +_ish_, as seemed so natural. + +Mr. Voltelen was a poor student, and I quite understood from the +conversation of my elders what a pleasure and advantage it was to him to +get a cup of coffee extra and fine white bread and fresh butter with it +every day. On the stroke of half-past ten the maid brought it in on a +tray. Lessons were stopped, and the tutor ate and drank with a relish +that I had never seen anyone show over eating and drinking before. The +very way in which he took his sugar--more sugar than Father or Mother +took--and dissolved it in the coffee before he poured in the cream, +showed what a treat the cup of coffee was to him. + +Mr. Voltelen had a delicate chest, and sometimes the grown-up people +said they were afraid he could not live. There was a report that a rich +benefactor, named Nobel, had offered to send him to Italy, that he might +recover in the warmer climate of the South. It was generous of Mr. +Nobel, and Mr. Voltelen was thinking of starting. Then he caught another +complaint. He had beautiful, brown, curly hair. One day he stayed away; +he had a bad head, he had contracted a disease in his hair from a dirty +comb at a bathing establishment. And when he came again I hardly +recognised him. He wore a little dark wig. He had lost every hair on his +head, even his eyebrows had disappeared. His face was of a chalky +pallor, and he coughed badly too. + +Why did not God protect him from consumption? And how could God find it +in His heart to give him the hair disease when he was so ill already? +God was strange. He was Almighty, but He did not use His might to take +care of Mr. Voltelen, who was so good and so clever, and so poor that he +needed help more than anyone else. Mr. Nobel was kinder to Mr. Voltelen +than God was. God was strange, too, in other ways; He was present +everywhere, and yet Mother was cross and angry if you asked whether He +was in the new moderator lamp, which burnt in the drawing-room with a +much brighter light than the two wax candles used to give. God knew +everything, which was very uncomfortable, since it was impossible to +hide the least thing from Him. Strangest of all was it when one +reflected that, if one knew what God thought one was going to say, one +could say something else and His omniscience would be foiled. But of +course one did not know what He thought would come next. The worst of +all, though, was that He left Mr. Voltelen in the lurch so. + + +VI. + +Some flashes of terrestrial majesty and magnificence shone on my modest +existence. Next after God came the King. As I was walking along the +street one day with my father, he exclaimed: "There is the King!" I +looked at the open carriage, but saw nothing noticeable there, so fixed +my attention upon the coachman, dressed in red, and the footman's plumed +hat. "The King wasn't there!" "Yes, indeed he was--he was in the +carriage." "Was that the King? He didn't look at all remarkable--he had +no crown on." "The King is a handsome man," said Father. "But he only +puts on his state clothes when he drives to the Supreme Court." + +So we went one day to see the King drive to the Supreme Court. A crowd +of people were standing waiting at the Naval Church. Then came the +procession. How splendid it was! There were runners in front of the +horses, with white silk stockings and regular flower-pots on their +heads; I had never seen anything like it; and there were postillions +riding on the horses in front of the carriage. I quite forgot to look +inside the carriage and barely caught a glimpse of the King. And that +glimpse made no impression upon me. That he was Christian VIII. I did +not know; he was only "the King." + +Then one day we heard that the King was dead, and that he was to lie in +state twice. These lyings in state were called by forced, unnatural +names, _Lit de Parade_ and _Castrum doloris_; I heard them so +often that I learnt them and did not forget them. On the _Lit de +Parade_ the body of the King himself lay outstretched; that was too +sad for a little boy. But _Castrum doloris_ was sheer delight, and +it really was splendid. First you picked your way for a long time along +narrow corridors, then high up in the black-draped hall appeared the +coffin covered with black velvet, strewn with shining, twinkling stars. +And a crowd of candles all round. It was the most magnificent sight I +had ever beheld. + + +VII. + +I was a town child, it is true, but that did not prevent me enjoying +open-air life, with plants and animals. The country was not so far from +town then as it is now. My paternal grandfather had a country-house a +little way beyond the North gate, with fine trees and an orchard; it was +the property of an old man who went about in high Wellington boots and +had a regular collection of wax apples and pears--such a marvellous +imitation that the first time you saw them you couldn't help taking a +bite out of one. Driving out to the country-house in the Summer, the +carriage would begin to lumber and rumble as soon as you passed through +the North gate, and when you came back you had to be careful to come in +before the gate was closed. + +We lived in the country ourselves, for that matter, out in the western +suburb, near the Black Horse (as later during the cholera Summer), or +along the old King's Road, where there were beautiful large gardens. In +one such a huge garden I stood one Summer day by my mother's side in +front of a large oblong bed with many kinds of flowers. "This bed shall +be yours," said Mother, and happy was I. I was to rake the paths round +it myself and tend and water the plants in it. I was particularly +interested to notice that a fresh set of flowers came out for every +season of the year. When the asters and dahlias sprang into bloom the +Summer was over. Still the garden was not the real country. The real +country was at Inger's, my dear old nurse's. She was called my nurse +because she had looked after me when I was small. But she had not fed +me, my mother had done that. + +Inger lived in a house with fields round it near High Taastrup. There +was no railway there then, and you drove out with a pair of horses. It +was only later that the wonderful railway was laid as far as Roskilde. +So it was an unparalleled event for the children, to go by train to +Valby and back. Their father took them. Many people thought that it was +too dangerous. But the children cared little for the danger. And it went +off all right and they returned alive. + +Inger had a husband whose name was Peer. He was nice, but had not much +to say. Inger talked far more and looked after everything. They had a +baby boy named Niels, but he was in the cradle and did not count. +Everything at Inger and Peer's house was different from the town. There +was a curious smell in the rooms, with their chests of drawers and +benches, not exactly disagreeable, but unforgettable. They had much +larger dishes of curds and porridge than you saw in Copenhagen. They did +not put the porridge or the curds on plates. Inger and Peer and their +little visitor sat round the milk bowl or the porridge dish and put +their spoons straight into it. But the guest had a spoon to himself. +They did not drink out of separate glasses, but he had a glass to +himself. + +It was jolly in the country. A cow and little pigs to play with and milk +warm from the cow. Inger used to churn, and there was buttermilk to +drink. It was great fun for a little Copenhagen boy to roll about in the +hay and lie on the hay-waggons when they were driven home. And every +time I came home from a visit to Inger Mother would laugh at me the +moment I opened my mouth, for, quite unconsciously, I talked just like +Inger and the other peasants. + + +VIII. + +In the wood attic, a little room divided from the main garret by wooden +bars, in which a quantity of split firewood and more finely chopped fir +sticks, smelling fresh and dry, are piled up in obliquely arranged +heaps, a little urchin with tightly closed mouth and obstinate +expression has, for more than two hours, been bearing his punishment of +being incarcerated there. + +Several times already his anxious mother has sent the housemaid to ask +whether he will beg pardon yet, and he has only shaken his head. He is +hungry; for he was brought up here immediately after school. But he will +not give in, for he is in the right. It is not his fault that the grown- +up people cannot understand him. They do not know that what he is +suffering now is nothing to what he has had to suffer. It is true that +he would not go with the nurse and his little brother into the King's +Gardens. But what do Father and Mother know of the ignominy of hearing +all day from the other schoolboys: "Oh! so you are fetched by the +nurse!" or "Here comes your nurse to fetch you!" He is overwhelmed with +shame at the thought of the other boys' scorn. She is not _his_ +nurse, she is his brother's. He could find his way home well enough, but +how can he explain to the other boys that his parents will not trust him +with the little one yet, and so send for them both at the same time! Now +there shall be an end to it; he will not go to the King's Gardens with +the nurse again. + +It is the housemaid, once more, come to ask if he will not beg pardon +now. In vain. Everything has been tried with him, scolding, and even a +box on the ear; but he has not been humbled. Now he stands here; he will +not give in. + +But this time his kind mother has not let the girl come empty-handed. +His meal is passed through the bars and he eats it. It is so much the +easier to hold out. And some hours later he is brought down and put to +bed without having apologised. + +Before I had so painfully become aware of the ignominy of going with the +maid to the King's Gardens, I had been exceedingly fond of the place. +What gardens they were for hide and seek, and puss in the corner! What +splendid alleys for playing Paradise, with Heaven and Hell! To say +nothing of playing at horses! A long piece of tape was passed over and +under the shoulders of two playfellows, and you drove them with a tight +rein and a whip in your hand. And if it were fun in the old days when I +only had tape for reins, it was ever so much greater fun now that I had +had a present from my father of splendid broad reins of striped wool, +with bells, that you could hear from far enough when the pair came +tearing down the wide avenues. + +I was fond of the gardens, which were large and at that time much larger +than they are now; and of the trees, which were many, at that time many +more than now. And every part of the park had its own attraction. The +Hercules pavilion was mysterious; Hercules with the lion, instructive +and powerful. A pity that it had become such a disgrace to go there! + +I had not known it before. One day, not so long ago, I had felt +particularly happy there. I had been able for a long time to read +correctly in my reading-book and write on my slate. But one day Mr. +Voltelen had said to me: "You ought to learn to read writing." And from +that moment forth my ambition was set upon reading _writing_, an +idea which had never occurred to me before. When my tutor first showed +me _writing_, it had looked to me much as cuneiform inscriptions +and hieroglyphics would do to ordinary grown-up people, but by degrees I +managed to recognize the letters I was accustomed to in this their +freer, more frivolous disguise, running into one another and with their +regularity broken up. In the first main avenue of the King's Gardens I +had paced up and down, in my hand the thin exercise-book, folded over in +the middle,--the first book of writing I had ever seen,--and had already +spelt out the title, "Little Red Riding-Hood." The story was certainly +not very long; still, it filled several of the narrow pages, and it was +exciting to spell out the subject, for it was new to me. In triumphant +delight at having conquered some difficulties and being on the verge of +conquering others, I kept stopping in front of a strange nurse-girl, +showed her the book, and asked: "Can you read writing?" + +Twenty-three years later I paced up and down the same avenue as a young +man, once more with a book of manuscript, that I was reading, in my +hand. I was fixing my first lecture in my mind, and I repeated it over +and over again to myself until I knew it almost by heart, only to +discover, to my disquiet, a few minutes later, that I had forgotten the +whole, and that was bad enough; for what I wished to say in my lecture +were things that I had very much at heart. + +The King's Garden continued to occupy its place in my life. Later on, +for so many years, when Spring and Summer passed by and I was tied to +the town, and pined for trees and the scent of flowers, I used to go to +the park, cross it obliquely to the beds near the beautiful copper +beeches, by the entrance from the ramparts, where there were always +flowers, well cared for and sweet scented. I caressed them with my eyes, +and inhaled their perfume leaning forward over the railings. + +But just now I preferred to be shut up in the wood-loft to being fetched +by the nurse from school to the Gardens. It was horrid, too, to be +obliged to walk so slowly with the girl, even though no longer obliged +to take hold of her skirt. How I envied the boys contemptuously called +street boys! They could run in and out of the courtyard, shout and make +as much noise as they liked, quarrel and fight out in the street, and +move about freely. I knew plenty of streets. If sent into the town on an +errand I should be able to find my way quite easily. + +And at last I obtained permission. Happy, happy day! I flew off like an +arrow. I could not possibly have walked. And I ran home again at full +galop. From that day forth I always ran when I had to go out alone. Yes, +and I could not understand how grown-up people and other boys could +walk. I tried a few steps to see, but impatience got the better of me +and off I flew. It was fine fun to run till you positively felt the +hurry you were in, because you hit your back with your heels at every +step. + +My father, though, could run very much faster. It was impossible to +compete with him on the grass. But it was astonishing how slow old +people were. Some of them could not run up a hill and called it trying +to climb stairs. + + +IX. + +On the whole, the world was friendly. It chiefly depended on whether one +were good or not. If not, Karoline was especially prone to complain and +Father and Mother were transformed into angry powers. Father was, of +course, a much more serious power than Mother, a more distant, more +hard-handed power. Neither of them, in an ordinary way, inspired any +terror. They were in the main protecting powers. + +The terrifying power at this first stage was supplied by the bogey-man. +He came rushing suddenly out of a corner with a towel in front of his +face and said: "Bo!" and you jumped. If the towel were taken away there +soon emerged a laughing face from behind it. That at once made the +bogey-man less terrible. And perhaps that was the reason Maren's threat: +"Now, if you are not good, the bogey-man will come and take you," +quickly lost its effect. And yet it was out of this same bogey-man, so +cold-bloodedly shaken off, that at a later stage a personality with whom +there was no jesting developed, one who was not to be thrust aside in +the same way, a personality for whom you felt both fear and trembling-- +the Devil himself. + +But it was only later that he revealed himself to my ken. It was not he +who succeeded first to the bogey-man. It was--the police. The police was +the strange and dreadful power from which there was no refuge for a +little boy. The police came and took him away from his parents, away +from the nursery and the drawing-room, and put him in prison. + +In the street the police wore a blue coat and had a large cane in his +hand. Woe to the one who made the acquaintance of that cane! + +My maternal grandfather was having his warehouse done up, a large +warehouse, three stories high. Through doors at the top, just under the +gable in the middle, there issued a crane, and from it hung down a +tremendously thick rope at the end of which was a strong iron hook. By +means of it the large barrels of sky-blue indigo, which were brought on +waggons, were hoisted. Inside the warehouse the ropes passed through +every storey, through holes in the floors. If you pulled from the inside +at the one or the other of the ropes, the rope outside with the iron +crook went up or down. + +In the warehouse you found Jens; he was a big, strong, taciturn, +majestic man with a red nose and a little pipe in his mouth, and his +fingers were always blue from the indigo. If you had made sure of Jens' +good-will, you could play in the warehouse for hours at a time, roll the +empty barrels about, and--which was the greatest treat of all--pull the +ropes. This last was a delight that kept all one's faculties at extreme +tension. The marvellous thing about it was that you yourself stood +inside the house and pulled, and yet at the same time you could watch +through the open doors in the wall how the rope outside went up or down. +How it came about was an enigma. But you had the refreshing +consciousness of having accomplished something--saw the results of your +efforts before your eyes. + +Nor could I resist the temptation of pulling the ropes when Jens was out +and the warehouse empty. My little brother had whooping cough, so I +could not live at home, but had to be at my grandfather's. One day Jens +surprised me and pretty angry he was. "A nice little boy you are! If you +pull the rope at a wrong time you will cut the expensive rope through, +and it cost 90 Rigsdaler! What do you think your grandfather will +say?" [Footnote: A Rigsdaler was worth about two shillings and +threepence, English money. It is a coin that has been out of use about +40 years.] + +It was, of course, very alarming to think that I might destroy such a +valuable thing. Not that I had any definite ideas of money and numbers. +I was well up in the multiplication table and was constantly wrestling +with large numbers, but they did not correspond to any actual conception +in my mind. When I reckoned up what one number of several digits came to +multiplied by another of much about the same value, I had not the least +idea whether Father or Grandfather had so many Rigsdaler, or less, or +more. There was only one of the uncles who took an interest in my gift +for multiplication, and that was my stout, rich uncle with the crooked +mouth, of whom it was said that he owned a million, and who was always +thinking of figures. He was hardly at the door of Mother's drawing-room +before he called out: "If you are a sharp boy and can tell me what +27,374 times 580,208 are, you shall have four skilling;" and quickly +slate and pencil appeared and the sum was finished in a moment and the +four skilling pocketed. [Footnote: Four skilling would be a sum equal to +1-1/2d. English money.] + +I was at home then in the world of figures, but not in that of values. +All the same, it would be a terrible thing to destroy such a value as 90 +Rigsdaler seemed to be. But might it not be that Jens only said so? He +surely could not see from the rope whether it had been pulled or not. + +So I did it again, and one day when Jens began questioning me sternly +could not deny my guilt. "I saw it," said Jens; "the rope is nearly cut +in two, and now you will catch it, now the policeman will come and fetch +you." + +For weeks after that I did not have one easy hour. Wherever I went, or +whatever I did, the fear of the police followed me. I dared not speak to +anyone of what I had done and of what was awaiting me. I was too much +ashamed, and I noticed, too, that my parents knew nothing. But if a door +opened suddenly I would look anxiously at the incomer. When I was +walking with the nurse and my little brother I looked all round on every +side, and frequently peeped behind me, to see whether the police were +after me. Even when I lay in my bed, shut in on all four sides by its +trellis-work, the dread of the police was upon me still. + +There was only one person to whom I dared mention it, and that was Jens. +When a few weeks had gone by I tried to get an answer out of him. Then I +perceived that Jens did not even know what I was talking about. Jens had +evidently forgotten all about it. Jens had been making fun of me. If my +relief was immense, my indignation was no less. So much torture for +nothing at all! Older people, who had noticed how the word "police" was +to me an epitome of all that was terrible, sometimes made use of it as +an explanation of things that they thought were above my comprehension. + +When I was six years old I heard the word "war" for the first time. I +did not know what it was, and asked. "It means," said one of my aunts, +"that the Germans have put police in Schleswig and forbidden the Danes +to go there, and that they will beat them if they stay there." That I +could understand, but afterwards I heard them talking about soldiers. +"Are there soldiers as well?" I asked. "Police and soldiers," was the +answer. But that confused me altogether, for the two things belonged in +my mind to wholly different categories. Soldiers were beautiful, gay- +coloured men with shakos, who kept guard and marched in step to the +sound of drums and fifes and music, till you longed to go with them. +That was why soldiers were copied in tin and you got them on your +birthday in boxes. But police went by themselves, without music, without +beautiful colours on their uniforms, looked stern and threatening, and +had a stick in their hands. Nobody dreamt of copying them in tin. I was +very much annoyed to find out, as I soon did, that I had been misled by +the explanation and that it was a question of soldiers only. + +Not a month had passed before I began to follow eagerly, when the grown- +up people read aloud from the farthing newspaper sheets about the +battles at Bov, Nybboel, etc. The Danes always won. At bottom, war was a +cheerful thing. + +Then one day an unexpected and overwhelming thing happened. Mother was +sitting with her work on the little raised platform in the drawing-room, +in front of the sewing-table with its many little compartments, in +which, under the loose mahogany lid, there lay so many beautiful and +wonderful things--rings and lovely earrings, with pearls in them--when +the door to the kitchen opened and the maid came in. "Has Madame heard? +The _Christian VIII_. has been blown up at Eckernfoerde and the +_Gefion_ is taken." + +"Can it be possible?" said Mother. And she leaned over the sewing-table +and burst into tears, positively sobbed. It impressed me as nothing had +ever done before. I had never seen Mother cry. Grown-up people did not +cry. I did not even know that they could. And now Mother was crying till +the tears streamed down her face. I did not know what either the +_Christian VIII_. or the _Gefion_ were, and it was only now +that the maid explained to me that they were ships. But I understood +that a great misfortune had happened, and soon, too, how people were +blown up with gunpowder, and what a good thing it was that one of our +acquaintances, an active young man who was liked by everyone and always +got on well, had escaped with a whole skin, and had reached Copenhagen +in civilian's dress. + + +X. + +About this time it dawned upon me in a measure what birth and death +were. Birth was something that came quite unexpectedly, and afterwards +there was one child more in the house. One day, when I was sitting on +the sofa between Grandmamma and Grandpapa at their dining-table in +Klareboderne, having dinner with a fairly large company, the door at the +back of the room just opposite to me opened. My father stood in the +doorway, and, without a good-morning, said: "You have got a little +brother"--and there really was a little one in a cradle when I went +home. + +Death I had hitherto been chiefly acquainted with from a large, handsome +painting on Grandfather's wall, the death of the King not having +affected me. The picture represented a garden in which Aunt Rosette sat +on a white-painted bench, while in front of her stood Uncle Edward with +curly hair and a blouse on, holding out a flower to her. But Uncle +Edward was dead, had died when he was a little boy, and as he had been +such a very good boy, everyone was very sorry that they were not going +to see him again. And now they were always talking about death. So and +so many dead, so and so many wounded! And all the trouble was caused by +the Enemy. + + +XI. + +There were other inimical forces, too, besides the police and the Enemy, +more uncanny and less palpable forces. When I dragged behind the +nursemaid who held my younger brother by the hand, sometimes I heard a +shout behind me, and if I turned round would see a grinning boy, making +faces and shaking his fist at me. For a long time I took no particular +notice, but as time went on I heard the shout oftener and asked the maid +what it meant. "Oh, nothing!" she replied. But on my repeatedly asking +she simply said: "It is a bad word." + +But one day, when I had heard the shout again, I made up my mind that I +would know, and when I came home asked my mother: "What does it mean?" +"Jew!" said Mother. "Jews are people." "Nasty people?" "Yes," said +Mother, smiling, "sometimes very ugly people, but not always." "Could I +see a Jew?" "Yes, very easily," said Mother, lifting me up quickly in +front of the large oval mirror above the sofa. + +I uttered a shriek, so that Mother hurriedly put me down again, and my +horror was such that she regretted not having prepared me. Later on she +occasionally spoke about it. + + +XII. + +Other inimical forces in the world cropped up by degrees. When you had +been put to bed early the maids often sat down at the nursery table, and +talked in an undertone until far on into the evening. And then they +would tell stories that were enough to make your hair stand on end. They +talked of ghosts that went about dressed in white, quite noiselessly, or +rattling their chains through the rooms of houses, appeared to people +lying in bed, frightened guilty persons; of figures that stepped out of +their picture-frames and moved across the floor; of the horror of +spending a night in the dark in a church--no one dared do that; of what +dreadful places churchyards were, how the dead in long grave-clothes +rose up from their graves at night and frightened the life out of +people, while the Devil himself ran about the churchyard in the shape of +a black cat. In fact, you could never be sure, when you saw a black cat +towards evening, that the Devil was not inside it. And as easily as +winking the Devil could transform himself into a man and come up behind +the person he had a grudge against. + +It was a terrifying excitement to lie awake and listen to all this. And +there was no doubt about it. Both Maren and Karoline had seen things of +the sort themselves and could produce witnesses by the score. It caused +a revolution in my consciousness. I learnt to know the realm of Darkness +and the Prince of Darkness. For a time I hardly ventured to pass through +a dark room. I dared not sit at my book with an open door behind me. Who +might not step noiselessly in! And if there were a mirror on the wall in +front of me I would tremble with fear lest I might see the Devil, +standing with gleaming eyes at the back of my chair. + +When at length the impression made upon me by all these ghost and devil +stories passed away, I retained a strong repugnance to all darkness +terror, and to all who take advantage of the defenceless fear of the +ignorant for the powers of darkness. + + +XIII. + +The world was widening out. It was not only home and the houses of my +different grandparents, and the clan of my uncles, aunts, and cousins; +it grew larger. + +I realized this at the homecoming of the troops. They came home twice. +The impression they produced the first time was certainly a great, +though not a deep one. It was purely external, and indistinctly merged +together: garlands on the houses and across the streets, the dense +throng of people, the flower-decked soldiers, marching in step to the +music under a constant shower of flowers from every window, and looking +up smiling. The second time, long afterwards, I took things in in much +greater detail. The wounded, who went in front and were greeted with a +sort of tenderness; the officers on horseback, saluting with their +swords, on which were piled wreath over wreath; the bearded soldiers, +with tiny wreaths round their bayonets, while big boys carried their +rifles for them. And all the time the music of _Den tapre +Landsoldat_, when not the turn of _Danmark dejligst_ or _Vift +stolt!_ [Footnote: Three favourite Danish tunes: "The Brave Soldier," +"Fairest Denmark," and "Proudly Wave." ] + +But the second time I was not wholly absorbed by the sight, for I was +tormented by remorse. My aunt had presented me the day before with three +little wreaths to throw at the soldiers; the one I was to keep myself, +and I was to give each of my two small brothers one of the others; I had +promised faithfully to do so. And I had kept them all three, intending +to throw them all myself. I knew it was wrong and deceitful; I was +suffering for it, but the delight of throwing all the wreaths myself was +too great. I flung them down. A soldier caught one on his bayonet; the +others fell to the ground. I was thoroughly ashamed of myself, and have +never forgotten my shame. + + +XIV. + +I knew that the theatre (where I had never been) was the place where +Mother and Father enjoyed themselves most. They often talked of it, and +were most delighted if the actors had "acted well," words which conveyed +no meaning to me. + +Children were not at that time debarred from the Royal Theatre, and I +had no more ardent wish than to get inside. I was still a very small +child when one day they took me with them in the carriage in which +Father and Mother and Aunt were driving to the theatre. I had my seat +with the others in the pit, and sat speechless with admiration when the +curtain went up. The play was called _Adventures on a Walking +Tour_. I could not understand anything. Men came on the stage and +talked together. One crept forward under a bush and sang. I could not +grasp the meaning of it, and when I asked I was only told to be quiet. +But my emotion was so great that I began to feel ill, and had to be +carried out. Out in the square I was sick and had to be taken home. +Unfortunately for me, that was precisely what happened the second time, +when, in response to my importunity, another try was made. My +excitement, my delight, my attention to the unintelligible were too +overwhelming. I nearly fainted, and at the close of the first act had to +leave the theatre. After that, it was a very long time before I was +regarded as old enough to stand the excitement. + +Once, though, I was allowed to go to see a comedy. Mr. Voltelen gave me +a ticket for some students' theatricals at the Court Theatre, in which +he himself was going to appear. The piece was called _A Spendthrift_, +and I saw it without suffering for it. There was a young, flighty man in +it who used to throw gold coins out of the window, and there was an ugly +old hag, and a young, beautiful girl as well. I sat and kept a sharp +lookout for when my master should come on, but I was disappointed; there +was no Mr. Voltelen to be seen. + +Next day, when I thanked him for the entertainment, I added: "But you +made game of me. You were not in it at all." "What? I was not in it? Did +you not see the old hag? That was I. Didn't you see the girl? That was +I." It was incomprehensible to me that anyone could disguise himself so. +Mr. Voltelen must most certainly have "acted well." But years +afterwards, I could still not understand how one judged of this. Since +plays affected me exactly like real life, I was, of course, not in a +position to single out the share the actors took. + + +XV. + +The war imbued my tin soldiers with quite a new interest. It was +impossible to have boxes enough of them. You could set them out in +companies and battalions; they opened their ranks to attack, stormed, +were wounded, and fell. Sometimes they lay down fatigued and slept on +the field of battle. But a new box that came one day made the old ones +lose all value for me. For the soldiers in the new box were proper +soldiers, with chests and backs, round to the touch, heavy to hold. In +comparison with them, the older ones, profile soldiers, so small that +you could only look at them sideways, sank into utter insignificance. A +step had been taken from the abstract to the concrete. It was no longer +any pleasure to me to play with the smaller soldiers. I said: "They +amused me last year, when I was little." There was a similar change, a +similar picture of historic progress, when the hobby-horse on which I +had spent so many happy hours, and on which I had ridden through rooms +and passages, was put in the corner in favour of the new rocking-horse +which, long coveted and desired, was carried in through the door, and +stood in the room, rocking slightly, as though ready for the boldest +ride, the moment its rider flung himself into the saddle. + +I mounted it and oh, happiness! I began to ride, and rode on with +passionate delight till I nearly went over the horse's head. "When I was +a little boy the hobby-horse amused me, but it does not now." Every time +I climbed a fresh rung of the ladder, no matter how low an one, the same +feeling possessed me, and the same train of thought. Mother often joked +about it, up to the time when I was a full grown man. If I quickly +outgrew my fancies, if I had quite done with anything or anybody that +had absorbed me a little while before, she would say, with a smile: +"Last year, when I was a little boy, the hobby-horse amused me." + +Still, progress was not always smooth. When I was small I had pretty +blouses, one especially, grey, with brown worsted lace upon it, that I +was fond of wearing; now I had plain, flat blouses with a leather belt +round the waist. Later on, I was ambitious to have a jacket, like big +boys, and when this wish had been gratified there awoke in me, as +happens in life, a more lofty ambition still, that to wear a frock coat. +In the fulness of time an old frock coat of my father's was altered to +fit me. I looked thin and lank in it, but the dress was honourable. Then +it occurred to me that everybody would see I was wearing a frock coat +for the first time. I did not dare to go out into the streets with it +on, but went out of my way round the ramparts for fear of meeting +anyone. + +When I was a little boy I did not, of course, trouble much about my +appearance. I did not remember that my portrait had been drawn several +times. But when I was nine years old, Aunt Sarah--at that time everybody +was either uncle or aunt--determined that we brothers should have our +portraits taken in daguerreotype for Father's birthday. The event made a +profound impression, because I had to stand perfectly still while the +picture was being taken, and because the daguerreotypist, a German, +whose name was Schaetzig, rolled his _r_s and hissed his _s_s. +The whole affair was a great secret, which was not to be betrayed. The +present was to be a surprise, and I was compelled to promise perfect +silence. I kept my promise for one day. But next day, at the dinner- +table, I accidentally burst out: "Now! quite shtill! _as the man +said_." "What man?" "Ah! that was the secret!" + +The visit to Schaetzig in itself I had reason to remember a long time. +Some one or another had said that I had a slender neck, and that it was +pretty. Just as we were going in, my aunt said: "You will catch cold +inside," and in spite of my protests tied a little silk handkerchief +round my neck. That handkerchief spoilt all my pleasure in being +immortalised. And it is round my neck on the old picture to this day. + + +XVI. + +The tin soldiers had called all my warlike instincts into being. After +the rocking-horse, more and more military appurtenances followed. A +shining helmet to buckle firmly under the chin, in which one looked +quite imposing; a cuirass of real metal like the Horseguards', and a +short rapier in a leather scabbard, which went by the foreign name of +Hirschfaenger, and was a very awe-inspiring weapon in the eyes of one's +small brothers, when they were mercilessly massacred with it. Sitting on +the rocking-horse, arrayed in all this splendour, wild dreams of +military greatness filled the soul, dreams which grew wilder and more +ambitious from year to year until between the age of 8 and 9 they +received a fresh and unwholesome stimulus from Ingemann's novels. +[Footnote: B.S. Ingemann (1789-1862), a Danish writer celebrated chiefly +as the author of many historical novels, now only read by very young +children.] + +On horseback, at the head of a chosen band, fighting like the lost +against unnumbered odds! Rock goes the rocking-horse, violently up and +down. The enemy wavers, he begins to give way. The rocking-horse is +pulled up. A sign with the Hirschfaenger to the herd of common troops. +The enemy is beaten and flies, the next thing is to pursue him. The +rocking-horse is set once more in furious motion. Complete victory. +Procession into the capital; shouts of jubilation and wreaths of +flowers, for the victor and his men. + + +XVII. + +Just about this time, when in imagination I was so great a warrior, I +had good use in real life for more strength, as I was no longer taken to +school by the nurse, but instead had myself to protect my brother, two +years my junior. The start from home was pleasant enough. Lunch boxes of +tin with the Danish greeting after meals in gold letters upon them, +stood open on the table. Mother, at one end of the table, spread each +child six pieces of bread and butter, which were then placed together, +two and two, white bread on brown bread, a mixture which, was uncommonly +nice. The box would take exactly so many. Then it was put in the school- +bag with the books. And with bag on back you went to school, always the +same way. But those were days when the journey was much impeded. Every +minute you met boys who called you names and tried to hit the little +one, and you had to fight at every street corner you turned. And those +were days when, even in the school itself, despite the humanity of the +age (not since attained to), terms of abuse, buffets and choice insults +were one's daily bread, and I can see myself now, as I sprang up one day +in a fight with a much bigger boy and bit him in the neck, till a master +was obliged to get me away from him, and the other had to have his neck +bathed under the pump. + +I admired in others the strength that I lacked myself. There was in the +class one big, stout, squarely built, inexpressibly good-natured boy, +for whom no one was a match in fighting. He was from Lolland, and his +name was Ludvig; he was not particularly bright, but robust and as +strong as a giant. Then one day there arrived at the school a West +Indian of the name of Muddie, dark of hue, with curly hair, as strong +and slim as a savage, and with all the finesse and feints which he had +at his command, irresistible, whether wrestling or when fighting with +his fists. He beat all the strongest boys in the school. Only Ludvig and +he had not challenged each other. But the boys were very anxious to see +a bout between the two, and a wrestling match between them was arranged +for a free quarter of an hour. For the boys, who were all judges, it was +a fine sight to see two such fighters wrestle, especially when the +Lollander flung himself down on the other and the West Indian struggled +vainly, writhing like a very snake to twist himself out of his grasp. + +One day two new boys came to school, two brothers; the elder, Adam, was +small and sallow, extraordinarily withered, looking like a cripple, +without, however, being one; the somewhat younger brother, Sofus, was +splendidly made and amazed us in the very first lesson in which the new +arrivals took part--a gymnastic class--by his unusual agility in +swarming and walking up the sloping bar. He seemed to be as strong as he +was dexterous, and in a little boy with a reverence for those who were +strong, he naturally aroused positive enthusiasm. This was even +augmented next day, when a big, malicious boy, who had scoffed at Adam +for being puny, was, in a trice, so well thrashed by Sofus that he lost +both his breath and his courage. + +Sofus, the new arrival, and I, who had achieved fighting exploits from +the rocking-horse only, were henceforth, for some time, inseparable +friends. It was one of the usual friendships between little boys, in +which the one admires and the other allows himself to be worshipped. The +admirer in this case could only feed his feelings by presenting the +other with the most cherished thing he possessed. This most cherished +thing happened to be some figures cut out in gold paper, from France, +representing every possible object and personage, from ships with masts +and sails, to knights and ladies. I had collected them for a long time +and preserved them, piece by piece, by gumming them into a book which +was the pride of my existence. I gave the book, without the slightest +hesitation, to Sofus, who accepted it without caring for it in the +least. + +And then by reason of the exaggerated admiration of which he was the +object, Sofus, who hitherto had been so straightforward, began to grow +capricious. It was a settled rule that he and I went home from school +together. But one day a difficulty cropped up; Sofus had promised +Valdemar, a horrid boy, who cheated at lessons, to go home with him. And +next day something else prevented him. But when, suddenly having learnt +to know all the pangs of neglect and despised affection, I met him the +third day, after having waited vainly for him, crossing Our Lady's +Square with Valdemar, in my anger I seized my quondam friend roughly by +the arm, my face distorted with rage, and burst out: "You are a rascal!" +then rushed off, and never addressed him again. It was a very ill- +advised thing to do, in fact, the very most foolish thing I could have +done. But I was too passionate to behave sensibly. Valdemar spread the +account of my conduct all through the class, and next day, in our +quarter of an hour's playtime, I heard on every side from the laughing +boys: "You are a rascal! You are a rascal!" + + +XVIII. + +The world was widening out. The instruction I received grew more varied. +There were a great many lessons out of school. From my drawing mistress, +a pleasant girl, who could draw Fingal in a helmet in charcoal, I learnt +to see how things looked in comparison with one another, how they hid +one another and revealed themselves, in perspective; from my music +mistress, my kind aunt, to recognise the notes and keys, and to play, +first short pieces, then sonatas, alone, then as duets. But alas! +Neither in the arts of sight nor hearing did I ever prove myself more +than mediocre. I never attained, either in drawing or piano-playing, to +more than a soulless accuracy. And I hardly showed much greater aptitude +when, on bright Sunday mornings, which invited not at all to the +delights of dancing, with many another tiny lad and lass I was +marshalled up to dance in the dancing saloon of Mr. Hoppe, the royal +dancer, and learnt to take up the first to the fifth positions and swing +the girls round in the polka mazurka. I became an ardent, but never a +specially good, dancer. + + +XIX. + +The world was widening out. Father brought from Paris a marvellous game, +called Fortuna, with bells over pockets in the wood, and balls which +were pushed with cues. Father had travelled from Paris with it five days +and six nights. It was inexpressibly fascinating; no one else in +Copenhagen had a game like it. And next year, when Father came home from +Paris again, he brought a large, flat, polished box, in which there were +a dozen different games, French games with balls, and battledores and +shuttlecocks, games which grown-up people liked playing, too; and there +were carriages which went round and round by clockwork, and a tumbler +who turned somersaults backwards down a flight of steps as soon as he +was placed on the top step. Those were things that the people in France +could do. + +The world was widening out more and more. Relations often came over from +Goeteborg. They spoke Swedish, but if you paid great attention you could +understand quite well what they said. They spoke the language of +_Frithiof's Saga_, but pronounced it differently from Mr. Voltelen. +And there came a young French count whose relations my father's brother +had known; he had come as a sailor on a French man-o'-war, and he came +and stayed to dinner and sang the Marseillaise. It was from him that I +heard the song for the first time. He was only fifteen, and very good- +looking, and dressed like an ordinary sailor, although he was a count. + +And then there were my two uncles, Uncle Jacob and Uncle Julius--my +mother's brother Jacob and my father's brother Julius, who had both +become Frenchmen long ago and lived in Paris. Uncle Jacob often came for +a few weeks or more at a time. He was small and broad-shouldered and +good-looking. Everybody was fond of Uncle Jacob; all the ladies wanted +to be asked to the house when Uncle Jacob came. He had a wife and four +children in Paris. But I had pieced together from the conversation of +the grown-up people that Aunt Victorine was his wife and yet not his +wife. Grandmother would have nothing to do with her. And Uncle Jacob had +gone all the way to the Pope in Rome and asked for her to remain his +wife. But the Pope had said No. Why? Because Aunt Victorine had had +another husband before, who had been cruel to her and beaten her, and +the man came sometimes, when Uncle was away, and took her furniture away +from her. It was incomprehensible that he should be allowed to, and that +the Pope would do nothing to prevent it, for after all she was a Catholic. + +Uncle Jacob had a peculiar expression about his mouth when he smiled. +There was a certain charm about everything he said and did, but his +smile was sad. He had acted thoughtlessly, they said, and was not happy. +One morning, while he was visiting Father and Mother and was lying +asleep in the big room, there was a great commotion in the house; a +messenger was sent for the doctor and the word _morphia_ was +spoken. He was ill, but was very soon well again. When he asked his +sister next day: "What has become of my case of pistols?" she replied +with a grave face: "I have taken it and I shall keep it." + +I had not thought as a boy that I should ever see Uncle Jacob's wife and +children. And yet it so happened that I did. Many years afterwards, when +I was a young man and went to Paris, after my uncle's death, I sought +out Victorine and her children. I wished to bring her personally the +monthly allowance that her relatives used to send her from Denmark. I +found her prematurely old, humbled by poverty, worn out by privation. +How was it possible that she should be so badly off? Did she not receive +the help that was sent from Copenhagen every month to uncle's best +friend, M. Fontane, in the Rue Vivienne? Alas, no! M. Fontane gave her a +little assistance once in a while, and at other times sent her and her +children away with hard words. + +It turned out that M. Fontane had swindled her, and had himself kept the +money that had been sent for years to the widow of his best friend. He +was a tall, handsome man, with a large business. No one would have +believed that a scoundrel could have looked as he did. He was eventually +compelled to make the money good. And when the cousin from Denmark rang +after that at his French relatives' door, he was immediately hung round, +like a Christmas tree, with little boys and one small girl, who jumped +up and wound their arms round his neck, and would not let him go. + + + + + +BOYHOOD'S YEARS + +Our House--Its Inmates--My Paternal Grandfather--My Maternal +Grandfather--School and Home--Farum--My Instructors--A Foretaste of Life +--Contempt for the Masters--My Mother--The Mystery of Life--My First +Glimpse of Beauty--The Head Master--Religion--My Standing in School-- +Self-esteem--An Instinct for Literature--Private Reading--Heine's +_Buch der Lieder_--A Broken Friendship. + + +I. + +The house belonged to my father's father, and had been in his possession +some twenty years. My parents lived on the second floor. It was situated +in the busy part of the town, right in the heart of Copenhagen. On the +first floor lived a West Indian gentleman who spoke Danish with a +foreign accent; sometimes there came to see him a Danish man of French +descent, Mr. Lafontaine, who, it was said, was so strong that he could +take two rifles and bayonets and hold them out horizontally without +bending his arm. I never saw Mr. Lafontaine, much less his marvellous +feat of strength, but when I went down the stairs I used to stare hard at +the door behind which these wonderful doings went on. + +In the basement lived Niels, manservant to the family, who, besides his +domestic occupations, found time to develop a talent for business. In +all secrecy he carried on a commerce, very considerable under the +circumstances, in common watches and in mead, two kinds of wares that in +sooth had no connection with each other. The watches had no particular +attraction for a little boy, but the mead, which was kept in jars, on a +shelf, appealed to me doubly. It was the beverage the old Northmen had +loved so much that the dead drank it in Valhalla. It was astonishing +that it could still be had. How nice it must be! I was allowed to taste +it and it surpassed all my expectations. Sweeter than sugar! More +delicious than anything else on earth that I had tasted! But if you +drank more than a very small glass of it, you felt sick. + +And I profoundly admired the dead warriors for having been able to toss +off mead from large drinking-horns and eat fat pork with it. What a +choice! And they never had stomach-ache! + + +II. + +On the ground floor was the shop, which occupied the entire breadth and +nearly the entire depth of the house, a silk and cloth business, large, +according to the ideas of the time, which was managed by my father and +grandfather together until my eleventh year, when Father began to deal +wholesale on his own account. It was nice in the shop, because when you +went down the assistants would take you round the waist and lift you +over to the other side of the semi-circular counter which divided them +from the customers. The assistants were pleasant, dignified gentlemen, +of fine appearance and behaviour, friendly without wounding +condescension. + +Between my fifth and sixth years some alterations were done at the shop, +which was consequently closed to me for a long time. When it was once +more accessible I stood amazed at the change. A long, glass-covered +gallery had been added, in which the wares lay stored on new shelves. +The extension of the premises was by no means inconsiderable, and +simultaneously an extension had been made in the staff. Among the new +arrivals was an apprentice named Gerhard, who was as tall as a grown +man, but must have been very young, for he talked to me, a six-year-old +child, like a companion. He was very nice-looking, and knew it. "You +don't want harness when you have good hips," he would say, pointing to +his mightily projecting loins. This remark made a great impression upon +me, because it was the first time I had heard anyone praise his own +appearance. I knew that one ought not to praise one's self and that +self-praise was no recommendation. So I was astonished to find that +self-praise in Gerhard's mouth was not objectionable; in fact, it +actually suited him. Gerhard often talked of what a pleasure it was to +go out in the evenings and enjoy one's self--what the devil did it +matter what old people said?--and listen to women singing--amusements +which his hearer could not manage to picture very clearly to himself. + +It soon began to be said that Gerhard was not turning out well. The +manner in which he procured the money for his pleasures resulted, as I +learnt long afterwards, in his sudden dismissal. But he had made some +slight impression on my boyish fancy--given me a vague idea of a +heedless life of enjoyment, and of youthful defiance. + + +III. + +On the landing which led from the shop to the stockroom behind, my +grandfather took up his position. He looked very handsome up there, with +his curly white hair. Thence, like a general, he looked down on +everything--on the customers, the assistants, the apprentices, both +before and behind him. If some specially esteemed lady customer came +into the shop, he hurriedly left his exalted position to give advice. If +the shopman's explanations failed to satisfy her, he put things right. +He was at the zenith of his strength, vigour, and apparently of his +glory. + +The glory vanished, because from the start he had worked his way up +without capital. The Hamburg firm that financed the business lent money +at too high a rate of interest and on too hard conditions for it to +continue to support two families. + +But when later on my grandfather had his time at his own disposal, he +took up the intellectual interests which in his working years he had had +to repress. In his old age, for instance, he taught himself Italian, and +his visitors would find him, with Tasso's _Gerusalemme liberata_ in +front of him, looking out in a dictionary every word that presented any +difficulty to him, and of such there were many. + +The old man was an ardent Buonapartist, and, strangely enough, an even +more ardent admirer of the Third Napoleon than of the First, because he +regarded him as shrewder, and was convinced that he would bequeath the +Empire to his son. But he and I came into collision on this point from +the time I was fourteen years of age. For I was of course a Republican, +and detested Napoleon III. for his breach of the Constitution, and used +to write secretly in impossible French, and in a still more impossible +metre (which was intended to represent hexameters and pentameters) +verses against the tyrant. An ode to the French language began: + + "Ah! quelle langue magnifique, si belle, si riche, si sonore, + Langue qu'un despote cruel met aux liens et aux fers!" + +On the subject of Napoleon III. grandfather and grandson could not +possibly agree. But this was the only subject on which we ever had any +dispute. + + +IV. + +My maternal grandfather was quite different, entirely devoid of +impetuosity, even-tempered, amiable, very handsome. He too had worked +his way up from straightened circumstances; in fact, it was only when he +was getting on for twenty that he had taught himself to read and write, +well-informed though he was at the time I write of. He had once been +apprentice to the widow of Moeller the dyer, when Oehlenschlaeger and the +Oersteds used to dine at the house. After the patriarchal fashion of the +day, he had sat daily at the same table as these great, much-admired +men, and he often told how he had clapped his hands till they almost +bled at Oehlenschlaeger's plays, in the years when, by reason of +Baggesen's attack, opinions about them at the theatre were divided. + +My great-grandfather, the father of my mother's stepmother, who wore +high boots with a little tassel in front, belonged to an even older +generation. He used to say: "If I could only live to see a Danish man- +o'-war close with an English ship and sink it, I should be happy; the +English are the most disgraceful pack of robbers in the world." He was +so old that he had still a vivid recollection of the battle in the +roadstead and of the bombardment of Copenhagen. + + +V. + +School and Home were two different worlds, and it often struck me that I +led a double life. Six hours a day I lived under school discipline in +active intercourse with people none of whom were known to those at home, +and the other hours of the twenty-four I spent at home, or with +relatives of the people at home, none of whom were known to anybody at +school. + +On Oct. 1st, 1849, I was taken to school, led in through the sober- +looking doorway, and up into a classroom, where I was received by a +kindly man, the arithmetic master, who made me feel at my ease. I +noticed at once that when the master asked a boy anything which another +knew, this other had a right to publish his knowledge by holding up a +finger--a right of which I myself made an excessive use in the first +lessons, until I perceived the sense of not trying, in season and out of +season, to attract attention to my knowledge or superiority, and kept my +hands on the table in front of me. + + +VI. + +Suddenly, with surprising vividness, a little incident of my childhood +rises up before me. I was ten years old. I had been ill in the Winter +and my parents had boarded me out in the country for the Summer +holidays; all the love of adventure in me surged up. At the Straw Market +a fat, greasy, grinning peasant promised to take me in his cart as far +as the little town of Farum, where I was to stay with the schoolmaster. +He charged two dalers, and got them. Any sum, of course, was the same to +me. I was allowed to drive the brown horses, that is to say, to hold the +reins, and I was in high glee. Where Farum was, I did not know and did +not care, but it was a new world. Until now I, who was a town child, had +seen nothing of the country except my nurse's house and land at +Glostrup,--but what lay in front of me was a village, a schoolhouse, a +large farm, in short an adventure in grand style. + +I had my shirts and blouses and stockings in a portmanteau, and amongst +them a magnificent garment, never yet worn, a blue cloth jacket, and a +white waistcoat belonging to it, with gold buttons, which my mother had +given me permission to wear on Sundays. For days, I always wore blouses, +so the jacket implied a great step forward. I was eager to wear it, and +regretted profoundly that it was still only Monday. + +Half-way there, the peasant pulled up. He explained to me that he could +not very well drive me any farther, so must put me down; he was not +going to Farum himself at all. But a peat cart was coming along the road +yonder, the driver of which was going to Farum, and he transferred me, +poor defenceless child as I was, to the other conveyance. He had had my +money; I had nothing to give the second man, and sadly I exchanged the +quick trot of the brown horses for the walking pace of the jades in the +peat-cart. + +My first experience of man's perfidy. + +At last I was there. On a high, wide hill--high and wide as it seemed to +me then--towered the huge schoolhouse, a miniature Christiansborg +Castle, with the schoolmaster's apartments on the right and the +schoolroom on the left. And the schoolmaster came out smiling, holding a +pipe which was a good deal taller than I, held out his hand, and asked +me to come in, gave me coffee at once, and expressed the profoundest +contempt for the peasant who had charged two rigsdaler for such a +trifle, and then left me in the road. I asked at once for pen and +paper, and wrote in cipher to a comrade, with whom I had concocted this +mysterious means of communication, asking him to tell my parents that I +had been most kindly received. I felt a kind of shyness at the +schoolmaster seeing what I wrote home from his house. I gave him the +sheet, and begged him to fold it up, as I could not do it myself. There +were no envelopes in those days. But what was my surprise to hear him, +without further ado, read aloud with a smile, from my manufactured +cipher: "I have been most kindly received," etc. I had never thought +such keen-wittedness possible. And my respect for him and his long pipe +rose. + +Just then there was a light knock at the door. In walked two girls, one +tall and one short, the former of whom positively bewildered me. She was +fair, her sister as dark as a negro. They were ten and eight years old +respectively, were named Henrietta and Nina K., came from Brazil, where +their home was, and were to spend a few years in Denmark; came as a rule +every day, but had now arrived specially to inspect the strange boy. +After gazing for two minutes at the lovely Henrietta's fair hair and +wonderful grey eyes, I disappeared from the room, and five minutes +afterwards reappeared again, clothed in the dark-blue jacket and the +white waistcoat with gold buttons, which I had been strictly forbidden +to wear except on Sundays. And from that time forth, sinner that I was, +I wore my Sunday clothes every blessed day,--but with what qualms of +conscience! + +I can still see lovely fields, rich in corn, along the sides of which we +played; we chased beautiful, gaudy butterflies, which we caught in our +hats and cruelly stuck on pins, and the little girls threw oats at my +new clothes, and if the oats stuck fast it meant something, sweethearts, +I believe. Sweethearts--and I! + +Then we were invited to the manor, a big, stately house, a veritable +castle. There lived an old, and exceedingly handsome, white-haired +Chamberlain, called the General, who frequently dined with Frederik VII, +and invariably brought us children goodies from dessert, lovely large +pieces of barley sugar in papers with gay pictures on the outside of +shepherd lovers, and crackers with long paper fringes. His youngest son, +who owned a collection of insects and many other fine things, became my +sworn friend, which means that I was his, for he did not care in the +least about me; but I did not notice that, and I was happy and proud of +his friendship and sailed with him and lots of other boys and girls on +the pretty Farum lake, and every day was more convinced that I was quite +a man. It was a century since I had worn blouses. + +Every morning I took all the newspapers to Dr. Doerr, the German tutor at +the castle, and every morning I accidentally met Henrietta, and after +that we were hardly separated all day. I had no name for the admiration +that attached me to her. I knew she was lovely, that was all. We were +anxious to read something together, and so read the whole of a +translation of _Don Quixote_, sitting cheek against cheek in the +summer-house. Of course, we did not understand one-half of it, and I +remember that we tried in vain to get an explanation of the frequently +recurring word "doxy"; but we laughed till we cried at what we did +understand. And after all, it is this first reading of _Don +Quixote_ which has dominated all my subsequent attempts to understand +the book. + +But Henrietta had ways that I did not understand in the least; she used +to amuse herself by little machinations, was inventive and intriguing. +One day she demanded that I should play the school children, small, +white-haired boys and girls, all of whom we had long learnt to know, a +downright trick. I was to write a real love-letter to a nine-year-old +little girl named Ingeborg, from an eleven or twelve-year-old boy called +Per, and then Henrietta would sew a fragrant little wreath of flowers +round it. The letter was completed and delivered. But the only result of +it was that next day, as I was walking along the high road with +Henrietta, Per separated himself from his companions, called me a dandy +from Copenhagen, and asked me if I would fight. There was, of course, no +question of drawing back, but I remember very plainly that I was a +little aghast, for he was much taller and broader than I, and I had, +into the bargain, a very bad cause to defend. But we had hardly +exchanged the first tentative blows before I felt overwhelmingly +superior. The poor cub! He had not the slightest notion how to fight. +From my everyday school life in Copenhagen, I knew hundreds of tricks +and feints that he had never learnt, and as soon as I perceived this I +flung him into the ditch like a glove. He sprang up again, but, with +lofty indifference, I threw him a second time, till his head buzzed. +That satisfied me that I had not been shamed before Henrietta, who, for +that matter, took my exploit very coolly and did not fling me so much as +a word for it. However, she asked me if I would meet her the same +evening under the old May-tree. When we met, she had two long straps +with her, and at once asked me, somewhat mockingly and dryly, whether I +had the courage to let myself be bound. Of course I said I had, +whereupon, very carefully and thoroughly, she fastened my hands together +with the one strap. Could I move my arms? No. Then, with eager haste, +she swung the other strap and let it fall on my back. Again and again. + +My first smart jacket was a well-thrashed one. She thoroughly enjoyed +exerting her strength. Naturally, my boyish ideas of honour would not +permit me to scream or complain; I merely stared at her with the +profoundest astonishment. She gave me no explanation, released my hands, +we each went our own way, and I avoided her the rest of my stay. + +This was my first experience of woman's perfidy. + +Still, I did not bear a grudge long, and the evening before I left we +met once again, at her request, and then she gave me the first and only +kiss, neither of us saying anything but the one word, "Good-bye." + +I have never seen her since. I heard that she died twenty years ago in +Brazil. But two years after this, when I was feeling my first schoolboy +affection for an eleven-year-old girl, she silenced me at a children's +ball with the scoffing remark: "Ah! it was you who let Henrietta K. +thrash you under the May-tree at Farum." Yes, it was I. So cruel had my +fair lady been that she had not even denied herself the pleasure of +telling her friends of the ignominious treatment to which she had +subjected a comrade who, from pure feeling of honour, had not struck +back. + +This was my first real experience of feminine nature. + + +VII. + +For nearly ten years I went to one and the same school. I came to know +the way there and back, to and from the three different places, all near +together, where my parents lived during the time, as I knew no other. In +that part of the town, all about the Round Tower, I knew, not only every +house, but every archway, every door, every window, every Paving-stone. +It all gradually imprinted itself so deeply upon me that in after years, +when gazing on foreign sights and foreign towns, even after I had been +living for a long time in the same place, I had a curious feeling that, +however beautiful and fascinating it all might be, or perhaps for that +very reason, it was dreamland, unreality, which would one day elude me +and vanish; reality was the Round Tower in Copenhagen and all that lay +about it. It was ugly, and altogether unattractive, but it was reality. +That you always found again. + +Similarly, though in a somewhat different sense, the wooded landscape in +the neighbourhood of Copenhagen, to be exact, the view over the +Hermitage Meadows down to the Sound, as it appears from the bench +opposite the Slesvig Stone, the first and dearest type of landscape +beauty with which I became acquainted, was endowed to me with an imprint +of actuality which no other landscape since, be it never so lovely or +never so imposing, has ever been able to acquire. + + +VIII. + +The instruction at school was out of date, inasmuch as, in every branch, +it lacked intelligibility. The masters were also necessarily, in some +instances, anything but perfect, even when not lacking in knowledge of +their subject. Nevertheless, the instruction as a whole, especially when +one bears in mind how cheap it was, must be termed good, careful and +comprehensive; as a rule it was given conscientiously. When as a grown +up man I have cast my thoughts back, what has surprised me most is the +variety of subjects that were instilled into a boy in ten years. There +certainly were teachers so lacking in understanding of the proper way to +communicate knowledge that the instruction they gave was altogether +wasted. For instance, I learnt geometry for four or five years without +grasping the simplest elements of the science. The principles of it +remained so foreign to me that I did not even recognise a right-angled +triangle, if the right angle were uppermost. It so happened that the +year before I had to sit for my examinations, a young University student +in his first year, who had been only one class in front of the rest of +us, offered us afternoon instruction in trigonometry and spherical +geometry gratis, and all who appreciated the help that was being offered +to them streamed to his lessons. This young student, later Pastor Joergen +Lund, had a remarkable gift for mathematics, and gave his instruction +with a lucidity, a fire, and a swing that carried his hearers with him. +I, who had never before been able to understand a word of the subject, +became keenly interested in it, and before many lessons were over was +very well up in it. As Joergen Lund taught mathematics, so all the other +subjects ought to have been taught. We were obliged to be content with +less. + +Lessons might have been a pleasure. They never were, or rather, only the +Danish ones. But in childhood's years, and during the first years of +boyhood they were fertilising. As a boy they hung over me like a dread +compulsion; yet the compulsion was beneficial. It was only when I was +almost fourteen that I began inwardly to rebel against the time which +was wasted, that the stupidest and laziest of the boys might be enabled +to keep up with the industrious and intelligent. There was too much +consideration shown towards those who would not work or could not +understand. And from the time I was sixteen, school was my despair. I +had done with it all, was beyond it all, was too matured to submit to +the routine of lessons; my intellectual pulses no longer beat within the +limits of school. What absorbed my interest was the endeavour to become +master of the Danish language in prose and verse, and musings over the +mystery of existence. In school I most often threw up the sponge +entirely, and laid my head on my arms that I might neither see nor hear +what was going on around me. + +There was another reason, besides my weariness of it all, which at this +latter period made my school-going a torture to me. I was by now +sufficiently schooled for my sensible mother to think it would be good +for me to make, if it were but a small beginning, towards earning my own +living. Or rather, she wanted me to earn enough to pay for my amusements +myself. So I tried, with success, to find pupils, and gave them lessons +chiefly on Sunday mornings; but in order to secure them I had called +myself _Studiosus_. Now it was an ever present terror with me lest +I should meet any of my pupils as I went to school in the morning, or +back at midday, with my books in a strap under my arm. Not to betray +myself, I used to stuff these books in the most extraordinary places, +inside the breast of my coat till it bulged, and in all my pockets till +they burst. + + +IX. + +School is a foretaste of life. A boy in a large Copenhagen school would +become acquainted, as it were in miniature, with Society in its entirety +and with every description of human character. I encountered among my +comrades the most varied human traits, from frankness to reserve, from +goodness, uprightness and kindness, to brutality and baseness. + +In our quarter of an hour's playtime it was easy to see how cowardice +and meanness met with their reward in the boy commonwealth. There was a +Jewish boy of repulsive appearance, very easy to cow, with a positively +slavish disposition. Every single playtime his schoolfellows would make +him stand up against a wall and jump about with his feet close together +till playtime was over, while the others stood in front of him and +laughed at him. He became later a highly respected Conservative +journalist. + +In lesson time it was easy to see that the equality under one +discipline, under the hierarchy of merit, which was expressed in the +boys' places on the forms, from highest to lowest, was not maintained +when opposed to the very different hierarchy of Society. On the lowest +form sat a boy whose gifts were exceedingly mediocre, and who was +ignorant, moreover, from sheer laziness; to him were permitted things +forbidden to all the others: he was the heir of a large feudal barony. +He always came late to school, and even at that rode in followed by a +groom on a second horse. He wore a silk hat and, when he came into the +schoolroom, did not hang it up on the peg that belonged to him, where he +was afraid it might be interfered with, but in the school cupboard, in +which only the master was supposed to keep his things; and the tall hat +crowning so noble a head impressed the masters to such an extent that +not one of them asked for it to be removed. And they acquiesced like +lambs in the young lord's departure half-way through the last lesson, if +the groom happened to be there with his horse to fetch him. + +It seemed impossible to drive knowledge of any sort into the head of +this young peer, and he was taken from school early. To what an extent +he must have worked later to make up for lost time was proved by +results. For he became nothing less than a Minister. + + +X. + +The reverence with which the boys, as youngsters, had looked up to the +masters, disappeared with striking rapidity. The few teachers in whose +lessons you could do what you liked were despised. The masters who knew +how to make themselves respected, only in exceptional cases inspired +affection. The love of mockery soon broke out. Children had not been at +school long before the only opinion they allowed scope to was that the +masters were the natural enemies of the boys. There was war between +them, and every stratagem was permissible. They were fooled, misled, and +plagued in every conceivable manner. Or they were feared and we +flattered them. + +A little boy with a natural inclination to reverence and respect and who +brought both industry and good-will to his work, felt confused by all +the derogatory things he was constantly hearing about the masters, and, +long before he was half grown up, formed as one result of it the fixed +determination that, whatever he might be when he grew up, there was one +thing he would never, under any circumstances be, and that was--master +in a school. + +From twelve years of age upwards, contempt for the masters was the +keynote of all conversation about them. The Latin master, a little, +insignificant-looking man, but a very good teacher, was said to be so +disgracefully enfeebled by debauchery that an active boy could throw him +without the least difficulty. The Natural History master, a clever, +outspoken young man, who would call out gaily: "Silence there, or you'll +get a dusting on the teapot that will make the spout fly off!" sank +deeply in our estimation when one of the boys told us that he spent his +evenings at music-halls. One morning there spread like wildfire through +the class the report that the reason the Natural History master had not +come that day was because he had got mixed up the night before in a +fight outside a music-pavilion. The contempt and the ridicule that were +heaped upon him in the conversation of the boys were immeasurable. When +he came next morning with a black, extravasated eye, which he bathed at +intervals with a rag, he was regarded by most of us as absolute scum. +The German master, a tall, good-looking man, was treated as utterly +incompetent because, when he asked a question in grammar or syntax, he +walked up and down with the book in front of him, and quite plainly +compared the answer with the book. We boys thought that anyone could be +a master, with a book in his hand. History and Geography were taught by +an old man, overflowing with good-humour, loquacious, but self- +confident, liked for his amiability, but despised for what was deemed +unmanliness in him. The boys pulled faces at him, and imitated his +expressions and mannerisms. + +The Danish master, Professor H.P. Holst, was not liked. He evidently +took no interest in his scholastic labours, and did not like the boys. +His coolness was returned. And yet, that which was the sole aim and +object of his instruction he understood to perfection, and drilled into +us well. The unfortunate part of it was that there was hardly more than +one boy in the class who enjoyed learning anything about just that +particular thing. Instruction in Danish was, for Holst, instruction in +the metrical art. He explained every metre and taught the boys to pick +out the feet of which the verses were composed. When we made fun of him +in our playtime, it was for remarks which we had invented and placed in +his mouth ourselves; for instance: "Scan my immortal poem, _The Dying +Gladiator_." The reason of this was simply that, in elucidation of +the composition of the antique distich, he made use of his own poem of +the above name, which he had included in a Danish reading-book edited by +himself. As soon as he took up his position in the desk, he began: + +"Hark ye the--storm of ap--plause from the--theatre's--echoing circle! +Go on, Moeller!" + +How could he find it in his heart, his own poem! + + +XI. + +The French master knew how to command respect; there was never a sound +during his lessons. He was altogether absorbed in his subject, was +absolutely and wholly a Frenchman; he did not even talk Danish with the +same accentuation as others, and he had the impetuous French disposition +of which the boys had heard. If a boy made a mess of his pronunciation, +he would bawl, from the depths of his full brown beard, which he was +fond of stroking: "You speak French _comme un paysan d'Amac_." When +he swore, he swore like a true Frenchman: _"Sacrebleu-Mops-Carot-ten- +Rapee!"_ [Footnote: Needless to say, this is impossible French, +composed chiefly of distorted Danish words. (Trans.)] If he got angry, +and he very often did, he would unhesitatingly pick up the full glass of +water that always stood in front of him on the desk, and in Gallic +exasperation fling it on the floor, when the glass would be smashed to +atoms and the water run about, whereupon he would quietly, with his +_Grand seigneur_ air, take his purse out of his pocket and lay the +money for the glass on the desk. + +For a time I based my ideas of the French mind and manner upon this +master, although my uncle Jacob, who had lived almost all his life in +Paris, was a very different sort of Frenchman. It was only later that I +became acquainted with a word and an idea which it was well I did not +know, as far as the master's capacity for making an impression was +concerned--the word _affected_. + +At last, one fine day, a little event occurred which was not without its +effect on the master's prestige, and yet aroused my compassion almost as +much as my surprise. The parents of one of my best friends were +expecting a French business friend for the evening. As they knew +themselves to be very weak in the language, they gave their son a polite +note to the French master, asking him to do them the honour of spending +the next evening at their house, on the occasion of this visit, which +rendered conversational support desirable. The master took the note, +which we two boys had handed to him, grew--superior though he usually +was--rather red and embarrassed, and promised a written reply. To our +astonishment we learnt that this reply was to the effect that he must +unfortunately decline the honour, as he had never been in France, had +never heard anyone speak French, and was not proficient in the language. +Thus this tiger of a savage Frenchman suddenly cast his tiger's skin and +revealed himself in his native wool. + +Unfortunately, the instruction of this master left long and deep traces +upon me. When I was fifteen and my French uncle began to carry on his +conversations with me in French, the Parisian was appalled at my +abominable errors of pronunciation. The worst of them were weeded out in +those lessons. But there were enough left to bring a smile many a time +and oft to the lips of the refined young lady whom my friends procured +me as a teacher on my first visit to Paris. + + +XII. + +Among the delights of Summer were picnics to the woods. There would be +several during the course of the season. When the weather seemed to +inspire confidence, a few phaetons would be engaged for the family and +their relations and friends, and some Sunday morning the seat of each +carriage would be packed full of good things. We took tablecloth and +serviettes with us, bread, butter, eggs and salmon, sausages, cold meat +and coffee, as well as a few bottles of wine. Then we drove to some +keeper's house, where for money and fair words they scalded the tea for +us, and the day's meal was seasoned with the good appetite which the +outdoor air gave us. + +As a child I preserved an uncomfortable and instructive recollection of +one of these expeditions. The next day my mother said to me: "You +behaved very ridiculously yesterday, and made a laughing stock of +yourself." "How?" "You went on in front of the grown-up people all the +time, and sang at the top of your voice. In the first place, you ought +not to go in front, and in the next place, you should not disturb other +people by singing." These words made an indelible impression upon me, +for I was conscious that I had not in the least intended to push myself +forward or put on airs. I could only dimly recollect that I had been +singing, and I had done it for my own pleasure, not to draw attention to +myself. + +I learnt from this experience that it was possible, without being +naughty or conceited, to behave in an unpleasing manner, understood that +the others, whom I had not been thinking about, had looked on me with +disfavour, had thought me a nuisance and ridiculous, my mother in +particular; and I was deeply humiliated at the thought. + +It gradually dawned upon me that there was no one more difficult to +please than my mother. No one was more chary of praise than she, and she +had a horror of all sentimentality. She met me with superior +intelligence, corrected me, and brought me up by means of satire. It was +possible to impress my aunts, but not her. The profound dread she had of +betraying her feelings or talking about them, the shrewdness that dwelt +behind that forehead of hers, her consistently critical and clear- +sighted nature, the mocking spirit that was so conspicuous in her, +especially in her younger days, gave me, with regard to her, a +conviction that had a stimulating effect on my character--namely, that +not only had she a mother's affection for me, but that the two shrewd +and scrutinising eyes of a very clever head were looking down upon me. +Rational as she was through and through, she met my visionary +inclinations, both religious and philosophical, with unshaken common +sense, and if I were sometimes tempted, by lesser people's over- +estimating of my abilities, to over-estimate them myself, it was she +who, with inflexible firmness, urged her conviction of the limitations +of my nature. None of my weaknesses throve in my mother's neighbourhood. + +This was the reason why, during the transitional years between boyhood +and adolescence, the years in which a boy feels a greater need of +sympathy than of criticism and of indulgence than of superiority, I +looked for and found comprehension as much from a somewhat younger +sister of my mother's as from the latter herself. This aunt was all +heart. She had an ardent, enthusiastic brain, was full of tenderness and +goodness and the keenest feeling for everything deserving of sympathy, +not least for me, while she had not my mother's critical understanding. +Her judgment might be obscured by passion; she sometimes allowed herself +to be carried to imprudent extremes; she had neither Mother's +equilibrium nor her satirical qualities. She was thus admirably adapted +to be the confidant of a big boy whom she gave to understand that she +regarded as extraordinarily gifted. When these transitional years were +over, Mother resumed undisputed sway, and the relations between us +remained in all essentials the same, even after I had become much her +superior in knowledge and she in some things my pupil. So that it +affected me very much when, many years after, my younger brother said to +me somewhat sadly: "Has it struck you, too, that Mother is getting old?" +"No, not at all," I replied. "What do you think a sign of it?" "I think, +God help me, that she is beginning to admire us." + + +XIII. + +My mind, like that of all other children, had been exercised by the +great problem of the mystery of our coming into the world. I was no +longer satisfied with the explanation that children were brought by the +stork, or with that other, advanced with greater seriousness, that they +drifted up in boxes, which were taken up out of Peblinge Lake. As a +child I tormented my mother with questions as to how you could tell whom +every box was for. That the boxes were numbered, did not make things +much clearer. That they were provided with addresses, sounded very +strange. Who had written the addresses? I then had to be content with +the assurance that it was a thing that I was too small to understand; it +should be explained to me when I was older. + +My thoughts were not directed towards the other sex. I had no little +girl playfellows, and as I had no sister, knew very few. When I was +eight or nine years old, it is true, there was one rough and altogether +depraved boy whose talk touched upon the sexual question in expressions +that were coarse and in a spirit coarser still. I was scoffed at for not +knowing how animals propagated themselves, and that human beings +propagated themselves like animals. + +I replied: "My parents, at any rate, never behaved in any such manner." +Then, with the effrontery of childhood, my schoolfellows went on to the +most shameless revelations, not only about a morbid development of +natural instincts, but actual crimes against nature and against the +elementary laws of society. In other words, I was shown the most +repulsive, most agitating picture of everything touching the relations +of the sexes and the propagation of the species. + +It is probable that most boys in a big school have the great mystery of +Nature sullied for them in their tender years by coarseness and +depravity. Whereas, in ancient Greek times, the mystery was holy, and +with a pious mind men worshipped the Force of Nature without exaggerated +prudery and without shamelessness, such conditions are impossible in a +society where for a thousand years Nature herself has been depreciated +by Religion, associated with sin and the Devil, stamped as unmentionable +and in preference denied, in which, for that very reason, brutality +takes so much more terrible a satisfaction and revenge. As grown-up +people never spoke of the forces of Nature in a pure and simple manner, +it became to the children a concealed thing. Individual children, in +whom the sexual impulse had awakened early, were taught its nature by +bestial dispositions, and the knowledge was interpreted by them with +childish shamelessness. These children then filled the ears of their +comrades with filth. + +In my case, the nastiness hit, and rebounded, without making any +impression. I was only infected by the tone of the other scholars in so +far as I learnt from them that it was manly to use certain ugly words. +When I was twelve years old, my mother surprised me one day, when I was +standing alone on the stairs, shouting these words out. I was reproved +for it, and did not do it again. + + +XIV. + +I hardly ever met little girls except at children's balls, and in my +early childhood I did not think further of any of them. But when I was +twelve years old I caught my first strong glimpse of one of the +fundamental forces of existence, whose votary I was destined to be for +life--namely, Beauty. + +It was revealed to me for the first time in the person of a slender, +light-footed little girl, whose name and personality secretly haunted my +brain for many a year. + +One of my uncles was living that Summer in America Road, which at that +time was quite in the country, and there was a beautiful walk thence +across the fields to a spot called _The Signal_, where you could +watch the trains go by from Copenhagen's oldest railway station, which +was not situated on the western side of the town, where the present +stations are. Near here lived a family whose youngest daughter used to +run over almost every day to my uncle's country home, to play with the +children. + +She was ten years old, as brown as a gipsy, as agile as a roe, and from +her childish face, from all the brown of her hair, eyes, and skin, from +her smile and her speech, glowed, rang, and as it were, struck me, that +overwhelming and hitherto unknown force, Beauty. I was twelve, she was +ten. Our acquaintance consisted of playing touch, not even alone +together, but with other children; I can see her now rushing away from +me, her long plaits striking against her waist. But although this was +all that passed between us, we both had a feeling as of a mysterious +link connecting us. It was delightful to meet. She gave me a pink. She +cut a Queen of Hearts out of a pack of cards, and gave it to me; I +treasured it for the next five years like a sacred thing. + +That was all that passed between us and more there never was, even when +at twelve years of age, at a children's ball, she confessed to me that +she had kept everything I had given her--gifts of the same order as her +own. But the impression of her beauty filled my being. + +Some one had made me a present of some stuffed humming-birds, perched on +varnished twigs under a glass case. I always looked at them while I was +reading in the nursery; they stood on the bookshelves which were my +special property. These birds with their lovely, shining, gay-coloured +plumage, conveyed to me my first impression of foreign or tropical +vividness of colouring. All that I was destined to love for a long time +had something of that about it, something foreign and afar off. + +The girl was Danish as far as her speech was concerned, but not really +Danish by descent, either on her father or her mother's side; her name, +too, was un-Danish. She spoke English at home and was called Mary at my +uncle's, though her parents called her by another name. All this +combined to render her more distinctive. + +Once a year I met her at a children's ball; then she had a white dress +on, and was, in my eyes, essentially different from all the other little +girls. One morning, after one of these balls, when I was fourteen, I +felt in a most singular frame of mind, and with wonder and reverence at +what I was about to do, regarding myself as dominated by a higher, +incomprehensible force, I wrote the first poetry I ever composed. + +There were several strophes of this heavenly poetry. Just because I so +seldom met her, it was like a gentle earthquake in my life, when I did. +I had accustomed myself to such a worship of her name that, for me, she +hardly belonged to the world of reality at all. But when I was sixteen +and I met her again, once more at a young people's ball, the glamour +suddenly departed. Her appearance had altered and corresponded no longer +to my imaginary picture of her. When we met in the dance she pressed my +hand, which made me indignant, as though it were an immodest thing. She +was no longer a fairy. She had broad shoulders, a budding bust, warm +hands; there was youthful coquetry about her--something that, to me, +seemed like erotic experience. I soon lost sight of her. But I retained +a sentiment of gratitude towards her for what, as a ten-year-old child, +she had afforded me, this naturally supernatural impression, my first +revelation of Beauty. + + +XV. + +The person upon whom the schoolboys' attention centred was, of course, +the Headmaster. To the very young ones, the Headmaster was merely +powerful and paternal, up above everything. As soon as the critical +instinct awoke, its utterances were specially directed, by the evil- +disposed, at him, petty and malicious as they were, and were echoed +slavishly by the rest. + +As the Head was a powerful, stout, handsome, distinguished-looking man +with a certain stamp of joviality and innocent good-living about him, +these malicious tongues, who led the rest, declared that he only lived +for his stomach. In the next place, the old-fashioned punishment of +caning, administered by the Head himself in his private room, gave some +cause of offence. It was certainly only very lazy and obdurate boys who +were thus punished; for others such methods were never even dreamt of. +But when they were ordered to appear in his room after school-time, and +the Head took them between his knees, thrashed them well and then +afterwards caressed them, as though to console them, he created ill- +feeling, and his dignity suffered. If there were some little sense in +the disgust occasioned by this, there was certainly none at all in +certain other grievances urged against him. + +It was the ungraceful custom for the boys, on the first of the month, to +bring their own school fees. In the middle of one of the lessons the +Head would come into the schoolroom, take his seat at the desk, and +jauntily and quickly sweep five-daler bills [Footnote: Five daler, a +little over 11/--English money.] into his large, soft hat and thence +into his pockets. One objection to this arrangement was that the few +poor boys who went to school free were thus singled out to their +schoolfellows, bringing no money, which they felt as a humiliation. In +the next place, the sight of the supposed wealth that the Head thus +became possessed of roused ill-feeling and derision. It became the +fashion to call him boy-dealer, because the school, which in its palmy +days had 550 scholars, was so well attended. This extraordinary influx, +which in all common sense ought to have been regarded as a proof of the +high reputation of the school, was considered a proof of the Head's +avarice. + +It must be added that there was in his bearing, which was evidently and +with good reason, calculated to impress, something that might justly +appear unnatural to keen-sighted boys. He always arrived with blustering +suddenness; he always shouted in a stentorian voice, and, when he gave +the elder boys a Latin lesson, he always appeared, probably from +indolence, a good deal behind time, but to make up, and as though there +were not a second to waste, began to hurl his questions at them the +moment he arrived on the threshold. He liked the pathetic, and was +certainly a man with a naturally warm heart. On a closer acquaintance, +he would have won much affection, for he was a clever man and a gay, +optimistic figure. As the number of his scholars was so great, he +produced more effect at a distance. + + +XVI. + +Neither he nor any of the other masters reproduced the atmosphere of the +classical antiquity round which all the instruction of the Latin side +centred. The master who taught Greek the last few years did so, not only +with sternness, but with a distaste, in fact, a positive hatred for his +class, which was simply disgusting. + +The Head, who had the gift of oratory, communicated to us some idea of +the beauty of Latin poetry, but the rest of the instruction in the dead +languages was purely grammatical, competent and conscientious though the +men who gave it might have been. Madvig's [Translator's note: Johan +Nicolai Madvig (1804-1886), a very celebrated Danish philologist, for +fifty years professor at the University of Copenhagen. He is especially +noted for his editions of the ancient classics, with critical notes on +the text, and for his Latin Grammar.] spirit brooded over the school. +Still, there was no doubt in the Head's mind as to the greatness of +Virgil or Horace, so that a boy with perception of stylistic emphasis +and metre could not fail to be keenly interested in the poetry of these +two men. Being the boy in the class of whom the Head entertained the +greatest hopes, I began at once secretly to translate them. I made a +Danish version of the second and fourth books of the Aeneid Danicised a +good part of the Songs and Epistles of Horace in imperfect verse. + + +XVII. + +Nothing was ever said at home about any religious creed. Neither of my +parents was in any way associated with the Jewish religion, and neither +of them ever went to the Synagogue. As in my maternal grandmother's +house all the Jewish laws about eating and drinking were observed, and +they had different plates and dishes for meat and butter and a special +service for Easter, orthodox Judaism, to me, seemed to be a collection +of old, whimsical, superstitious prejudices, which specially applied to +food. The poetry of it was a sealed book to me. At school, where I was +present at the religious instruction classes as an auditor only, I +always heard Judaism alluded to as merely a preliminary stage of +Christianity, and the Jews as the remnant of a people who, as a +punishment for slaying the Saviour of the world, had been scattered all +over the earth. The present-day Israelites were represented as people +who, urged by a stiff-necked wilfulness and obstinacy and almost +incomprehensible callousness, clung to the obsolete religious ideal of +the stern God in opposition to the God of Love. + +When I attempted to think the matter out for myself, it annoyed me that +the Jews had not sided with Jesus, who yet so clearly betokened progress +within the religion that He widened and unintentionally overthrew. The +supernatural personality of Jesus did not seem credible to me. The +demand made by faith, namely, that reason should be fettered, awakened a +latent rebellious opposition, and this opposition was fostered by my +mother's steady rationalism, her unconditional rejection of every +miracle. When the time came for me to be confirmed, in accordance with +the law, I had advanced so far that I looked down on what lay before me +as a mere burdensome ceremony. The person of the Rabbi only inspired me +with distaste; his German pronunciation of Danish was repulsive and +ridiculous to me. The abominable Danish in which the lesson-book was +couched offended me, as I had naturally a fine ear for Danish. +Information about ancient Jewish customs and festivals was of no +interest to me, with my modern upbringing. The confirmation, according +to my mocking summary of the impression produced by it, consisted mainly +in the hiring of a tall silk hat from the hat-maker, and the sending of +it back next day, sanctified. The silly custom was at that time +prevalent for boys to wear silk hats for the occasion, idiotic though +they made them look. With these on their heads, they went, after +examination, up the steps to a balustrade where a priest awaited, +whispered a few affecting words in their ear about their parents or +grandparents, and laid his hand in blessing upon the tall hat. When +called upon to make my confession of faith with the others, I certainly +joined my first "yes," this touching a belief in a God, to theirs, but +remained silent at the question as to whether I believed that God had +revealed Himself to Moses and spoken by His prophets. I did not believe +it. + +I was, for that matter, in a wavering frame of mind unable to arrive at +any clear understanding. What confused me was the unveracious manner in +which historical instruction, which was wholly theological, was given. +The History masters, for instance, told us that when Julian the Apostate +wanted to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem, flames had shot out of the +earth, but they interpreted this as a miracle, expressing the Divine +will. If this were true--and I was unable to refute it then--God had +expressly taken part against Judaism and the Jews as a nation. The +nation, in that case, seemed to be really cursed by Him. Still, +Christianity fundamentally repelled me by its legends, its dogmatism, +and its church rites. The Virgin birth, the three persons in the +Trinity, and the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper in particular, seemed to +me to be remnants of the basest barbarism of antiquity. + +Under these circumstances, my young soul, feeling the need of something +it could worship, fled from Asia's to Europe's divinities, from +Palestine to Hellas, and clung with vivid enthusiasm to the Greek world +of beauty and the legends of its Gods. From all the learned education I +had had, I only extracted this one thing: an enthusiasm for ancient +Hellas and her Gods; they were my Gods, as they had been those of +Julian. Apollo and Artemis, Athene and Eros and Aphrodite grew to be +powers that I believed in and rejoiced over in a very different sense +from any God revealed on Sinai or in Emmaus. They were near to me. + +And under these circumstances the Antiquities Room at Charlottenburg, +where as a boy I had heard Hoeyen's lectures, grew to be a place that I +entered with reverence, and Thorwaldsen's Museum my Temple, imperfectly +though it reproduced the religious and heroic life and spirit of the +Greeks. But at that time I knew no other, better door to the world of +the Gods than the Museum offered, and Thorwaldsen and the Greeks, from +fourteen to fifteen, were in my mind merged in one. Thorwaldsen's Museum +was to me a brilliant illustration of Homer. There I found my Church, my +Gods, my soul's true native land. + + +XVIII. + +I had for several years been top of my class, when a boy was put in who +was quite three years older than I, and with whom it was impossible for +me to compete, so much greater were the newcomer's knowledge and +maturity. It very soon became a settled thing for the new boy always to +be top, and I invariably No. 2. However, this was not in the least +vexatious to me; I was too much wrapped up in Sebastian for that. The +admiration which as a child I had felt for boys who distinguished +themselves by muscular strength was manifested now for superiority in +knowledge or intelligence. Sebastian was tall, thin, somewhat disjointed +in build, with large blue eyes, expressive of kindness, and +intelligence; he was thoroughly well up in all the school subjects, and +with the ripeness of the older boy, could infer the right thing even +when he did not positively know it. The reason why he was placed at +lessons so late was doubtless to be found in the narrow circumstances of +his parents. They considered that they had not the means to allow him to +follow the path towards which his talents pointed. But the Head, as +could be seen on pay days, was now permitting him to come to school +free. He went about among his jacketed schoolfellows in a long frock +coat, the skirts of which flapped round his legs. + +No. 2 could not help admiring No. 1 for the confidence with which he +disported himself among the Greek aorists, in the labyrinths of which I +myself often went astray, and for the knack he had of solving +mathematical problems. He was, moreover, very widely read in belles +lettres, and had almost a grown-up man's taste with regard to books at a +time when I still continued to admire P.P.'s [Footnote: P.P. was a +writer whose real name was Rumohr. He wrote a number of historical +novels of a patriotic type, but which are only read by children up to +14.] novels, and was incapable of detecting the inartistic quality and +unreality of his popular descriptions of the exploits of sailor heroes. +As soon as my eyes were opened to the other's advanced acquirements, I +opened my heart to him, gave him my entire confidence, and found in my +friend a well of knowledge and superior development from which I felt a +daily need to draw. + +When at the end of the year the large number of newcomers made it +desirable for the class to be divided, it was a positive blow to me that +in the division, which was effected by separating the scholars according +to their numbers, odd or even, Sebastian and I found ourselves in +different classes. I even took the unusual step of appealing to the Head +to be put in the same class as Sebastian, but was refused. + +However, childhood so easily adapts itself to a fresh situation that +during the ensuing year, in which I myself advanced right gaily, not +only did I feel no lack, but I forgot my elder comrade. And at the +commencement of the next school year, when the two parallel classes, +through several boys leaving, were once more united, and I again found +myself No. 2 by the side of my one-time friend, the relations between us +were altogether altered, so thoroughly so, in fact, that our roles were +reversed. If formerly the younger had hung upon the elder's words, now +it was the other way about. If formerly Sebastian had shown the interest +in me that the half-grown man feels for a child, now I was too absorbed +by my own interests to wish for anything but a listener in him when I +unfolded the supposed wealth of my ideas and my soaring plans for the +future, which betrayed a boundless ambition. I needed a friend at this +stage only in the same sense as the hero in French tragedies requires a +confidant, and if I attached myself as before, wholly and completely to +him, it was for this reason. It is true that the other was still a good +deal in front of me in actual knowledge, so that there was much I had to +consult him about; otherwise our friendship would hardly have lasted; +but the importance of this superiority was slight, inasmuch as Sebastian +henceforward voluntarily subordinated himself to me altogether; indeed, +by his ready recognition of my powers, contributed more than anyone else +to make me conscious of these powers and to foster a self-esteem which +gradually assumed extraordinary forms. + + +XIX. + +This self-esteem, in its immaturity, was of a twofold character. It was +not primarily a belief that I was endowed with unusual abilities, but a +childish belief that I was one set apart, with whom, for mysterious +reasons, everything must succeed. The belief in a personal God had +gradually faded away from me, and there were times when, with the +conviction of boyhood, I termed myself an atheist to my friend; my +attitude towards the Greek gods had never been anything more than a +personification of the ideal forces upon which I heaped my enthusiasm. +But I believed in my star. And I hypnotised my friend into the same +belief, infected him so that he talked as if he were consecrating his +life to my service, and really, as far as was possible for a schoolboy, +lived and breathed exclusively for me, I, for my part, being gratified +at having, as my unreserved admirer and believer, the one whom, of all +people I knew, I placed highest, the one whose horizon seemed to me the +widest, and whose store of knowledge was the greatest; for in many +subjects it surpassed even that of the masters in no mean degree. + +Under such conditions, when I was fifteen or sixteen, I was deeply +impressed by a book that one might think was infinitely beyond the +understanding of my years, Lermontof's _A Hero of Our Time_, in +Xavier Marmier's French translation. The subject of it would seem +utterly unsuited to a schoolboy who had never experienced anything in +the remotest degree resembling the experiences of a man of the world, at +any rate those which produced the sentiments pervading this novel. +Nevertheless, this book brought about a revolution in my ideas. For the +first time I encountered in a book a chief character who was not a +universal hero, a military or naval hero whom one had to admire and if +possible imitate, but one in whom, with extreme emotion, I fancied that +I recognised myself! + +I had certainly never acted as Petsjorin did, and never been placed in +such situations as Petsjorin. No woman had ever loved me, still less had +I ever let a woman pay with suffering the penalty of her affection for +me. Never had any old friend of mine come up to me, delighted to see me +again, and been painfully reminded, by my coolness and indifference, how +little he counted for in my life. Petsjorin had done with life; I had +not even begun to live. Petsjorin had drained the cup of enjoyment; I +had never tasted so much as a drop of it. Petsjorin was as blase as a +splendid Russian Officer of the Guards could be; I, as full of +expectation as an insignificant Copenhagen schoolboy could be. +Nevertheless, I had the perplexing feeling of having, for the first time +in my life, seen my inmost nature, hitherto unknown even to myself, +understood, interpreted, reproduced, magnified, in this unharmonious +work of the Russian poet who was snatched away so young. + + +XX. + +The first element whence the imaginary figure which I fancied I +recognized again in Lermontof had its rise was doubtless to be found in +the relations between my older friend and myself (in the reversal of our +roles, and my consequent new feeling of superiority over him). The +essential point, however, was not the comparatively accidental shape in +which I fancied I recognised myself, but that what was at that time +termed _reflection_ had awaked in me, introspection, self- +consciousness, which after all had to awake some day, as all other +impulses awake when their time comes. This introspection was not, +however, by any means a natural or permanent quality in me, but on the +contrary one which made me feel ill at ease and which I soon came to +detest. During these transitional years, as my pondering over myself +grew, I felt more and more unhappy and less and less sure of myself. The +pondering reached its height, as was inevitable, when there arose the +question of choosing a profession and of planning the future rather than +of following a vocation. But as long as this introspection lasted, I had +a torturing feeling that my own eye was watching me, as though I were a +stranger, a feeling of being the spectator of my own actions, the +auditor of my own words, a double personality who must nevertheless one +day become one, should I live long enough. After having, with a friend, +paid a visit to Kaalund, who was prison instructor at Vridsloeselille at +the time and showed us young fellows the prison and the cells, I used to +picture my condition to myself as that of a prisoner enduring the +torture of seeing a watchful eye behind the peep-hole in the door. I had +noticed before, in the Malmoe prison, how the prisoners tried to besmear +this glass, or scratch on it, with a sort of fury, so that it was often +impossible to see through it. My natural inclination was to act naively, +without premeditation, and to put myself wholly into what I was doing. +The cleavage that introspection implies, therefore, was a horror to me; +all bisection, all dualism, was fundamentally repellent to me; and it +was consequently no mere chance that my first appearance as a writer was +made in an attack on a division and duality in life's philosophy, and +that the very title of my first book was a branding and rejection of a +_Dualism_. So that it was only when my self-contemplation, and with +it the inward cleavage, had at length ceased, that I attained to +quietude of mind. + + +XXI. + +Thus violently absorbing though the mental condition here suggested was, +it was not permanent. It was childish and child-like by virtue of my +years; the riper expressions which I here make use of to describe it +always seem on the verge of distorting its character. My faith in my +lucky star barely persisted a few years unassailed. My childish idea had +been very much strengthened when, at fifteen years of age, in the first +part of my finishing examination, I received _Distinction_ in all +my subjects, and received a mighty blow when, at seventeen, I only had +_Very Good_ in five subjects, thus barely securing Distinction for +the whole. + +I ceased to preoccupy myself about my likeness to Petsjorin after having +recovered from a half, or quarter, falling in love, an unharmonious +affair, barren of results, which I had hashed up for myself through +fanciful and affected reverie, and which made me realise the fundamental +simplicity of my own nature,--and I then shook off the unnatural +physiognomy like a mask. Belief in my own unbounded superiority and the +absolutely unmeasured ambition in which this belief had vented itself, +collapsed suddenly when at the age of eighteen, feeling my way +independently for the first time, and mentally testing people, I learnt +to recognise the real mental superiority great writers possess. It was +chiefly my first reading of the principal works of Kierkegaard that +marked this epoch in my life. I felt, face to face with the first great +mind that, as it were, had personally confronted me, all my real +insignificance, understood all at once that I had as yet neither lived +nor suffered, felt nor thought, and that nothing was more uncertain than +whether I might one day evince talent. The one certain thing was that my +present status seemed to amount to nothing at all. + + +XXII. + +In those boyhood's years, however, I revelled in ideas of greatness to +come which had not so far received a shock. And I was in no doubt as to +the domain in which when grown up I should distinguish myself. All my +instincts drew me towards Literature. The Danish compositions which were +set at school absorbed all my thoughts from week to week; I took the +greatest pains with them, weighed the questions from as many sides as I +could and endeavoured to give good form and style to my compositions. +Unconsciously I tried to find expressions containing striking contrasts; +I sought after descriptive words and euphonious constructions. Although +not acquainted with the word style in any other sense than that it bears +in the expression "style-book," the Danish equivalent for what in +English is termed an "exercise-book," I tried to acquire a certain +style, and was very near falling into mannerism, from sheer +inexperience, when a sarcastic master, to my distress, reminded me one +day of Heiberg's words: "The unguent of expression, smeared thickly over +the thinness of thoughts." + + +XXIII. + +Together with a practical training in the use of the language, the +Danish lessons afforded a presentment of the history of our national +literature, given intelligently and in a very instructive manner by a +master named Driebein, who, though undoubtedly one of the many +Heibergians of the time, did not in any way deviate from what might be +termed the orthodoxy of literary history. Protestantism carried it +against Roman Catholicism, the young Oehlenschlaeger against Baggesen, +Romanticism against Rationalism; Oehlenschlaeger as the Northern poet of +human nature against a certain Bjoernson, who, it was said, claimed to be +more truly Norse than he. In Mr. Driebein's presentment, no recognised +great name was ever attacked. And in his course, as in Thortsen's +History of Literature, literature which might be regarded as historic +stopped with the year 1814. + +The order in which in my private reading I became acquainted with Danish +authors was as follows: Ingemann, Oehlenschlaeger, Grundtvig, Poul +Moeller, many books by these authors having been given me at Christmas +and on birthdays. At my grandfather's, I eagerly devoured Heiberg's +vaudevilles as well. As a child, of course, I read uncritically, merely +accepting and enjoying. But when I heard at school of Baggesen's +treatment of Oehlenschlaeger, thus realising that there had been various +tendencies in literature at that time, and various opinions as to which +was preferable, I read with enthusiasm a volume of selected poems by +Baggesen, which I had had one Christmas, and the treatment of language +in it fascinated me exceedingly, with its gracefulness and light, +conversational tone. Then, when Hertz's [Footnote: Henrik Hertz, a +Danish poet (1797-1870), published "Ghost Letters" anonymously, and +called them thus because in language and spirit they were a kind of +continuation of the long-deceased Baggesen's rhymed contribution to a +literary dispute of his day. Hertz, like the much greater Baggesen, laid +great stress upon precise and elegant form.--[Translator's note.]] +_Ghost Letters_ fell into my hands one day, and the diction of them +appealed to me almost more, I felt myself, first secretly, afterwards +more consciously, drawn towards the school of form in Danish literature, +and rather enjoyed being a heretic on this point. For to entertain +kindly sentiments for the man who had dared to profane Oehlenschlaeger +was like siding with Loki against Thor. Poul Moeller's Collected Works I +had received at my confirmation, and read again and again with such +enthusiasm that I almost wore the pages out, and did not skip a line, +even of the philosophical parts, which I did not understand at all. But +Hertz's Lyrical Poems, which I read in a borrowed copy, gave me as much +pleasure as Poul Moeller's Verses had done. And for a few years, grace +and charm, and the perfect control of language and poetic form, were in +my estimation the supreme thing until, on entering upon my eighteenth +year, a violent reaction took place, and resonance, power and grandeur +alone seemed to have value. From Hertz my sympathies went over to +Christian Winther, from Baggesen to Homer, Aeschylus, the Bible, +Shakespeare, Goethe. One of the first things I did as a student was to +read the Bible through in Danish and the Odyssey in Greek. + + +XXIV. + +The years of approaching maturity were still distant, however, and my +inner life was personal, not real, so that an element of fermentation +was cast into my mind when a copy of Heine's _Buch der Lieder_ was +one day lent to me. What took my fancy in it was, firstly, the +combination of enthusiasm and wit, then its terse, pithy form, and after +that the parts describing how the poet and his lady love, unable to +overcome the shyness which binds their tongues, involuntarily play hide +and seek with one another and lose each other; for I felt that I should +be equally unable to find natural and simple expression for my feelings, +should things ever come to such a pass with me. Of Heine's personality, +of the poet's historic position, political tendencies or importance, I +knew nothing; in these love-poems I looked more especially for those +verses in which violent self-esteem and blase superiority to every +situation find expression, because this fell in with the Petsjorin note, +which, since reading Lermontof's novel, was the dominant one in my mind. +As was my habit in those years, when it was still out of the question +for me to buy books that pleased me, I copied out of the _Buch der +Lieder_ all that I liked best, that I might read it again. + + +XXV. + +Of all this life of artistic desire and seeking, of external +impressions, welcomed with all the freshness and impulsiveness of a +boy's mind, but most of self-study and self-discovery, the elder of the +two comrades was a most attentive spectator, more than a spectator. He +made use of expressions and said things which rose to my head and made +me conceited. Sebastian would make such a remark as: "It is not for your +abilities that I appreciate you, it is for your enthusiasm. All other +people I know are machines without souls, at their best full of +affected, set phrases, such as one who has peeped behind the scenes +laughs at; but in you there is a fulness of ideality too great for you +ever to be happy." "Fulness of ideality" was the expression of the time +for the supremest quality of intellectual equipment. No wonder, then, +that I felt flattered. + +And my older comrade united a perception of my mental condition, which +unerringly perceived its immaturity, with a steadfast faith in a future +for me which in spite of my arrogance, I thirsted to find in the one of +all others who knew me best and was most plainly my superior in +knowledge. One day, when I had informed him that I felt "more mature and +clearer about myself," he replied, without a trace of indecision, that +this was undoubtedly a very good thing, if it were true, but that he +suspected I was laboring under a delusion. "I am none the less +convinced," he added, "that you will soon reach a crisis, will overcome +all obstacles and attain the nowadays almost giant's goal that you have +set before you." This goal, for that matter, was very indefinite, and +was to the general effect that I intended to make myself strongly felt, +and bring about great changes in the intellectual world; of what kind, +was uncertain. + +Meanwhile, as the time drew near for us to enter the University, and I +approached the years of manhood which the other, in spite of his modest +position as schoolboy, had already long attained, Sebastian grew utterly +miserable. He had, as he expressed it, made up his mind to be my +_Melanchthon_. But through an inward collapse which I could not +understand he now felt that the time in which he could be anything to me +had gone by; it seemed to him that he had neglected to acquire the +knowledge and the education necessary, and he reproached himself +bitterly. "I have not been in the least what I might have been to you," +he exclaimed one day, and without betraying it he endured torments of +jealousy, and thought with vexation and anxiety of the time when a +larger circle would be opened to me in the University, and he himself +would become superfluous. + +His fear was thus far unfounded, that, naive in my selfishness, as in my +reliance on him, I still continued to tell him everything, and in return +constantly sought his help when philological or mathematical +difficulties which I could not solve alone presented themselves to me. + +But I had scarcely returned to Copenhagen, after my first journey abroad +(a very enjoyable four weeks' visit to Goeteborg), I had scarcely been a +month a freshman, attending philosophical lectures and taking part in +student life than the dreaded separation between us two so differently +constituted friends came to pass. The provocation was trifling, in fact +paltry. One day I was standing in the lecture-room with a few fellow- +students before a lecture began, when a freshman hurried up to us and +asked: "Is it true, what Sebastian says, that he is the person you think +most of in the world?" My reply was: "Did he say that himself?" "Yes." +And, disgusted that the other should have made such a remark in order to +impress perfect strangers, though it might certainly very easily have +escaped him in confidence, I said hastily: "Oh! he's mad!" which +outburst, bearing in mind young people's use of the word "mad," was +decidedly not to be taken literally, but was, it is quite true, ill- +naturedly meant. + +The same evening I received a short note from Sebastian in which, though +in polite terms, he repudiated his allegiance and fidelity; the letter, +in which the polite form _you_ was used instead of the accustomed +_thou_, was signed: "Your 'mad' and 'foolish,' but respectful +Sebastian." + +The impression this produced upon me was exceedingly painful, but an +early developed mental habit of always accepting a decision, and a +vehement repugnance to renew any connection deliberately severed by +another party, resulted in my never even for a moment thinking of +shaking his resolution, and in my leaving the note unanswered. However, +the matter was not done with, and the next few months brought me many +insufferable moments, indeed hours, for Sebastian, whose existence had +for so long centred round mine that he was evidently incapable of doing +without me altogether, continually crossed my path, planted himself near +me on every possible occasion, and one evening, at a students' +gathering, even got a chair outside the row round the table, sat himself +down just opposite to me, and spent a great part of the evening in +staring fixedly into my face. As may be supposed, I felt exceedingly +irritated. + +Three months passed, when one day I received a letter from Sebastian, +and at intervals of weeks or months several others followed. They were +impressive letters, splendidly written, with a sort of grim humour about +them, expressing his passionate affection and venting his despair. This +was the first time that I had come in contact with passion, but it was a +passion that without having any unnatural or sensual element in it, +nevertheless, from a person of the same sex, excited a feeling of +displeasure, and even disgust, in me. + +Sebastian wrote: "I felt that it was cheating you to take so much +without being able to give you anything in return; I thought it mean to +associate with you; consequently, I believe that I did perfectly right +to break with you. Still, it is true that I hardly needed to do it. Time +and circumstances would have effected the breach." And feeling that our +ways were now divided, he continued: + + Hie locus est, partes ubi se via findit in ambas. + Dextera, quae Ditis magni sub moenia tendit + Hac iter Elysium nobis; at laeva malorum + Exercet poenas et ad impia Tartara mittit. + +"I cannot kill myself at present, but as soon as I feel able I shall do +so." + +Or he wrote: "Towards the end of the time when we were friends, I was +not quite myself when talking to you; I was unbalanced; for I was +convinced that you wasted your valuable time talking to me, and at the +same time was oppressed with grief at the thought that we must part. +Then I tried to make you angry by pretending to question your abilities, +by affecting indifference and scorn; but it was the dog baying at the +moon. I had to bring about the severance that I did. That I should be so +childish as to be vexed about a slight from you, you cannot yourself +believe. I cannot really regret it, for I could no longer be of use to +you; you doubtless think the same yourself; but I cannot do without you; +my affection for you is the only vital thing in me; your life throbbed +in mine." + +Sometimes the letters ended with an outburst of a sort of despairing +humour, such as: "Vale! (Fanfare! somersaults by Pagliaccio.)" But +whether Sebastian assumed a serious or a desperate tone, the renewal of +our old companionship was equally impossible to me. I could not ignore +what had happened, and I could not have a friend who was jealous if I +talked to others. Since my intellectual entity had awakened, all +jealousy had been an abomination to me, but jealousy in one man of +another man positively revolted me. I recognised Sebastian's great +merits, respected his character, admired his wide range of knowledge, +but I could not associate with him again, could not even so much as walk +down the street by his side. All his affectionate and beautiful letters +glanced off ineffectual from this repugnance. Something in me had +suddenly turned stony, like a plant plunged in petrifying water. + +Six years passed before we saw each other again. We met then with simple +and sincere affection. Sebastian's old passion had evaporated without +leaving a trace; he himself could no longer understand it. And, though +far apart, and with nothing to connect us closely, we continued to think +kindly of one another and to exchange reflections, until, after a few +years, Death carried him away, ere he had reached the years of real +manhood, or fulfilled any of the promises of his gifted and industrious +youth. + + + + +TRANSITIONAL YEARS + +Schoolboy Fancies--Religion--Early Friends--_Daemonic_ Theory--A +West Indian Friend--My Acquaintance Widens--Politics--The Reactionary +Party--The David Family--A Student Society--An Excursion to Slesvig-- +Temperament--The Law--Hegel--Spinoza--Love for Humanity--A Religious +Crisis--Doubt--Personal Immortality--Renunciation. + + +I. + +My second schoolboy fancy dated from my last few months at school. It +was a natural enough outcome of the attraction towards the other sex +which, never yet encouraged, was lurking in my mind; but it was not +otherwise remarkable for its naturalness. It had its origin partly in my +love of adventure, partly in my propensity for trying my powers, but, as +love, was without root, inasmuch as it was rooted neither in my heart +nor in my senses. + +The object of it was again a girl from another country. Her name and +person had been well known to me since I was twelve years old. We had +even exchanged compliments, been curious about one another, gone so far +as to wish for a lock of each other's hair. There was consequently a +romantic background to our first meeting. When I heard that she was +coming to Denmark I was, as by chance, on the quay, and saw her arrive. + +She was exactly the same age as I, and, without real beauty, was very +good-looking and had unusually lovely eyes. I endeavoured to make her +acquaintance through relatives of hers whom I knew, and had no +difficulty in getting into touch with her. An offer to show her the +museums and picture galleries in Copenhagen was accepted. Although I had +very little time, just before my matriculation examination, my new +acquaintance filled my thoughts to such an extent that I did not care +how much of this valuable time I sacrificed to her. In the Summer, when +the girl went out near Charlottenlund, whereas my parents were staying +much nearer to the town, I went backwards and forwards to the woods +nearly every day, in the uncertain but seldom disappointed hope of +seeing her. Sometimes I rowed her about in the Sound. + +Simple and straightforward though the attraction I felt might seem, the +immature romance I built up on it was anything but simple. + +It was, as stated, not my senses that drew me on. Split and divided up +as I was just then, a merely intellectual love seemed to me quite +natural; one might feel an attraction of the senses for an altogether +different woman. I did not wish for a kiss, much less an embrace; in +fact, was too much a child to think of anything of the sort. + +But neither was it my heart that drew me on; I felt no tenderness, +hardly any real affection, for this young girl whom I was so anxious to +win. She only busied my brain. + +In the condition of boyish self-inquisition in which I then found +myself, this acquaintance was a fresh element of fermentation, and the +strongest to which my self-examination had hitherto been subjected. I +instinctively desired to engage her fancy; but my attitude was from +myself through her to myself. I wanted less to please than to dominate +her, and as it was only my head that was filled with her image, I wholly +lacked the voluntary and cheerful self-humiliation which is an element +of real love. I certainly wished with all my heart to fascinate her; but +what I more particularly wanted was to hold my own, to avoid submission, +and retain my independence. My boyish pride demanded it. + +The young foreigner, whose knowledge of the world was hardly greater +than my own, had certainly never, during her short life, come in contact +with so extraordinary a phenomenon; it afforded matter for reflection. +She certainly felt attracted, but, woman-like, was on her guard. She was +of a quiet, amiable disposition, innocently coquettish, naturally +adapted for the advances of sound common sense and affectionate good- +will, not for the volts of passion; she was, moreover, femininely +practical. + +She saw at a glance that this grown-up schoolboy, who almost staggered +her with his eloquence, his knowledge, his wild plans for the future, +was no wooer, and that his advances were not to be taken too seriously. +Next, with a woman's unfailing intuition, she discovered his empty love +of power. And first involuntarily, and then consciously, she placed +herself in an attitude of defence. She did not lack intelligence. She +showed a keen interest in me, but met me with the self-control of a +little woman of the world, now and then with coolness, on one occasion +with well-aimed shafts of mockery. + +Our mutual attitude might have developed into a regular war between the +sexes, had we not both been half-children. Just as I, in the midst of a +carefully planned assault on her emotions, occasionally forgot myself +altogether and betrayed the craving to be near her which drove me almost +every day to her door, she also would at times lose the equilibrium she +had struggled for, and feverishly reveal her agitated state of mind. But +immediately afterwards I was again at the assault, she once more on the +alert, and after the lapse of four months our ways separated, without a +kiss, or one simple, affectionate word, ever having passed between us. + +In my morbid self-duplication, I had been busy all this time fixing in +my memory and writing down in a book all that I had said to her or she +to me, weighing and probing the scope and effect of the words that had +been uttered, laying plans for future methods of advance, noting actual +victories and defeats, pondering over this inanity, bending over all +this abnormality, like a strategist who, bending over the map, marks +with his nail the movements of troops, the carrying or surrender of a +fortified position. + +This early, unsatisfactory and not strictly speaking erotic experience +had the remarkable effect of rendering me for the next seven years +impervious to the tender passion, so that, undisturbed by women or +erotic emotions, I was able to absorb myself in the world of varied +research that was now opening up to me. + + +II. + +A school-friend who was keenly interested in astronomy and had directed +my nightly contemplations of the heavens, drew me, just about this time, +a very good map of the stars, by the help of which I found those stars I +knew and extended my knowledge further. + +The same school-friend sometimes took me to the Observatory, to see old +Professor d'Arrest--a refined and sapient man--and there, for the first +time, I saw the stellar heavens through a telescope. I had learnt +astronomy at school, but had lacked talent to attain any real insight +into the subject. Now the constellations and certain of the stars began +to creep into my affections; they became the nightly witnesses of my +joys and sorrows, all through my life; the sight of them sometimes +comforted me when I felt lonely and forsaken in a foreign land. The +Lyre, the Swan, the Eagle, the Crown and Booetes, Auriga, the Hyades and +the Pleiades, and among the Winter constellations, Orion; all these +twinkling groups, that human eyes have sought for thousands of years, +became distant friends of mine, too. And the thoughts which the sight of +the countless globes involuntarily and inevitably evokes, were born in +me, too,--thoughts of the littleness of the earth in our Solar System, +and of our Solar System in the Universe, of immeasurable distances--so +great that the stars whose rays, with the rapidity of light's +travelling, are striking against our eyes now, may have gone out in our +childhood; of immeasurable periods of time, in which a human life, or +even the lifetime of a whole people, disappears like a drop in the +ocean. And whereas at school I had only studied astronomy as a subject, +from its mathematical aspect, I now learnt the results of spectroscopic +analysis, which showed me how the human genius of Bunsen and Kirchhoff +had annihilated the distance between the Earth and the Sun; and at the +same time I perceived the inherent improbability of the culture of our +Earth ever being transmitted to other worlds, even as the Earth had +never yet received communications from the civilisation of any of the +stars. + +This circumstance, combined with the certainty of the gradual cooling +and eventual death of the Earth, gave me a conclusive impression of the +finality of all earthly existence and of the merely temporary character +of all progress. + +Feeling that all religions built up on a belief in a God were +collapsing, Europe had long inclined towards the religion of Progress as +the last tenable. Now I perceived as I raised my eyes to the starry +expanse and rejoiced in my favourite stars, Sirius in the Great Dog, and +Vega in the Lyre or Altair in the Eagle, that it, too, was tottering, +this last religion of all. + + +III. + +At school, I had known a score of boys of my own age, and naturally +found few amongst them who could be anything to me. Among the advantages +that the freedom of student life afforded was that of coming in contact +all at once with hundreds of similarly educated young men of one's own +age. Young men made each other's acquaintance at lectures and banquets, +were drawn to one another, or felt themselves repulsed, and elective +affinity or accident associated them in pairs or groups for a longer or +shorter period. + +A young fellow whose main passion was a desire for intellectual +enrichment was necessarily obliged to associate with many of the other +young men of his own age, in order to learn to know them, in order, +externally and internally, to gain as much experience as possible and +thereby develop himself. + +In the case of many of them, a few conversations were enough to prove +that any fruitful intimacy was out of the question. I came into fleeting +contact with a number of suave, or cold, or too ordinary young students, +without their natures affecting mine or mine theirs. But there were +others who, for some months, engaged my attention to a considerable +extent. + +The first of these was a type of the student of the time. Vilsing was +from Jutland, tall, dark, neither handsome nor plain, remarkable for his +unparalleled facility in speaking. He owed his universal popularity to +the fact that at students' Parties he could at any time stand up and +rattle off at a furious rate an apparently unprepared speech, a sort of +stump speech in which humorous perversions, distortions, lyric remarks, +clever back-handed blows to right and left, astonishing incursions and +rapid sorties, were woven into a whole so good that it was an +entertaining challenge to common sense. + +The starting point, for instance, might be some travesty of Sibbern's +whimsical definition of life, which at that time we all had to learn by +heart for the examination. It ran: + +"Life altogether is an activity and active process, preceding from an +inner source and working itself out according to an inner impulse, +producing and by an eternal change of matter, reproducing, organising +and individualising, and, since it by a certain material or substratum +constitutes itself a certain exterior, within which it reveals itself, +it simultaneously constitutes itself as the subsisting activity and +endeavour in this, its exterior, of which it may further be inquired how +far a soul can be said to live and subsist in it, as a living entity-- +appearing in such a life." + +It is not difficult to conceive what delightful nonsense this barbaric +elucidation might suggest, if a carouse, or love, woman or drunkenness +were defined in this vein; and he would weave in amusing attacks on +earlier, less intrepid speakers, who, as Vilsing put it, reminded one of +the bashful forget-me-not, inasmuch as you could read in the play of +their features: "Forget me not! I, too, was an orator." + +Vilsing, who had been studying for some years already, paid a freshman a +compliment by desiring his acquaintance and seeking his society. He +frequented the Students' Union, was on terms of friendship with those +who led the fashion, and was a favourite speaker. It was a species of +condescension on his part to seek out a young fellow just escaped from +school, a fellow who would have sunk into the earth if he had had to +make a speech, and who had no connection with the circle of older +students. + +Vilsing was a young man of moods, who, like many at that time, like +Albrecht, the chief character in Schandorph's [Footnote: Sophus +Schandorph, b. 1820, d. 1901; a prominent Danish novelist, who commenced +his literary activity in the sixties.--[Translator's note.]] _Without +a Centre_, would exhibit all the colours of the rainbow in one +morning. He would give himself, and take himself back, show himself +affectionate, cordial, intimate, confidential, full of affectionate +anxiety for me his young friend, and at the next meeting be as cursory +and cool as if he scarcely remembered having seen me before; for he +would in the meantime have been attacked by vexation at his too great +friendliness, and wish to assert himself, as knowing his own value. + +He impressed me, his junior, by revealing himself, not precisely as a +man of the world, but as a much sought after society man. He told me how +much he was asked out, and how he went from one party and one ball to +another, which, to me, with my hankering after experiences, seemed to be +an enviable thing. But I was more struck by what Vilsing told me of the +favour he enjoyed with the other sex. One girl--a charming girl!--he was +engaged to, another loved him and he her; but those were the least of +his erotic triumphs; wherever he showed himself, he conquered. And +proofs were to hand. For one day, when he had dragged me up to his room +with him, he bewildered me by shaking out before my eyes a profusion of +embroidered sofa-cushions, fancy pillows, cigar-cases, match-holders, +crocheted purses, worked waistcoats, etc.; presents from every +description of person of the feminine gender. In every drawer he pulled +out there were presents of the sort; they hung over chairs and on pegs. + +I was young enough to feel a certain respect for a man so sought after +by the fair sex, although I thought his frankness too great. What first +began to undermine this feeling was not doubt of the truth of his tales, +or the genuineness of the gifts, but the fact that one after another of +my comrades, when the first cool stages of acquaintance were passed, +invariably found a favourable opportunity of confidentially informing +me--he could not explain why it was himself, but it was a fact--that +wherever he showed himself women were singularly fascinated by the sight +of him; there must be something about him which vanquished them in spite +of him. When at last one evening the most round-backed of all of them, a +swain whose blond mustache, of irregular growth, resembled an old, worn- +out toothbrush more than anything else, also confided in me that he did +not know how it was, or what could really be the cause of it, but there +must be something about him, etc.,--then my belief in Vilsing's +singularity and my admiration for him broke down. It must not be +supposed that Vilsing regarded himself as a sensual fiend. He did not +pose as cold and impudent, but as heartfelt and instinct with feeling. +He was studying theology, and cherished no dearer wish than eventually +to become a priest. He constantly alternated between contrition and +self-satisfaction, arrogance and repentance, enjoyed the consciousness +of being exceptionally clever, an irresistible charmer, and a true +Christian. It seemed to him that, in the freshman whom he had singled +out from the crowd and given a place at his side, he had found an +intellectual equal, or even superior, and this attracted him; he met +with in me an inexperience and unworldliness so great that the +inferiority in ability which he declared he perceived was more than +counterbalanced by the superiority he himself had the advantage of, both +in social accomplishments and in dealing with women. + +It thus seemed as though many of the essential conditions of a tolerably +permanent union between us were present. But during the first +conversation in which he deigned to be interested in my views, there +occurred in our friendship a little rift which widened to a chasm. +Vilsing sprang back horrified when he heard how I, greenhorn though I +was, regarded life and men and what I considered right. "You are in the +clutches of Evil, and your desire is towards the Evil. I have not time +or inclination to unfold an entire Christology now, but what you reject +is the Ideal, and what you appraise is the Devil himself. God! God! How +distressed I am for you! I would give my life to save you. But enough +about it for the present; I have not time just now; I have to go out to +dinner." + +This was our last serious conversation. I was not saved. He did not give +his life. He went for a vacation tour the following Summer holidays, +avoided me on his return, and soon we saw no more of each other. + + +IV. + +The theory, the intimation of which roused Vilsing to such a degree, +bore in its form witness to such immaturity that it could only have made +an impression on a youth whose immaturity, in spite of his age, was +greater still. To present it with any degree of clearness is scarcely +possible; it was not sufficiently clear in itself for that. But this was +about what it amounted to: + +The introspection and energetic self-absorption to which I had given +myself up during my last few years at school became even more persistent +on my release from the restraint of school and my free admission to the +society of grown-up people. + +I took advantage of my spare time in Copenhagen, and on the restricted +travels that I was allowed to take, to slake my passionate thirst for +life; firstly, by pondering ever and anon over past sensations, and +secondly, by plunging into eager and careful reading of the light +literature of all different countries and periods that I had heard +about, but did not yet myself know at first hand. + +Through all that I experienced and read, observed and made my own, my +attitude towards myself was, that before all, I sought to become clear +as to what manner of man I really, in my inmost being, was. I asked +myself who I was. I endeavoured to discover the mysterious word that +would break the charm of the mists in which I found myself and would +answer my fundamental question, _What_ was I? And then at last, my +ponderings and my readings resulted in my finding the word that seemed +to fit, although nowadays one can hardly hear it without a smile, the +word _Daemonic_. + +I was daemonic in giving myself this reply it seemed to me that I had +solved the riddle of my nature. I meant thereby, as I then explained it +to myself, that the choice between good and evil did not present itself +to me, as to others, since evil did not interest me. For me, it was not +a question of a choice, but of an unfolding of my ego, which had its +justification in itself. + +That which I called the _daemonic_ I had encountered for the first +time outside my own mind in Lermontof's hero. Petsjorin was compelled to +act in pursuance of his natural bent, as though possessed by his own +being. I felt myself in a similar manner possessed. I had met with the +word _Daimon_ and _Daimones_ in Plato; Socrates urges that by +_daemons_ the Gods, or the children of the Gods, were meant. I felt +as though I, too, were one of the children of the Gods. In all the great +legendary figures of the middle ages I detected the feature of divine +possession, especially in the two who had completely fascinated the +poets of the nineteenth century, Don Juan and Faust. The first was the +symbol of magic power over women, the second of the thirst for knowledge +giving dominion over humanity and Nature. Among my comrades, in Vilsing, +even in the hunch-backed fellow with the unsuccessful moustache, I had +seen how the Don Juan type which had turned their heads still held sway +over the minds of young people; I myself could quite well understand the +magic which this beautiful ideal of elementary irresistibility must +have; but the Faust type appealed to me, with my thirst for knowledge, +very much more. Still, the main thing for me was that in the first great +and wholly modern poets that I made acquaintance with, Byron and his +intellectual successors, Lermontof and Heine, I recognised again the +very fundamental trait that I termed _daemonic_, the worship of +one's own originality, under the guise of an uncompromising love of +liberty. + +I was always brooding over this idea of the _daemonic_ with which +my mind was filled. I recorded my thoughts on the subject in my first +long essay (lost, for that matter), _On the Daemonic, as it Reveals +Itself in the Human Character_. + +When a shrewdly intelligent young fellow of my own age criticised my +work from the assumption that the _daemonic_ did not exist, I +thought him ridiculous. I little dreamt that twenty-five years later +Relling, in _The Wild Duck_, would show himself to be on my +friend's side in the emphatic words: "What the Devil does it mean to be +daemonic! It's sheer nonsense." + + +V. + +The "daemonic" was also responsible for the mingled attraction that was +exerted over me at this point by a young foreign student, and for the +intercourse which ensued between us. Kappers was born somewhere in the +West Indies, was the son of a well-to-do German manufacturer, and had +been brought up in a North German town. His father, for what reason I do +not know, wished him to study at Copenhagen University, and there take +his law examination. There was coloured blood in his veins, though much +diluted, maybe an eighth or so. He was tall and slender, somewhat loose +in his walk and bearing, pale-complexioned, with dark eyes and negro +hair. His face, though not handsome, looked exceedingly clever, and its +expression was not deceptive, for the young man had an astonishing +intellect. + +He was placed in the house of a highly respected family in Copenhagen, +that of a prominent scientist, a good-natured, unpractical savant, very +unsuited to be the mentor of such an unconventional young man. He was +conspicuous among the native Danish freshmen for his elegant dress and +cosmopolitan education, and was so quick at learning that before very +many weeks he spoke Danish almost without a mistake, though with a +marked foreign accent, which, however, lent a certain charm to what he +said. His extraordinary intelligence was not remarkable either for its +comprehensiveness or its depth, but it was a quicker intelligence than +any his Copenhagen fellow-student had ever known, and so keen that he +seemed born to be a lawyer. + +Kappers spent almost all his day idling about the streets, talking to +his companions; he was always ready for a walk; you never saw him work +or heard him talk about his work. Nevertheless, he, a foreigner, who had +barely mastered the language, presented himself after six months--before +he had attended all the lectures, that is,--for the examination in +philosophy and passed it with _Distinction_ in all three subjects; +indeed, Rasmus Nielsen, who examined him in Propaedeutics, was so +delighted at the foreigner's shrewd and ready answers that he gave him +_Specially excellent_, a mark which did not exist. + +His gifts in the juridical line appeared to be equally remarkable. When +he turned up in a morning with his Danish fellow-students at the coach's +house it might occasionally happen that he was somewhat tired and slack, +but more often he showed a natural grasp of the handling of legal +questions, and a consummate skill in bringing out every possible aspect +of each question, that were astonishing in a beginner. + +His gifts were of unusual power, but for the externalities of things +only, and he possessed just the gifts with which the sophists of old +time distinguished themselves. He himself was a young sophist, and at +the same time a true comedian, adapting his behaviour to whomsoever he +might happen to be addressing, winning over the person in question by +striking his particular note and showing that side of his character with +which he could best please him. Endowed with the capacity of mystifying +and dazzling those around him, exceedingly keen-sighted, adaptable but +in reality empty, he knew how to set people thinking and to fascinate +others by his lively, unprejudiced and often paradoxical, but +entertaining conversation. He was now colder, now more confidential; he +knew how to assume cordiality, and to flatter by appearing to admire. + +With a young student like myself who had just left school, was quite +inexperienced in all worldly matters, and particularly in the chapter of +women, but in whom he detected good abilities and a very strained +idealism, he affected ascetic habits. With other companions he showed +himself the intensely reckless and dissipated rich man's son he was; +indeed, he amused himself by introducing some of the most inoffensive +and foolish of them into the wretched dens of vice and letting them +indulge themselves at his expense. + +Intellectually interested as he was, he proposed, soon after our first +meeting, that we should start a "literary and scientific" society, +consisting of a very few freshmen, who, at the weekly meetings, should +read a paper one of them had composed, whereupon two members who had +previously read the paper should each submit it to a prepared criticism +and after that, general discussion of the question. All that concerned +the proposed society was carried out with a genuine Kappers-like +mystery, as if it were a conspiracy, and with forms and ceremonies +worthy of a diplomat's action. + +Laws were drafted for the society, although it eventually consisted only +of five members, and elaborate minutes were kept of the meetings. Among +the members was V. Topsoee, afterwards well known as an editor and +author, at that time a cautious and impudent freshman, whose motto was: +"It is protection that we people must live by." He read the society a +paper _On the Appearance_, dealing with how one ought to dress, +behave, speak, do one's hair, which revealed powers of observation and a +sarcastic tendency. Amongst those who eagerly sought for admission but +never secured it was a young student, handsome, and with no small love +of study, but stupid and pushing, for whom I, who continued to see +myself in Lermontof's Petsjorin, cherished a hearty contempt, for the +curious reason that he in every way reminded me of Petsjorin's fatuous +and conceited adversary, Gruchnitski. Vilsing was asked to take part in +the society's endeavours, but refused. "What I have against all these +societies," he said, "is the self-satisfaction they give rise to; the +only theme I should be inclined to treat is that of how the modern Don +Juan must be conceived; but that I cannot do, since I should be obliged +to touch on so many incidents of my own life." + +This was the society before which I read the treatise on _The +Daemonic_, and it was Kappers who, with his well-developed +intelligence, would not admit the existence of anything of the sort. + +The regular meetings went on for six months only, the machinery being +too large and heavy in comparison with the results attained. Kappers and +his intimate friends, however, saw none the less of each other. The +brilliant West Indian continued to pursue his legal studies and to carry +on his merry life in Copenhagen for some eighteen months. But his +studies gradually came to a standstill, while his gay life took up more +and more of his time. He was now living alone in a flat which, to begin +with, had been very elegantly furnished, but grew emptier and emptier by +degrees, as his furniture was sold, or went to the pawnbroker's. His +furniture was followed by his books, and when Schou's "_Orders in +Council_" had also been turned into money, his legal studies ceased +of themselves. When the bookshelves were empty it was the turn of the +wardrobe and the linen drawers, till one Autumn day in 1861, an emissary +of his father, who had been sent to Copenhagen to ascertain what the son +was really about, found him in his shirt, without coat or trousers, +wrapped up in his fur overcoat, sitting on the floor in his drawing- +room, where there was not so much as a chair left. Asked how it was that +things had come to such a pass with him, he replied: "It is the curse +that follows the coloured race." + +A suit of clothes was redeemed for Kappers junior, and he was hurried +away as quickly as possible to the German town where his father lived, +and where the son explained to everyone who would listen that he had +been obliged to leave Copenhagen suddenly "on account of a duel with a +gentleman in a very exalted position." + + +VI. + +My first experiences of academic friendship made me smile in after years +when I looked back on them. But my circle of acquaintances had gradually +grown so large that it was only natural new friendships should grow out +of it. + +One of the members of Kappers' "literary and scientific" society, and +the one whom the West Indian had genuinely cared most for, was a young +fellow whose father was very much respected, and to whom attention was +called for that reason; he was short, a little heavy on his feet, and a +trifle indolent, had beautiful eyes, was warm-hearted and well educated, +had good abilities without being specially original, and was somewhat +careless in his dress, as in other things. + +His father was C.N. David, well known in his younger days as a +University professor and a liberal politician, who later became the Head +of the Statistical Department and a Member of the Senate. He had been in +his youth a friend of Johan Ludvig Heiberg, [Footnote: J.L. Heiberg, to +whom such frequent allusion is made, was a well-known Danish author of +the last century (1791-1860). Among many other things, he wrote a series +of vaudevilles for the Royal Theatre at Copenhagen, Of which he was +manager. In every piece he wrote there was a special part for his wife, +Johanne Luise Heiberg, who was the greatest Danish actress of the 19th +century.] and had been dramatic contributor to the latter's paper. + +He was a very distinguished satirist and critic and his influence upon +the taste and critical opinion of his day can only be compared with that +of Holberg in the 18th century. + +Now, in concert with Bluhme and a few other of the elder politicians, he +had formed a Conservative Fronde, opposed to the policy of the National +Liberals. One day as we two young men were sitting in his son's room, +drafting the rules for the freshmen's society of five members, the old +gentleman came through and asked us what we were writing. "Rules for a +society; we want to get them done as quickly as we can." "That is right. +That kind of constitution may very well be written out expeditiously. +There has not been very much more trouble or forethought spent on the +one we have in this country." + +It was not, however, so much the internal policy of the National +Liberals that he objected to--it was only the Election Law that he was +dissatisfied with--as their attitude towards Germany. Whenever a step +was taken in the direction of the incorporation of Slesvig, he would +exclaim: "We are doing what we solemnly promised not to do. How can +anyone be so childish as to believe that it will turn out well!" + +The son, whose home impressions in politics had been Conservative, was a +happy young man with a somewhat embarrassed manner, who sometimes hid +his uncertainty under the cloak of a carelessness that was not +altogether assumed. Behind him stood his family, to whom he hospitably +introduced those of his companions whom he liked, and though the family +were not gentle of origin, they belonged, nevertheless, to the highest +circles in the country and exercised their attraction through the son. + +I, whom Ludvig David was now eagerly cultivating, had known him for many +years, as we had been school-fellows and even classmates, although David +was considerably older. I had never felt drawn to him as a boy, in fact, +had not liked him. Neither had David, in our school-days, ever made any +advances to me, having had other more intimate friends. Now, however, he +was very cordial to me, and expressed in strong terms his appreciation +of my industry and abilities; he himself was often teased at home for +his lack of application. + +C.N. David was the first public personality with whom, as a student, I +became acquainted and into whose house I was introduced. For many years +I enjoyed unusual kindness and hospitality at the hands of the old +politician, afterwards Minister of Finance. + + +VII. + +I had hitherto been only mildly interested in politics. I had, of +course, as a boy, attentively followed the course of the Crimean war, +which my French uncle, on one of his visits, had called the fight for +civilisation against barbarism, although it was a fight for Turkey! now, +as a student, I followed with keen interest the Italian campaign and the +revolt against the Austrian Dukes and the Neapolitan Bourbons. But the +internal policy of Denmark had little attraction for me. As soon as I +entered the University I felt myself influenced by the spirit of such +men as Poul Moeller, J.L. Heiberg, Soeren Kierkegaard, and distinctly +removed from the belief in the power of the people which was being +preached everywhere at that time. This, however, was hardly more than a +frame of mind, which did not preclude my feeling myself in sympathy with +what at that time was called broad thought (i.e., Liberalism). Although +I was often indignant at the National Liberal and Scandinavian terrorism +which obtained a hearing at both convivial and serious meetings in the +Students' Union, my feelings in the matter of Denmark's foreign policy +with regard to Sweden and Norway, as well as to Germany, were the same +as those held by all the other students. I felt no intellectual debt to +either Sweden or Norway, but I was drawn by affection towards the Swedes +and the Norsemen, and in Christian Richardt's lovely song at the +Northern Celebration in 1860, _For Sweden and Norway_, I found the +expression of the fraternal feelings that I cherished in my breast for +our two Northern neighbours. On the other hand, small as my store of +knowledge still was, I had already acquired some considerable impression +of German culture. Nevertheless, the increasingly inimical attitude of +the German people towards Denmark, and the threatenings of war with +Germany, together with my childish recollections of the War of 1848-50, +had for their effect that in the Germany of that day I only saw an +enemy's country. A violent affection that I felt at sixteen for a +charming little German girl made no difference to this view. + + +VIII. + +The old men, who advocated the greatest caution in dealing with the +impossible demands of the German Federation, and were profoundly +distrustful as to the help that might be expected from Europe, were +vituperated in the press. As _Whole-State Men_, they were regarded +as unpatriotic, and as so-called _Reactionaries_, accused of being +enemies to freedom. When I was introduced into the house of one of these +politically ill-famed leaders, in spite of my ignorance, I knew enough +of politics, as of other subjects, to draw a sharp distinction between +that which I could in a measure grasp, and that which I did not +understand; I was sufficiently educated to place Danish constitutional +questions in the latter category, and consequently I crossed, devoid of +prejudice, the threshold of a house whence proceeded, according to the +opinion of the politically orthodox, a pernicious, though fortunately +powerless, political heterodoxy. + +It must not be supposed that I came into close touch with anything of +the sort. The old Minister never opened his mouth on political matters +in the bosom of his family. But the impression of superior intelligence +and knowledge of men that he conveyed was enough to place him in a +different light from that in which he was depicted in _The +Fatherland_, the paper whose opinions were swallowed blindly by the +student body. And my faith in the infallibility of the paper was shaken +even more one day, when I saw the Leader of the Reactionary Party +himself, Privy Councillor Bluhme, at the house, and sat unnoticed in a +corner, listening to his conversation. He talked a great deal, although, +like the master of the house, he did not allude to his public work. Like +a statesman of the old school, he expressed himself with exquisite +politeness and a certain ceremony. But of the affectation of which +_The Fatherland_ accused him, there was not a trace. What +profoundly impressed me was the Danish the old gentleman spoke, the most +perfect Danish. He told of his travels in India--once upon a time he had +been Governor of Trankebar--and you saw before you the banks of the +Ganges and the white troops of women, streaming down to bathe in the +river, as their religion prescribed. + +I never forgot the words with which Bluhme rose to go: "May I borrow the +English blue-books for a few days? There might be something or other +that the newspapers have not thought fit to tell us." I started at the +words. It dawned upon me for the first time, though merely as a remote +possibility, that the Press might purposely and with intent to mislead +keep silence about facts that had a claim upon the attention of the +public. + + +IX. + +Young David had once asked me to read Ovid's Elegiacs with him, and this +was the beginning of our closer acquaintance. In town, in the Winter, we +two younger ones were only rarely with the rest of the family, but in +Summer it was different. The Minister had built a house at Rungsted, on +a piece of land belonging to his brother, who was a farmer and the owner +of Rungstedgaard, Rungstedlund and Folehavegaard, a shrewd and practical +man. To this villa, which was in a beautiful situation, overlooking the +sea, I was often invited by my friend to spend a few days in the Summer, +sometimes even a month at a time. At first, of course, I was nothing to +the rest of the family; they received me for the son's sake; but by +degrees I won a footing with them, too. The handsome, clever and +sprightly mistress of the house took a motherly interest in me, and the +young daughters showed me kindness for which I was very grateful. + +The master of the house sometimes related an anecdote, as, for instance, +about Heiberg's mad pranks as a young man. When he went off into the +woods and got hungry, he used to take provisions from the stores in the +lockers of the phaetons that put up at Klampenborg, while the people +were walking about in the park, and the coachmen inside the public- +house. One day, with Moehl and David, he got hold of a huge layer-cake. +The young fellows had devoured a good half of it and replaced it under +the seat of the carriage, when the family came back, caught sight of +Heiberg, whom they knew, and invited the young men to have a piece of +cake and a glass of wine. When they made the horrifying discovery of the +havoc that had been wrought, they themselves would not touch it, and the +robbers, who were stuffed already, were obliged to consume the remainder +of the cake between them. + +There was often music at the Villa; sometimes I was asked to read aloud, +and then I did my best, choosing good pieces not well known, and reading +carefully. The pleasant outdoor life gave me a few glimpses of that rare +and ardently desired thing, still contentment. It was more particularly +alone with Nature that I felt myself at home. + +A loose page from my diary of those days will serve to indicate the +untried forces that I felt stirring within me: + + On the way down, the sky was dappled with large and many-coloured + clouds. I wandered about in the woods to-day, among the oaks and + beeches, and saw the sun gilding the leaves and the tree-trunks, lay + down under a tree with my Greek Homer and read the first and second + books of the Odyssey. Went backwards and forwards in the clover field, + revelled in the clover, smelt it, and sucked the juice of the flowers. I + have the same splendid view as of old from my window. The sea, in all + its flat expanse, moved in towards me to greet me, when I arrived. It + was roaring and foaming mildly. Hveen could be seen quite clearly. Now + the wind is busy outside my window, the sea is stormy, the dark heavens + show streaks of moonlight.... + + East wind and rain. Went as far as Valloroed in a furious wind. The sky + kept clear; a dark red patch of colour showed the position of the Sun on + the horizon. The Moon has got up hurriedly, has turned from red to + yellow, and looks lovely. I am drunk with the beauties of Nature. Go to + Folehave and feel, like the gods in Homer, without a care.... + + I can never get sleepy out in the open country on a windy night. Rested + a little, got up at four o'clock, went at full speed along soaked roads + to Humlebaek, to Gurre Ruins and lake, through the woods to Fredensborg + park, back to Humlebaek, and came home to Rungsted by steamer. Then went + up on the hill. Quiet beauty of the landscape. Feeling that Nature + raises even the fallen into purer, loftier regions. Took the Odyssey and + went along the field-path to the stone table; cool, fresh air, harmony + and splendour over Nature. "Wildly soars the hawk." Went up into the + sunlit wood at Hoersholm, gazed at the melancholy expression in the faces + of the horses and sheep. + + I made ducks and drakes and asked the others riddles. A woman came and + begged for help to bury her husband; he had had such an easy death. (She + is said to have killed him with a blow from a wooden shoe.) Sat under a + giant beech in Rungsted Wood; then had a splendid drive after the heavy + rain up to Folehave and thence to Hoersholm. Everything was as fresh and + lovely as in an enchanted land. What a freshness! The church and the + trees mirrored themselves in the lake. The device on my shield shall be + three lucky peas. [Footnote: There seems to be some such legendary + virtue attached in Denmark to a pea-pod containing _three_ or + _nine_ peas, as with us to a four-leaved clover.--[Translator's + note.]] To Vedbaek and back. We were going for a row. My hostess agreed, + but as we had a large, heavy and clumsy boat, they were all nervous. + Then Ludvig's rowlock snapped and he caught a crab. It was no wonder, as + he was rowing too deep. So I took both sculls myself. It was tiring to + pull the heavy boat with so many, but the sea was inexpressibly lovely, + the evening dead calm. Silver sheen on the water, visible to the + observant and initiated Nature-lover. Ripple from the west wind (GREEK: + phrhix). + + Grubbed in the shingle, and went to Folehave. Gathered flowers and + strawberries. My fingers still smell of strawberries. + + Went out at night. Pictures of my fancy rose around me. A Summer's + night, but as cold as Winter, the clouds banked up on the horizon. + Suppose in the wind and cold and dark I were to meet one I know! Over + the corn the wind whispered or whistled a name. The waves dashed in a + short little beat against the shore. It is only the sea that is as + Nature made it; the land in a thousand ways is robbed of its virginity + by human hands, but the sea now is as it was thousands of years ago. A + thick fog rose up. The birches bent their heads and went to sleep. But I + can hear the grass grow and the stars sing. + +Gradually my association with Ludvig David grew more and more intimate, +and the latter proved himself a constant friend. A few years after our +friendship had begun, when things were looking rather black for me, my +father having suffered great business losses, and no longer being able +to give me the same help as before, Ludvig David invited me to go and +live altogether at his father's house, and be like a son there--an offer +which I of course refused, but which affected me deeply, especially when +I learnt that it had only been made after the whole family had been +consulted. + + +X. + +In November, 1859, at exactly the same time as Kappers' "literary and +scientific" society was started, a fellow-student named Groenbeck, from +Falster, who knew the family of Caspar Paludan-Mueller, the historian, +proposed my joining another little society of young students, of whom +Groenbeck thought very highly on account of their altogether unusual +knowledge of books and men. + +In the old Students' Union in Boldhusgade, the only meeting-place at +that time for students, which was always regarded in a poetic light, I +had not found what I wanted. There was no life in it, and at the +convivial meetings on Saturday night the punch was bad, the speeches +were generally bad, and the songs were good only once in a way. + +I had just joined one new society, but I never rejected any prospect of +acquaintances from whom I could learn anything, and nothing was too much +for me. So I willingly agreed, and one evening late in November I was +introduced to the society so extolled by Groenbeck, which called itself +neither "literary" nor "scientific," had no other object than +sociability, and met at Ehlers' College, in the rooms of a young +philological student, Frederik Nutzhorn. + +Expecting as I did something out of the ordinary, I was very much +disappointed. The society proved to be quite vague and indefinite. Those +present, the host, a certain Jens Paludan-Mueller, son of the historian, +a certain Julius Lange, son of the Professor of Pedagogy, and a few +others, received me as though they had been waiting for me to put the +society on its legs; they talked as if I were going to do everything to +entertain them, and as if they themselves cared to do nothing; they +seemed to be indolent, almost sluggish. First we read aloud in turns +from Bjoernson's _Arne_, which was then new; a lagging conversation +followed. Nutzhorn talked nonsense, Paludan-Mueller snuffled, Julius +Lange alone occasionally let fall a humorous remark. The contrast +between Nutzhorn's band, who took sociability calmly and quietly, and +Kappers' circle, which met to work and discuss things to its utmost +capacity, was striking. The band seemed exceedingly phlegmatic in +comparison. + +This first impression was modified at subsequent meetings. As I talked +to these young men I discovered, first and foremost, how ignorant I was +of political history and the history of art; in the next place, I +seemed, in comparison with them, to be old in my opinions and my habits. +They called themselves Republicans, for instance, whereas Republicanism +in Denmark had in my eyes hitherto been mere youthful folly. Then again, +they were very unconventional in their habits. After a party near +Christmas time, which was distinguished by a pretty song by Julius +Lange, they proposed--at twelve o'clock at night!--that we should go to +Frederiksborg. And extravagances of this kind were not infrequent. + +Still it was only towards midsummer 1860 that I became properly merged +into the new circle and felt myself at home in it. It had been increased +by two or three first-rate fellows, Harald Paulsen, at the present time +Lord Chief Justice, a courageous young fellow, who was not afraid of +tackling any ruffian who interfered with him in a defile; Troels Lund, +then studying theology, later on the esteemed historian, who was always +refined, self-controlled, thoughtful, and on occasion caustic, great at +feints in the fencing class; and Emil Petersen, then studying law (died +in 1890, as Departmental Head of Railways), gentle, dreamy, exceedingly +conscientious, with a marked lyric tendency. + +One evening, shortly before Midsummer's eve, when we had gone out to +Vedbaek, fetched Emil Petersen from Tryggeroed and thoroughly enjoyed the +beautiful scenery, we had a wrestling match out in the water off +Skodsborg and a supper party afterwards at which, under the influence of +the company, the gaiety rose to a wild pitch and eventually passed all +bounds. We made speeches, sang, shouted our witticisms at each other all +at once, seized each other round the waist and danced, till we had to +stop for sheer tiredness. Then we all drank pledges of eternal +friendship, and trooped into the town together, and hammered at the +doors of the coffee-houses after midnight to try to get in somewhere +where we could have coffee. We had learnt all at once to know and +appreciate each other to the full; we were united by a feeling of +brotherhood and remained friends for life. The life allotted to several +of the little band was, it is true, but short; Jens Paludan-Mueller fell +at Sankelmark three and a half years later; Nutzhorn had only five years +and a half to live. Of the others, Emil Petersen and Julius Lange are +dead. But, whether our lives were long or short, our meetings frequent +or rare, we continued to be cordially attached to one another, and no +misunderstanding or ill-feeling ever cropped up between us. + + +XI. + +Among my Danish excursions was one to Slesvig in July, 1860. The +Copenhagen students had been asked to attend a festival to be held at +Angel at the end of July for the strengthening of the sparse Danish +element in that German-minded region. There were not many who wished to +go, but several of those who did had beautiful voices, and sang +feelingly the national songs with which it was hoped the hearts of the +Angel people, and especially of the ladies, might be touched. Several +gentlemen still living, at that time among the recognised leaders of the +students, went with us. + +We sailed from Korsoer to Flensborg one exquisite Summer night; we gave +up the berths we had secured and stayed all night on deck with a bowl of +punch. It was a starlight night, the ship cut rapidly through the calm +waters, beautiful songs were sung and high-flown speeches made. One +speech was held in a whisper, the one in honour of General de Meza, who +was still a universal favourite, and who was sitting in his stateroom, +waked up out of his sleep, with his white gloves and gaufred lace cuffs +on and a red and white night-cap on his head. We young ones only thought +of him as the man who, during the battle of Fredericia, had never moved +a muscle of his face, and when it was over had said quietly: "The result +is very satisfactory." + +Unfriendly and sneering looks from the windows at Flensborg very soon +showed the travellers that Danish students' caps were not a welcome +sight there. The Angel peasants, however, were very pleasant. The +festival, which lasted all day and concluded with dancing and fireworks, +was a great success, and a young man who had been carousing all night, +travelling all day, and had danced all the evening with pretty girls +till his senses were in a whirl, could not help regarding the scene of +the festival in a romantic light, as he stood there alone, late at +night, surrounded by flaring torches, the fireworks sputtering and +glittering about him. Some few of the students sat in the fields round +flaming rings of pitch, an old Angel peasant keeping the fires alight +and singing Danish songs. Absolutely enraptured, and with tears in his +eyes, he went about shaking hands with the young men and thanking them +for coming. It was peculiarly solemn and beautiful. + +Next day, when I got out at Egebaek station on my way from Flensborg, +intending to go to Idsted, it seemed that three other young men had had +the same idea, so we all four walked together. They were young men of a +type I had not met with before. The way they felt and spoke was new to +me. They all talked in a very affectionate manner, betrayed at once that +they worshipped one another, and seemed to have strong, open natures, +much resembling each other. They were Ernst Trier, Noerregaard, and +Baagoee, later the three well-known High School men. + +The little band arrived at a quick pace on Idsted's beautiful heath, all +tufts of ling, the red blossoms of which looked lovely in the light of +the setting sun. We sat ourselves down on the hill where Baudissin and +his staff had stood. Then Baagoee read aloud Hammerich's description of +the battle of Idsted, while each of us in his mind's eye saw the +seething masses of troops advance and fall upon one another, as they had +done just ten years before. + +Our time was short, if we wanted to get under a roof that night. At 9 +o'clock we were still eight miles from Slesvig. We did the first four at +a pace that was novel to me. Three-parts of the way we covered in forty- +five minutes, the last two miles took us twenty. When we arrived at the +hotel, there stood Madam Esselbach, of war renown, in the doorway, with +her hands on her hips, as in her portrait; she summed up the arrivals +with shrewd, sharp eyes, and exclaimed: "_Das ist ja das junge +Daenemark_." Inside, officers were sitting, playing cards. Major +Sommer promised us young men to show us Gottorp at 6 o'clock next +morning; we should then get a view of the whole of the town from +Hersterberg beforehand. + +The Major, who was attacked in the newspapers after the war, and whose +expression "my maiden sword," was made great fun of, showed us younger +ones the magnificent church, and afterwards the castle, which, as a +barracks, was quite spoilt. He acted as the father of the regiment, and, +like Poul Moeller's artist, encouraged the efficient, and said hard words +to the slighty, praising or blaming unceasingly, chatted Danish to the +soldiers, Low German to the cook, High German to the little housekeeper +at the castle, and called the attention of his guests to the perfect +order and cleanliness of the stables. He complained bitterly that a +certain senior lieutenant he pointed out to us, who in 1848 had flung +his cockade in the gutter and gone over to the Germans, had been +reinstated in the regiment, and placed over the heads of brave second- +lieutenants who had won their crosses in the war. + +Here I parted with my Grundtvigian friends. When I spoke of them to +Julius Lange on my return, he remarked: "They are a good sort, who wear +their hearts in their buttonholes as decorations." + +The society I fell in with for the rest of my journey was very droll. +This consisted of Borup, later Mayor of Finance, and a journalist named +Falkman (really Petersen), even at that time on the staff of _The +Dally Paper_. I little guessed then that my somewhat vulgar +travelling companion would develop into the Cato who wished Ibsen's +_Ghosts_ "might be thrust into the slime-pit, where such things +belong," and would write articles by the hundred against me. Neither had +I any suspicion, during my acquaintance with Topsoee, that the latter +would one day be one of my most determined persecutors. Without exactly +being strikingly youthful, the large, broad-shouldered Borup was still a +young man. Falkman wrote good-humouredly long reports to Bille about +Slesvig, which I corrected for him. Borup and Falkman generally +exclaimed the moment I opened my mouth: "Not seraphic, now!" + +We travelled together to Gluecksborg, saw the camp there, and, as we had +had nothing since our morning coffee at 5 o'clock, ate between the three +of us a piece of roast meat six pounds weight. We spent the night at +Flensborg and drove next day to Graasten along a lovely road with wooded +banks on either side. It was pouring with rain, and we sat in dead +silence, trying to roll ourselves up in horse-cloths. When in an hour's +time the rain stopped, and we put up at an inn, our enforced silence +gave place to the wildest merriment. We three young fellows--the future +Finance Minister as well--danced into the parlour, hopped about like +wild men, spilt milk over ourselves, the sofa, and the waitress; then +sprang, waltzing and laughing, out through the door again and up into +the carriage, after having heaped the girl with small copper coins. + +From Graasten we proceeded to Soenderborg. The older men lay down and +slept after the meal. I went up to Dybboelmoelle. On the way back, I found +on a hill looking out over Als a bench from which there was a beautiful +view across to Slesvig. I lay down on the seat and gazed up at the sky +and across the perfect country. The light fields, with their tall, dark +hedges, which give the Slesvig scenery its peculiar stamp, from this +high-lying position looked absolutely lovely. + + +XII. + +I was not given to looking at life in a rosy light. My nature, one +uninterrupted endeavour, was too tense for that. Although I occasionally +felt the spontaneous enjoyments of breathing the fresh air, seeing the +sun shine, and listening to the whistling of the wind, and always +delighted in the fact that I was in the heyday of my youth, there was +yet a considerable element of melancholy in my temperament, and I was so +loth to abandon myself to any illusion that when I looked into my own +heart and summed up my own life it seemed to me that I had never been +happy for a day. I did not know what it was to be happy for a whole day +at a time, scarcely for an hour. I had only known a moment's rapture in +the companionship of my comrades at a merry-making, in intercourse with +a friend, under the influence of the beauties of Nature, or the charm of +women, or in delight at gaining intellectual riches--during the reading +of a poem, the sight of a play, or when absorbed in a work of art. + +Any feeling that I was enriching my mind from those surrounding me was +unfortunately rare with me. Almost always, when talking to strangers, I +felt the exact opposite, which annoyed me exceedingly, namely, that I +was being intellectually sucked, squeezed like a lemon, and whereas I +was never bored when alone, in the society of other people I suffered +overwhelmingly from boredom. In fact, I was so bored by the visits +heaped upon me by my comrades and acquaintances, who inconsiderately +wasted my time, in order to kill a few hours, that I was almost driven +to despair; I was too young obstinately to refuse to see them. + +By degrees, the thought of the boredom that I suffered at almost all +social functions dominated my mind to such an extent that I wrote a +little fairy tale about boredom, by no means bad (but unfortunately +lost), round an idea which I saw several years later treated in another +way in Sibbern's well-known book of the year 2135. This fairy tale was +read aloud to Nutzhorn's band and met with its approval. + +But although I could thus by no means be called of a happy disposition, +I was, by reason of my overflowing youth, in a constant state of +elation, which, as soon as the company of others brought me out of my +usual balance, acted like exuberant mirth and made me burst out +laughing. + +I was noted, among my comrades, and not always to my advantage, for my +absolutely ungovernable risibility. I had an exceedingly keen eye for +the ridiculous, and easily influenced as I still was, I could not +content myself with a smile. Not infrequently, when walking about the +town, I used to laugh the whole length of a street. There were times +when I was quite incapable of controlling my laughter; I laughed like a +child, and it was incomprehensible to me that people could go so soberly +and solemnly about. If a person stared straight at me, it made me laugh. +If a girl flirted a little with me, I laughed in her face. One day I +went out and saw two drunken labourers, in a cab, each with a wreath on +his knee; I was obliged to laugh; I met an old dandy whom I knew, with +two coats on, one of which hung down below the other; I had to laugh at +that, too. Sometimes, walking or standing, absorbed in thoughts, I was +outwardly abstracted, and answered mechanically, or spoke in a manner +unsuited to my words; if I noticed this myself, I could not refrain from +laughing aloud at my own absent-mindedness. It occasionally happened +that at an evening party, where I had been introduced by the son of the +house to a stiff family to whom I was a stranger, and where the +conversation at table was being carried on in laboured monosyllables, I +would begin to laugh so unrestrainedly that every one stared at me in +anger or amazement. And it occasionally happened that when some sad +event, concerning people present, was being discussed, the recollection +of something comical I had seen or heard the same day would crop up in +my mind to the exclusion of all else, and I would be overtaken by fits +of laughter that were both incomprehensible and wounding to those round +me, but which it was impossible to me to repress. At funeral ceremonies, +I was in such dread of bursting out laughing that my attention would +involuntarily fix itself on everything it ought to avoid. This habit of +mine was particularly trying when my laughter had a ruffling effect on +others in a thing that I myself was anxious to carry through. Thus I +spoilt the first rehearsals of Sophocles' Greek play _Philoctetes_, +which a little group of students were preparing to act at the request of +Julius Lange. Some of them pronounced the Greek in an unusual manner, +others had forgotten their parts or acted badly--and that was quite +enough to set me off in a fit of laughter which I had difficulty in +stopping. Thus I often laughed, when I was tormented at being compelled +to laugh, in reality feeling melancholy, and mentally worried; I used to +think of Oechlenschlaeger's Oervarodd, who does not laugh when he is +happy, but breaks into a guffaw when he is deeply affected. + +These fits of laughter were in reality the outcome of sheer +youthfulness; with all my musings and reflection, I was still in many +ways a child; I laughed as boys and girls laugh, without being able to +stop, and especially when they ought not. But this painful trait in +myself directed my thoughts to the nature proper of laughter; I tried to +sum up to myself why I laughed, and why people in general laughed, +pondered, as well as I was capable of doing the question of what the +comical consisted of, and then recorded the fruits of my reflections in +my second long treatise, _On Laughter_, which has been lost. + +As I approached my twentieth year, these fits of laughter stopped. "I +have," wrote I at the time, "seen into that Realm of Sighs, on the +threshold of which I--like Parmeniscus after consulting the Oracle of +Trophonius--have suddenly forgotten how to laugh." + + +XIII. + +Meanwhile I had completed my eighteenth year and had to make my choice +of a profession. But what was I fitted for? My parents, and those other +of my relations whose opinions I valued, wished me to take up the law; +they thought that I might make a good barrister; but I myself held back, +and during my first year of study did not attend a single law lecture. +In July, 1860, after I had passed my philosophical examination (with +_Distinction_ in every subject), the question became urgent. +Whether I was likely to exhibit any considerable talent as a writer, it +was impossible for me to determine. There was only one thing that I felt +clear about, and that was that I should never be contented with a +subordinate position in the literary world; better a hundred times be a +judge in a provincial town. I felt an inward conviction that I should +make my way as a writer. It seemed to me that a deathlike stillness +reigned for the time being over European literature, but that there were +mighty forces working in the silence. I believed that a revival was +imminent. In August, 1860, I wrote in my private papers: "We Danes, with +our national culture and our knowledge of the literatures of other +countries, will stand well equipped when the literary horn of the Gods +resounds again through the world, calling fiery youth to battle. I am +firmly convinced that that time will come and that I shall be, if not +the one who evokes it in the North, at any rate one who will contribute +greatly towards it." + +One of the first books I had read as a student was Goethe's _Dichtung +und Wahrheit_, and this career had extraordinarily impressed me. In +my childlike enthusiasm I determined to read all the books that Goethe +says that he read as a boy, and thus commenced and finished +Winckelmann's collected works, Lessing's _Laocoon_ and other books +of artistic and archaeological research; in other words, studied the +history and philosophy of Art in the first instance under aspects which, +from the point of view of subsequent research, were altogether +antiquated, though in themselves, and in their day, valuable enough. + +Goethe's life fascinated me for a time to such an extent that I found +duplicates of the characters in the book everywhere. An old language +master, to whom I went early in the morning, in order to acquire from +him the knowledge of English which had not been taught me at school, +reminded me vividly, for instance, of the old dancing master in Goethe, +and my impression was borne out when I discovered that he, too, had two +pretty daughters. A more important point was that the book awoke in me a +restless thirst for knowledge, at the same time that I conceived a +mental picture of Goethe's monumental personality and began to be +influenced by the universality of his genius. + +Meanwhile, circumstances at home forced me, without further vacillation, +to take up some special branch of study. The prospects literature +presented were too remote. For Physics I had no talent; the logical bent +of my abilities seemed to point in the direction of the Law; so +Jurisprudentia was selected and my studies commenced. + +The University lectures, as given by Professors Aagesen and Gram, were +appalling; they consisted of a slow, sleepy dictation. A death-like +dreariness brooded always over the lecture halls. Aagesen was especially +unendurable; there was no trace of anything human or living about his +dictation. Gram had a kind, well-intentioned personality, but had barely +reached his desk than it seemed as though he, too, were saying: "I am a +human being, everything human is alien to me." + +We consequently had to pursue our studies with the help of a coach, and +the one whom I, together with Kappers, Ludvig David and a few others, +had chosen, Otto Algreen-Ussing, was both a capable and a pleasant +guide. Five years were yet to elapse before this man and his even more +gifted brother, Frederik, on the formation of the Loyal and Conservative +Society of August, were persecuted and ridiculed as reactionaries, by +the editors of the ascendant Press, who, only a few years later, proved +themselves to be ten times more reactionary themselves. Otto was +positively enthusiastic over Law; he used to declare that a barrister +"was the finest thing a man could be." + +However, he did not succeed in infecting me with his enthusiasm. I took +pains, but there was little in the subject that aroused my interest. +Christian the Fifth's _Danish Law_ attracted me exclusively on +account of its language and the perspicuity and pithiness of the +expressions occasionally made use of. + +With this exception what impressed me most of all that I heard in the +lessons was Anders Sandoee Oersted's _Interpretation of the Law_. +When I had read and re-read a passage of law which seemed to me to be +easily intelligible, and only capable of being understood in one way, +how could I do other than marvel and be seized with admiration, when the +coach read out Oersted's Interpretation, proving that the Law was +miserably couched, and could be expounded in three or four different +ways, all contradicting one another! But this Oersted very often did +prove in an irrefutable manner. + +In my lack of receptivity for legal details, and my want of interest in +Positive Law, I flung myself with all the greater fervour into the study +of what in olden times was called Natural Law, and plunged again and +again into the study of Legal Philosophy. + + +XIV. + +About the same time as my legal studies were thus beginning, I planned +out a study of Philosophy and Aesthetics on a large scale as well. My +day was systematically filled up from early morning till late at night, +and there was time for everything, for ancient and modern languages, for +law lessons with the coach, for the lectures in philosophy which +Professors H. Broechner and R. Nielsen were holding for more advanced +students, and for independent reading of a literary, scientific and +historic description. + +One of the masters who had taught me at school, a very erudite +philologian, now Dr. Oscar Siesbye, offered me gratuitous instruction, +and with his help several of the tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides, +various things of Plato's, and comedies by Plautus and Terence were +carefully studied. + +Frederik Nutzhorn read the _Edda_ and the _Niebelungenlied_ +with me in the originals; with Jens Paludan-Mueller I went through the +New Testament in Greek, and with Julius Lange, Aeschylus, Sophocles, +Pindar, Horace and Ovid, and a little of Aristotle and Theocritus. +Catullus, Martial and Caesar I read for myself. + +But I did not find any positive inspiration in my studies until I +approached my nineteenth year. In philosophy I had hitherto mastered +only a few books by Soeren Kierkegaard. But now I began a conscientious +study of Heiberg's philosophical writings and honestly endeavoured to +make myself familiar with his speculative logic. As Heiberg's _Prose +Writings_ came out, in the 1861 edition, they were studied with +extreme care. Heiberg's death in 1860 was a great grief to me; as a +thinker I had loved and revered him. The clearness of form and the +internal obscurity of his adaptation of Hegel's Teachings, gave one a +certain artistic satisfaction, at the same time that it provoked an +effort really to understand. + +But in the nature of things, Heiberg's philosophical life-work could not +to a student be other than an admission into Hegel's train of thought, +and an introduction to the master's own works. I was not aware that by +1860 Europe had long passed his works by in favour of more modern +thinking. With a passionate desire to reach a comprehension of the +truth, I grappled with the System, began with the Encyclopaedia, read +the three volumes of Aesthetics, The Philosophy of Law, the Philosophy +of History, the Phenomenology of the Mind, then the Philosophy of Law +again, and finally the Logic, the Natural Philosophy and the Philosophy +of the Mind in a veritable intoxication of comprehension and delight. +One day, when a young girl towards whom I felt attracted had asked me to +go and say good-bye to her before her departure, I forgot the time, her +journey, and my promise to her, over my Hegel. As I walked up and down +my room I chanced to pull my watch out of my pocket, and realised that I +had missed my appointment and that the girl must have started long ago. + +Hegel's Philosophy of Law had a charm for me as a legal student, partly +on account of the superiority with which the substantial quality of +Hegel's mind is there presented, and partly on account of the challenge +in the attitude of the book to accepted opinions and expressions, +"morality" here being almost the only thing Hegel objects to. + +But it was the book on Aesthetics that charmed me most of all. It was +easy to understand, and yet weighty, superabundantly rich. + +Again and again while reading Hegel's works I felt carried away with +delight at the new world of thought opening out before me. And when +anything that for a long time had been incomprehensible to me, at last +after tenacious reflection became clear, I felt what I myself called "an +unspeakable bliss." Hegel's system of thought, anticipatory of +experience, his German style, overburdened with arbitrarily constructed +technical words from the year 1810, which one might think would daunt a +young student of another country and another age, only meant to me +difficulties which it was a pleasure to overcome. Sometimes it was not +Hegelianism itself that seemed the main thing. The main thing was that I +was learning to know a world-embracing mind; I was being initiated into +an attempt to comprehend the universe which was half wisdom and half +poetry; I was obtaining an insight into a method which, if +scientifically unsatisfying, and on that ground already abandoned by +investigators, was fruitful and based upon a clever, ingenuous, highly +intellectual conception of the essence of truth; I felt myself put to +school to a great intellectual leader, and in this school I learnt to +think. + +I might, it is true, have received my initiation in a school built up on +more modern foundations; it is true that I should have saved much time, +been spared many detours, and have reached my goal more directly had I +been introduced to an empirical philosophy, or if Fate had placed me in +a school in which historical sources were examined more critically, but +not less intelligently, and in which respect for individuality was +greater. But such as the school was, I derived from it all the benefit +it could afford to my _ego_, and I perceived with delight that my +intellectual progress was being much accelerated. Consequently it did +not specially take from my feeling of having attained a measure of +scientific insight, when I learnt--what I had not known at first--that +my teachers, Hans Broechner, as well as Rasmus Nielsen, were agreed not +to remain satisfied with the conclusions of the German philosopher, had +"got beyond Hegel." At the altitude to which the study of philosophy had +now lifted me, I saw that the questions with which I had approached +Science were incorrectly formulated, and they fell away of themselves, +even without being answered. Words that had filled men's minds for +thousands of years, God, Infinity, Thought, Nature and Mind, Freedom and +Purpose, all these words acquired another and a deeper meaning, were +stamped with a new character, acquired a new value, and the depurated +ideas which they now expressed opposed each other, and combined with +each other, until the universe was seen pierced by a plexus of thoughts, +and resting calmly within it. + +Viewed from these heights, the petty and the every-day matters which +occupied the human herd seemed so contemptible. Of what account, for +instance, was the wrangling in the Senate and the Parliament of a little +country like Denmark compared with Hegel's vision of the mighty march, +inevitable and determined by spiritual laws, of the idea of Freedom, +through the world's History! And of what account was the daily gossip of +the newspapers, compared with the possibility now thrown open of a life +of eternal ideals, lived in and for them! + + +XV. + +I had an even deeper perception of my initiation when I went back from +Hegel to Spinoza and, filled with awe and enthusiasm, read the +_Ethica_ for the first time. Here I stood at the source of modern +pantheistic Philosophy. Here Philosophy was even more distinctly +Religion, since it took Religion's place. Though the method applied was +very artificial, purely mathematical, at least Philosophy had here the +attraction of a more original type of mind, the effect being much the +same as that produced by primitive painting, compared with a more +developed stage. His very expression, _God or Nature_, had a +fascinating mysticism about it. The chapter in the book which is devoted +to the Natural History of passions, surprised and enriched one by its +simple, but profound, explanation of the conditions of the human soul. +And although his fight against Superstition's views of life is conducted +with a keenness that scouts discussion, whereas in modern Philosophy the +contention is merely implied, it seemed as though his thoughts travelled +along less stormy paths. + +In Hegel, it had been exclusively the comprehensiveness of the thoughts +and the mode of the thought's procedure that held my attention. With +Spinoza it was different. It was his personality that attracted, the +great man in him, one of the greatest that History has known. With him a +new type had made its entrance into the world's History; he was the calm +thinker, looking down from above on this earthly life, reminding one, by +the purity and strength of his character, of Jesus, but a contrast to +Jesus, inasmuch as he was a worshipper of Nature and Necessity, and a +Pantheist. His teaching was the basis of the faith of the new age. He +was a Saint and a Heathen, seditious and pious, at the same time. + + +XVI. + +Still, while I was in this way making a purely mental endeavour to +penetrate into as many intellectual domains as I could, and to become +master of one subject after another, I was very far from being at peace +with regard to my intellectual acquisitions, or from feeling myself in +incontestable possession of them. While I was satisfying my desire for +insight or knowledge and, by glimpses, felt my supremest happiness in +the delight of comprehension, an ever more violent struggle was going on +in my emotions. + +As my being grew and developed within me and I slowly emerged from the +double state of which I had been conscious, in other words, the more I +became one and individual and strove to be honest and true, the less I +felt myself to be a mere individual, the more I realised that I was +bound up with humanity, one link in the chain, one organ belonging to +the Universe. The philosophical Pantheism I was absorbed by, itself +worked counter to the idea of individualism inherent in me, taught me +and presented to me the union of all beings in Nature the All-Divine. +But it was not from Pantheism that the crisis of my spiritual life +proceeded; it was from the fountains of emotion which now shot up and +filled my soul with their steady flow. A love for humanity came over me, +and watered and fertilised the fields of my inner world which had been +lying fallow, and this love of humanity vented itself in a vast +compassion. + +This gradually absorbed me till I could hardly bear the thought of the +suffering, the poor, the oppressed, the victims of Injustice. I always +saw them in my mind's eye, and it seemed to be my duty to work for them, +and to be disgraceful of me to enjoy the good things of life while so +many were being starved and tortured. Often as I walked along the +streets at night I brooded over these ideas till I knew nothing of what +was passing around me, but only felt how all the forces of my brain drew +me towards those who suffered. + +There were warm-hearted and benevolent men among my near relatives. The +man whom my mother's younger sister had married had his heart in the +right place, so much indeed that he no sooner saw or heard of distress +than his hand was in his pocket, although he had little from which to +give. My father's brother was a genuinely philanthropic man, who founded +one beneficent institution or society after the other, had an unusual +power of inducing his well-to-do fellow-townsmen to carry his schemes +through, and in the elaboration of them showed a perception and +practical sense that almost amounted to genius; this was the more +surprising since his intelligence was not otherwise remarkable for its +keenness and his reasoning methods were confused. But what I felt was +quite different. My feelings were not so easily roused as those of the +first-mentioned; I was not so good-natured or so quick to act as he. +Neither did they resemble those of my other uncle, who merely +represented compassion for those unfortunately situated, but was without +the least vestige of rebellious feeling against the conditions or the +people responsible for the misery; my uncle was always content with life +as it was, saw the hand of a loving Providence everywhere and was fully +and firmly convinced that he himself was led and helped by this same +Providence, which specially watched over the launching of his projects +for the welfare of mankind. No, my feeling was of quite another kind. +Nothing was farther removed from me than this sometimes quite childish +optimism. It was not enough for me to advertise the sufferings of a few +individuals and, when possible, alleviate them; I sought the causes of +them in brutality and injustice. Neither could I recognise the finger of +a Universal Ruler in a confusion of coincidences, conversations, +newspaper articles, and advice by prudent men, the outcome of all which +was the founding of a society for seamstresses or the erection of a +hospital to counteract the misery that the Controlling Power had Itself +occasioned. I was a child no longer, and in that sense never had been +childish. But my heart bled none the less with sympathy for society's +unfortunates. I did not as yet perceive the necessity of that +selfishness which is self-assertion, and I felt oppressed and tormented +by all that I, in my comparatively advantageous position as a non- +proletarian, enjoyed, while many others did not. + +Then another mood, with other promptings, asserted itself. I felt an +impulse to step forward as a preacher to the world around me, to the +thoughtless and the hardhearted. Under the influence of strong emotion I +wrote an edifying discourse, _The Profitable Fear_. I began to +regard it as my duty, so soon as I was fitted for it, to go out into the +town and preach at every street-corner, regardless of whether a lay +preacher, like myself, should encounter indifference or harvest scorn. + +This course attracted me because it presented itself to me under the +guise of the most difficult thing, and, with the perversity of youth, I +thought difficulty the only criterion of duty. I only needed to hit upon +something that seemed to me to be the right thing and then say to +myself: "You dare not do it!" for all the youthful strength and daring +that was in me, all my deeper feelings of honour and of pride, all my +love of grappling with the apparently insurmountable to unite, and in +face of this _You dare not_, satisfy myself that I did dare. + +As provisionally, self-abnegation, humility, and asceticism seemed to me +to be the most difficult things, for a time my whole spiritual life was +concentrated into an endeavour to attain them. Just at this time--I was +nineteen--my family was in a rather difficult pecuniary position, and I, +quite a poor student, was cast upon my own resources. I had consequently +not much of this world's goods to renounce. From a comfortable residence +in Crown Prince's Street, my parents had moved to a more modest flat in +the exceedingly unaristocratic Salmon Street, where I had an attic of +limited dimensions with outlook over roofs by day and a view of the +stars by night. Quiet the nights were not, inasmuch as the neighbouring +houses re-echoed with screams and shrieks from poor women, whom their +late-returning husbands or lovers thrashed in their cups. But never had +I felt myself so raised, so exhilarated, so blissfully happy, as in that +room. My days slipped by in ecstasy; I felt myself consecrated a +combatant in the service of the Highest. I used to test my body, in +order to get it wholly under my control, ate as little as possible, +slept as little as possible, lay many a night outside my bed on the bare +floor, gradually to make myself as hardy as I required to be. I tried to +crush the youthful sensuality that was awakening in me, and by degrees +acquired complete mastery over myself, so that I could be what I wished +to be, a strong and willing instrument in the fight for the victory of +Truth. And I plunged afresh into study with a passion and a delight that +prevented my perceiving any lack, but month after month carried me +along, increasing in knowledge and in mental power, growing from day to +day. + + +XVII. + +This frame of mind, however, was crossed by another. The religious +transformation in my mind could not remain clear and unmuddied, placed +as I was in a society furrowed through and through by different +religious currents, issued as I was from the European races that for +thousands of years had been ploughed by religious ideas. All the +atavism, all the spectral repetition of the thoughts and ideas of the +past that can lie dormant in the mind of the individual, leaped to the +reinforcement of the harrowing religious impressions which came to me +from without. + +It was not the attitude of my friends that impressed me. All my more +intimate friends were orthodox Christians, but the attempts which +various ones, amongst them Julius Lange, and Jens Paludan-Mueller, had +made to convert me had glanced off from my much more advanced thought +without making any impression. I was made of much harder metal than +they, and their attempts to alter my way of thinking did not penetrate +beyond my hide. To set my mind in vibration, there was needed a brain +that I felt superior to my own; and I did not find it in them. I found +it in the philosophical and religious writings of Soeren Kierkegaard, in +such works, for instance, as _Sickness unto Death_. + +The struggle within me began, faintly, as I approached my nineteenth +year. My point of departure was this: one thing seemed to me requisite, +to live in and for _The Idea_, as the expression for the highest at +that time was. All that rose up inimical to _The Idea_ or Ideal +merited to be lashed with scorn or felled with indignation. And one day +I penned this outburst: "Heine wept over _Don Quixote_. Yes, he was +right. I could weep tears of blood when I think of the book." But the +first thing needed was to acquire a clear conception of what must be +understood by the Ideal. Heiberg had regarded the uneducated as those +devoid of ideals. But I was quite sure myself that education afforded no +criterion. And I could find no other criterion of devotion to the Ideal +than a willingness to make sacrifices. If, I said, I prove myself less +self-sacrificing than any one of the wretches I am fighting, I shall +myself incur well-merited scorn. But if self-sacrifice were the +criterion, then Jesus, according to the teachings of tradition, was the +Ideal, for who as self-sacrificing as He? + +This was an inclined plane leading to the Christian spiritual life, and +a year later, when I was nearly twenty, I had proceeded so far on this +plane that I felt myself in all essentials in agreement with the +Christian mode of feeling, inasmuch as my life was ascetic, and my +searching, striving, incessantly working mind, not only found repose, +but rapture, in prayer, and was elated and fired at the idea of being +protected and helped by "God." + +But just as I was about to complete my twentieth year, the storm broke +out over again, and during the whole of the ensuing six months raged +with unintermittent violence. Was I, at this stage of my development, a +Christian or not? And if not, was it my duty to become a Christian? + +The first thought that arose was this: It is a great effort, a constant +effort, sometimes a minutely recurring effort, to attain moral mastery +over one's self, and though this certainly need not bring with it a +feeling of self-satisfaction, much less _ought_ to do so, it does +bring with it a recognition of the value of this self-mastery. How +strange, then, that Christianity, which commands its attainment, at the +same time declares it to be a matter of indifference to the revealed God +whether a man has lived morally or not, since Faith or lack of Faith is +the one condition upon which so-called Salvation depends! + +The next thought was this: It is only in the writings of Kierkegaard, in +his teachings concerning paradox, that Christianity appears so definite +that it cannot be confused with any other spiritual trend whatever. But +when one has to make one's choice between Pantheism and Christianity, +then the question arises, Are Kierkegaard's teachings really historic +Christianity, and not rather a rational adaptation? And this question +must be answered in the negative, since it is possible to assimilate it +without touching upon the question of the revelation of the Holy Ghost +in the shape of a dove, to the Voice from the clouds, and the whole +string of miracles and dogmas. + +The next thought again was this: Pantheism does not place any one +unconditional goal in front of man. The unbeliever passes his life +interested in the many aims that man, as man, has. The Pantheist will +therefore have difficulty in living a perfect ethical life. There are +many cases in which, by deviating from the strictly ethic code, you do +not harm anyone, you only injure your own soul. The Non-Believer will in +this case only hardly, for the sake of impersonal Truth, make up his +mind to the step which the God-fearing man will take actuated by his +passionate fear of offending God. + +Thus was I tossed backwards and forwards in my reflections. + + +XVIII. + +What I dreaded most was that if I reached a recognition of the truth, a +lack of courage would prevent me decisively making it my own. Courage +was needed, as much to undertake the burdens entailed by being a +Christian as to undertake those entailed by being a Pantheist. When +thinking of Christianity, I drew a sharp distinction between the +cowardice that shrunk from renunciation and the doubt that placed under +discussion the very question as to whether renunciation were duty. And +it was clear to me that, on the road which led to Christianity, doubt +must be overcome before cowardice--not the contrary, as Kierkegaard +maintains in his _For Self-Examination_, where he says that none of +the martyrs doubted. + +But my doubt would not be overcome. Kierkegaard had declared that it was +only to the consciousness of sin that Christianity was not horror or +madness. For me it was sometimes both. I concluded therefrom that I had +no consciousness of sin, and found this idea confirmed when I looked +into my own heart. For however violently at this period I reproached +myself and condemned my failings, they were always in my eyes weaknesses +that ought to be combatted, or defects that could be remedied, never +sins that necessitated forgiveness, and for the obtaining of this +forgiveness, a Saviour. That God had died for me as my Saviour,--I could +not understand what it meant; it was an idea that conveyed nothing to +me. + +And I wondered whether the inhabitants of another planet would be able +to understand how on the Earth that which was contrary to all reason was +considered the highest truth. + + +XIX. + +With Pantheism likewise I was on my guard against its being lack of +courage, rather than a conviction of its untruth, which held me back +from embracing it. I thought it a true postulate that everything seemed +permeated and sustained by a Reason that had not human aims in front of +it and did not work by human means, a Divine Reason. Nature could only +be understood from its highest forms; the Ideal, which revealed itself +to the world of men at their highest development, was present, in +possibility and intent, in the first germ, in the mist of primeval +creation, before it divided itself into organic and inorganic elements. +The whole of Nature was in its essence Divine, and I felt myself at +heart a worshipper of Nature. + +But this same Nature was indifferent to the weal or woe of humans. It +obeyed its own laws regardless of whether men were lost thereby; it +seemed cruel in its callousness; it took care that the species should be +preserved, but the individual was nothing to it. + +Now, like all other European children, I had been brought up in the +theory of personal immortality, a theory which, amongst other things, is +one way of expressing the immense importance, the eternal importance, +which is attributed to each individual. The stronger the feeling of his +own _ego_ that the individual has, the more eagerly he necessarily +clings to the belief that he cannot be annihilated. But to none could +the belief be more precious than to a youth who felt his life pulsate +within, as if he had twenty lives in himself and twenty more to live. It +was impossible to me to realise that I could die, and one evening, about +a year later, I astonished my master, Professor Broechner, by confessing +as much. "Indeed," said Broechner, "are you speaking seriously? You +cannot realise that you will have to die one day? How young! You are +very different from me, who always have death before my eyes." + +But although my vitality was so strong that I could not imagine my own +death, I knew well enough that my terrestrial life, like all other +men's, would come to an end. But I felt all the more strongly that it +was impossible everything could be at an end then; death could not be a +termination; it could only, as the religions preached and as eighteenth- +century Deism taught, be a moment of transition to a new and fuller +existence. In reward and punishment after death I could not believe; +those were mediaeval conceptions that I had long outgrown. But the dream +of immortality I could not let go. And I endeavoured to hold it fast by +virtue of the doctrine of the impossibility of anything disappearing. +The quantity of matter always remained the same; energy survived every +transformation. + +Still, I realised that this could not satisfy one, as far as the form +which we term individuality was concerned. What satisfaction was it to +Alexander that his dust should stop a bung-hole? or to Shakespeare that +Romeo and Juliet were acted in Chicago? So I took refuge in parallels +and images. Who could tell whether the soul, which on earth had been +blind to the nature of the other life, did not, in death, undergo the +operation which opened its eyes? Who could tell whether death were not, +as Sibbern had suggested, to be compared with a birth? Just as the +unborn life in its mother's womb would, if it were conscious, believe +that the revolution of birth meant annihilation, whereas it was for the +first time awakening to a new and infinitely richer life, so it was +perhaps for the soul in the dreaded moment of death.... + +But when I placed before my master these comparisons and the hopes I +built upon them, they were swept away as meaningless; he pointed out +simply that nothing went to prove a continuation of personality after +death, while on the contrary everything argued against it,--and to this +I could not refuse my assent. + +Then I understood that in what I called Pantheism, the immortality of +the individual had no place. And a slow, internal struggle commenced for +renunciation of the importance and value of the individual. I had many a +conversation on this point with my teacher, a man tired of life and +thoroughly resigned. + +He always maintained that the desire of the individual for a +continuation of personality was nothing but the outcome of vanity. He +would very often put the question in a comical light. He related the +following anecdote: In summer evenings he used to go for a walk along +the Philosopher's Avenue (now West Rampart Street). Here he had +frequently met, sitting on their benches, four or five old gentlemen who +took their evening ramble at the same time; by degrees they made each +other's acquaintance and got into conversation with one another. It +turned out that the old gentlemen were candle-makers who had retired +from business and now had considerable difficulty in passing their time +away. In reality they were always bored, and they yawned incessantly. +These men had one theme only, to which they always recurred with +enthusiasm--their hope in personal immortality for all eternity. And it +amused Broechner that they, who in this life did not know how to kill so +much as one Sunday evening, should be so passionately anxious to have a +whole eternity to fill up. His pupil then caught a glimpse himself of +the grotesqueness of wishing to endure for millions of centuries, which +time even then was nothing in comparison with eternity. + + +XX. + +But in spite of it all, it was a hard saying, that in the pantheistic +view of life the absorption of the individual into the great whole took +the place of the continued personal existence which was desired by the +_ego_. But what frightened me even more was that the divine All was +not to be moved or diverted by prayer. But pray I had to. From my +earliest childhood I had been accustomed, in anxiety or necessity, to +turn my thoughts towards a Higher Power, first forming my needs and +wishes into words, and then later, without words, concentrating myself +in worship. It was a need inherited from many hundreds of generations of +forefathers, this need of invoking help and comfort. Nomads of the +plains, Bedouins of the desert, ironclad warriors, pious priests, roving +sailors, travelling merchants, the citizen of the town and the peasant +in the country, all had prayed for centuries, and from the very dawn of +time; the women, the hundreds and hundreds of women from whom I was +descended, had centred all their being in prayer. It was terrible, never +to be able to pray again.... Never to be able to fold one's hands, never +to raise one's eyes above, but to live, shut in overhead, alone in the +universe! + +If there were no eye in Heaven that watched over the individual, no ear +that understood his plaint, no hand that protected him in danger, then +he was placed, as it were, on a desolate steppe where the wolves were +howling. + +And in alarm I tried once more the path towards religious quietude that +I had recently deemed impracticable,--until the fight within me calmed +again, and in renunciation I forced my emotion to bow to what my reason +had acknowledged as the Truth. + + + + +ADOLESCENCE + +Julius Lange--A New Master--Inadaption to the Law--The University Prize +Competition--An Interview with the Judges--Meeting of Scandinavian +Students--The Paludan-Muellers--Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson--Magdalene +Thoresen--The Gold Medal--The Death of King Frederik VII--The Political +Situation--My Master of Arts Examination--War--_Admissus cum laude +praecipua_--Academical Attention--Lecturing--Music--Nature--A Walking +Tour--In Print--Philosophical Life in Denmark--Death of Ludwig David-- +Stockholm. + + +I. + +Among my many good comrades, there was one, Julius Lange, with whom +comradeship had developed into friendship, and this friendship again +assumed a passionate character. We were the two, who, of them all, were +most exactly suited to one another, completed one another. Fundamentally +different though we were, we could always teach each other something. We +grew indispensable to one another; for years there seldom a day went by +that we did not meet. The association with his junior cannot possibly +have given Julius Lange a delight corresponding to that which his +society gave me. Intellectually equal, we were of temperaments +diametrically opposed. Having the same love of Art and the same +enthusiasm for Art,--save that the one cared more for its pictorial and +the other for its literary expression,--we were of mutual assistance to +one another in the interchange of thoughts and information. Entirely at +variance in our attitude towards religious tradition, in our frequent +collisions we were both perpetually being challenged to a critical +inspection of our intellectual furniture. But I was the one who did the +worshipping. + +When Julius Lange, on December 17, 1861, after having twice been to see +me and found me out, the third time met with me and informed me: "I have +received an invitation to go to Italy on Saturday and be away five +months," was, though surprised, exceedingly glad for my friend's sake, +but at the same time I felt as if I had received a blow in the face. +What would become of me, not only during the interval, but afterwards? +Who could say whether Lange would ever come back, or whether he would +not come back changed? How should I be able to endure my life! I should +have to work tremendously hard, to be able to bear the loss of him. I +could hardly understand how I should be able to exist when I could no +longer, evening after evening, slip up to my friend's little room to sit +there in calm, quiet contentment, seeing pictures and exchanging +thoughts! It was as though a nerve had been cut. I only then realised +that I had never loved any man so much. I had had four eyes; now I had +only two again; I had had two brains; now I had only one; in my heart I +had felt the happiness of two human beings; now only the melancholy of +one was left behind. + +There was not a painting, a drawing, a statue or a bas-relief in the +galleries and museums of Copenhagen that we had not studied together and +compared our impressions of. We had been to Thorwaldsen's Museum +together, we went together to Bissen's studio, where in November, 1861, +I met for the first time my subsequent friends, Vilhelm Bissen and +Walter Runeberg. The memory of Julius Lange was associated in my mind +with every picture of Hobbema, Dubbels or Ruysdael, Rembrandt or Rubens, +every reproduction of Italian Renaissance art, every photograph of +church or castle. And I myself loved pictures even more ardently than +poetry. I was fond of comparing my relations with literature to +affection for a being of the same sex; my passion for pictures to the +stormy passion of a youth for a woman. It is true that I knew much less +about Art than about Poetry, but that made no difference. I worshipped +my favourite artists with a more impetuous enthusiasm than any of my +favourite authors. And this affection for pictures and statuary was a +link between my friend and myself. When we were sitting in my room +together, and another visitor happened to be there, I positively +suffered over the sacrifice of an hour's enjoyment and when Lange got up +to go, I felt as though a window had been slammed to, and the fresh air +shut out. + + +II. + +I had for a long time pursued my non-juridic studies as well as I could +without the assistance of a teacher. But I had felt the want of one. And +when a newly appointed docent at the University, Professor H. Broechner, +offered instruction in the study of Philosophy to any who cared to +present themselves at his house at certain hours, I had felt strongly +tempted to take advantage of his offer. I hesitated for some time, for I +was unwilling to give up the least portion of my precious freedom; I +enjoyed my retirement, the mystery of my modest life of study, but on +the other hand I could not grapple with Plato and Aristotle without the +hints of a competent guide as to the why and wherefore. + +I was greatly excited. I had heard Professor Broechner speak on +Psychology, but his diction was handled with such painful care, was so +monotonous and sounded so strange, that it could not fail to alarm. It +was only the professor's distinguished and handsome face that attracted +me, and in particular his large, sorrowful eyes, with their beautiful +expression, in which one read a life of deep research--and tears. Now, I +determined to venture up to Broechner. But I had not the courage to +mention it to my mother beforehand, for fear speaking of it should +frighten me from my resolution, so uneasy did I feel about the step I +was taking. When the day which I had fixed upon for the attempt arrived +--it was the 2nd of September, 1861,--I walked up and down in front of +the house several times before I could make up my mind to go upstairs; I +tried to calculate beforehand what the professor would say, and what it +would be best for me to reply, interminably. + +The tall, handsome man with the appearance of a Spanish knight, opened +the door himself and received the young fellow who was soon to become +his most intimate pupil, very kindly. To my amazement, as soon as he +heard my name, he knew which school I had come from and also that I had +recently become a student. He vigorously dissuaded me from going through +a course of Plato and Aristotle, saying it would be too great a strain-- +said, or implied, that I should be spared the difficult path he had +himself traversed, and sketched out a plan of study of more modern +Philosophy and Aesthetics. His manner inspired confidence and left +behind it the main impression that he wished to save the beginner all +useless exertion. All the same, with my youthful energy, I felt, as I +went home, a shade disappointed that I was not to begin the History of +Philosophy from the beginning. + +My visit was soon repeated, and a most affectionate intimacy quickly +sprang up between master and pupil, revealed on the side of the elder, +in an attitude of fatherly goodwill to which the younger had hitherto +been a stranger, the teacher, while instructing his pupil and giving him +practical guidance, constantly keeping in view all that could further +his well-being and assist his future; my attitude was one of reverence +and affection, and of profound gratitude for the care of which I was the +object. + +I certainly, sometimes, in face of my master's great thoroughness and +his skill in wrestling with the most difficult thoughts, felt a painful +distrust of my own capacity and of my own intellectual powers, compared +with his. I was also not infrequently vexed by a discordant note, as it +were, being struck in our intercourse, when Broechner, despite the doubts +and objections I brought forward, always took it for granted that I +shared his pantheistic opinions, without perceiving that I was still +tossed about by doubts, and fumbling after a firm foothold. But the +confidential terms upon which I was with the maturer man had an +attraction for me which my intimacy with undecided and youthfully +prejudiced comrades necessarily lacked; he had the experience of a +lifetime behind him, he looked down from superior heights on the +sympathies and antipathies of a young man. + +To me, for instance, Ploug's _The Fatherland_ was at that time +Denmark's most intellectual organ, whereas Bille's _Daily Paper_ +disgusted me, more particularly on account of the superficiality and the +tone of finality which distinguished its literary criticisms. Broechner, +who, with not unmixed benevolence, and without making any special +distinction between the two, looked down on both these papers of the +educated mediocrity, saw in his young pupil's bitterness against the +trivial but useful little daily, only an indication of the quality of +his mind. Broechner's mere manner, as he remarked one day with a smile, +"You do not read _The Daily Paper_ on principle," made me perceive +in a flash the comicality of my indignation over such articles as it +contained. My horizon was still sufficiently circumscribed for me to +suppose that the state of affairs in Copenhagen was, in and of itself, +of importance. I myself regarded my horizon as wide. One day, when +making a mental valuation of myself, I wrote, with the naivete of +nineteen, "My good qualities, those which will constitute my +personality, if I ever become of any account, are a mighty and ardent +enthusiasm, a thorough authority in the service of Truth, _a wide +horizon_ and philosophically trained thinking powers. These must make +up for my lack of humour and facility." + +It was only several years after the beginning of our acquaintance that I +felt myself in essential agreement with Hans Broechner. I had been +enraptured by a study of Ludwig Feuerbach's books, for Feuerbach was the +first thinker in whose writings I found the origin of the idea of God in +the human mind satisfactorily explained. In Feuerbach, too, I found a +presentment of ideas without circumlocution and without the usual heavy +formulas of German philosophy, a conquering clarity, which had a very +salutary effect on my own way of thinking and gave me a feeling of +security. If for many years I had been feeling myself more conservative +than my friend and master, there now came a time when in many ways I +felt myself to be more liberal than he, with his mysterious life in the +eternal realm of mind of which he felt himself to be a link. + + +III. + +I had not been studying Jurisprudence much more than a year before it +began to weigh very heavily upon me. The mere sight of the long rows of +_Schou's Ordinances_, which filled the whole of the back of my +writing-table, were a daily source of vexation. I often felt that I +should not be happy until the Ordinances were swept from my table. And +the lectures were always so dreary that they positively made me think of +suicide--and I so thirsty of life!--as a final means of escape from the +torment of them. I felt myself so little adapted to the Law that I +wasted my time with Hamlet-like cogitations as to how I could give up +the study without provoking my parents' displeasure, and without +stripping myself of all prospects for the future. And for quite a year +these broodings grew, till they became a perfect nightmare to me. + +I had taken a great deal of work upon myself; I gave lessons every day, +that I might have a little money coming in, took lessons myself in +several subjects, and not infrequently plunged into philosophical works +of the past, that were too difficult for me, such as the principal works +of Kant. Consequently when I was nineteen, I begun to feel my strength +going. I felt unwell, grew nervous, had a feeling that I could not draw +a deep breath, and when I was twenty my physical condition was a violent +protest against overwork. One day, while reading Kant's _Kritik der +Urteilskraft_, I felt so weak that I was obliged to go to the doctor. +The latter recommended physical exercises and cold shower-baths. + +The baths did me good, and I grew so accustomed to them that I went on +taking them and have done so ever since. I did my gymnastic exercises +with a Swede named Nycander, who had opened an establishment for Swedish +gymnastics in Copenhagen. + +There I met, amongst others, the well-known Icelandic poet and +diplomatist, Grimur Thomsen, who bore the title of Counsellor of +Legation. His compatriots were very proud of him. Icelandic students +declared that Grimur possessed twelve dress shirts, three pairs of +patent leather boots, and had embraced a marchioness in Paris. At +gymnastics, Grimur Thomsen showed himself audacious and not seldom +coarse in what he said and hinted. It is true that by reason of my youth +I was very susceptible and took offence at things that an older man +would have heard without annoyance. + + +IV. + +I continued to be physically far from strong. Mentally, I worked +indefatigably. The means of deciding the study question that, after long +reflection, seemed to me most expedient, was this: I would compete for +one of the University prizes, either the aesthetic or the philosophical, +and then, if I won the gold medal, my parents and others would see that +if I broke with the Law it was not from idleness, but because I really +had talents in another direction. + +As early as 1860 I had cast longing eyes at the prize questions that had +been set, and which hung up in the Entrance Hall of the University. But +none of them were suited to me. In 1861 I made up my mind to attempt a +reply, even if the questions in themselves should not be attractive. + +There was amongst them one on the proper correlation between poetic +fiction and history in the historical romances. The theme in itself did +not particularly fascinate me; but I was not ignorant of the subject, +and it was one that allowed of being looked at in a wide connection, +i.e., the claims of the subject as opposed to the imagination of the +artist, in general. I was of opinion that just as in sculpture the human +figure should not be represented with wings, but the conception of its +species be observed, so the essential nature of a past age should be +unassailed in historic fiction. Throughout numerous carefully elaborated +abstractions, extending over 120 folio pages, and in which I aimed at +scientific perspicuity, I endeavoured to give a soundly supported theory +of the limits of inventive freedom in Historical Romance. The +substructure was so painstaking that it absorbed more than half of the +treatise. Quite apart from the other defects of this tyro handiwork, it +lauded and extolled an aesthetic direction opposed to that of both the +men who were to adjudicate upon it. Hegel was mentioned in it as "The +supreme exponent of Aesthetics, a man whose imposing greatness it is +good to bow before." I likewise held with his emancipated pupil, Fr. Th. +Vischer, and vindicated him. Of Danish thinkers, J.L. Heiberg and S. +Kierkegaard were almost the only ones discussed. + +Heiberg was certainly incessantly criticised, but was treated with +profound reverence and as a man whose slightest utterance was of +importance. Sibbern's artistic and philosophical researches, on the +other hand, were quite overlooked, indeed sometimes Vischer was praised +as being the first originator of psychological developments, which +Sibbern had suggested many years before him. I had, for that matter, +made a very far from sufficient study of Sibbern's researches, which +were, partly, not systematic enough for me, and partly had repelled me +by the peculiar language in which they were couched. + +Neither was it likely that this worship of Heiberg, which undeniably +peeped out through all the proofs of imperfections and self- +contradictions in him, would appeal to Hauch. + +When I add that the work was youthfully doctrinaire, in language not +fresh, and that in its skeleton-like thinness it positively tottered +under the weight of its definitions, it is no wonder that it did not win +the prize. The verdict passed upon it was to the effect that the +treatise was thorough in its way, and that it would have been awarded +the prize had the question asked been that of determining the +correlation between History and Fiction in general, but that under the +circumstances it dwelt too cursorily on Romance and was only deemed +deserving of "a very honourable mention." + +Favourable as this result was, it was nevertheless a blow to me, who had +made my plans for the following years dependent on whether I won the +prize or not. Julius Lange, who knocked at my door one evening to tell +me the result, was the witness of my disappointment. "I can understand," +he said, "that you should exclaim: _'Oleum et operam perdidi!'_, +but you must not give up hope for so little. It is a good thing that you +prohibited the opening of the paper giving your name in the event of the +paper not winning the prize, for no one will trouble their heads about +the flattering criticism and an honourable mention would only harm you +in People's eyes; it would stamp you with the mark of mediocrity." + + +V. + +The anonymous recipient of the honourable mention nevertheless +determined to call upon his judges, make their acquaintance, and let +them know who he was. + +I went first to Hauch, who resided at that time at Frederiksberg Castle, +in light and lofty rooms. Hauch appeared exaggeratedly obliging, the old +man of seventy and over paying me, young man as I was, one compliment +after the other. The treatise was "extraordinarily good," they had been +very sorry not to give me the prize; but I was not to bear them any ill- +will for that; they had acted as their consciences dictated. In eighteen +months I should be ready to take my Magister examination; the old poet +thought he might venture to prophesy that I should do well. He was +surprised at his visitor's youth, could hardly understand how at my age +I could have read and thought so much, and gave me advice as to the +continuation of my studies. + +Sibbern was as cordial as Hauch had been polite and cautious. It was +very funny that, whereas Hauch remarked that he himself had wished to +give me the prize with an _although_ in the criticism, but that +Sibbern had been against it, Sibbern declared exactly the reverse; in +spite of all its faults he had wanted to award the medal, but Hauch had +expressed himself adverse. Apparently they had misunderstood one +another; but in any case the result was just, so there was nothing to +complain of. + +Sibbern went into the details of the treatise, and was stricter than +Hauch. He regretted that the main section of the argument was deficient; +the premises were too prolix. He advised a more historic, less +philosophical study of Literature and Art. He was pleased to hear of the +intimate terms I was on with Broechner, whereas Hauch would have +preferred my being associated with Rasmus Nielsen, whom he jestingly +designated "a regular brown-bread nature." When the treatise was given +back to me, I found it full of apt and instructive marginal notes from +Sibbern's hand. + +Little as I had gained by my unsuccessful attempt to win this prize, and +unequivocally as my conversation with the practical Sibbern had proved +to me that a post as master in my mother tongue at a Grammar-school was +all that the Magister degree in Aesthetics was likely to bring me, +whereas from my childhood I had made up my mind that I would never be a +master in a school, this conversation nevertheless ripened my +determination to give up my law studies, but of course only when by +successfully competing for the prize the next year I had satisfactorily +proved my still questionable ability. + + +VI. + +The Meeting of Scandinavian students at Copenhagen in June, 1862, taught +me what it meant to be a Scandinavian. Like all the other +undergraduates, I was Scandinavian at heart, and the arrangements of the +Meeting were well calculated to stir the emotions of youth. Although, an +insignificant Danish student, I did not take part in the expedition to +North Zealand specially arranged for our guests, consequently neither +was present at the luncheon given by Frederik VII to the students at +Fredensborg (which was interrupted by a heavy shower), I was +nevertheless deeply impressed by the Meeting. + +It was a fine sight to behold the students from the three other +Scandinavian Universities come sailing across the Sound from Malmoe to +Copenhagen. The Norwegians were especially striking, tall and straight, +with narrow faces under tasseled caps, like a wood of young fir trees; +the national type was so marked that at first I could hardly see any +difference between them. + +For me, there were three perfect moments during the festivities. The +first was at the meeting of all the students in the Square of Our Lady, +after the arrival of the visitors, when the scholars of the Metropolitan +School, crowding the windows of the building, greeted them with a shout +of delight. There was such a freshness, such a childish enthusiasm about +it, that some of us had wet eyes. It was as though the still distant +future were acclaiming the young ones now advancing to the assault, and +promising them sympathy and conquest. + +The second was when the four new flags embroidered by Danish ladies for +the students were consecrated and handed over. Clausen's speech was full +of grandeur, and addressed, not to the recipients, but to the flags as +living beings: "Thou wilt cross the Baltic to the sanctuary at Upsala. +Thou wilt cross the Cattegat to the land of rocks...." and the address +to each of the flags concluded: "Fortune and Honour attend thee!" The +evening after the consecration of the flags, there was a special +performance at the Royal Theatre for the members of the Meeting, at +which Heiberg, radiant as she always was, and saluted with well-merited +enthusiasm, played _Sophie_ in the vaudeville "_No_," with a +rosette of the Scandinavian colours at her waist. Then it was that +Paludan-Mueller's prologue, recited by our idolised actor, Michael Wiehe, +caused me the third thrilling moment. Listening to the words of the poet +from a bad place in the gallery, I was hardly the only one who felt +strangely stirred, as Wiehe, letting his eyes roam round the theatre, +said: + + Oh! that the young of the North might one day worthily play + Their part! Oh that each one might do his best + For the party he has chosen! That never there be lack + Of industry, fidelity, strength and talents! + And may he firm step forth, the mighty genius + (_Mayhap, known only to the secret power within him, + Seated amongst us now_), the mighty genius, + Who, as Fate hath willed it, is to play + The mighty part and do the mighty things. + +Involuntarily we looked round, seeking for the one to whom the poet's +summons referred. + +The general spirit of this Meeting has been called flat in comparison +with that pervading former meetings. It did not strike the younger +participants so. A breath of Scandinavianism swept over every heart; one +felt borne along on a historic stream. It seemed like a bad dream that +the peoples of the North had for so many centuries demolished and laid +waste each other, tapped one another for blood and gold, rendered it +impossible for the North to assert herself and spread her influence in +Europe. + +One could feel at the Meeting, though very faintly, that the Swedes and +Norwegians took more actual pleasure in each other, and regarded +themselves as to a greater extent united than either of them looked upon +themselves as united with the Danes, who were outside the political +Union. I was perhaps the only Dane present who fancied I detected this, +but when I mentioned what I thought I observed to a gifted young +Norwegian, so far was he from contradicting me that he merely replied: +"Have you noticed that, too?" + +Notwithstanding, during the whole of the Meeting, one constantly heard +expressed on every hand the conviction that if Germany were shortly to +declare war against Denmark--which no one doubted--the Swedes and +Norwegians would most decidedly not leave the Danes in the lurch. The +promise was given oftener than it was asked. Only, of course, it was +childish on the part of those present at the Meeting to regard such +promises, given by the leaders of the students, and by the students +themselves in festive mood, as binding on the nations and their +statesmen. + +I did not make any intellectually inspiring acquaintances through the +Meeting, although I was host to two Upsala students; neither of them, +however, interested me. I got upon a friendly footing through mutual +intellectual interests with Carl von Bergen, later so well known as an +author, he, like myself, worshipping philosophy and hoping to contribute +to intellectual progress. Carl von Bergen was a self-confident, +ceremonious Swede, who had read a great many books. At that time he was +a new Rationalist, which seemed to promise one point of interest in +common; but he was a follower of the Bostroem philosophy, and as such an +ardent Theist. At this point we came into collision, my researches and +reflections constantly tending to remove me farther from a belief in any +God outside the world, so that after the Meeting Carl von Bergen and I +exchanged letters on Theism and Pantheism, which assumed the width and +thickness of treatises. For very many years the Swedish essayist and I +kept up a friendly, though intermittent intercourse. Meanwhile von +Bergen, whose good qualities included neither character nor originality, +inclined, as years went on, more and more towards Conservatism, and at +forty years old he had attained to a worship of what he had detested, +and a detestation of what he had worshipped. His vanity simultaneously +assumed extraordinary proportions. In a popular Encyclopaedia, which he +took over when the letter B was to be dealt with, and, curiously enough, +disposed of shortly afterwards, _von Bergen_ was treated no less in +detail than _Buonaparte_. He did battle with some of the best men +and women in Sweden, such as Ellen Key and Knut Wicksell, who did not +fail to reply to him. When in 1889 his old friend from the Students' +Meeting gave some lectures on Goethe in Stockholm, he immediately +afterwards directed some poor opposition lectures against him, which +neither deserved nor received any reply. It had indeed become a +specialty of his to give "opposition lectures." When he died, some few +years later, what he had written was promptly forgotten. + +There was another young Swedish student whom I caught a glimpse of for +the first time at the Students' Meeting, towards whom I felt more and +more attracted, and who eventually became my friend. This was the +darling of the gods, Carl Snoilsky. At a fete in Rosenborg Park, amongst +the songs was one which, with my critical scent, I made a note of. It +was by the then quite unknown young Count Snoilsky, and it was far from +possessing the rare qualities, both of pith and form, that later +distinguished his poetry; but it was a poet's handiwork, a troubadour +song to the Danish woman, meltingly sweet, and the writer of it was a +youth of aristocratic bearing, regular, handsome features, and smooth +brown hair, a regular Adonis. The following year he came again, drawn by +strong cords to Christian Winther's home, loving the old poet like a +son, as Swinburne loved Victor Hugo, sitting at Mistress Julie Winther's +feet in affectionate admiration and semi-adoration, although she was +half a century old and treated him as a mother does a favourite child. + +It was several years, however, before there was any actual friendship +between the Swedish poet and myself. He called upon me one day in my +room in Copenhagen, looking exceedingly handsome in a tight-fitting +waistcoat of blue quilted silk. In the absence of the Swedo-Norwegian +Ambassador, he was Charge d'Affaires in Copenhagen, after, in his +capacity as diplomatic attache, having been stationed in various parts +of the world and, amongst others, for some time in Paris. He could have +no warmer admirer of his first songs than myself, and we very frequently +spent our evenings together in Bauer's wine room--talking over +everything in Scandinavian, English, or French literature which both of +us had enthusiastically and critically read. On many points our verdicts +were agreed. + +There came a pause in Snoilsky's productive activity; he was depressed. +It was generally said, although it sounded improbable, that he had had +to promise his wife's relations to give up publishing verse, they +regarding it as unfitting the dignity of a noble. In any case, he was at +that time suffering under a marriage that meant to him the deprivation +of the freedom without which it was impossible to write. Still, he never +mentioned these strictly personal matters. But one evening that we were +together, Snoilsky was so overcome by the thought of his lack of freedom +that tears suddenly began to run down his cheeks. He was almost +incapable of controlling himself again, and when we went home together +late at night, poured out a stream of melancholy, half-despairing +remarks. + +A good eighteen months later we met again in Stockholm; Snoilsky was +dignified and collected. But when, a few years later, so-called public +opinion in Sweden began to rave against the poet for the passion for his +second wife which so long made him an exile from his country, I often +thought of that evening. + +As years passed by, his outward bearing became more and more reserved +and a trifle stiff, but he was the same at heart, and no one who had +known him in the heyday of his youth could cease to love him. + + +VII. + +A month after the Students' Meeting, at the invitation of my friend Jens +Paludan-Mueller, I spent a few weeks at his home at Nykjoebing, in the +island of Falster, where his father, Caspar Paludan-Mueller, the +historian, was at the time head master of the Grammar-school. Those were +rich and beautiful weeks, which I always remembered later with +gratitude. + +The stern old father with his leonine head and huge eyebrows impressed +one by his earnestness and perspicacity, somewhat shut off from the +world as he was by hereditary deafness. The dignified mistress of the +house likewise belonged to a family that had made its name known in +Danish literature. She was a Rosenstand-Goeiske. Jens was a cordial and +attentive host, the daughters were all of them women out of the +ordinary, and bore the impress of belonging to a family of the highest +culture in the country; the eldest was womanly and refined, the second, +with her Roman type of beauty and bronze-coloured head, lovely in a +manner peculiarly her own; the youngest, as yet, was merely an amiable +young girl. The girls would have liked to get away from the monotony of +provincial life, and their release came when their father was appointed +to a professorship at Copenhagen University. There was an ease of manner +and a tone of mental distinction pervading the whole family. Two young, +handsome Counts Reventlow were being brought up in the house, still only +half-grown boys at that time, but who were destined later to win +honourable renown. One of them, the editor of his ancestress's papers, +kept up his acquaintance with the guest he had met in the Paludan-Mueller +home for over forty years. + +There often came to the house a young Dane from Caracas in Venezuela, of +unusual, almost feminine beauty, with eyes to haunt one's dreams. He +played uncommonly well, was irresistibly gentle and emotional. After a +stay of a few years in Denmark he returned to his native place. The +previously mentioned Groenbeck, with his pretty sister, and other young +people from the town, were frequent guests during the holidays, and the +days passed in games, music, wanderings about the garden, and delightful +excursions to the woods. + +On every side I encountered beauty of some description. I said to Jens +one day: "One kind of beauty is the glow which the sun of Youth casts +over the figure, and it vanishes as soon as the sun sets. Another is +stamped into shape from within; it is Mind's expression, and will remain +as long as the mind remains vigorous. But the supremest beauty of all is +in the unison of the two harmonies, which are contending for existence. +In the bridal night of this supremest beauty, Mind and Nature melt into +one." + +A few years later the old historian was called upon to publish the +little book on Gulland, with its short biography prefixed, as a memorial +to his only son, fallen at Sankelmark, and again, a few years later, to +edit Frederik Nutzhorn's translation of Apuleius in memory of his son's +friend, his elder daughter's fiance. During the preparation of these two +little books, our relations became more intimate, and our friendship +continued unbroken until in the month of February, 1872, a remark in one +of my defensive articles caused him to take up his pen against me. My +remark was to the effect that there were men of the same opinions as +myself even among the priests of the established church. Caspar Paludan- +Mueller declared it my public duty to mention of whom I was thinking at +the time, since such a traitor was not to be tolerated in the lap of the +Church. As I very naturally did not wish to play the part of informer, I +incurred, by my silence, the suspicion of having spoken without +foundation. The Danish man whom I had in my thoughts, and who had +confided his opinions to me, was still alive at the time. This was the +late Dean Ussing, at one time priest at Mariager, a man of an +extraordinarily refined and amiable disposition, secretly a convinced +adherent of Ernest Renan. A Norwegian priest, who holds the same +opinions, is still living. + + +VIII. + +In August, 1863, on a walking tour through North Sjaelland, Julius Lange +introduced me to his other celebrated uncle, Frederik Paludan-Mueller, +whose Summer residence was at Fredensborg. In appearance he was of a +very different type from his brother Caspar. The distinguishing mark of +the one was power, of the other, nobility. For Frederik Paludan-Mueller +as a poet I cherished the profoundest admiration. He belonged to the +really great figures of Danish literature, and his works had so fed and +formed my inmost nature that I should scarcely be the same had I not +read them. It was unalloyed happiness to have access to his house and be +allowed to enjoy his company. It was a distinction to be one of the few +he vouchsafed to take notice of and one of the fewer still in whose +future he interested himself. Do the young men of Denmark to-day, I +wonder, admire creative intellects as they were admired by some few of +us then? It is in so far hardly possible, since there is not at the +present time any Northern artist with such a hall-mark of refined +delicacy as Frederik Paludan-Mueller possessed. + +The young people who came to his house might have wished him a younger, +handsomer wife, and thought his choice, Mistress Charite, as, curiously +enough, she was called, not quite worthy of the poet. Unjustly so, since +he himself was perfectly satisfied with her, and was apparently wholly +absorbed by a union which had had its share in isolating him from the +world. His wife was even more theologically inclined than himself, and +appeared anonymously--without anyone having a suspicion of the fact--as +a religious authoress. Still, she was exceedingly kind to anyone, +regardless of their private opinions, who had found favour in the poet's +eyes. + +The dry little old lady was the only one of her sex with whom Paludan- +Mueller was intimate. He regarded all other women, however young and +beautiful, as mere works of art. But his delight in them was charming in +him, just because of its freedom from sense. One evening that he was +giving a little banquet in honour of a Swedish lady painter, named +Ribbing, a woman of rare beauty, he asked her to stand by the side of +the bust of the Venus of Milo, that the resemblance, which really +existed between them, might be apparent. His innocent, enthusiastic +delight in the likeness was most winning. + + +IX. + +Two other celebrated personages whom I met for the first time a little +later were Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson and Magdalene Thoresen. + +I became acquainted with Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson at the Nutzhorns, their +son, Ditlev, being a passionate admirer of his. His _King Sverre_ +of 1861 had been a disappointment, but _Sigurd Slembe_ of the +following year was new and great poetry, and fascinated young people's +minds. Bjoernson, socially, as in literature, was a strong figure, self- +confident, loud-voiced, outspoken, unique in all that he said, and in +the weight which he knew how to impart to all his utterances. His manner +jarred a little on the more subdued Copenhagen style; the impression he +produced was that of a great, broad-shouldered, and very much spoilt +child. In the press, all that he wrote and did was blazoned abroad by +the leading critics of the day, who had a peculiar, challenging way of +praising Bjoernson, although his ability was not seriously disputed by +anyone. The National Liberal Leaders, Alfred Hage, Carl Ploug, etc., had +opened their hearts and houses to him. It is said that at one time +Heiberg had held back; the well-bred old man, a little shocked by the +somewhat noisy ways of the young genius, is said to have expressed to +his friend Krieger some scruples at inviting him to his house. To +Krieger's jesting remark: "What does it matter! He is a young man; let +him rub off his corners!" Heiberg is credited with having replied: "Very +true! Let him! but not in my drawing-room! That is not a place where +people may rub anything off." Heiberg's wife, on the other hand, admired +him exceedingly, and was undoubtedly very much fascinated by him. + +In a circle of younger people, Bjoernson was a better talker than +conversationalist. Sometimes he came out with decidedly rash expressions +of opinion, conclusively dismissing a question, for instance, with +severe verdicts over Danish music, Heyse's excepted, judgments which +were not supported by sufficient knowledge of the subject at issue. But +much of what he said revealed the intellectual ruler, whose self- +confidence might now and again irritate, but at bottom was justified. He +narrated exceptionally well, with picturesque adjectives, long +remembered in correct Copenhagen, spoke of the _yellow_ howl of +wolves, and the like. Take it all in all, his attitude was that of a +conqueror. + +He upheld poetry that was actual and palpable, consequently had little +appreciation for poetry, that, like Paludan-Mueller's, was the perfection +of thought and form, and boldly disapproved of my admiration for it. + + +X. + +It was likewise through Frederik Nutzhorn that I, when a young beginner +in the difficult art of life, became acquainted with Madame Magdalene +Thoresen. Our first conversation took place in the open air one Summer +day, at the Klampenborg bathing establishment. Although Magdalene +Thoresen was at that time at least forty-six years old, her warm, +brownish complexion could well stand inspection in the strongest light. +Her head, with its heavy dark hair, was Southern in its beauty, her +mouth as fresh as a young girl's; she had brilliant and very striking +eyes. Her figure was inclined to be corpulent, her walk a trifle heavy, +her bearing and movements full of youth and life. + +She was remarkably communicative, open and warmhearted, with a +propensity towards considerable extravagance of speech. Originally +incited thereto by Bjoernson's peasant stories, she had then published +her first tales, _The Student and Signe's Story_, which belonged, +half to Norwegian, half to Danish literature, and had been well +received. She was the daughter of a fisherman at Fredericia, and after +having known both the buffets and the smiles of Fortune, had come to be +on terms of friendship with many men and women of importance, now +belonging to the recognised personalities of the day. She was also very +well received and much appreciated in the Heiberg circle. + +In comparison with her, a woman, I might have been called erudite and +well-informed. Her own knowledge was very desultory. She was interested +in me on account of my youth, and her warm interest attached me to her +for the next five years,--as long, that is, as she remained in Denmark. +She very soon began to confide in me, and although she scarcely did so +unreservedly, still, no woman, at least no mature and gifted woman, had +told me so much about herself before. She was a woman who had felt +strongly and thought much; she had lived a rich, and eventful life; but +all that had befallen her she romanticised. Her poetic tendency was +towards the sublime. She was absolutely veracious, and did not really +mean to adorn her tales, but partly from pride, partly from +whimsicality, she saw everything, from greatest to least, through +beautifully coloured magnifying-glasses, so that a translation of her +communications into every-day language became a very difficult matter, +and when an every-day occurrence was suspected through the narrative, +the same could not be reproduced in an every-day light, and according to +an every-day standard, without wounding the narrator to the quick. For +these reasons I never ventured to include among my Collected Essays a +little biographical sketch of her (written just as she herself had +idealised its events to me), one of the first articles I had printed. + +She saw strong natures, rich and deep natures, in lives that were meagre +or unsuccessful. Again, from lack of perspicacity, she sometimes saw +nothing but inefficiency in people with wide intellectual gifts; thus, +she considered that her son-in-law, Henrik Ibsen, who at that time had +not become either known or celebrated, had very imperfect poetic gifts. +"What he writes is as flat as a drawing," she would say. Or she would +remark: "He ought to be more than a collaborator of Kierkegaard." It was +only much later that she discovered his genius. Bjoernson, on the other +hand, she worshipped with an enthusiastic love; it was a trouble to her +that just about this time he had become very cool to her. + +Vague feelings did not repel her, but all keen and pointed intelligence +did. She was wholly and entirely romantic. Gallicism she objected to; +the clarity of the French seemed to her superficial; she saw depth in +the reserved and taciturn Northern, particularly the Norwegian, nature. +She had groped her way forward for a long time without realising what +her gifts really were. Her husband, who had done all he could to assist +her education, had even for a time imagined, and perhaps persuaded her, +that her gifts lay in the direction of Baggesen's. Now, however, she had +found her vocation and her path in literature. + +On all questions of thought, pure and simple, she was extremely vague. +She was a Christian and a Heathen with equal sincerity, a Christian with +her overflowing warm-heartedness, with her honest inclination to +believe, a Heathen in her averseness to any negation of either life or +Nature. She used to say that she loved Christ and Eros equally, or +rather, that to her, they both meant the same. To her, Christianity was +the new, the modern, in contrast to the rationalism of a past age, so +that Christianity and modern views of life in general merged in her eyes +into one unity. + +Hers was a deeply feminine nature, and a productive nature. Her fertile +character was free from all taint of over-estimation of herself. She +only revealed a healthy and pleasing self-satisfaction when she imagined +that some person wished to set up himself or herself over her and +misjudge acts or events in her life with respect to which she considered +herself the only person qualified to judge. At such times she would +declare in strong terms that by her own unassisted strength she had +raised herself from a mean and unprotected position to the level of the +best men and women of her day. Herself overflowing with emotion, and of +a noble disposition, she craved affection and goodwill, and gave back a +hundredfold what she received. If she felt herself the object of cold +and piercing observation, she would be silent and unhappy, but if she +herself were at ease and encountered no coolness, she was all geniality +and enthusiasm, though not to such an extent that her enthusiasm ceased +to be critical. + +She could over-value and under-value people, but was at the same time a +keen, in fact a marvellous psychologist, and sometimes astonished one by +the pertinent things she said, surprising one by her accurate estimate +of difficult psychological cases. For instance, she understood as few +others did the great artist, the clever coquette, and the old maid in +Heiberg's wife, the actress. + +She had no moral prejudices, and had written _Signe's Story_ as a +protest against conventional morality; but she was none the less +thoroughly permeated by Christian and humane ideas of morality, and +there was no element of rebellion in her disposition. + +On the whole, she was more a woman than an authoress. Her nature was +tropical in comparison with Mrs. Charite Paludan-Mueller's North Pole +nature. She lived, not in a world of ideas remote from reality, but in a +world of feeling and passion, full of affection and admiration, jealousy +and dislike. Being a woman, she was happy at every expression of +pleasure over one of her books that she heard or read of, and liked to +fancy that the solitary young man who sent her an enthusiastic letter of +thanks was only one of hundreds who thought as he did. Like a woman, +also, she was hurt by indifference, which, however, her warm heart +rarely encountered. + +This richly endowed woman made me appear quite new to myself, inasmuch +as, in conversations with my almost maternal friend, I began to think I +was of a somewhat cold nature, a nature which in comparison with hers +seemed rather dry, unproductive and unimaginative, a creature with +thoughts ground keen. + +Magdalene Thoresen compared me one day to an unlighted glass candelabra, +hanging amid several others all lighted up, which had the gleam of the +fire on the countless facets of its crystals, but was itself nothing but +cold, smooth, polished, prisms. + +Thus during my association with Magdalene Thoresen I came to regard +myself in a new light, when I saw myself with her eyes, and I was struck +more than ever by how different the verdicts over me would be were my +various friends and acquaintances each to describe me is I appeared to +them. To Magdalene Thoresen I was all mind, to others all passion, to +others again all will. At the Nutzhorns' I went by the name of the +modest B., elsewhere I was deemed conceitedly ambitious, some people +thought me of a mild temper, others saw in me a quarrelsome unbeliever. + +All this was a challenge to me to come to a clear understanding about my +real nature. The fruits of my work must show me what sort of man I was. + + +XI. + +I continued my legal studies with patient persistence, and gradually, +after having made myself master of Civil Proceedings, I worked my way +through the whole of the juridic system, Roman Law excluded. But the +industry devoted to this was purely mechanical. I pursued my other +studies, on the contrary, with delight, even tried to produce something +myself, and during the last months of 1862 elaborated a very long paper +on _Romeo and Juliet_, chiefly concerning itself with the +fundamental problems of the tragedy, as interpreted in the Aesthetics of +the day; it has been lost, like so much else that I wrote during those +years. I sent it to Professor Broechner and asked his opinion of it. + +Simultaneously I began to work upon a paper on the Idea of Fate in Greek +Tragedy, a response to the Prize question of the year 1862-1863, and on +December 31, 1862, had finished the Introduction, which was published +for the first time about six years later, under the title _The Idea of +Tragic Fate_. Appended to this was a laborious piece of work dealing +with the conceptions of Fate recorded in all the Greek tragedies that +have come down to us. This occupied the greater part of the next six +months. + +The published Introduction gives a true picture of the stage of my +development then, partly because it shows the manner in which I had +worked together external influences, the Kierkegaardian thoughts and the +Hegelian method, partly because with no little definiteness it reveals a +fundamental characteristic of my nature and a fundamental tendency of my +mind, since it is, throughout, a protest against the ethical conception +of poetry and is a proof of how moral ideas, when they become part of an +artistic whole, lose their peculiar stamp and assume another aspect. + +In November, 1862, I joined a very large recently started +undergraduates' society, which met once a fortnight at Borch's College +to hear lectures and afterwards discuss them together. It numbered full +fifty members, amongst them most of the men of that generation who +afterwards distinguished themselves in Denmark. The later known +politician, Octavius Hansen, was Speaker of the Meetings, and even then +seemed made for the post. His parliamentary bearing was unrivalled. It +was not for nothing he was English on the mother's side. He looked +uncommonly handsome on the platform, with his unmoved face, his +beautiful eyes, and his brown beard, curled like that of Pericles in the +Greek busts. He was good-humoured, just, and well-informed. Of the +numerous members, Wilhelm Thomsen the philologist was certainly the most +prominent, and the only one whom I later on came to value, that is, for +purely personal reasons; in daily association it was only once in a way +that Thomsen could contribute anything from his special store of +knowledge. One day, when we had been discussing the study of cuneiform +inscriptions, the young philologist had said, half in jest, half in +earnest: "If a stone were to fall down from the Sun with an inscription +in unknown signs, in an unknown language, upon it, we should be able to +make it out,"--a remark which I called to mind many years later when +Thomsen deciphered the Ancient Turkish inscriptions in the Mountains of +Siberia. + +A great many political lectures were given. I gave one on Heiberg's +Aesthetics. + +On January 1, 1863, I received a New Year's letter from Broechner, in +which he wrote that the essay on Romeo and Juliet had so impressed him +that, in his opinion, no one could dispute my fitness to fill the Chair +of Aesthetics, which in the nature of things would soon be vacant, since +Hauch, at his advanced age, could hardly continue to occupy it very +long. + +Thus it was that my eager patron first introduced what became a +wearisome tangle, lasting a whole generation, concerning my claims to a +certain post, which gradually became in my life what the French call +_une scie_, an irritating puzzle, in which I myself took no part, +but which attached itself to my name. + +That letter agitated me very much; not because at so young an age the +prospect of an honourable position in society was held out to me by a +man who was in a position to judge of my fitness for it, but because +this smiling prospect of an official post was in my eyes a snare which +might hold me so firmly that I should not be able to pursue the path of +renunciation that alone seemed to me to lead to my life's goal. I felt +myself an apostle, but an apostle and a professor were, very far apart. +I certainly remembered that the Apostle Paul had been a tent-maker. But +I feared that, once appointed, I should lose my ideal standard of life +and sink down into insipid mediocrity. If I once deviated from my path, +I might not so easily find it again. It was more difficult to resign a +professorship than never to accept it. And, once a professor, a man soon +got married and settled down as a citizen of the state, not in a +position to dare anything. To dispose of my life at Broechner's request +would be like selling my soul to the Devil. + +So I replied briefly that I was too much attached to Hauch to be able or +willing to speculate on his death. But to this Broechner very logically +replied: "I am not speculating on his death, but on his life, for the +longer he lives, the better you will be prepared to be his successor." + +By the middle of June, 1863, the prize paper was copied out. In +September the verdict was announced; the gold medal was awarded to me +with a laudatory criticism. The gold medal was also won by my friend +Jens Paludan-Mueller for a historic paper, and in October, at the annual +Ceremony at the University, we were presented with the thin medal +bearing the figure of Athene, which, for my part, being in need of a +Winter overcoat, I sold next day. Clausen, the Rector, a little man with +regular features, reserved face and smooth white hair, said to us that +he hoped this might prove the first fruits of a far-reaching activity in +the field of Danish literature. But what gave me much greater pleasure +was that I was shaken hands with by Monrad, who was present as Minister +for Education. Although Clausen was well known, both as a theologian and +an important National Liberal, I cared nothing for him. But I was a +little proud of Monrad's hand-pressure, for his political liberality, +and especially his tremendous capacity for work, compelled respect, +while from his handsome face with its thoughtful, commanding forehead, +there shone the evidence of transcendent ability. + + +XII. + +On the morning of November 15th, 1863, Julius Lange and I went together +to offer our congratulations to Frederik Nutzhorn, whose birthday it +was. His sisters received me with their usual cheerfulness, but their +father, the old doctor, remarked as I entered: "You come with grave +thoughts in your mind, too," for the general uneasiness occasioned by +Frederik VII's state of health was reflected in my face. There was good +reason for anxiety concerning all the future events of which an +unfavourable turn of his illness might be the signal. + +I went home with Julius Lange, who read a few wild fragments of his +"System" to me. This turned upon the contrasting ideas of +_Contemplation_ and _Sympathy_, corresponding to the inhaling +and exhaling of the breath; the resting-point of the breathing was the +moment of actual consciousness, etc.; altogether very young, curious, +and confused. + +In the afternoon came the news of the King's death. In the evening, at +the Students' Union, there was great commotion and much anxiety. There +were rumours of a change of Ministry, of a Bluhme-David-Ussing Ministry, +and of whether the new King would be willing to sign the Constitution +from which people childishly expected the final incorporation of Slesvig +into Denmark. That evening I made the acquaintance of the poet Christian +Richardt, who told me that he had noticed my face before he knew my +name. Julius Lange was exceedingly exasperated and out of spirits. Ploug +went down the stairs looking like a man whose hopes had been shattered, +and whom the blow had found unprepared. His paper had persistently sown +distrust of the Prince of Denmark. + +The Proclamation was to take place in front of Christiansborg Castle on +December 16th, at 11 o'clock. I was fetched to it by a student of the +same age, the present Bishop Frederik Nielsen. The latter had made my +acquaintance when a Free-thinker, but fortunately he recognised his +errors only a very few years later, and afterwards the valiant +theologian wrote articles and pamphlets against the heretic he had +originally cultivated for holding the same opinions as himself. There is +hardly anyone in Denmark who persists in error; people recognise their +mistakes in time, before they have taken harm to their souls; sometimes, +indeed, so much betimes that they are not even a hindrance to their +worldly career. + +The space in front of the Castle was black with people, most of whom +were in a state of no little excitement. Hall, who was then Prime +Minister, stepped out on the balcony of the castle, grave and upright, +and said, first standing with his back to the Castle, then looking to +the right and the left, these words: "King Frederik VII is dead. Long +live King Christian IX!" + +Then the King came forward. There were loud shouts, doubtless some cries +of "Long live the King," but still more and louder shouts of: "The +Constitution forever!" which were by no means loyally intended. At a +distance, from the Castle balcony, the different shouts could, of +course, not be distinguished. As the King took them all to be shouts of +acclamation, he bowed politely several times, and as the shouts +continued kissed his hand to right and left. The effect was not what he +had intended. His action was not understood as a simple-hearted +expression of pure good-will. People were used to a very different +bearing on the part of their King. With all his faults and foibles, +Frederik VII was always in manner the Father of his people; always the +graceful superior; head up and shoulders well back, patronisingly and +affectionately waving his hand: "Thank you, my children, thank you! And +now go home and say 'Good-morning' to your wives and children from the +King!" One could not imagine Frederik VII bowing to the people, much +less kissing his hand to them. + +There was a stormy meeting of the Students' Union that evening. Vilhelm +Rode made the principal speech and caustically emphasised that it took +more than a "Kiss of the hand and a parade bow" to win the hearts of the +Danish people. The new dynasty, the head of which had been abused for +years by the National Liberal press, especially in _The Fatherland_, +who had thrown suspicion of German sympathies on the heir-presumptive, was +still so weak that none of the students thought it necessary to take much +notice of the change of sovereigns that had taken place. This was partly +because since Frederik VII's time people had been accustomed to +indiscriminate free speech concerning the King's person--it was the +fashion and meant nothing, as he was beloved by the body of the people +--partly because what had happened was not regarded as irrevocable. All +depended on whether the King signed the Constitution, and even the coolest +and most conservative, who considered that his signing it would be a fatal +misfortune, thought it possible that Christian IX. would be dethroned if +he did not. So it is not difficult to form some idea of how the Hotspurs +talked. The whole town was in a fever, and it was said that Prince Oscar +was in Scania, ready at the first sign to cross the Sound and allow +himself to be proclaimed King on behalf of Charles XV. Men with +Scandinavian sympathies hoped for this solution, by means of which the +three kingdoms would have been united without a blow being struck. + +In the middle of the meeting, there arrived a message from Crone, the +Head of Police, which was delivered verbally in this incredibly +irregular form--that the Head of Police was as good a Scandinavian as +anyone, but he begged the students for their own sakes to refrain from +any kind of street disturbance that would oblige him to interfere. + +I, who had stood on the open space in front of the Castle, lost in the +crowd, and in the evening at the meeting of the students was auditor to +the passionate utterances let fall there, felt my mood violently swayed, +but was altogether undecided with regard to the political question, the +compass of which I could not fully perceive. I felt anxious as to the +attitude of foreign powers would be in the event of the signing of the +Constitution. Old C.N. David had said in his own home that if the matter +should depend on him, which, however, he hoped it would not, he would +not permit the signing of the Constitution, were he the only man in +Denmark of that way of thinking, since by so doing we should lose our +guarantee of existence, and get two enemies instead of one, Russia as +well as Germany. + +The same evening I wrote down: "It is under such circumstances as these +that one realises how difficult it is to lead a really ethical +existence. I am not far-sighted enough to perceive what would be the +results of that which to me seems desirable, and one cannot +conscientiously mix one's self up in what one does not understand. +Nevertheless, as I stood in the square in front of the Castle, I was so +excited that I even detected in myself an inclination to come forward as +a political speaker, greenhorn though I be." + + +XIII. + +On the 18th of November, the fever in the town was at its height. From +early in the morning the space in front of the Castle was crowded with +people. Orla Lehmann, a Minister at the time, came out of the Castle, +made his way through the crowd, and shouted again and again, first to +one side, then to the other: + +"He has signed! He has signed!" + +He did not say: "The King." + +The people now endured seven weeks of uninterrupted change and +kaleidoscopic alteration of the political situation. Relations with all +foreign powers, and even with Sweden and Norway, presented a different +aspect to the Danish public every week. Sweden's withdrawal created a +very bitter impression; the public had been induced to believe that an +alliance was concluded. Then followed the "pressure" in Copenhagen by +the emissaries of all the Powers, to induce the Government to recall the +November Constitution, then the Czar's letter to the Duke of +Augustenborg, finally the occupation of Holstein by German troops, with +all the censure and disgrace that the Danish army had to endure, for +Holstein was evacuated without a blow being struck, and the Duke, to the +accompanyment of scorn and derision heaped on the Danes, was proclaimed +in all the towns of Holstein. + +On Christmas Eve came tidings of the convocation of the Senate, +simultaneously with a change of Ministry which placed Monrad at the head +of the country, and in connection with this a rumour that all young men +of twenty-one were to be called out at once. This last proved to be +incorrect, and the minds of the young men alternated between composure +at the prospect of war and an enthusiastic desire for war, and a belief +that there would be no war at all. The first few days in January, +building on the rumour that the last note from England had promised help +in the event of the Eider being passed, people began to hope that the +war might be avoided, and pinned their faith to Monrad's dictatorship. + +Frederik Nutzhorn, who did not believe there would be a war, started on +a visit to Rome; Jens Paludan-Mueller, who had been called out, was +quartered at Rendsborg until the German troops marched in; Julius Lange, +who, as he had just become engaged, did not wish to see his work +interrupted and his future prospects delayed by the war, had gone to +Islingen, where he had originally made the acquaintance of his fiancee. +Under these circumstances, as a twenty-one-year-old student who had +completed his university studies, I was anxious to get my examination +over as quickly as possible. At the end of 1863 I wrote to my teacher, +Professor Broechner, who had promised me a short philosophical summary as +a preparation for the University test: "I shall sit under a conjunction +of all the most unfavourable circumstances possible, since for more than +a month my head has been so full of the events of the day that I have +been able neither to read nor think, while the time of the examination +itself promises to be still more disquiet. Still, I dare not draw back, +as I should then risk--which may possibly happen in any case--being +hindered from my examination by being called out by the conscription and +perhaps come to lie in my grave as _Studiosus_ instead of +_candidatus magisterii_, which latter looks infinitely more +impressive and is more satisfying to a man as greedy of honour as Your +respectful and heartily affectionate, etc." + + +XIV. + +Shortly before, I had paid my first visit to Professor Rasmus Nielsen. +He was exceedingly agreeable, recognised me, whom perhaps he remembered +examining, and accorded me a whole hour's conversation. He was, as +always, alert and fiery, not in the least blase, but with a slight +suggestion of charlatanism about him. His conversation was as lively and +disconnected as his lectures; there was a charm in the clear glance of +his green eyes, a look of genius about his face. He talked for a long +time about Herbart, whose Aesthetics, for that matter, he betrayed +little knowledge of, then of Hegel, Heiberg, and Kierkegaard. To my +intense surprise, he opened up a prospect, conflicting with the opinions +he had publicly advocated, that Science, "when analyses had been carried +far enough," might come to prove the possibility of miracles. This was +an offence against my most sacred convictions. + +Nielsen had recently, from the cathedra, announced his renunciation of +the Kierkegaard standpoint he had so long maintained, in the phrase: +"The Kierkegaard theory is impracticable"; he had, perhaps influenced +somewhat by the Queen Dowager, who about that time frequently invited +him to meet Grundtvig, drawn nearer to Grundtvigian ways of thinking,-- +as Broechner sarcastically remarked about him: "The farther from +Kierkegaard, the nearer to the Queen Dowager." + +In the midst of my final preparations for the examination, I wrestled, +as was my wont, with my attempts to come to a clear understanding over +Duty and Life, and was startled by the indescribable irony in the word +by which I was accustomed to interpret my ethically religious +endeavours,--_Himmelspraet_. [Footnote: Word implying one who +attempts to spring up to Heaven, and of course falls miserably to earth +again. The word, in ordinary conversation, is applied to anyone tossed +in a blanket.] + +I handed in, then, my request to be allowed to sit for my Master of Arts +examination; the indefatigable Broechner had already mentioned the matter +to the Dean of the University, who understood the examinee's reasons for +haste. But the University moved so slowly that it was some weeks before +I received the special paper set me, which, to my horror, ran as +follows: "Determine the correlation between the pathetic and the +symbolic in general, in order by that means to elucidate the contrast +between Shakespeare's tragedies and Dante's _Divina Commedia_, +together with the possible errors into which one might fall through a +one-sided preponderance of either of these two elements." + +This paper, which had been set by R. Nielsen, is characteristic of the +purely speculative manner, indifferent to all study of history, in which +Aesthetics were at that time pursued in Copenhagen. It was, moreover, +worded with unpardonable carelessness; it was impossible to tell from it +what was to be understood by the correlation on which it was based, and +which was assumed to be a given conclusion. Even so speculative a +thinker as Frederik Paludan-Mueller called the question absolutely +meaningless. It looked as though its author had imagined Shakespeare's +dramas and Dante's epic were produced by a kind of artistic commingling +of pathetic with symbolic elements, and as though he wished to call +attention to the danger of reversing the correct proportions, for +instance, by the symbolic obtaining the preponderance in tragedy, or +pathos in the epopee, or to the danger of exaggerating these +proportions, until there was too much tragic pathos, or too much epic +symbolism. But a scientific definition of the expressions used was +altogether lacking, and I had to devote a whole chapter to the +examination of the meaning of the problem proposed to me. + +The essay, for the writing of which I was allowed six weeks, was handed +in, 188 folio pages long, at the right time. By reason of the sheer +foolishness of the question, it was never published. + +In a postscript, I wrote: "I beg my honoured examiners to remember the +time during which this treatise was written, a time more eventful than +any other young men can have been through, and during which I, for my +part, have for days at a time been unable to work, and should have been +ashamed if I could have done so." + +In explanation of this statement, the following jottings, written down +at the time on a sheet of paper: + +_Sunday, Jan. 17th_. Received letter telling me I may fetch my +leading question to-morrow at 5 o'clock. + +_Monday, Feb. 1st_. Heard to-day that the Germans have passed the +Eider and that the first shots have been exchanged. + +_Saturday, Feb. 6th_. Received to-day the terrible, +incomprehensible, but only too certain news that the Danevirke has been +abandoned without a blow being struck. This is indescribable, +overwhelming. + +_Thursday, Feb. 28th_. We may, unfortunately, assume it as certain +that my dear friend Jens Paludan-Mueller fell at Oversoe on Feb. 5th. + +_Feb. 28th_. Heard definitely to-day.--At half-past one this night +finished my essay. + + +XV. + +I thought about this time of nothing but my desire to become a competent +soldier of my country. There was nothing I wanted more, but I felt +physically very weak. When the first news of the battles of Midsunde and +Bustrup arrived, I was very strongly inclined to follow Julius Lange to +the Reserve Officers' School. When tidings came of the abandonment of +the Danevirke my enthusiasm cooled; it was as though I foresaw how +little prospect of success there was. Still, I was less melancholy than +Lange at the thought of going to the war. I was single, and delighted at +the thought of going straight from the examination-table into a camp +life, and from a book-mad student to become a lieutenant. I was +influenced most by the prospect of seeing Lange every day at the +Officers' School, and on the field. But my comrades explained to me that +even if Lange and I came out of the School at the same time, it did not +follow that we should be in the same division, and that the thing, +moreover, that was wanted in an officer, was entire self-dependence. +They also pointed out to me the improbability of my being able to do the +least good, or having the slightest likelihood in front of me of doing +anything but quickly find myself in hospital. I did not really think +myself that I should be able to stand the fatigue, as the pupils of the +military academy went over to the army with an equipment that I could +scarcely have carried. I could not possibly suppose that the +conscription would select me as a private, on account of my fragile +build; but like all the rest, I was expecting every day a general +ordering out of the fit men of my age. + +All this time I worked with might and main at the development of my +physical strength and accomplishments. I went every day to fencing +practice, likewise to cavalry sword practice; I took lessons in the use +of the bayonet, and I took part every afternoon in the shooting +practices conducted by the officers--with the old muzzle-loaders which +were the army weapons at the time. I was very delighted one day when Mr. +Hagemeister, the fencing-master, one of the many splendid old Holstein +non-commissioned officers holding the rank of lieutenant, said I was "A +smart fencer." + + +XVI. + +Meanwhile, the examination was taking its course. As real curiosities, I +here reproduce the questions set me. The three to be replied to in +writing were: + +1. To what extent can poetry be called the ideal History? + +2. In what manner may the philosophical ideas of Spinoza and Fichte lead +to a want of appreciation of the idea of beauty? + +3. In what relation does the comic stand to its limitations and its +various contrasts? + +The three questions which were to be replied to in lectures before the +University ran as follows: + +1. Show, through poems in our literature, to what extent poetry may +venture to set itself the task of presenting the Idea in a form +coinciding with the philosophical understanding of it? + +2. Point out the special contributions to a philosophical definition of +the Idea made by Aesthetics in particular. + +3. What are the merits and defects of Schiller's tragedies? + +These questions, in conjunction with the main question, may well be +designated a piece of contemporary history; they depict exactly both the +Science of the time and the peculiar philosophical language it adopted. +Hardly more than one, or at most two, of them could one imagine set to- +day. + +After the final (and best) lecture, on Schiller, which was given at six +hours' notice on April 25th, the judges, Hauch, Nielsen and Broechner, +deliberated for about ten minutes, then called in the auditors and R. +Nielsen read aloud the following verdict: "The candidate, in his long +essay, in the shorter written tests, and in his oral lectures, has +manifested such knowledge of his subject, such intellectual maturity, +and such originality in the treatment of his themes, that we have on +that account unanimously awarded him the mark: _admissus cum laude +praecipua_." + + +XVII. + +The unusually favourable result of this examination attracted the +attention of academical and other circles towards me. The mark +_admissus cum praecipua laude_ had only very rarely been given +before. Hauch expressed his satisfaction at home in no measured terms. +His wife stopped my grandfather in the street and informed him that his +grandson was the cleverest and best-read young man that her husband had +come across during his University experience. When I went to the old +poet after the examination to thank him, he said to me (these were his +very words): "I am an old man and must die soon; you must be my +successor at the University; I shall say so unreservedly; indeed, I will +even say it on my death-bed." Strangely enough, he did say it and record +it on his death-bed seven years later, exactly as he had promised to do. + +In Broechner's house, too, there was a great deal said about my becoming +a professor. I myself was despondent about it; I thought only of the +war, only wished to be fit for a soldier. Hauch was pleased at my +wanting to be a soldier. "It is fine of you, if you can only stand it." +When Hauch heard for certain that I was only 22 years old (he himself +was 73), he started up in his chair and said: + +"Why, it is incredible that at your age you can have got so far." Rasmus +Nielsen was the only one of the professors who did not entertain me with +the discussion of my future academic prospects; but he it was who gave +me the highest praise: + +"According to our unanimous opinions," said he, "you are the foremost of +all the young men." + +I was only the more determined not to let myself be buried alive in the +flower of my youth by accepting professorship before I had been able to +live and breathe freely.--I might have spared myself any anxiety. + + +XVIII. + +A few days later, on May both, a month's armistice was proclaimed, which +was generally construed as a preliminary to peace, if this could be +attained under possible conditions. It was said, and soon confirmed, +that at the Conference of London, Denmark had been offered North +Slesvig. Most unfortunately, Denmark refused the offer. On June 26th, +the war broke out again; two days later Alsen was lost. When the young +men were called up to the officers' board for conscription, "being too +slight of build," I was deferred till next year. Were the guerilla war +which was talked about to break out, I was determined all the same to +take my part in it. + +But the Bluhme-David Ministry succeeded to Monrad's, and concluded the +oppressive peace. + +I was very far from regarding this peace as final; for that, I was too +inexperienced. I correctly foresaw that before very long the state of +affairs in Europe would give rise to other wars, but I incorrectly +concluded therefrom that another fight for Slesvig, or in any case, its +restoration to Denmark, would result from them. + +In the meantime peace, discouraging, disheartening though it was, opened +up possibilities of further undisturbed study, fresh absorption in +scientific occupations. + +When, after the termination of my University studies, I had to think of +earning my own living, I not only, as before, gave private lessons, but +I gave lectures, first to a circle before whom I lectured on Northern +and Greek mythology, then to another, in David's house, to whom I +unfolded the inner history of modern literature to interested listeners, +amongst them several beautiful young girls. I finally engaged myself to +my old Arithmetic master as teacher of Danish in his course for National +school-mistresses. I found the work horribly dull, but there was one +racy thing about it, namely, that I, the master, was three years younger +than the youngest of my pupils; these latter were obliged to be at least +25, and consequently even at their youngest were quite old in my eyes. + +But there were many much older women amongst them, one even, a priest or +schoolmaster's widow, of over fifty, a poor thing who had to begin--at +her age!--from the very beginning, though she was anything but gifted. +It was not quite easy for a master without a single hair on his face to +make himself respected. But I succeeded, my pupils being so well- +behaved. + +It was an exciting moment when these pupils of mine went up for their +teacher's examination, I being present as auditor. + +I continued to teach this course until the Autumn of 1868. When I left, +I was gratified by one of the ladies rising and, in a little speech, +thanking me for the good instruction I had given. + + +XIX. + +Meanwhile, I pursued my studies with ardour and enjoyment, read a very +great deal of _belles-lettres_, and continued to work at German +philosophy, inasmuch as I now, though without special profit, plunged +into a study of Trendelenburg. My thoughts were very much more +stimulated by Gabriel Sibbern, on account of his consistent scepticism. +It was just about this time that I made his acquaintance. Old before his +time, bald at forty, tormented with gout, although he had always lived a +most abstemious life, Gabriel Sibbern, with his serene face, clever eyes +and independent thoughts, was an emancipating phenomenon. He had +divested himself of all Danish prejudices. "There is still a great deal +of phlogiston in our philosophy," he used to say sometimes. + +I had long been anxious to come to a clear scientific understanding of +the musical elements in speech. I had busied myself a great deal with +metrical art. Bruecke's _Inquiries_ were not yet in existence, but I +was fascinated by Apel's attempt to make use of notes (crotchets, +quavers, dotted quavers, and semi-quavers) as metrical signs, and by +J.L. Heiberg's attempt to apply this system to Danish verse. But the +system was too arbitrary for anything to be built up upon it. And I then +made up my mind, in order better to understand the nature of verse, to +begin at once to familiarise myself with the theory of music, which +seemed to promise the opening out of fresh horizons in the +interpretation of the harmonies of language. + +With the assistance of a young musician, later the well-known composer +and Concert Director, Victor Bendix, I plunged into the mysteries of +thorough-bass, and went so far as to write out the entire theory of +harmonics. I learnt to express myself in the barbaric language of music, +to speak of minor scales in fifths, to understand what was meant by +enharmonic ambiguity. I studied voice modulation, permissible and non- +permissible octaves; but I did not find what I hoped. I composed a few +short tunes, which I myself thought very pretty, but which my young +master made great fun of, and with good reason. One evening, when he was +in very high spirits, he parodied one of them at the piano in front of a +large party of people. It was a disconcerting moment for the composer of +the tune. + +A connection between metrical art and thorough-bass was not +discoverable. Neither were there any unbreakable laws governing +thorough-bass. The unversed person believes that in harmonics he will +find quite definite rules which must not be transgressed. But again and +again he discovers that what is, as a general rule, forbidden, is +nevertheless, under certain circumstances, quite permissible. + +Thus he learns that in music there is no rule binding on genius. And +perhaps he asks himself whether, in other domains, there are rules which +are binding on genius. + + +XX. + +I had lived so little with Nature. The Spring of 1865, the first Spring +I had spent in the country--although quite near to Copenhagen--meant to +me rich impressions of nature that I never forgot, a long chain of the +most exquisite Spring memories. I understood as I had never done before +the inborn affection felt by every human being for the virgin, the +fresh, the untouched, the not quite full-blown, just as it is about to +pass over into its maturity. It was in the latter half of May. I was +looking for anemones and violets, which had not yet gone to seed. The +budding beech foliage, the silver poplar with its shining leaves, the +maple with its blossoms, stirred me, filled me with Spring rapture. I +could lie long in the woods with my gaze fastened on a light-green +branch with the sun shining through it, and, as if stirred by the wind, +lighted up from different sides, and floating and flashing as if coated +with silver. I saw the empty husks fall by the hundred before the wind. +I followed up the streams in the wood to their sources. For a while a +rivulet oozed slowly along. Then came a little fall, and it began to +speak, to gurgle and murmur; but only at this one place, and here it +seemed to me to be like a young man or woman of twenty. Now that I, who +in my boyhood's days had gone for botanical excursions with my master +and school-fellows, absorbed myself in every plant, from greatest to +least, without wishing to arrange or classify any, it seemed as though +an infinite wisdom in Nature were being revealed to me for the first +time. + +As near to Copenhagen as Soendermarken, stood the beech, with its curly +leaves and black velvet buds in their silk jackets. In the gardens of +Frederiksberg Avenue, the elder exhaled its fragrance, but was soon +over; the hawthorn sprang out in all its splendour. I was struck by the +loveliness of the chestnut blooms. When the blossom on the cherry-trees +had withered, the lilac was out, and the apple and pear-trees paraded +their gala dress. + +It interested me to notice how the colour sometimes indicated the shape, +sometimes produced designs quite independently of it. I loitered in +gardens to feast my eyes on the charming grouping of the rhubarb leaves +no less than on the exuberance of their flowers, and the leaves of the +scorzonera attracted my attention, because they all grew in one plane, +but swung about like lances. + +And as my habit was, I philosophised over what I saw and had made my +own, and I strove to understand in what beauty consisted. I considered +the relations between beauty and life; why was it that artificial +flowers and the imitation of a nightingale's song were so far behind +their originals in beauty? What was the difference between the beauty of +the real, the artificial and the painted flower? Might not Herbart's +Aesthetics be wrong, in their theory of form? The form itself might be +the same in Nature and the imitation, in the rose made of velvet and the +rose growing in the garden. And I reflected on the connection between +the beauty of the species and that of the individual. Whether a lily be +a beautiful flower, I can say without ever having seen lilies before, +but whether it be a beautiful lily, I cannot. The individual can only be +termed beautiful when more like than unlike to the ideal of the species. +And I mused over the translation of the idea of beauty into actions and +intellectual conditions. Was not the death of Socrates more beautiful +than his preservation of Alcibiades' life in battle?--though this was +none the less a beautiful act. + + +XXI. + +In the month of July I started on a walking tour through Jutland, with +the scenery of which province I had not hitherto been acquainted; +travelled also occasionally by the old stage-coaches, found myself at +Skanderborg, which, for me, was surrounded by the halo of mediaeval +romance; wandered to Silkeborg, entering into conversation with no end +of people, peasants, peasant boys, and pretty little peasant girls, +whose speech was not always easy to understand. I studied their Juttish, +and laughed heartily at their keen wit. The country inns were often +over-full, so that I was obliged to sleep on the floor; my wanderings +were often somewhat exhausting, as there were constant showers, and the +night rain had soaked the roads. I drove in a peasant's cart to Mariager +to visit my friend Emil Petersen, who was in the office of the district +judge of that place, making his home with his brother-in-law and his +very pretty sister, and I stayed for a few days with him. Here I became +acquainted with a little out-of-the-world Danish town. The priest and +his wife were an interesting and extraordinary couple. The priest, the +before-mentioned Pastor Ussing, a little, nervous, intelligent and +unworldly man, was a pious dreamer, whose religion was entirely +rationalistic. Renan's recently published _Life of Jesus_ was so +far from shocking him that the book seemed to him in all essentials to +be on the right track. He had lived in the Danish West Indies, and there +he had become acquainted with his wife, a lady with social triumphs +behind her, whose charms he never wearied of admiring. The mere way in +which she placed her hat upon her head, or threw a shawl round her +shoulders, could make him fall into ecstasies, even though he only +expressed his delight in her in half-facetious terms. This couple showed +me the most cordial kindness; to their unpractised, provincial eyes, I +seemed to be a typical young man of the world, and they amazed me with +the way in which they took it for granted that I led the dances at every +ball, was a lion in society, etc. I was reminded of the student's words +in Hostrup's vaudeville: "Goodness! How innocent they must be to think +_me_ a dandy!" and vainly assured them that I lived an exceedingly +unnoticed life in Copenhagen, and had never opened a ball in my life. + +The priest asked us two young men to go and hear his Sunday sermon, and +promised that we should be pleased with it. We went to church somewhat +expectant, and the sermon was certainly a most unusual one. It was +delivered with great rapture, after the priest had bent his head in his +hands for a time in silent reflection. With great earnestness he +addressed himself to his congregation and demanded, after having put +before them some of the cures in the New Testament, generally extolled +as miracles, whether they dared maintain that these so-called miracles +could not have taken place according to Nature's laws. And when he +impressively called out: "Darest thou, with thy limited human +intelligence, say, 'This cannot happen naturally?'" it was in the same +tone and style in which another priest would have shouted out: "Darest +thou, with thy limited human intelligence, deny the miracle?" The +peasants, who, no doubt, understood his words quite in this latter +sense, did not understand in the least the difference and the contrast, +but judged much the same as a dog to whom one might talk angrily with +caressing words or caressingly with abusive words, simply from the +speaker's tone; and both his tone and facial expression were ecstatic. +They perceived no heresy and felt themselves no less edified by the +address than did the two young Copenhagen graduates. + + +XXII. + +My first newspaper articles were printed in _The Fatherland_ and +the _Illustrated Times_; the very first was a notice of Paludan- +Mueller's _Fountain of Youth_, in which I had compressed matter for +three or four lectures; a commissioned article on Dante was about the +next, but this was of no value. But it was a great event to see one's +name printed in a newspaper for the first time, and my mother saw it not +without emotion. + +About this time Henrik Ibsen's first books fell into my hands and +attracted my attention towards this rising poet, who, among the leading +Danish critics, encountered a reservation of appreciation that scarcely +concealed ill-will. From Norway I procured Ibsen's oldest dramas, which +had appeared there. + +Frederik Algreen-Ussing asked me to contribute to a large biographical +dictionary, which he had for a long time been planning and preparing, +and which he had just concluded a contract for with the largest Danish +publishing firm of the time. A young man who hated the August +Association and all its deeds could not fail to feel scruples about +engaging in any collaboration with its founder. But Algreen-Ussing knew +how to vanquish all such scruples, inasmuch as he waived all rights of +censorship, and left it to each author to write as he liked upon his own +responsibility. And he was perfectly loyal to his promise. Moreover, the +question here was one of literature only, and not politics. + +As the Danish authors were to be dealt with in alphabetical order, the +article that had to be set about at once was an account of the only +Danish poet whose name began with _Aa_. Thus it was that Emil +Aarestrup came to be the first Danish poet of the past of whom I chanced +to write. I heard of the existence of a collection of unprinted letters +from Aarestrup to his friend Petersen, the grocer, which were of very +great advantage to my essay. A visit that I paid to the widow of the +poet, on the other hand, led to no result whatever. It was strange to +meet the lady so enthusiastically sung by Aarestrup in his young days, +as a sulky and suspicious old woman without a trace of former beauty, +who declared that she had no letters from her husband, and could not +give me any information about him. It was only a generation later that +his letters to her came into my hands. + +In September, 1865, the article on Aarestrup was finished. It was +intended to be quickly followed up by others on the remaining Danish +authors in A. But it was the only one that was written, for Algreen- +Ussing's apparently so well planned undertaking was suddenly brought to +a standstill. The proprietors of the National Liberal papers declared, +as soon as they heard of the plan, that they would not on any account +agree to its being carried out by a man who took up such a "reactionary" +position in Danish politics as Ussing, and in face of their threat to +annihilate the undertaking, the publishers, who were altogether +dependent on the attitude of these papers, did not dare to defy them. +They explained to Algreen-Ussing that they felt obliged to break their +contract with him, but were willing to pay him the compensation agreed +upon beforehand for failure to carry it out. He fought long to get his +project carried through, but his efforts proving fruitless, he refused, +from pride, to accept any indemnity, and was thus compelled to see with +bitterness many years' work and an infinite amount of trouble completely +wasted. Shortly afterwards he succumbed to an attack of illness. + + +XXIII. + +A young man who plunged into philosophical study at the beginning of the +sixties in Denmark, and was specially engrossed by the boundary +relations between Philosophy and Religion, could not but come to the +conclusion that philosophical life would never flourish in Danish soil +until a great intellectual battle had been set on foot, in the course of +which conflicting opinions which had never yet been advanced in express +terms should be made manifest and wrestle with one another, until it +became clear which standpoints were untenable and which could be +maintained. Although he cherished warm feelings of affection for both R. +Nielsen and Broechner the two professors of Philosophy, he could not help +hoping for a discussion between them of the fundamental questions which +were engaging his mind. As Broechner's pupil, I said a little of what was +in my mind to him, but could not induce him to begin. Then I begged +Gabriel Sibbern to furnish a thorough criticism of Nielsen's books, but +he declined. I began to doubt whether I should be able to persuade the +elder men to speak. + +A review in The _Fatherland_ of the first part of Nielsen's +_Logic of Fundamental Ideas_ roused my indignation. It was in +diametric opposition to what I considered irrefutably true, and was +written in the style, and with the metaphors, which the paper's literary +criticisms had brought into fashion, a style that was repugnant to me +with its sham poetical, or meaninglessly flat expressions ("Matter is +the hammer-stroke that the Ideal requires"--"Spontaneity is like food +that has once been eaten"). + +In an eleven-page letter to Broechner I condensed all that I had thought +about the philosophical study at the University during these first years +of my youth, and proved to him, in the keenest terms I could think of, +that it was his duty to the ideas whose spokesman he was, to come +forward, and that it would be foolish, in fact wrong, to leave the +matter alone. I knew well enough that I was jeopardising my precious +friendship with Broechner by my action, but I was willing to take the +risk. I did not expect any immediate result of my letter, but thought to +myself that it should ferment, and some time in the future might bear +fruit. The outcome of it far exceeded my expectations, inasmuch as +Broechner was moved by my letter, and not only thanked me warmly for my +daring words, but went without delay to Nielsen and told him that he +intended to write a book on his entire philosophical activity and +significance. Nielsen took his announcement with a good grace. + +However, as Broechner immediately afterwards lost his young wife, and was +attacked by the insidious consumption which ravaged him for ten years, +the putting of this resolution into practice was for several years +deferred. + +At that I felt that I myself must venture, and, as a beginning, Julius +Lange and I, in collaboration, wrote a humorous article on Schmidt's +review of _The Logic of Fundamental Ideas_, which Lange was to get +into _The Daily Paper_, to which he had access. Three days after +the article was finished Lange came to me and told me that to his dismay +it was--gone. It was so exactly like him that I was just as delighted as +if he had informed me that the article was printed. For some time we +hoped that it might be on Lange's table, for, the day before, he had +said: + +"I am not of a curious disposition, but I should like to know what there +really is on that table!" + +However, it had irrevocably disappeared. + +I then came forward myself with a number of shorter articles which I +succeeded in getting accepted by the _Fatherland_. When I entered +for the first time Ploug's tiny little office high up at the top of a +house behind Hoejbro Place, the gruff man was not unfriendly. Surprised +at the youthful appearance of the person who walked in, he merely burst +out: "How old are you?" And to the reply: "Twenty-three and a half," he +said smilingly, "Don't forget the half." + +The first article was not printed for months; the next ones appeared +without such long delay. But Ploug was somewhat uneasy about the +contents of them, and cautiously remarked that there was "not to be any +fun made of Religion," which it could not truthfully be said I had done. +But I had touched upon dogmatic Belief and that was enough. + +Later on, Ploug had a notion that, as he once wrote, he had excluded me +from the paper as soon as he perceived my mischievous tendency. This was +a failure of memory on his part; the reason I left the paper was a +different one, and I left of my own accord. + +Bold and surly, virile and reliable as Ploug seemed, in things +journalistic you could place slight dependence on his word. His dearest +friend admitted as much; he gave his consent, and then forgot it, or +withdrew it. Nothing is more general, but it made an overweening +impression on a beginner like myself, inexperienced in the ways of life. + +When Ibsen's _Brand_ came out, creating an unusual sensation, I +asked Ploug if I might review the book and received a definite "Yes" +from him. I then wrote my article, to which I devoted no little pains, +but when I took it in it was met by him, to my astonishment, with the +remark that the paper had now received another notice from their regular +reviewer, whom he "could not very well kick aside." Ploug's promise had +apparently been meaningless! I went my way with my article, firmly +resolved never to go there again. + +From 1866 to 1870 I sought and found acceptance for my newspaper +articles (not very numerous) in Bille's _Daily Paper_, which in its +turn closed its columns to me after my first series of lectures at the +University of Copenhagen. Bille as an editor was pleasant, a little +patronising, it is true, but polite and invariably good-tempered. He +usually received his contributors reclining at full length on his sofa, +his head, with its beautifully cut features, resting against a cushion +and his comfortable little stomach protruding. He was scarcely of medium +height, quick in everything he did, very clear, a little flat; very +eloquent, but taking somewhat external views; pleased at the great +favour he enjoyed among the Copenhagen bourgeoisie. If he entered +Tivoli's Concert Hall in an evening all the waiter's ran about at once +like cockroaches. They hurried to know what he might please to want, and +fetched chairs for him and his party. Gay, adaptable, and practised, he +was the principal speaker at every social gathering. In his editorial +capacity he was courteous, decided, and a man of his word; he did not +allow himself to be alarmed by trifles. When Bjoernson attacked me (I was +at the time his youngest contributor), he raised my scale of pay, +unsolicited. The first hitch in our relations occurred when in 1869 I +published a translation of Mill's Subjection of Women. This book roused +Bille's exasperation and displeasure. He forbade it to be reviewed in +his paper, refused me permission to defend it in the paper, and would +not even allow the book in his house, so that his family had to read it +clandestinely, as a dangerous and pernicious work. + + +XXIV. + +In the beginning of the year 1866 Ludvig David died suddenly in Rome, of +typhoid fever. His sorrowing parents founded in memory of him an +exhibition for law-students which bears and perpetuates his name. The +first executors of the fund were, in addition to his most intimate +friend, two young lawyers named Emil Petersen and Emil Bruun, who had +both been friends of his. The latter, who has not previously been +mentioned in these pages, was a strikingly handsome and clever young +man, remarkable for his calm and superior humour, and exceedingly self- +confident and virile. His attitude towards Ludvig David in his early +youth had been somewhat that of a protector. Unfortunately he was +seriously wounded during the first storming of the Dybboel redoubts by +the Germans; a bullet crushed one of the spinal vertebrae; gradually the +wound brought on consumption of the lungs and he died young. + +Ludvig David's death was a great loss to his friends. It was not only +that he took such an affectionate interest in their welfare and +happiness, but he had a considerable gift for Mathematics and History, +and, from his home training, an understanding of affairs of state which +was considerably above that of most people. Peculiarly his own was a +combination of keen, disintegrating intelligence, and a tendency towards +comprehensive, rounded off, summarising. He had strong public +antipathies. In his opinion the years of peace that had followed the +first war in Slesvig had had an enervating effect; public speakers and +journalists had taken the places of brave men; many a solution of a +difficulty, announced at first with enthusiasm, had in course of time +petrified into a mere set phrase. He thought many of the leading men +among the Liberals superficial and devoid of character, and accused +them, with the pitilessness of youth, of mere verbiage. Influenced as he +was by Kierkegaard, such a man as Bille was naturally his aversion. He +considered--not altogether justly--that Bille cloaked himself in false +earnestness. + +He himself was profoundly and actively philanthropic, with an impulse-- +by no means universal--to relieve and help. Society life he hated; to +him it was waste of time and a torture to be obliged to figure in a +ballroom; he cared very little for his appearance, and was by no means +elegant in his dress. He was happy, however, in the unconstrained +society of the comrades he cared about, enjoyed a merry chat or a +frolicsome party, and in intimate conversation he would reveal his +inmost nature with modest unpretension, with good-natured wit, directed +against himself as much as against others, and with an understanding and +sympathetic eye for his surroundings. His warmest outburst had generally +a little touch of mockery or teasing about it, as though he were +repeating, half roguishly, the feelings of another, rather than +unreservedly expressing his own. But a heartfelt, steadfast look would +often come into his beautiful dark eyes. + + +XXV. + +His death left a great void in his home. His old father said to me one +day: + +"Strange how one ends as one begins! I have written no verses since my +early youth, and now I have written a poem on my grief for Ludvig. I +will read it to you." + +There was an Art and Industrial Exhibition in Stockholm, that Summer, +which C.N. David was anxious to see. As he did not care to go alone, he +took me in his son's place. It was my first journey to a foreign +capital, and as such both enjoyable and profitable. I no longer, it is +true, had the same intense boyish impressionability as when I was in +Sweden for the first time, seven years before. The most trifling thing +then had been an experience. In Goeteborg I had stayed with a friend of +my mother's, whose twelve-year-old daughter, Bluma Alida, a wondrously +charming little maiden, had jokingly been destined by the two mothers +for my bride from the child's very birth. And at that time I had +assimilated every impression of people or scenery with a voracious +appetite which rendered these impressions ineffaceable all my life long. +That Summer month, my fancy had transformed every meeting with a young +girl into an adventure and fixed every landscape on my mental retina +with an affection such as the landscape painter generally only feels for +a place where he is specially at home. Then I had shared for a whole +month Goeteborg family and social life. Now I was merely travelling as a +tourist, and as the companion of a highly respected old man. + +I was less entranced at Stockholm by the Industrial Exhibition than by +the National Museum and the Royal Theatre, where the lovely Hyasser +captivated me by her beauty and the keen energy of her acting. I became +exceedingly fond of Stockholm, this most beautifully situated of the +Northern capitals, and saw, with reverence, the places associated with +the name of Bellman. I also accompanied my old friend to Ulriksdal, +where the Swedish Queen Dowager expected him in audience. More than an +hour before we reached the Castle he threw away his cigar. + +"I am an old courtier," he remarked. He had always been intimately +associated with the Danish Royal family; for a long time the Crown +Prince used to go regularly to his flat in Queen's Crossway Street, to +be instructed by him in political economy. He was consequently used to +Court ceremonial. + +Beautiful were those Summer days, lovely the light nights in Stockholm. + +One recollection from these weeks is associated with a night when the +sky was overcast. I had wandered round the town, before retiring to +rest, and somewhere, in a large square, slipping my hand in my pocket, +and feeling it full of bits of paper, could not remember how they got +there, and threw them away. When I was nearly back at the hotel it +flashed upon me that it had been small Swedish notes--all the money that +I had changed for my stay in Stockholm--that I had been carrying loose +in my pocket and had so thoughtlessly thrown away. With a great deal of +trouble, I found the square again, but of course not a sign of the +riches that in unpardonable forgetfulness I had scattered to the winds. +I was obliged to borrow six Rigsdaler (a sum of a little over thirteen +shillings) from my old protector. That my requirements were modest is +proved by the fact that this sum sufficed. + +The Danish Ambassador was absent from Stockholm just at this time, and +the Charge d'Affaires at the Legation had to receive the Danish ex- +Minister in his stead. He was very attentive to us, and took the +travellers everywhere where C.N. David wished his arrival to be made +known. He himself, however, was a most unfortunate specimen of Danish +diplomacy, a man disintegrated by hideous debauchery, of coarse +conversation, and disposition so brutal that he kicked little children +aside with his foot when they got in front of him in the street. +Abnormities of too great irregularity brought about, not long +afterwards, his dismissal and his banishment to a little Danish island. + +This man gave a large dinner-party in honour of the Danish ex-Minister, +to which, amongst others, all the Swedish and Norwegian Ministers in +Stockholm were invited. It was held at Hasselbakken, [Footnote: a +favourite outdoor pleasure resort at Stockholm.] and the arrangements +were magnificent. But what highly astonished me, and was in reality most +out of keeping in such a circle, was the tone that the conversation at +table gradually assumed, and especially the obscenity of the subjects of +conversation. It was not, however, the Ministers and Diplomats present, +but a Danish roue, a professor of Physics, who gave this turn to the +talk. He related anecdotes that would have made a sailor blush. Neither +Count Manderstroem, nor any of the other Ministers, neither Malmgren, nor +the dignified and handsome Norwegian Minister Bretteville, seemed to be +offended. Manderstroem's expression, however, changed very noticeably +when the professor ventured to make some pointed insinuations regarding +the Swedish attitude, and his personal attitude in particular, previous +to the Dano-German war and during its course. He suddenly pretended not +to understand, and changed the subject of conversation. + +It produced an extremely painful impression upon me that not only the +Danish Charge d'Affaires, but apparently several of these fine +gentlemen, had determined on the additional amusement of making me +drunk. Everybody at table vied one with the other to drink my health, +and they informed me that etiquette demanded I should each time empty my +glass to the bottom; the contrary would be a breach of good form. As I +very quickly saw through their intention, I escaped from the difficulty +by asking the waiter to bring me a very small glass. By emptying this I +could, without my manners being affected, hold my own against them all. + +But,--almost for the first time in my life,--when the company rose from +table I felt that I had been in exceedingly bad company, and a disgust +for the nominally highest circles, who were so little capable of acting +in accordance with the reputation they enjoyed, and the polish imputed +to them, remained with me for many years to come. + + + + +FIRST LONG SOJOURN ABROAD + +My Wish to See Paris--_Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_--A +Journey--Impressions of Paris--Lessons in French--Mademoiselle Mathilde +--Taine. + + +I. + +I had wished for years to see Paris, the city that roused my most devout +feelings. As a youth I had felt a kind of reverent awe for the French +Revolution, which represented to me the beginning of human conditions +for all those who were not of the favoured among men,--and Paris was the +city of the Revolution. Moreover, it was the city of Napoleon, the only +ruler since Caesar who had seriously fascinated me, though my feelings +for him changed so much that now admiration, now aversion, got the upper +hand. And Paris was the city, too, of the old culture, the city of +Julian the Apostate, the city of the middle ages, that Victor Hugo had +portrayed in _Notre Dame de Paris_--the first book I had read in +French, difficult though it was with its many peculiar expressions for +Gothic arches and buttresses--and it was the city where Alfred de Musset +had written his poems and where Delacroix had painted. The Louvre and +the Luxembourg, the Theatre Francais and the Gymnase were immense +treasuries that tempted me. In the Autumn of 1866, when Gabriel Sibbern +started to Paris, somewhat before I myself could get away, my last words +to him: "Till we meet again in the Holy City!" were by no means a jest. + + +II. + +Before I could start, I had to finish the pamphlet which, with Sibbern's +help, I had written against Nielsen's adjustment of the split between +Protestant orthodoxy and the scientific view of the universe, and which +I had called _Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_. I was not troubled +with any misgivings as to how I should get the book published. As long +ago as 1864 a polite, smiling, kindly man, who introduced himself to me +as Frederik Hegel, the bookseller, had knocked at the door of my little +room and asked me to let him print the essay which I had written for my +Master of Arts examination, and if possible he would also like the paper +which had won the University gold medal; and in fact, anything else I +might wish published. To my amazed reply that those essays were not +worth publishing, and that in general I did not consider what I wrote +sufficiently mature for publication, Hegel had first suggested that I +should leave that question to the publisher, and then, when he saw that +my refusal was honestly meant, had simply asked me to take my work to +him when I myself considered that the moment had arrived. On this +occasion, as on many others, the acute and daring publisher gave proof +of the _flair_ which made him the greatest in the North. He +accepted the little book without raising any difficulties, merely +remarking that it would have to be spread out a little in the printing, +that it might not look too thin. Even before the pamphlet was mentioned +in the Press, its author was on his way to foreign parts. + + +III. + +On one of the first days of November, I journeyed, in a tremendous +storm, to Luebeck, the characteristic buildings of which (the Church of +Mary, the Exchange, the Town-hall), together with the remains of the old +fortifications, aroused my keen interest. In this Hanse town, with its +strongly individual stamp, I found myself carried back three hundred +years. + +I was amazed at the slave-like dress of the workmen, the pointed hats of +the girls, and the wood pavements, which were new to me. + +I travelled through Germany with a Portuguese, a little doctor from the +University of Coimbra, in whose queer French fifteen was _kouss_ +and Goethe _Shett_. A practical American, wrapped up in a +waterproof, took up three places to lie down in one evening, pretended +to sleep, and never stirred all night, forcing his inexperienced fellow- +travellers to crowd up into the corners of the carriage, and when the +day broke, chatted with them as pleasantly as if they and he were the +best friends in the world. + +At Cologne, where I had stood, reverential, in the noble forest of +pillars in the Cathedral, then afterwards, in my simplicity, allowed +someone to foist a whole case of Eau de Cologne upon me, I shortened my +stay, in my haste to see Paris. But, having by mistake taken a train +which would necessitate my waiting several hours at Liege, I decided +rather to continue my journey to Brussels and see that city too. The run +through Belgium seemed to me heavenly, as for a time I happened to be +quite alone in my compartment and I walked up and down, intoxicated with +the joy of travelling. + +Brussels was the first large French town I saw; it was a foretaste of +Paris, and delighted me. + +Never having been out in the world on my own account before, I was still +as inexperienced and awkward as a child. It was not enough that I had +got into the wrong train; I discovered, to my shame, that I had mislaid +the key of my box, which made me think anxiously of the customs +officials in Paris, and I was also so stupid as to ask the boots in the +Brussels hotel for "a little room," so that they gave me a miserable +little sleeping-place under the roof. + +But at night, after I had rambled about the streets of Brussels, as I +sat on a bench somewhere on a broad boulevard, an overwhelming, +terrifying, transporting sense of my solitariness came over me. It +seemed to me as though now, alone in a foreign land, at night time, in +this human swarm, where no one knew me and I knew no one, where no one +would look for me if anything were to happen to me, I was for the first +time thrown entirely on my own resources, and I recognised in the +heavens, with a feeling of reassurance, old friends among the stars. + +With a guide, whom in my ignorance I thought necessary, I saw the sights +of the town, and afterwards, for the first time, saw a French play. So +little experience of the world had I, that, during the interval, I left +my overcoat, which I had not given up to the attendant, lying on the +seat in the pit, and my neighbour had to explain to me that such great +confidence in my fellow-men was out of place. + +Everything was new to me, everything fascinated me. I, who only knew +"indulgence" from my history lessons at school, saw with keen interest +the priest in a Brussels church dispense "_indulgence pleniere_," +or, in Flemish, _vollen aflaet_. I was interested in the curious +names of the ecclesiastical orders posted up in the churches, marvelled, +for instance, at a brotherhood that was called "St. Andrew Avellin, +patron saint against apoplexy, epilepsy and sudden death." + +In the carriage from Brussels I had for travelling companion a pretty +young Belgian girl named Marie Choteau, who was travelling with her +father, but talked all the time to her foreign fellow-traveller, and in +the course of conversation showed me a Belgian history and a Belgian +geography, from which it appeared that Belgium was the centre of the +globe, the world's most densely built over, most religious, and at the +same time most enlightened country, the one which, in proportion to its +size, had the most and largest industries. I gave her some of my +bountiful supply of Eau de Cologne. + + +IV. + +The tiring night-journey, with its full four hours' wait at Liege, was +all pure enjoyment to me, and in a mood of mild ecstasy, at last, at +half-past ten on the morning of November 11th 1866, I made my entry into +Paris, and was received cordially by the proprietors of a modest but +clean little hotel which is still standing, No. 20 Rue Notre Dame des +Victoires, by the proprietors, two simple Lorrainers, Francois and +Mueller, to whom Gabriel Sibbern, who was staying there, had announced my +arrival. The same morning Sibbern guided my first steps to one of +Pasdeloup's great classical popular concerts. + +In the evening, in spite of my fatigue after travelling all night, I +went to the Theatre Francais for the first time, and there, lost in +admiration of the masterly ensemble and the natural yet passionate +acting, with which I had hitherto seen nothing to compare, I saw +Girardin's _Le supplice d'une femme_, and Beaumarchais' _Le +mariage de Figaro_, in one evening making the acquaintance of such +stars as Regnier, Madame Favart, Coquelin and the Sisters Brohan. + +Regnier especially, in his simple dignity, was an unforgettable figure, +being surrounded, moreover, in my eyes by the glory which the well-known +little poem of Alfred de Musset, written to comfort the father's heart, +had shed upon him. Of the two celebrated sisters, Augustine was all wit, +Madeleine pure beauty and arch, melting grace. + +These first days were rich days to me, and as they did not leave me any +time for thinking over what I had seen, my impressions overwhelmed me at +night, till sometimes I could not sleep for sheer happiness. This, to +me, was happiness, an uninterrupted garnering of intellectual wealth in +association with objects that all appealed to my sympathies, and I wrote +home: "To be here, young, healthy, with alert senses, keen eyes and good +ears, with all the curiosity, eagerness to know, love of learning, and +susceptibility to every impression, that is youth's own prerogative, and +to have no worries about home, all that is so great a happiness that I +am sometimes tempted, like Polycrates, to fling the handsome ring I had +from Christian Richardt in the gutter." + +For the rest, I was too fond of characteristic architecture to feel +attracted by the building art displayed in the long, regular streets of +Napoleon III, and too permeated with national prejudices to be able at +once to appreciate French sculpture. I was justified in feeling repelled +by many empty allegorical pieces on public monuments, but during the +first weeks I lacked perception for such good sculpture as is to be +found in the _foyer_ of the Theatre Francais. "You reel at every +step," I wrote immediately after my arrival, "that France has never had a +Thorwaldsen, and that Denmark possesses an indescribable treasure in +him. We are and remain, in three or four directions, the first nation in +Europe. This is pure and simple truth." + +To my youthful ignorance it was the truth, but it hardly remained such +after the first month. + +Being anxious to see as much as possible and not let anything of +interest escape me, I went late to bed, and yet got up early, and tried +to regulate my time, as one does a blanket that is too short. + +I was immensely interested in the art treasures from all over the world +collected in the Louvre. Every single morning, after eating my modest +breakfast at a _cremerie_ near the chateau, I paid my vows in the +_Salon carre_ and then absorbed myself in the other halls. The +gallery of the Louvre was the one to which I owe my initiation. Before, +I had seen hardly any Italian art in the original, and no French at all. +In Copenhagen I had been able to worship all the Dutch masters. Leonardo +and the Venetians spoke to me here for the first time. French painting +and sculpture, Puget and Houdon, Clouet and Delacroix, and the French +art that was modern then, I learnt for the first time to love and +appreciate at the Luxembourg. + +I relished these works of art, and the old-time art of the Greeks and +Egyptians which the Museum of the Louvre contained, in a mild +intoxication of delight. + +And I inbreathed Paris into my soul. When on the broad, handsome Place +de la Concorde, I saw at the same time, with my bodily eyes, the +beautifully impressive obelisk, and in my mind's eye the scaffold on +which the royal pair met with their death in the Revolution; when in the +Latin quarter I went upstairs to the house in which Charlotte Corday +murdered Marat, or when, in the highest storey of the Louvre, I gazed at +the little gray coat from Marengo and the three-cornered hat, or from +the Arc de Triomphe let my glance roam over the city, the life that +pulsated through my veins seemed stimulated tenfold by sight and +visions. + +Yet it was not only the city of Paris, its appearance, its art gems, +that I eagerly made my own, and with them much that intellectually +belonged to Italy or the Netherlands; it was French culture, the best +that the French nature contains, the fragrance of her choicest flowers, +that I inhaled. + +And while thus for the first time learning to know French people, and +French intellectual life, I was unexpectedly admitted to constant +association with men and women of the other leading Romance races, +Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, Brazilians. + +Broechner had given me a letter of introduction to Costanza Testa, a +friend of his youth, now married to Count Oreste Blanchetti and living +in Paris, with her somewhat older sister Virginia, a kind-hearted and +amiable woman of the world. The latter had married in Brazil, as her +second husband, the Italian banker Pagella, and to their house came, not +only Italians and other European Southerners, but members of the South +American colony. + +So warm a reception as I met with from the two sisters and their +husbands I had never had anywhere before. After I had known the two +families one hour, these people treated me as though I were their +intimate friend; Costanza's younger brother, they called me. I had a +seat in their carriage every day, when the ladies drove out in the Bois +de Boulogne; they never had a box at the Italian opera, where Adelina +Patti's first notes were delighting her countrymen, without sending me a +seat. They expected me every evening, however late it often might be +when I came from the theatre, in their drawing-room, where, according to +the custom of their country, they always received the same circle of +friends. + +I was sincerely attached to the two sisters, and felt myself at ease in +their house, although the conversation there was chiefly carried on in a +language of which I understood but little, since French was spoken only +on my account. The only shadow over my pleasure at spending my evenings +in the Rue Valois du Roule was the fact that this necessitated my +missing some acts at the Theatre Francais, for which the Danish +Minister, through the Embassy, had procured me a free pass. Certainly no +Dane was ever made so happy by the favour. They were enraptured hours +that I spent evening after evening in the French national theatre, where +I became thoroughly acquainted with the modern, as well as the +classical, dramatic repertoire,--an acquaintance which was further +fortified during my long stay in Paris in 1870. + +I enjoyed the moderation of the best actors, their restraint, and +subordination of self to the role and the general effect. It is true +that the word genius could only be applied to a very few of the actors, +and at that time I saw none who, in my opinion, could be compared with +the great representatives of the Danish stage, such as Michael Wiehe, +Johanne Luise Heiberg, or Phister. But I perceived at once that the +mannerisms of these latter would not be tolerated here for a moment; +here, under the influence of this artistic whole-harmony, they would +never have been able to give free vent to individuality and peculiarity +as they did at home. + +I saw many hundred performances in these first years of my youth at the +Theatre Francais, which was then at its zenith. There, if anywhere, I +felt the silent march of the French muses through Time and Space. + + +V. + +A capable journalist named Gregoire, a sickly, prematurely aged, limping +fellow, with alert wits, an Alsatian, who knew Danish and regularly read +Bille's _Daily Paper_, had in many ways taken me up almost from the +first day of my sojourn on French soil. This man recommended me, on my +expressing a wish to meet with a competent teacher, to take instruction +in the language from a young girl, a friend of his sister, who was an +orphan and lived with her aunt. She was of good family, the daughter of +a colonel and the granddaughter of an admiral, but her own and her +aunt's circumstances were narrow, and she was anxious to give lessons. + +When I objected that such lessons could hardly be really instructive, I +was told that she was not only in every way a nice but a very gifted and +painstaking young girl. + +The first time I entered the house, as a future pupil, I found the young +lady, dressed in a plain black silk dress, surrounded by a circle of +toddlers of both sexes, for whom she had a sort of school, and whom on +my arrival she sent away. She had a pretty figure, a face that was +attractive without being beautiful, a large mouth with good teeth, and +dark brown hair. Her features were a little indefinite, her face rather +broad than oval, her eyes brown and affectionate. She had at any rate +the beauty that twenty years lends. We arranged for four lessons a week, +to begin with. + +The first dragged considerably. My teacher was to correct any mistakes +in pronunciation and grammar that I made in conversation. But we could +not get up any proper conversation. She was evidently bored by the +lessons, which she had only undertaken for the sake of the fees. If I +began to tell her anything, she only half listened, and yawned with all +her might very often and very loudly, although she politely put her hand +in front of her large mouth. There only came a little animation into her +expression when I either pronounced as badly as I had been taught by my +French master at school, or made some particularly ludicrous mistake, +such as _c'est tout egal_ for _bien egal_. At other times she +was distracted, sleepy, her thoughts elsewhere. + +After having tried vainly for a few times to interest the young lady by +my communications, I grew tired of the lessons. Moreover, they were of +very little advantage to me, for the simple reason that my youthful +teacher had not the very slightest scientific or even grammatical +knowledge of her own tongue, and consequently could never answer my +questions as to _why_ you had to pronounce in such and such a way, +or by virtue of what _rule_ you expressed yourself in such and such +a manner. I began to neglect my lessons, sometimes made an excuse, but +oftener remained away without offering any explanation. + +On my arrival one afternoon, after having repeatedly stayed away, the +young lady met me with some temper, and asked the reason of my failures +to come, plainly enough irritated and alarmed at my indifference, which +after all was only the reflection of her own. I promised politely to be +more regular in future. To insure this, she involuntarily became more +attentive. + +She yawned no more. I did not stay away again. + +She began to take an interest herself in this eldest pupil of hers, who +at 24 years of age looked 20 and who was acquainted with all sorts of +things about conditions, countries, and people of which she knew +nothing. + +She had been so strictly brought up that nearly all secular reading was +forbidden to her, and she had never been to any theatre, not even the +Theatre Francais. She had not read Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Musset, +had not even dared to read _Paul et Virginie_, only knew expurgated +editions of Corneille, Racine and Moliere. She was sincerely clerical, +had early been somewhat influenced by her cousin, later the well-known +Roman Catholic author, Ernest Hello, and in our conversations was always +ready to take the part of the Jesuits against Pascal; what the latter +had attacked were some antiquated and long-abandoned doctrinal books; +even if there were defects in the teaching of certain Catholic +ecclesiastics, their lives at any rate were exemplary, whereas the +contrary was the case with the free-thinking men of science; their +teaching was sometimes unassailable, but the lives they led could not be +taken seriously. + +When we two young people got into a dispute, we gradually drew nearer to +one another. Our remarks contradicted each other, but an understanding +came about between our eyes. One day, as I was about to leave, she +called me back from the staircase, and, very timidly, offered me an +orange. The next time she blushed slightly when I came in. She +frequently sent me cards of admission to the Athenee, a recently started +institution, in which lectures were given by good speakers. She began to +look pleased at my coming and to express regret at the thought of my +departure. + +On New Year's day, as a duty gift, I had sent her a bouquet of white +flowers, and the next day she had tears in her eyes as she thanked me: +"I ask you to believe that I highly appreciate your attention." From +that time forth she spoke more and more often of how empty it would be +for her when I was gone. I was not in love with her, but was too young +for her feelings, so unreservedly expressed, to leave me unaffected, and +likewise young enough to imagine that she expected me before long to ask +for her hand. So I soon informed her that I did not feel so warmly +towards her as she did towards me, and that I was not thinking of +binding myself for the present. + +"Do you think me so poor an observer?" she replied, amazed. "I have +never made any claims upon you, even in my thoughts. But I owe you the +happiest month of my life." + + +VI. + +This was about the state of affairs between Mademoiselle Louise and me, +when one evening, at Pagella's, where there were Southerners of various +races present, I was introduced to a young lady, Mademoiselle Mathilde +M., who at first sight made a powerful impression upon me. + +She was a young Spanish Brazilian, tall of stature, a proud and dazzling +racial beauty. The contours of her head were so impeccably perfect that +one scarcely understood how Nature could have made such a being +inadvertently, without design. The rosy hue of her complexion made the +carnation even of a beautiful woman's face look chalky or crimson by the +side of hers. At the same time there was a something in the colour of +her skin that made me understand better the womanish appearance of +Zurbaran and Ribera, a warm glow which I had never seen in Nature +before. Her heavy, bluish-black hair hung down, after the fashion of the +day, in little curls over her forehead and fell in thick ringlets upon +her shoulders. Her eyebrows were exquisitely pencilled, arched and +almost met over her delicate nose, her eyes were burning and a deep +brown; they conquered, and smiled; her mouth was a little too small, +with white teeth that were a little too large, her bust slender and +full. Her manner was distinguished, her voice rich; but most marvellous +of all was her hand, such a hand as Parmeggianino might have painted, +all soul, branching off into five delightful fingers. + +Mentally I unhesitatingly dubbed her the most marvelous feminine +creature I had ever seen, and that less on account of her loveliness +than the blending of the magnificence of her bearing with the ardour, +and often the frolicsomeness, of her mode of expression. + +She was always vigorous and sometimes daring in her statements, cared +only for the unusual, loved only "the impossible," but nevertheless +carefully observed every established custom of society. To my very first +remark to her, to the effect that the weakness of women was mostly only +an habitual phrase; they were not weak except when they wished to be, +she replied: "Young as you are, you know women very well!" In that she +was quite wrong. + +Besides Spanish and Portuguese, she spoke French perfectly and English +not badly, sang in a melodious contralto voice, drew well for an +amateur, carved alabaster vases, and had all kinds of talents. She did +not care to sing ballads, only cared for grand pathos. + +She was just twenty years of age, and had come into the world at Rio, +where her father represented the Spanish government. The family were +descended from Cervantes. As she had early been left motherless, her +father had sent her over in her fifteenth year to her aunt in Paris. +This latter was married to an old monstrosity of a Spaniard, religious +to the verge of insanity, who would seem to have committed some crime in +his youth and now spent his whole day in the church, which was next door +to his house, imploring forgiveness for his sins. He was only at home at +mealtimes, when he ate an alarming amount, and he associated only with +priests. The aunt herself, however, in spite of her age, was a pleasure- +seeking woman, rarely allowed her niece to stay at home and occupy +herself as she liked, but dragged her everywhere about with her to +parties and balls. In her aunt's company she sometimes felt depressed, +but alone she was cheerful and without a care. At the Pagellas' she was +like a child of the house. She had the Spanish love of ceremony and +magnificence, the ready repartee of the Parisian, and, like a well- +brought-up girl, knew how to preserve the balance between friendliness +and mirth. She was not in the least prudish, and she understood +everything; but there was a certain sublimity in her manner. + +While Mademoiselle Louise, the little Parisian, had been brought up in a +convent, kept from all free, intelligent, mundane conversation, and all +free artistic impressions, the young Spaniard, at the same age, had the +education and the style of a woman of the world in her manner. + +We two young frequenters of the Pagella salon, felt powerfully drawn to +one another. We understood one another at once. Of course, it was only I +who was fascinated. When, in an evening, I drove across Paris in the +expectation of seeing her, I sometimes murmured to myself Henrik Hertz's +verse: + + "My beloved is like the dazzling day, + Brazilia's Summer!" + +My feelings, however, were much more admiration than love or desire. I +did not really want to possess her. I never felt myself quite on a level +with her even when she made decided advances to me. I rejoiced over her +as over something perfect, and there was the rich, foreign colouring +about her that there had been about the birds of paradise in my nursery. +She seldom disturbed my peace of mind, but I said to myself that if I +were to go away then, I should in all probability never see her again, +as her father would be taking her the next year to Brazil or Madrid, and +I sometimes felt as though I should be going away from my happiness +forever. She often asked me to stay with such expressions and with such +an expression that I was quite bewildered. And then she monopolised my +thoughts altogether, like the queenly being she was. + +A Danish poet had once called the beautiful women of the South "Large, +showy flowers without fragrance." Was she a large, showy flower? Forget- +me-nots were certainly by no means showy, but they were none the more +odorous for that. + +Now that I was seeing the radiant Mathilde almost every day, my position +with regard to Louise seemed to me a false one. I did not yet know how +exceedingly rare an undivided feeling is, did not understand that my +feelings towards Mathilde were just as incomplete as those I cherished +for Louise. I looked on Mademoiselle Mathilde as on a work of art, but I +came more humanly close to Mademoiselle Louise. She did not evoke my +enthusiastic admiration; that was quite true, but Mademoiselle Mathilde +evoked my enthusiastic admiration only. If there were a great deal of +compassion mingled with my feelings for the Parisian, there was likewise +a slight erotic element. + +The young Frenchwoman, in her passion, found expressions for affection +and tenderness, in which she forgot all pride. She lived in a +commingling, very painful for me, of happiness at my still being in +Paris, and of horror at my approaching departure, which I was now about +to accelerate, merely to escape from the extraordinary situation in +which I found myself, and which I was too young to carry. Although +Mathilde, whom I had never seen alone, was always the same, quite the +great lady, perfectly self-controlled, it was the thought of saying +good-bye to her that was the more painful to me. Every other day, on the +other hand, Louise was trembling and ill, and I dreaded the moment of +separation. + + +VII. + +I had not left off my daily work in Paris, but had read industriously at +the Imperial Library. I had also attended many lectures, some +occasionally, others regularly, such as those of Janet, Caro, Leveque +and Taine. + +Of all contemporary French writers, I was fondest of Taine. I had begun +studying this historian and thinker in Copenhagen. The first book of his +that I read was _The French Philosophers of the Nineteenth +Century_, in a copy that had been lent to me by Gabriel Sibbern. The +book entranced me, and I determined to read every word that I could get +hold of by the same author. In the Imperial Library in Paris I read +first of all _The History of English Literature_, of which I had +hitherto only been acquainted with a few fragments, which had appeared +in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. Taine was to me an antidote to +German abstraction and German pedantry. Through him I found the way to +my own inmost nature, which my Dano-German University education had +covered over. + +Shortly after my arrival in Paris, therefore, I had written to Taine and +begged for an interview. By a singular piece of ill-luck his reply to me +was lost, and it was only at the very end of my stay that I received a +second invitation to go to him. Although this one conversation could not +be of any vast importance to me, it was nevertheless the first personal +link between me and the man who was and remained my greatly loved master +and deliverer, even though I mistrusted his essential teachings. I was +afraid that I had created a bad impression, as I had wasted the time +raising objections; but Taine knew human nature well enough to perceive +the personality behind the clumsy form and the admiration behind the +criticism. In reality, I was filled with passionate gratitude towards +Taine, and this feeling remained unaltered until his latest hour. + +During this my first stay in Paris I added the impression of Taine's +personality to the wealth of impressions that I took back with me from +Paris to Copenhagen. + + + + +EARLY MANHOOD + +Feud in Danish Literature--Riding--Youthful Longings--On the Rack--My +First Living Erotic Reality--An Impression of the Miseries of Modern +Coercive Marriage--Researches on the Comic--Dramatic Criticism--A Trip +to Germany--Johanne Louise Heiberg--Magdalene Thoresen--Rudolph Bergh-- +The Sisters Spang--A Foreign Element--The Woman Subject--Orla Lehmann-- +M. Goldschmidt--Public Opposition--A Letter from Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson-- +Hard Work. + + +I. + +After my return from France to Denmark, in 1867, my thoughts were taken +up once more by the feud that had broken out in Danish literature +between Science and so-called Revelation (in the language of the time, +Faith and Knowledge). More and more had by degrees entered the lists, +and I, who centred my greatest intellectual interest in the battle, took +part in it with a dual front, against the orthodox theologians, and more +especially against R. Nielsen, the assailant of the theologians, whom I +regarded as no less theologically inclined than his opponents. + +I thereby myself became the object of a series of violent attacks from +various quarters. These did not have any appreciable effect on my +spirits, but they forced me for years into a somewhat irritating +attitude of self-defence. Still I was now arrived at that period of my +youth when philosophy and art were unable to keep temperament in check. + + +II. + +This manifested itself first in a fresh need for physical exercise. +During the first two years after the decision of 1864, while things were +leading up to war between Prussia and Austria, and while the young blood +of Denmark imagined that their country would be drawn into this war, I +had taken part, as a member of the Academic Shooting Society, in drill +and shooting practice. After the battle of Koeniggratz these occupations +lost much of their attraction. + +I was now going in for an exercise that was new to me and which I had +long wished to become proficient in. This was riding. + +Up to that time I had never been able to afford to ride. But just then a +captain of the dragoons offered to teach me for a very low fee, and in +the Queen's Riding-School I was initiated during the Spring months into +the elementary stages of the art, in order that in Summer I might be +able to ride out. These riding-lessons were the keenest possible delight +to me. I, who so seldom felt happy, and still more seldom jubilant, was +positively exultant as I rode out in the morning along the Strand Road. +Even if I had had an almost sleepless night I felt fresh on horseback. + +It was no pleasure to me to ride the same horse often, if I knew its +disposition. I liked to change as often as possible, and preferred +rather difficult horses to mares too well broken in. I felt the arrogant +pride of youth seethe in my veins as I galloped briskly along. + +I was still far from an accomplished horseman when an examination of my +finances warned me that I must give up my riding lessons. + +When I informed my instructor that I could no longer allow myself the +pleasure of his lessons, and in reply to his "Why?" had mentioned the +reason, the captain answered that it would be very easy to settle that +matter: he had a sister, an elderly maiden lady, who was passionately +fond of literature and literary history. Lessons in that subject could +to our mutual satisfaction balance the riding lessons, which could thus +go on indefinitely. It is unnecessary to say how welcome the proposition +was to me. It was such a relief! + +The captain was a pleasant, good-natured man, quite uneducated in +literary matters, who confidingly communicated his bachelor experiences +to his pupil. These were summed up in the reflection that when womenkind +fall in love, they dread neither fire nor water; the captain himself, +who yet, in his own opinion, only looked well on horseback, had once had +an affair with a married lady who bombarded him with letters, and who, +in her ardour, began writing one day without noticing that her husband, +who was standing behind her chair, was looking over her shoulder. Since +then the captain had not felt the need of women, so to speak, preferred +to be without them, and found his greatest pleasure in his horses and +his skill as an equestrian. + +The sister was a maiden lady of forty, by no means devoid of +intellectual ability, with talent for observation and an appreciation of +good books, but whose development had been altogether neglected. She now +cherished an ambition to write. She wrote in secret little tales that +were not really stupid but had not the slightest pretensions to style or +literary talent. She was very plain and exceedingly stout, which +produced a comical effect, especially as she was inclined to +exaggeration both of speech and gesture. + +There was a disproportion between the ages of the master and the pupil; +in my eyes she was quite an old person, in her eyes, being her +intellectual equal, I was likewise her equal in age. In the natural +order of things she felt more personal sympathy for me than I for her. +Consequently, I involuntarily put a dash of teasing into my instruction, +and occasionally made fun of her sentimentality, and when the large +lady, half angry, half distressed, rose to seize hold of me and give me +a shaking, I would run round the table, pursued by her, or shoot out a +chair between her and myself,--which indubitably did not add to the +dignity of our lessons. + +There was no question of thorough or connected instruction. What the +lady wanted more particularly was that I should go through her literary +attempts and correct them, but corrections could not transform them into +art. And so it came about that after no very long time I gave up these +arduous lessons, although obliged to give up my precious riding lessons +at the same time. + +Consequently I never became a really expert rider, although during the +next few years I had a ride now and then. But after a severe attack of +phlebitis following upon typhoid fever, in 1870-71, I was compelled to +give up all the physical exercises that I loved best. + + +III. + +My temperament expressed itself in a profusion of youthful longings, as +well as in my love of athletics. + +During my University studies, in my real budding manhood, I had +voluntarily cut myself away from the usual erotic diversions of youth. +Precocious though I was in purely intellectual development, I was very +backward in erotic experience. In that respect I was many years younger +than my age. + +On my return, my Paris experiences at first exercised me greatly. +Between the young French lady and myself an active correspondence had +sprung up, while the young Spaniard's radiant figure continued to retain +the same place in my thoughts. + +Then my surroundings claimed their rights, and it was not without +emotion that I realised how charming the girls at home were. For I was +only then entering upon the Cherubino stage of my existence, when the +sight of feminine grace or beauty immediately transports a youth into a +mild state of love intoxication. + +It was incredible how rich the world was in bewitching creatures, and +the world of Copenhagen especially. If you walked down Crown Princess +Street, at a window on the ground floor you saw a dark girl with a +Grecian-shaped head and two brown eyes, exquisitely set, beneath a high +and noble forehead. She united the chaste purity of Pallas Athene with a +stern, attractive grace. + +If you went out towards the north side of the town, there was a house +there on the first floor of which you were very welcome, where a +handsome and well-bred couple once a week received young men for the +sake of the lady's young niece. The master of the house was a lean and +silent man, who always looked handsome, and was always dignified; he had +honourably filled an exalted official post. His wife had been very +attractive in her youth, had grown white while still quite young, and +was now a handsome woman with snow-white curls clustering round her +fresh-coloured face. To me she bore, as it were, an invisible mark upon +her forehead, for when quite a young girl she had been loved by a great +man. She was sincerely kind and genuinely pleasant, but the advantage of +knowing her was not great; for that she was too restless a hostess. When +it was her At Home she never remained long enough with one group of +talkers properly to understand what was being discussed. After about a +minute she hurried off to the opposite corner of the drawing-room, said +a few words there, and then passed on to look after the tea. + +It was neither to see her nor her husband that many of the young people +congregated at the house. It was for the sake of the eighteen-year-old +fairy maiden, her niece, whose face was one to haunt a man's dreams. It +was not from her features that the witchery emanated, although in shape +her face was a faultless oval, her narrow forehead high and well-shaped, +her chin powerful. Neither was it from the personality one obtained a +glimpse of through her features. The girl's character and mental quality +seemed much the same as that of other girls; she was generally silent, +or communicative about trifles, and displayed no other coquetry than the +very innocent delight in pleasing which Nature itself would demand. + +But all the same there was a fascination about her, as about a fairy +maiden. There was a yellow shimmer about her light hair; azure flames +flashed from her blue eyes. These flames drew a magic circle about her, +and the dozen young men who had strayed inside the circle flocked round +her aunt the evening in the week that the family were "at home" and sat +there, vying with each other for a glance from those wondrous eyes, +hating each other with all their hearts, and suffering from the +ridiculousness of yet meeting like brothers, week after week, as guests +in the same house. The young girl's male relatives, who had outgrown +their enthusiasm for her, declared that her character was not good and +reliable--poor child! had she to be all that, too? Others who did not +ask so much were content to enjoy the sound of her voice. + +She was not a Copenhagen girl, only spent a few Winters in the town, +then disappeared again. + +Some years after, it was rumoured, to everybody's astonishment, that she +had married a widower in a provincial town--she who belonged to the +realms of Poesy! + +Then there was another young girl, nineteen. Whereas the fairy maiden +did not put herself out to pretend she troubled her head about the young +men whom she fascinated with the rhythm of her movements or the +radiation of her loveliness, was rather inclined to be short in her +manner, a little staccato in her observations, too accustomed to +admiration to attract worshippers to herself by courting them, too +undeveloped and impersonal to consciously assert herself--this other +girl was of quite another sort. She had no innate irresistibility, but +was a shrewd and adaptable human girl. Her face did not attract by its +beauty, though she was very much more beautiful than ugly, with a +delicately hooked nose, a mouth full of promise, an expression of +thoughtfulness and determination. When she appeared at a ball, men's +eyes lingered on her neck, and even more on her white back, with its +firm, smooth skin, and fine play of the muscles; for if she did not +allow very much of her young bust to be seen, her dress at the back was +cut down nearly to her belt. Her voice was a deep contralto, and she +knew how to assume an expression of profound gravity and reflection. But +she captivated most by her attentiveness. When a young man whom she +wished to attract commenced a conversation with her, she never took her +eyes from his, or rather she gazed into his, and showed such a rapt +attention to his words, such an interest in his thoughts and his +occupations, that after meeting her once he never forgot her again. Her +coquetry did not consist of languishing glances, but of a pretended +sympathy, that flattered and delighted its object. + + +IV. + +These Danish girls were likely to appeal to a young man just returned +from travels abroad, during which his emotions had been doubly stirred, +for the first time, by feminine affection and by enthusiasm for a woman. +They influenced me the more strongly because they were Danish, and +because I, who loved everything Danish, from the language to the +monuments, had, since the war, felt something lacking in everyone, man +or woman, who was foreign to Denmark. + +But in the midst of all these visitations of calf-love, and their +vibrations among undefined sensations, I was pulled back with a jerk, as +it were, to my earlier and deepest impression, that of the loveliness +and exalted person of the young Spaniard. Letters from Paris furrowed my +mind like steamers the waters of a lake, made it foam, and the waves run +high, left long streaks across its wake. Not that Mlle. Mathilde sent +letters to me herself, but her Italian lady and gentlemen friends wrote +for her, apparently in her name, loudly lamenting my unreasonable +departure, wishing and demanding my return, telling me how she missed +me, sometimes how angry she was. + +I was too poor to be able to return at once. I did what I could to +procure money, wrote to those of my friends whom I thought could best +afford it and on whom I relied most, but met with refusals, which made +me think of the messages Timon of Athens received in response to similar +requests. Then I staked in the lottery and did not win. + +Urged from France to return, and under the high pressure of my own +romantic imagination, it seemed clear to me all at once that I ought to +unite my lot for good to that of this rare and beautiful woman, whom, it +is true, I had never spoken to one minute alone, who, moreover, had +scarcely anything in common with me, but who, just by the dissimilarity +of her having been born of Spanish parents in Rio, and I of a Danish +father and mother in Copenhagen, seemed destined by Fate for me, as I +for her. The Palm and the Fir-tree had dreamed of one another, and could +never meet; but men and women could, however far apart they might have +been born. In the middle of the Summer of 1867 I was as though possessed +by the thought that she and I ought to be united. + +The simplest objection of all, namely, that I, who was scarcely able to +support myself, could not possibly support a wife, seemed to me +altogether subordinate. My motives were purely chivalric; I could not +leave her in the lurch, as the miserable hero of Andersen's _Only a +Player_ did Noomi. And a vision of her compelling loveliness hovered +before my eyes. + +The whole of the month of July and part of the month of August I was on +the rack, now passionately desiring a successful issue of my plans, now +hoping just as ardently that they would be stranded through the +opposition of the foreign family; for I was compelled to admit to myself +that the beautiful Spaniard would be very unsuited to Copenhagen, would +freeze there, mentally as well as literally. And I said to myself every +day that supposing the war expected in Denmark were to break out again, +and the young men were summoned to arms, the most insignificant little +Danish girl would make me a better Valkyrie; all my feelings would be +foreign to her, and possibly she would not even be able to learn Danish. +Any other woman would understand more of my mind than she. And yet! Yet +she was the only one for me. + +Thus I was swayed by opposing wishes the whole of the long time during +which the matter was pending and uncertain. I was so exhausted by +suspense that I only kept up by taking cold baths twice a day and by +brisk rides. The mere sight of a postman made my heart beat fast. The +scorn heaped upon me in the Danish newspapers had a curious effect upon +me under these circumstances; it seemed to me to be strangely far away, +like blows at a person who is somewhere else. + +I pondered all day on the painful dilemma in which I was placed; I +dreamt of my Dulcinea every night, and began to look as exhausted as I +felt. One day that I went to Fredensborg, in response to an invitation +from Frederik Paludan-Mueller, the poet said to me: "Have you been ill +lately? You look so pale and shaken." I pretended not to care; whatever +I said or did in company was incessant acting. + +I experienced revulsions of feeling similar to those that troubled Don +Quixote. Now I saw in my distant Spanish maiden the epitome of +perfection, now the picture melted away altogether; even my affection +for her then seemed small, artificial, whimsical, half-forgotten. And +then again she represented supreme happiness. + +When the decision came, when,--as everyone with the least experience of +the world could have foretold,--all the beautiful dreams and audacious +plans collapsed suddenly, I felt as though this long crisis had thrown +me back indescribably; my intellectual development had been at a +standstill for months. It was such a feeling as when the death of some +loved person puts an end to the long, tormenting anxiety of the +foregoing illness. I, who had centred everything round one thought, must +now start joylessly along new paths. My outburst,--which astonished +myself,--was: + +"How I wanted a heart!" + + +V. + +I could not at once feel it a relief that my fancies had all been +dissipated into thin air. Physically I was much broken down, but, with +my natural elasticity, quickly recovered. Yet in my relations towards +the other sex I was torn as I had never been before. My soul, or more +exactly, that part of my psychical life bordering on the other sex, was +like a deep, unploughed field, waiting for seed. + +It was not much more than a month before the field was sown. Amongst my +Danish acquaintances there was only one, a young and very beautiful +widow, upon whom, placed as I was with regard to Mile. Mathilde, I had +definitely counted. I should have taken the young Spaniard to her; she +alone would have understood her--they would have been friends. + +There had for a long time been warm feelings of sympathy between her and +me. It so chanced that she drew much closer to me immediately after the +decisive word had been spoken. She became, consequently, the only one to +whom I touched upon the wild fancies to which I had given myself up, and +confided the dreams with which I had wasted my time. She listened to me +sympathetically, no little amazed at my being so devoid of practical +common sense. She stood with both feet on the earth; but she had one +capacity that I had not met with before in any young woman--the capacity +for enthusiasm. She had dark eyes, with something melancholy in their +depths; but when she spoke of anything that roused her enthusiasm, her +eyes shone like stars. + +She pointed out how preposterous it was in me to wish to seek so far +away a happiness that perhaps was very close to me, and how even more +preposterous to neglect, as I had done, my studies and intellectual aims +for a fantastic love. And for the first time in my life, a young woman +spoke to me of my abilities and of the impression she had received of +them, partly through the reading of the trifles that I had had printed, +partly, and more particularly, through her long talks with me. Neither +the little French girl nor the young Spanish lady had ever spoken to me +of myself, my talents, or my future; this Danish woman declared that she +knew me through and through. And the new thing about it all, the thing +hitherto unparalleled in my experience, was that she believed in me. +More than that: she had the highest possible conception of my abilities, +asserted in contradiction to my own opinion, that I was already a man of +unusual mark, and was ardently ambitious for me. + +Just at this moment, when so profoundly disheartened, and when in idle +hopes and plans I had lost sight of my higher goal, by her firm belief +in me she imparted to me augmented self-respect. Her confidence in me +gave me increasing confidence in myself, and a vehement gratitude awoke +in me for the good she thus did me. + +Then it happened that one day, without preamble, she admitted that the +interest she felt in me was not merely an intellectual one; things had +now gone so far that she could think of nothing but me. + +My whole nature was shaken to its foundations. Up to this time I had +only regarded her as my friend and comforter, had neither felt nor +fought against any personal attraction. But she had scarcely spoken, +before she was transformed in my eyes. The affection I had thirsted for +was offered to me here. The heart I had felt the need of was this heart. +And it was not only a heart that was offered me, but a passion that +scorned scruples. + +In my austere youth hitherto, I had not really had erotic experiences +whatever. I had led the chaste life of the intellectual worker. My +thoughts had been the thoughts of a man; they had ascended high and had +delved deep, but my love affairs had been the enthusiasms and fancies of +a half-grown boy, chimeras and dreams. This young woman was my first +living erotic reality. + +And suddenly, floodgates seemed to open within me. Streams of lava, +streams of molten fire, rushed out over my soul. I loved for the first +time like a man. + +The next few days I went about as if lifted above the earth; in the +theatre, in the evening, I could not follow the performance, but sat in +the pit with my face in my hands, full of my new destiny, as though my +heart would burst. + +And yet it was more a physical state, an almost mechanical outcome of +what to me was overwhelmingly new, association with a woman. It was not +because it was just this particular woman. For my emotional nature was +so composite that even in the first moment of my bliss I did not regard +this bliss as unmixed. From the very first hour, I felt a gnawing regret +that it was not I who had desired her, but she who had chosen me, so +that my love in my heart of hearts was only a reflection of hers. + + +VI. + +About this time it so happened that another woman began to engage my +thoughts, but in an altogether different manner. Circumstances resulted +in my being taken into the secret of unhappy and disturbing domestic +relations in a well-to-do house to which I was frequently invited, and +where to all outward seeming all the necessary conditions of domestic +happiness were present. + +The master of the house had in his younger days been a very handsome +man, lazy, not clever, and of an exceedingly passionate temper. He was +the son of a man rich, worthy and able, but of a very weak character, +and of a kept woman who had been the mistress of a royal personage. +Through no fault of his own, he had inherited his mother's professional +vices, persistent untruthfulness, a comedian's manner, prodigality, a +love of finery and display. He was quite without intellectual interests, +but had a distinguished bearing, a winning manner, and no gross vices. + +His wife, who, for family reasons, had been married to him much too +young, had never loved him, and never been suited to him. As an +innocent, ignorant girl, she had been placed in the arms of a man who +was much the worse for a reckless life, and suffering from an illness +that necessitated nursing, and made him repulsive to her. Every day that +passed she suffered more from being bound to a man whose slightest +movement was objectionable to her and whose every remark a torture. In +the second decade of her marriage the keenest marital repulsion had +developed in her; this was so strong that she sometimes had to pull +herself together in order, despite her maternal feelings, not to +transfer her dislike to the children, who were likewise his, and in whom +she dreaded to encounter his characteristics. + +Towards her, the man was despotic and cunning, but not unkind, and in so +far excusable that, let him have done what he might, she could not have +got rid of the hatred that plagued him and consumed her. So dissimilar +were their two natures. + +Her whole aim and aspiration was to get the bond that united them +dissolved. But this he would not hear of, for many reasons, and more +especially from dislike of scandal. He regarded himself, and according +to the usual conception of the words, justly so, as a good husband and +father. He asked for no impossible sacrifice from his wife, and he was +affectionate to his children. He could not help her detesting him, and +indeed, did not fully realise that she did. And yet, it was difficult +for him to misunderstand. For his wife scarcely restrained her aversion +even when there were guests in the house. If he told an untruth, she +kept silence with her lips, but scarcely with her expression. And she +would sometimes talk of the faults and vices that she most abhorred, and +then name his. + +The incessant agitation in which she lived had made her nervous and +restless to excess. As the feminine craving to be able, in marriage, to +look up to the man, had never been satisfied, she only enacted the more +vehemently veracity, firmness and intellect in men. But undeveloped as +she was, and in despair over the dissatisfaction, the drowsiness, and +the darkness in which her days glided away, whatever invaded the +stagnation and lighted up the darkness: sparkle, liveliness, brilliance +and wit, were estimated by her more highly than they deserved to be. + +At first when, in the desolation of her life, she made advances to me, +this repelled me somewhat. The equestrian performer in Heiberg's Madame +Voltisubito cannot sing unless she hears the crack of a whip. Thus it +seemed to me that her nature could not sing, save to the accompaniment +of all the cart, carriage and riding whips of the mind. But I saw how +unhappy she was, and that the intense strain of her manner was only an +expression of it. + +She could not know the beauty of inward peace, and in spite of her +Protestant upbringing she had retained all the unaffectedness and +sincerity of the natural human being, all the obstinate love of freedom, +unmoved in the least by what men call discipline, ethics, Christianity, +convention. She did not believe in it all, she had seen what it resulted +in, and what it covered up, and she passed her life in unmitigated +despair, which was ordinarily calm to all appearance, but in reality +rebellious: what she was enduring was the attempted murder of her soul. + +To all that she suffered purely mentally from her life with her husband +in the home that was no home at all, there had of late been added +circumstances which likewise from a practical point of view made +interference and alteration necessary. Her lord and master had always +been a bad manager, in fact worse than that; in important matters, +thoroughly incapable and fatuous. That had not mattered much hitherto, +since others had looked after his affairs; but now the control of them +had fallen entirely into his own hands, and he managed them in such a +way that expenses increased at a terrific rate, while his income +diminished with equal rapidity, and the question of total ruin only +seemed a matter of time. + +His wife had no outside support. She was an orphan and friendless. Her +husband's relations did not like her and did not understand her. And yet +just at this time she required as a friend a man who understood her and +could help her to save her own and the children's fortunes from the +shipwreck, before it was too late. She felt great confidence in me, whom +she had met, at intervals, from my boyhood, and she now opened her heart +to me in conversation more and more. She confided in me fully, gave me a +complete insight into the torture of her life, and implored me to help +her to acquire her freedom. + +Thus it was that while still quite a young man a powerful, never-to-be- +effaced impression of the miseries of modern coercive marriage was +produced upon me. The impression was not merely powerful, but it waked, +like a cry of distress, both my thinking powers and my energy. As +through a chink in the smooth surface of society, I looked down into the +depths of horror. Behind the unhappiness of one, I suspected that of a +hundred thousand, knew that of a hundred thousand. And I felt myself +vehemently called upon, not only to name the horror by its name, but to +step in, as far as I was able, and prevent the thing spreading unheeded. + +Scales had fallen from my eyes. Under the semblance of affection and +peace, couples were lacerating one another by the thousand, swallowed up +by hatred and mutual aversion. The glitter of happiness among those +higher placed dazzled the thoughtless and the credulous. He who had eyes +to see, observed how the wretchedness due to the arrangement of society, +wound itself right up to its pinnacles. + +The vices and paltrinesses of the individual could not be directly +remedied; inherited maladies and those brought upon one's self, +stupidity and folly, brutality and malice, undeniably existed. But the +institutions of society ought to be so planned as to render these +destructive forces inoperative, or at least diminish their harmfulness, +not so as to give them free scope and augment their terrors by securing +them victims. + +In marriage, the position of the one bound against his or her will was +undignified, often desperate, but worst in the case of a woman. As a +mother she could be wounded in her most vulnerable spot, and what was +most outrageous of all, she could be made a mother against her will. One +single unhappy marriage had shown me, like a sudden revelation, what +marriage in countless cases is, and how far from free the position of +woman still was. + +But that woman should be oppressed in modern society, that the one-half +of the human race could be legally deprived of their rights, revealed +that justice in society, as it at present stood, was in a sorry state. +In the relations between the strong and the weak, the rich and the poor, +the same legalised disproportion would necessarily prevail as between +man and woman. + +My thought pierced down into the state of society that obtained and was +praised so highly, and with ever less surprise and ever greater +disquiet, found hollowness everywhere. And this called my will to +battle, armed it for the fight. + + +VII. + +From this time forth I began to ponder quite as much over Life as over +Art, and to submit to criticism the conditions of existence in the same +way as I had formerly done with Faith and Law. + +In matters concerning Life, as in things concerning Art, I was not a +predetermined Radical. There was a great deal of piety in my nature and +I was of a collecting, retentive disposition. Only gradually, and step +by step, was I led by my impressions, the incidents I encountered, and +my development, to break with many a tradition to which I had clung to +the last extremity. + +It was in the spirit of the Aesthetics of the time, that, after having +been engaged upon the Tragic Idea, I plunged into researches on the +Comic, and by degrees, as the material ordered itself for me, I tried to +write a doctor's thesis upon it, Abstract researches were regarded as +much more valuable than historic investigation. In comic literature +Aristophanes in particular delighted me, and I was thinking of letting +my general definitions merge into a description of the greatness of the +Greek comedian; but as the thread broke for me, I did not get farther +than the theory of the Comic in general. It was not, like my previous +treatise on the Tragic, treated under three headings, according to the +Hegelian model, but written straight ahead, without any subdivision into +sections. + +Whilst working at this paper I was, of course, obliged constantly to +consult the national comedies and lighter plays, till I knew them from +cover to cover. Consequently, when Gotfred Rode, the poet, who was +connected with a well-known educational establishment for girls, asked +me whether I would care to give a course of public lectures for ladies, +I chose as my subject _The Danish Comedy_. The lectures were +attended in force. The subject was supremely innocent, and it was +treated in quite a conservative manner. At that time I cherished a +sincere admiration, with only slight reservations, for Heiberg, Hertz, +Hostrup and many others as comic playwriters, and was not far short of +attributing to their works an importance equal to those of Holberg. And +yet I was unable to avoid giving offence. I had, it appears, about +Heiberg's _Klister and Malle_, an inseparable betrothed couple, +used what was, for that matter, an undoubtedly Kierkegaardian +expression, viz., _to beslobber a relation_. This expression was +repeated indignantly to the Headmistress, and the thoughtless lecturer +was requested to call upon the Principal of the college. When, after a +long wait, and little suspecting what was going to be said to me, I was +received in audience, it appeared that I had been summoned to receive a +polite but decided admonition against wounding the susceptibilities of +my listeners by expressions which were not "good form," and when I, +unconscious of wrongdoing, asked which expression she alluded to, the +unfortunate word "beslobber" was alleged; my young hearers were not +"'Arriets" for whom such expressions might be fitting. + +I was not asked again to give lectures for young ladies. + + +VIII. + +Hitherto, when I had appeared before the reading public, it had only +been as the author of shorter or longer contributions to the +philosophical discussion of the relations between Science and Faith; +when these had been accepted by a daily paper it had been as its +heaviest ballast. I had never yet written anything that the ordinary +reader could follow with pleasure, and I had likewise been obliged to +make use of a large number of abstruse philosophical words. + +The proprietors of the _Illustrated Times_ offered me the reviewing +of the performances at the Royal Theatre in their paper, which had not +hitherto printed dramatic criticisms. I accepted the offer, because it +afforded me a wished-for opportunity of further shaking off the dust of +the schools. I could thus have practice with my pen, and get into touch +with a section of the reading public who, without caring for philosophy, +nevertheless had intellectual interests; and these articles were in +reality a vent for what I had at heart about this time touching matters +human and artistic. They were written in a more colloquial style than +anything I had written before, or than it was usual to write in Denmark +at that time, and they alternated sometimes with longer essays, such as +those on Andersen and Goldschmidt. + +Regarded merely as dramatic criticisms, they were of little value. The +Royal Theatre, the period of whose zenith was nearly at an end, I cared +little for, and I was personally acquainted with next to none of the +actors, only meeting, at most, Phister and Adolf Rosenkilde and of +ladies, Soedring in society. + +I found it altogether impossible to brandish my cane over the individual +actor in his individual part. But the form of it was merely a pretext. I +wanted to show myself as I was, speak out about dramatic and other +literature, reveal how I felt, show what I thought about all the +conditions of life represented or touched upon on the stage. + +My articles were read with so much interest that the editors of the +_Illustrated Times_ raised the writer's scale of remuneration to 10 +Kr. a column (about 11_s_. 3_d_.), which at that time was very +respectable pay. Unfortunately, however, I soon saw that even at that, +if I wrote in the paper all the year round, I could not bring up my +yearly income from this source to more than 320 kroner of our money, +about I7_l_. 12_s_. 6_d_. in English money; so that, without a +University bursary, I should have come badly off, and even with it +was not rolling in riches. + +The first collection of my articles, which I published in 1868 under the +title of _Studies in Aesthetics_, augmented my income a little, it +is true, but for that, as for the next collection, _Criticisms and +Portraits_, I only received 20 kroner (22_s_. 6_d_.) per +sheet of sixteen pages. Very careful management was necessary. + + +IX. + +With the first money I received for my books, I went in the middle of +the Summer of 1868 for a trip to Germany. I acquired some idea of +Berlin, which was then still only the capital of Prussia, and in +population corresponded to the Copenhagen of our day; I spent a few +weeks in Dresden, where I felt very much at home, delighted in the +exquisite art collection and derived no small pleasure from the theatre, +at that time an excellent one. I saw Prague for the first time, +worshipped Rubens in Munich, and, with him specially in my mind, tried +to realise how the greatest painters had regarded Life. Switzerland +added to my store of impressions with grand natural spectacles. I saw +the Alps, and a thunderstorm in the Alps, passed starlit nights on the +Swiss lakes, traced the courses of foaming mountain streams such as the +Tamina at Pfaeffers, ascended the Rigi at a silly forced march, and from +the Kulm saw a procession of clouds that gripped my fancy like the +procession of the Vanir in Northern mythology. Many years afterwards I +described it in the Fourth volume of _Main Currents_. From +Interlaken I gazed on the whiteness of the Jungfrau, but scarcely with +greater emotion than once upon a time when I had gazed at the white +cliffs of Moeen. On my homeward journey I saw Heidelberg's lovely ruins, +to which Charles V.'s castle, near the Al-hambra, makes a marvellous +pendant, Strassburg's grave Cathedral, and Goethe's house at Frankfurt. + +My travels were not long, but were extraordinarily instructive. I made +acquaintance with people from the most widely different countries, with +youthful frankness engaged in conversation with Germans and Frenchmen, +Englishmen and Americans, Poles and Russians, Dutchmen, Belgians and +Swiss, met them as travelling companions, and listened attentively to +what they narrated. They were, moreover, marvellously frank towards the +young man who, with the curiosity of his age, plied them with questions. + +Young Dutchmen, studying music in Dresden, gave me some idea of the ill- +will felt in their country towards the Prussians, an ill-will not +unmingled with contempt. On the other hand, I was astonished, during a +half day's excursion on foot with a few Leipzig students, to learn how +strong was the feeling of the unity of Germany and of the necessity of +the supremacy of Prussia, even in the states which in the 1866 war had +been on the side of Austria. The students felt no grief over having been +defeated, the victors were Germans too; everything was all right so long +as the German Empire became one. These and similar conversations, which +finally brought me to the conclusion that the whole of the bourgeoisie +was satisfied with the dominance of Prussia, had for result that in 1870 +I did not for a moment share the opinion of the Danes and the French, +that the defeated German states would enter into an alliance with France +against Prussia. + +English undergraduates told me what philosophical and historical works +were being most read in the universities of Great Britain; Bohemian +students explained to me that in the German philosophical world Kant had +quite outshone Hegel and put him in the background. + +The lady members of an American family from Boston treated me quite +maternally; the wife suggested almost at once, in the railway-carriage, +that I should give her when we reached the hotel whatever linen or +clothes I had that wanted repairs; she would be very pleased to mend +them for me. The husband, who was very pious and good-natured, had all +his pockets full of little hymn-books and in his memorandum book a +quantity of newspaper cuttings of devotional verse, which he now and +then read aloud enthusiastically. + +But I also met with Americans of quite a different cast. A young student +from Harvard University, who, for that matter, was not in love with the +Germans and declared that the United States could with difficulty absorb +and digest those who were settled there, surprised me with his view that +in the future Bismarck would come to be regarded as no less a figure +than Cavour. The admiration of contemporary educated thought was then +centred around Cavour, whereas Bismarck had hitherto only encountered +passionate aversion outside Germany, and even in Germany was the object +of much hatred. This student roused me into thinking about Bismarck for +myself. + +Having lain down, all bathed in perspiration, during the ascent without +a guide of a mountain in Switzerland, I was accosted by a woman, who +feared I had come to some harm. I walked on up with her. She turned out +to be a young peasant woman from Normandy, who lived half-way up the +mountain. She had accompanied her husband to Switzerland, but cursed her +lot, and was always longing to be back in France. When I remarked that +it must be some consolation to live in so lovely a place, she +interrupted me with the most violent protests. A beautiful place! This! +The steep mountain, the bristly fir-trees and pine-trees, the snow on +the top and the lake deep down below--anything uglier it would be hard +to conceive. No fields, no pasture-land, no apple-trees! No indeed! If +she had to mention a country that really was beautiful, it was Normandy. +There was plenty of food for all there, you did not need to go either up +or down hill; there, thank God, it was flat. Did I think stones +beautiful, perhaps? She had not been down in the valley for five months, +and higher than her house she had never been and would never go; no, +thank you, not she! She let her husband fetch what they required for the +house; she herself sat and fretted all through the Winter; life then was +almost more than she could bear. + +On one of the steamers on the Lake of Lucerne, I caught, for the first +time, a glimpse of Berthold Auerbach, who was very much admired by my +comrades in Copenhagen and by myself. + +At the hotel table at Lucerne I made the acquaintance of a Dutch captain +from Batavia, an acquaintance productive of much pleasure to me. Before +the soup was brought round I had pulled out a letter I had just +received, opened it and begun to read it. A voice by my side said in +French: + +"Happy man! You are reading a letter in a woman's writing!" With that +our acquaintance was made. + +The captain was a man of forty, who in the course of an active life had +had many and varied experiences and met with prosperity, but was +suffering from a feeling of great void. His society was exceedingly +attractive to me, and he related to me the main events of his life; but +after one day's association only, we were obliged to part. All through +my trip I had a curious feeling of every farewell on the journey being +in all human probability a farewell for life, but had not realised it +painfully before. But when next day the brave captain, whose home was +far away in another quarter of the globe, held his hand out to say good- +bye, I was much affected. "Till we meet again" said the captain. + +"And where?" + +"Till we meet again all and everywhere, for we live an eternal life; +till we meet again in time and space, or outside time and space!" + +I reflected sadly that I should never again see this man, who, the last +twenty-four hours had shown me, was in extraordinary sympathy and +agreement with me. + +Separated from those dearest to me, the whole of the journey, for that +matter, was a sort of self-torment to me, even though a profitable one. +Like every other traveller, I had many a lonely hour, and plenty of time +to ponder over my position and vocation in life. I summed up my +impressions in the sentence: "The Powers have designated me the champion +of great ideas against great talents, unfortunately greater than I." + + +X. + +There was only one distinguished person outside my circle of +acquaintance to whom I wished to bring my first descriptive book, as a +mark of homage, Johanne Louise Heiberg, the actress. I had admired her +on the stage, even if not to the same extent as Michael Wiehe; but to me +she was the representative of the great time that would soon sink into +the grave. In addition, I ventured to hope that she, being a friend of +Frederik Paludan-Mueller, Magdalene Thoresen and others who wished me +well, would be at any rate somewhat friendly inclined towards me. A few +years before, it had been rumoured in Copenhagen after the publication +of my little polemical pamphlet against Nielsen, that at a dinner at the +Heiberg's there had been a good deal of talk about me; even Bishop +Martensen had expressed himself favourably, and it also attracted +attention that a short time afterwards, in a note to his book _On +Knowledge and Faith_, he mentioned me not unapprovingly, and +contented himself with a reminder to me not to feel myself too soon +beyond being surprised. When the Bishop of Zealand, one of the actress's +most faithful adherents, had publicly spoken thus mildly of the youthful +heretic, there was some hope that the lady herself would be free from +prejudice. My friends also eagerly encouraged me to venture upon a visit +to her home. + +I was admitted and asked to wait in a room through the glass doors of +which I was attentively observed for some time by the lady's adopted +children. Then she came in, in indoor dress, with a stocking in her +hand, at which she uninterruptedly continued to knit during the +following conversation: She said: "Well! So you have collected your +articles." I was simple enough to reply--as if that made any difference +to the lady--that the greater part of the book had not been printed +before. She turned the conversation upon Bjoernson's _Fisher Girl_, +which had just been published, and which had been reviewed by _The +Fatherland_ the evening before, declaring that she disagreed +altogether with the reviewer, who had admired in the _Fisher Girl_ +a psychological study of a scenic genius. "It is altogether a mistake," +said Mrs. Heiberg, absorbed in counting her stitches, "altogether a +mistake that genius is marked by restlessness, refractoriness, an +irregular life, or the like. That is all antiquated superstition. True +genius has no connection whatever with excesses and caprices, in fact, +is impossible without the strict fulfilment of one's duty. (Knitting +furiously.) Genius is simple, straightforward, domesticated, +industrious." + +When we began to speak of mutual acquaintances, amongst others, +Magdalene Thoresen, feeling very uncomfortable in the presence of the +lady, I blurted out most tactlessly that I was sure that lady was much +interested in me. It was a mere nothing, but at the moment sounded like +conceit and boasting. I realised it the moment the words were out of my +mouth, and instinctively felt that I had definitely displeased her. But +the conversational material was used up and I withdrew. I never saw +Johanne Louise Heiberg again; henceforth she thought anything but well +of me. + + +XI. + +Magdalene Thoresen was spending that year in Copenhagen, and our +connection, which had been kept up by correspondence, brought with it a +lively mutual interchange of thoughts and impressions. Our natures, it +is true, were as much unlike as it was possible for them to be; but +Magdalene Thoresen's wealth of moods and the overflowing warmth of her +heart, the vivacity of her disposition, the tenderness that filled her +soul, and the incessant artistic exertion, which her exhausted body +could not stand, all this roused in me a sympathy that the mistiness of +her reasoning, and the over-excitement of her intellectual life, could +not diminish. Besides which, especially when she was away from +Copenhagen, but when she was there, too, she needed a literary assistant +who could look through her MSS. and negotiate over them with the +publishers of anthologies, year-books, and weekly papers, and for this +purpose she not infrequently seized upon me, innocently convinced, like +everybody else for that matter, that she was the only person who made a +similar demand upon me. + +Still, it was rather trying that, when my verdict on her work did not +happen to be what she wished, she saw in what I said an unkindness, for +which she alleged reasons that had nothing whatever to do with Art. + +Magdalene Thoresen could not be otherwise than fond of Rasmus Nielsen; +they were both lively, easily enraptured souls, who breathed most freely +in the fog. That, however, did not come between her and me, whom she +often thought in the right. With regard to my newspaper activity, she +merely urged the stereotyped but pertinent opinion, that I ought not to +write so many small things; my nature could not stand this wasting, drop +by drop. + +I had myself felt for a long time that I ought to concentrate my forces +on larger undertakings. + + +XII. + +There were not many of the upper middle class houses in Copenhagen at +that time, the hospitality of which a young man with intellectual +interests derived any advantage from accepting. One of these houses, +which was opened to me, and with which I was henceforward associated, +was that of Chief Physician Rudolph Bergh. His was the home of +intellectual freedom. + +The master of the house was not only a prominent scientist and savant, +but, at a time when all kinds of prejudices ruled unassailed, a man who +had retained the uncompromising radicalism of the first half of the +century. The spirit of Knowledge was the Holy Spirit to him; the +profession of doctor had placed him in the service of humanity, and to +firmness of character he united pure philanthropy. The most despised +outcasts of society met with the same consideration and the same +kindness from him as its favoured ones. + +His wife was well calculated, by her charm of manner, to be the centre +of the numerous circle of talented men who, both from Denmark and +abroad, frequented the house. There one met all the foreign natural +scientists who came to Copenhagen, all the esteemed personalities +Denmark had at the time, who might be considered as belonging to the +freer trend of thought, and many neutrals. Actors such as Hoeedt and +Phister went there, favourite narrators such as Bergsoee, painters like +Kroeyer, distinguished scientists like J.C. Schioedte, the entomologist. +This last was an independent and intellectual man, somewhat touchy, and +domineering in his manner, a master of his subject, a man of learning, +besides, ceremonious, often cordial, ready to listen to anything worth +hearing that was said. He had weaknesses, never would admit that he had +made a mistake, and was even very unwilling to own he had not read a +book that was being spoken of. Besides which, he had spent too great a +part of his life in virulent polemics to be devoid of the narrowing of +the horizon which is the concomitant of always watching and being ready +to attack the same opponent. But he was in the grand style, which is +rare in Denmark, as elsewhere. + + +XIII. + +The house of the sisters Spang was a pleasant one to go to; they were +two unmarried ladies who kept an excellent girls' school, at which +Julius Lange taught drawing. Benny Spang, not a beautiful, but a +brilliant girl, with exceptional brains, daughter of the well-known +Pastor Spang, a friend of Soeren Kierkegaard, adopted a tone of good- +fellowship towards me that completely won my affection. She was +cheerful, witty, sincere and considerate. Not long after we became +acquainted she married a somewhat older man than herself, the gentle and +refined landscape painter, Gotfred Rump. The latter made a very good +sketch of me. + +The poet Paludan-Mueller and the Lange family visited at the house; so +did the two young and marvellously beautiful girls, Alma Trepka and +Clara Rothe, the former of whom was married later to Carl Bloch the +painter, the other to her uncle, Mr. Falbe, the Danish Minister in +London. + +It was hard to say which of the two was the more beautiful. Both were +unusually lovely. Alma Trepka was queenly, her movements sedate, her +disposition calm and unclouded--Carl Bloch could paint a Madonna, or +even a Christ, from her face without making any essential alteration in +the oval of its contours. Clara Rothe's beauty was that of the white +hart in the legend; her eyes like a deer's, large and shy, timid, and +unself-conscious, her movements rapid, but so graceful that one was +fascinated by the harmony of them. + + +XIV. + +Just about this time a foreign element entered the circle of Copenhagen +students to which I belonged. One day there came into my room a youth +with a nut-brown face, short and compactly built, who after only a few +weeks' stay in Copenhagen could speak Danish quite tolerably. He was a +young Armenian, who had seen a great deal of the world and was of very +mixed race. His father had married, at Ispahan, a lady of Dutch-German +origin. Up to his seventh year he had lived in Batavia. When the family +afterwards moved to Europe, he was placed at school in Geneva. He had +there been brought up, in French, to trade, but as he revealed an +extraordinary talent for languages, was sent, for a year or eighteen +months at a time, to the four German universities of Halle, Erlangen, +Goettingen and Leipzig. Now, at the age of 22, he had come to Copenhagen +to copy Palahvi and Sanscrit manuscripts that Rask and Westergaard had +brought to Europe. He knew a great many languages, and was moreover very +many-sided in his acquirements, sang German student songs charmingly, +was introduced and invited everywhere, and with his foreign appearance +and quick intelligence was a great success. He introduced new points of +view, was full of information, and brought with him a breath from the +great world outside. Industrious though he had been before, Copenhagen +social life tempted him to idleness. His means came to an end; he said +that the annual income he was in the habit of receiving by ship from +India had this year, for some inexplicable reason, failed to arrive, +dragged out a miserable existence for some time under great +difficulties, starved, borrowed small sums, and disappeared as suddenly +as he had come. + + +XV. + +Knowing this Armenian made me realise how restricted my own learning +was, and what a very general field of knowledge I had chosen. + +I wrote my newspaper articles and my essays, and I worked at my doctor's +thesis on French Aesthetics, which cost me no little pains; it was my +first attempt to construct a consecutive book, and it was only by a +vigorous effort that I completed it at the end of 1869. But I had then +been casting over in my mind for some years thoughts to which I never +was able to give a final form, thoughts about the position of women in +society, which would not let me rest. + +A woman whose thought fired mine even further just about this time, a +large-minded woman, who studied society with an uncompromising +directness that was scarcely to be met with in any man of the time in +Denmark, was the wife of the poet Carsten Hauch. When she spoke of +Danish women, the stage of their development and their position in law, +their apathy and the contemptibleness of the men, whether these latter +were despots, pedants, or self-sufficient Christians, she made me a +sharer of her point of view; our hearts glowed with the same flame. + +Rinna Hauch was not, like certain old ladies of her circle, a "woman's +movement" woman before the name was invented. She taught no doctrine, +but she glowed with ardour for the cause of freedom and justice. She saw +through the weak, petty men and women of her acquaintance and despised +them. She too passionately desired a thorough revolution in modern +society to be able to feel satisfied merely by an amelioration of the +circumstances of women of the middle classes; and yet it was the +condition of women, especially in the classes she knew well, that she +thought most about. + +She began to place some credence in me and cherished a hope that I +should do my utmost to stir up the stagnation at home, and during the +long conversations we had together, when, in the course of these +Summers, I now and again spent a week at a time with the Hauchs at +Hellebaek, she enflamed me with her ardour. + +In September, 1868, after wandering with my old friend up and down the +shore, under the pure, starlit heaven, and at last finding myself late +at night in my room, I was unable to go to rest. All that had been +talked of and discussed in the course of the day made my head hot and +urged me to reflection and action. Often I seized a piece of paper and +scribbled off, disconnectedly, in pencil, remarks corresponding to the +internal agitation of my mind, jottings like the following, for example: + + S.R., that restive fanatic, has a wife who cannot believe, and wishes + for nothing but to be left in peace on religious matters. He _forces + her_ to go to Communion, though he knows the words of Scripture, that + he who partakes unworthily eats and drinks to his own damnation. + + There is not one sound, healthy sentiment in the whole of our religious + state of being. You frequently hear it said: "Everyone can't be a + hypocrite." True enough. But begin, in the middle classes, to deduct + hypocrisy, and gross affectation and cowardly dread of Hell, and see + what is left! + + If we have young people worthy the name, I will tell them the truth; but + this band of backboneless creatures blocks up the view. + + Women whom Life has enlightened and whom it has disappointed! You I can + help. + + I see two lovers hand in hand, kissing the tears away from each other's + eyes. + + I can only rouse the wakeful. Nothing can be done with those who are + incapable of feeling noble indignation. + + I have known two women prefer death to the infamy of conjugal life. + + Open the newspapers!--hardly a line that is not a lie. + + And poets and speakers flatter a people like that. + + Christianity and Humanity have long wished for divorce. Now this is an + accomplished fact. + + And the priests are honoured. They plume themselves on not having + certain vices, for which they are too weak. + + I know that I shall be stoned, that every boy has his balderdash ready + against that to which the reflection of years and sleepless nights has + given birth. But do you think I am afraid of anyone? + + Stupidity was always the bodyguard of Lies. + + A people who have put up with the Oldenborgs for four hundred years and + made loyalty to them into a virtue! + + They do not even understand that here there is no Antichrist but Common + Sense. + + Abandoned by all, except Unhappiness and me. + + When did God become Man? When Nature reached the point in its + development at which the first man made his appearance; when Nature + became man, then God did. + + Women say of the beloved one: "A bouquet he brings smells better than + one another brings." + + You are weak, dear one, God help you! And you help! and I help! + + These thoughts have wrought a man of me, have finally wrought me to a + man. + +I procured all that was accessible to me in modern French and English +literature on the woman subject. + +In the year 1869 my thoughts on the subordinate position of women in +society began to assume shape, and I attempted a connected record of +them. I adopted as my starting point Soeren Kierkegaard's altogether +antiquated conception of woman and contested it at every point. But all +that I had planned and drawn up was cast aside when in 1869 John Stuart +Mill's book on the subject fell into my hands. I felt Mill's superiority +to be so immense and regarded his book as so epoch-making that I +necessarily had to reject my own draft and restrict myself to the +translation and introduction of what he had said. In November, 1869, I +published Mill's book in Danish and in this manner introduced the modern +woman's movement into Denmark. + +The translation was of this advantage to me that it brought me first +into epistolary communication, and later into personal contact with one +of the greatest men of the time. + + +XVI. + +There was one of the political figures of the time whom I often met +during these years. This was the man most beloved of the previous +generation, whose star had certainly declined since the war, but whose +name was still one to conjure with, Orla Lehmann. + +I had made his acquaintance when I was little more than a boy, in a very +curious way. + +In the year 1865 I had given a few lectures in C.N. David's house, on +Runeberg, whom I had glorified exceedingly, and as the David and Lehmann +houses, despite the political differences between them, were closely +related one to the other, and intimately connected, Orla Lehmann had +heard these lectures very warmly spoken of. At that time he had just +founded a People's Society as a counterpoise to the supremely +conservative Society of August, and, looking out for lecturers for it, +hit upon the twenty-three-year-old speaker as upon a possibility. + +I was then living in a little cupboard of a room on the third floor in +Crystal Street, and over my room was one, in the attic, inhabited by my +seventeen-year-old brother, who had not yet matriculated. + +Orla Lehmann, who had been told that the person he was seeking lived +high up, rapidly mounted the four storeys, and knocked, a little out of +breath, at the schoolboy's door. When the door opened, he walked in, and +said, still standing: + +"You are Brandes? I am Lehmann." Without heeding the surprise he read in +the young fellow's face, he went on: + +"I have come to ask you to give a lecture to the People's Society in the +Casino's big room." + +As the addressee looked about to speak, he continued, drowning every +objection, "I know what you are going to say. That you are too young. +Youth is written in your face. But there is no question of seniority +here. I am accustomed to accomplish what I determine upon, and I shall +take no notice of objections. I know that you are able to give lectures, +you have recently given proof of it." + +At last there was a minute's pause, permitting the younger one to +interpose: + +"But you are making a mistake, it is not I you mean. It must be my elder +brother." + +"Oh! very likely. Where does your brother live?" + +"Just underneath." + +A minute later there was a knock at the third-storey door beneath; it +was opened, and without even stopping to sit down, the visitor began: + +"You are Brandes? I am Lehmann. You recently gave some lectures on +Runeberg. Will you kindly repeat one of them before the People's Society +in the Casino's big room?" + +"Won't you sit down? I thank you for your offer. But my lecture was not +good enough to be repeated before so large a gathering. I do not know +enough about Runeberg's life, and my voice, moreover, will not carry. I +should not dare, at my age, to speak in so large a room." + +"I expected you to reply that you are too young. Your youth is written +in your face. But there is no question of seniority about it. I am +accustomed to carry through anything that I have determined upon, and I +take no notice of objections. What you do not know about Runeberg's +life, you can read up in a literary history. And if you can give a +successful lecture to a private audience, you can give one in a theatre +hall. I am interested in you, I am depending on you, I take your promise +with me. Good-bye!" + +This so-called promise became a regular nightmare to me, young and +absolutely untried as I was. It did not even occur to me to work up and +improve my lecture on Runeberg, for the very thought of appearing before +a large audience alarmed me and was utterly intolerable to me. During +the whole of my first stay in Paris I was so tormented by the consent +that Orla Lehmann had extorted from me, that it was a shadow over my +pleasure. I would go happy to bed and wake up in the middle of the night +with the terror of a debtor over something far off, but surely +threatening, upon me, seek in my memory for what it was that was +troubling me, and find that this far-off, threatening thing was my +promise to Lehmann. It was only after my return home that I summoned up +courage to write to him, pleading my youth and unfitness, and begging to +be released from the honourable but distasteful duty. Orla Lehmann, in +the meantime, had in all probability not bestowed a thought on the whole +matter and long since forgotten all about it. + +In any case he never referred to the subject again in after years, when +we frequently met. + +Among Broechner's private pupils was a young student. Kristian Moeller, by +name, who devoted himself exclusively to philosophy, and of whom +Broechner was particularly fond. He had an unusually keen intelligence, +inclined to critical and disintegrating research. His abilities were +very promising, inasmuch as it seemed that he might be able to establish +destructive verdicts upon much that was confused, or self- +contradicting, but nevertheless respected; in other respects he had a +strangely infertile brain. He had no sudden inspirations, no +imagination. It could not be expected that he would ever bring forward +any specially new thoughts, only that he would penetrate confusion, +think out errors to the bottom, and, with the years, carry out a process +of thorough cleansing. + +But before he had accomplished any independent work his lungs became +affected. It was not at once perceived how serious the affection was, +and Orla Lehmann, who, with the large-mindedness and open-handedness of +a patriot, had taken him up, as well as sundry other young men who +promised well or were merely poor, not only invited him to his weekly +dinner-parties at Frederiksberg, but sent him to Upsala, that he might +study Swedish philosophy there. Moeller himself was much inclined to +study Bostroemianism and write a criticism of this philosophy, which was +at that time predominant in Sweden. + +He ought to have been sent South, or rather to a sanatorium; Orla +Lehmann's Scandinavian sympathies, however, determined his stay in the +North, which proved fatal to his health. + +In 1868 he returned to Copenhagen, pale, with hollow cheeks, and a +stern, grave face, that of a marked man, his health thoroughly +undermined. His friends soon learnt, and doubtless he understood +himself, that his condition was hopeless. The quite extraordinary +strength of character with which he submitted, good-temperedly and +without a murmur, to his fate, had for effect that all who knew him vied +with each other in trying to lessen the bitterness of his lot and at any +rate show him how much they cared for him. As he could not go out, and +as he soon grew incapable of connected work, his room became an +afternoon and evening meeting-place for many of his comrades, who went +there to distract him with whatever they could think of to narrate, or +discuss. If you found him alone, it was rarely long before a second and +a third visitor came, and the room filled up. + +Orla Lehmann, his patron, was also one of Kristian Moeller's frequent +visitors. But whenever he arrived, generally late and the last, the +result was always the same. The students and graduates, who had been +sitting in the room in lively converse, were struck dumb, awed by the +presence of the great man; after the lapse of a few minutes, one would +get up and say good-bye; immediately afterwards the next would remember +that he was engaged elsewhere just at that particular time; a moment +later the third would slip noiselessly out of the room, and it would be +empty. + +There was one, however, who, under such circumstances, found it simply +impossible to go. I stayed, even if I had just been thinking of taking +my leave. + +Under the autocracy, Orla Lehmann had been the lyrical figure of +Politics; he had voiced the popular hopes and the beauty of the people's +will, much more than the political poets did. They wrote poetry; his +nature was living poetry. The swing of his eloquence, which so soon grew +out of date, was the very swing of youth in men's souls then. At the +time I first knew him, he had long left the period of his greatness +behind him, but he was still a handsome, well set-up man, and, at 58 +years of age, had lost nothing of his intellectual vivacity. He had lost +his teeth and spoke indistinctly, but he was fond of telling tales and +told them well, and his enemies declared that as soon as a witty thought +struck him, he took a cab and drove round from house to house to relate +it. + +Passionately patriotic though Orla Lehmann was, he was very far from +falling into the then usual error of overestimating Denmark's historical +exploits and present importance. He related one day that when he was in +Paris, as a young man, speaking under an impression very frequent among +his travelled compatriots, he had, in a conversation with Sainte-Beuve, +reproached the French with knowing so shamefully little of the Danes. +The great critic, as was his habit, laid his head a little on one side, +and with roguish impertinence replied: "_Eh! bien, faites quelque +chose! on parlera de vous_." He approved of the reply. We younger +ones looked upon him as belonging to another period and living in +another plane of ideas, although, being a liberal-minded man, he was not +far removed from us. He was supposed to be a freethinker, and it was +told of him that when his old housekeeper repeatedly, and with +increasing impatience, requested him to come to table, he would reply, +in the presence of students--a rallying allusion to the lady's Christian +disposition: + +"Get help from Religion, little Bech, get help from Religion!"--a remark +that in those days would be regarded as wantonly irreligious! + +People felt sorry for Lehmann because his politics had so wholly +miscarried, and somewhat sore against him because he wanted to lay all +the blame on the old despotism and the unfavourable circumstances of the +time. Take him altogether, to those who were not intimately associated +with him, and did not share the strong dislike felt against him in +certain circles, he was chiefly a handsome and attractive antiquity. + +Kristian Moeller died in 1869, and his death was deeply lamented. He was +one of the few comrades admired by the younger ones alike for his gifts +and his stoicism. With his death my opportunities of frequently meeting +Orla Lehmann ceased. But that the latter had not quite lost sight of me, +he proved by appearing, at the end of February, 1870, at my examination +upon my doctor's thesis at the University. As on this occasion Lehmann +arrived a little late, he was placed on a chair in front of all the +other auditors, and very imposing he looked, in a mighty fur coat which +showed off his stately figure. He listened very attentively to +everything, and several times during the discussion showed by a short +laugh that some parrying reply had amused him. + +Six months afterwards he was no more. + + +XVII. + +During those years I came into very curious relations with another +celebrity of the time. This was M. Goldschmidt, the author, whose great +talent I had considerable difficulty in properly appreciating, so +repelled was I by his uncertain and calculating personality. + +I saw Goldschmidt for the first time, when I was a young man, at a large +ball at a club in Copenhagen. + +A man who had emigrated to England as a poor boy returned to Copenhagen +in the sixties at the age of fifty, after having acquired a considerable +fortune. He was uneducated, kind, impeccably honourable, and was anxious +to secure acquaintances and associates for his adopted daughter, a +delicate young girl, who was strange to Copenhagen. With this object in +view, he invited a large number of young people to a ball in the rooms +of the King's Club, provided good music and luxurious refreshments. This +man was a cousin of Goldschmidt's, and as he himself was unable to make +more of a speech than a short welcome to table, he begged "his cousin, +the poet," to be his spokesman on this occasion. + +One would have thought that so polished a writer, such a master of +language, as Goldschmidt, would be able, with the greatest ease, to make +an after-dinner speech, especially when he had had plenty of time to +prepare himself; but the gift of speaking is, as everyone knows, a gift +in itself. And a more unfortunate speaker than Goldschmidt could not be. +He had not even the art of compelling silence while he spoke. + +That evening he began rather tactlessly by telling the company that +their host, who was a rich man, had earned his money in a strictly +honourable manner; it was always a good thing to know "that one had +clear ground to dance upon"; then he dwelt on the Jewish origin of the +giver of the feast, and, starting from the assumption that the greater +number of the invited guests were young Jews and Jewesses, he formulated +his toast in praise of "the Jewish woman, who lights the Sabbath +candles." The young Jewesses called out all at once: "The Danish woman I +The Danish woman! We are Danish!" They were irritated at the dead +Romanticism into which Goldschmidt was trying to push them back. They +lighted no Sabbath candles! they did not feel themselves Jewish either +by religion or nationality. The day of Antisemitism had not arrived. +Consequently there was still no Zionist Movement. They had also often +felt vexed at the descriptions that Goldschmidt in his novels frequently +gave of modern Jews, whose manners and mode of expression he screwed +back fifty years. + +These cries, which really had nothing offensive about them, made +Goldschmidt lose his temper to such an extent that he shouted, in great +exasperation: "Will you keep silence while I speak! What manners are +these! I will teach you to keep silence!" and so forth,--which evoked a +storm of laughter. He continued for some time to rebuke their exuberant +mirth in severe terms, but was so unsuccessful that he broke off his +speech and, very much out of humour, sat down. + +Not long afterwards, perhaps in the year 1865, I came into contact with +Goldschmidt once only, when walking one evening with Magdalene Thoresen. +On meeting this lady, whom he knew, he turned round, walking with her as +far as her house on the shores of the Lakes, after which his way led +towards the town, as did mine. As long as Mrs. Thoresen was present, he +naturally addressed his conversation to her and expressed himself, as +his habit was, without much ceremony. For instance, he said: "I don't as +a rule care for women writers, not even for those we have; but I will +concede that, of all the ladies who write, you are the freshest." When +Mrs. Thoresen brought the conversation round to her favourite subject, +love, he said, banteringly: "My heart is like the flags of the Zouave +Regiments, so pierced with holes that it is almost impossible to tell +what the material originally looked like." + +On the whole, he was animated and polite, but his glance was somewhat +stinging. + +Goldschmidt had greater difficulty in hitting on the right manner to +adopt towards a much younger man. He used expressions which showed that +he was standing on his dignity, and was all the time conscious of his +own superiority. "People have spoken about you to me," he said, "and I +know you by name." The word here rendered _people_ had a strangely +foreign sound, as though translated, or affected. + +"Have you read Taine's History of English Literature?" he asked. + +"No, I don't know it." + +"Ah, perhaps you are one of those who regard it as superfluous to learn +about anything foreign. We have enough of our own, is it not so? It is a +very widespread opinion, but it is a mistake." + +"You judge too hastily; that is not my opinion." + +"Oh,--ah. Yes. Good-bye." + +And our ways parted. + +I did not like Goldschmidt. He had dared to profane the great Soeren +Kierkegaard, had pilloried him for the benefit of a second-rate public. +I disliked him on Kierkegaard's account. But I disliked him much more +actively on my master, Professor Broechner's account. + +Broechner had an intense contempt for Goldschmidt; intellectually he +thought him of no weight, as a man he thought him conceited, and +consequently ridiculous. He had not the slightest perception of the +literary artist in him. The valuable and unusual qualities of his +descriptive talent he overlooked. But the ignorance Goldschmidt had +sometimes shown about philosophy, and the incapacity he had displayed +with regard to art, his change of political opinion, his sentimentality +as a wit, all the weaknesses that one Danish critic had mercilessly +dragged into the light, had inspired Broechner with the strongest +aversion to Goldschmidt. Add to this the personal collisions between the +two men. At some public meeting Broechner had gazed at Goldschmidt with +such an ironic smile that the latter had passionately called him to +account. + +"Don't make a scene now!" replied Broechner. + +"I am ready to make a scene anywhere," the answer is reported to have +been. + +"That I can believe; but keep calm now!" + +Shortly afterwards, in _North and South_, Goldschmidt, on the +occasion of Broechner's candidature for parliament, had written that the +well-known atheist, H. Broechner, naturally, as contributor to _The +Fatherland_, was supported by the "Party." Now, there was nothing +that annoyed Broechner so much as when anyone called him an atheist, and +tried to make him hated for that reason,--the word, it is true, had a +hundred times a worse sound then than now,--he always maintaining that +he and other so-called atheists were far more religious than their +assailants. And although Goldschmidt's sins against Broechner were in +truth but small, although the latter, moreover--possibly unjustifiably-- +had challenged him to the attack, Broechner nevertheless imbued me with +such a dislike of Goldschmidt that I could not regard him with quite +unprejudiced eyes. + +Goldschmidt tried to make personal advances to me during my first stay +in Paris in 1866. + +Besides the maternal uncle settled in France, of whom I have already +spoken, I had still another uncle, my father's brother, who had gone to +France as a boy, had become naturalised, and had settled in Paris. He +was a little older than my father, a somewhat restless and fantastic +character, whom Goldschmidt frequently met at the houses of mutual +friends. He let me know through this man that he would like to make my +acquaintance, gave him his address and mentioned his receiving hours. As +I held back, he repeated the invitation, but in vain. Broechner's +influence was too strong. A few years later, in some dramatic articles, +I had expressed myself in a somewhat satirical, offhand manner about +Goldschmidt, when one day an attempt was made to bring the poet and +myself into exceedingly close connection. + +One Spring morning in 1869, a little man with blue spectacles came into +my room and introduced himself as Goldschmidt's publisher, Bookseller +Steen. He had come on a confidential errand from Goldschmidt, regarding +which he begged me to observe strict silence, whatever the outcome of +the matter might be. + +Goldschmidt knew that, as a critic, I was not in sympathy with him, but +being very difficultly placed, he appealed to my chivalry. For reasons +which he did not wish to enter into, he would be obliged, that same +year, to sever his connection with Denmark and settle down permanently +in England. For the future he should write in English. But before he +left he wished to terminate his literary activity in his native country +by an edition of his collected works, or at any rate a very exhaustive +selection from them. He would not and could not direct so great an +undertaking himself, from another country; he only knew one man who was +capable of doing so, and him he requested to undertake the matter. He +had drawn up a plan of the edition, a sketch of the order in which the +writings were to come out, and what the volume was to contain, and he +placed it before me for approval or criticism. The edition was to be +preceded by an account of Goldschmidt as an author and of his artistic +development; if I would undertake to write this, I was asked to go to +see Goldschmidt, in order to hear what he himself regarded as the main +features and chief points of his literary career. + +The draft of what the projected edition was to include made quite a +little parcel of papers; besides these, Steen gave me to read the actual +request to me to undertake the task, which was cautiously worded as a +letter, not to me, but to Bookseller Steen, and which Steen had been +expressly enjoined to bring back with him. Although I did not at all +like this last-mentioned item, and although this evidence of distrust +was in very conspicuous variance with the excessive and unmerited +confidence that was at the same time being shown me, this same +confidence impressed me greatly. + +The information that Goldschmidt, undoubtedly the first prose writer in +the country, was about to break off his literary activity and +permanently leave Denmark, was in itself overwhelming and at once set my +imagination actively at work. What could the reason be? A crime? That +was out of the question. What else could there be but a love affair, and +that had my entire sympathy. It was well known that Goldschmidt admired +a very beautiful woman, who was watched the more jealously by her +husband, because the latter had for a great number of years been +paralysed. He would not allow her to go to the theatre to sit anywhere +but in the mirror box [Footnote: The mirror box was a box in the first +Royal Theatre, surrounded by mirrors and with a grating in front, where +the stage could be seen, reflected in the mirrors, but the occupants +were invisible. It was originally constructed to utilise a space whence +the performance could not otherwise be seen, and was generally occupied +by actresses, etc.], where she could not be seen by the public. The +husband met with no sympathy from the public; he had always been a +characterless and sterile writer, had published only two books, written +in a diametrically opposite spirit, flatly contradicting one another. As +long as he was able to go out he had dyed his red hair black. He was an +insignificant man in every way, and by his first marriage with an ugly +old maid had acquired the fortune which alone had enabled him to pay +court to the beautiful woman he subsequently won. + +It had leaked out that she was the original of the beautiful woman in +The Inheritance, and that some of the letters that occur in it were +really notes from Goldschmidt to her. + +What more likely than the assumption that the position of affairs had at +last become unbearable to Goldschmidt, and that he had determined on an +elopement to London? In a romantic purpose of the sort Goldschmidt could +count upon the sympathy of a hot-blooded young man. I consequently +declared myself quite willing to talk the matter over with the poet and +learn more particulars as to what was expected of me; meanwhile, I +thought I might promise my assistance. It was Easter week, I believe +Maunday Thursday; I promised to call upon Goldschmidt on one of the +holidays at a prearranged time. + +Good Friday and Easter Sunday I was prevented from going to him, and I +had already made up my mind to pay my visit on Easter Monday when on +Monday morning I received a letter from Bookseller Steen which made me +exceedingly indignant. The letter, which exhibited, as I considered, +(incorrectly, as it turned out), unmistakably signs of having been +dictated to him, bore witness to the utmost impatience. Steen wrote that +after undertaking to pay a visit to Goldschmidt I had now let two days +elapse without fulfilling my promise. There was "no sense in keeping a +man waiting" day after day, on such important business; in Steen's +"personal opinion," it had not been at all polite of me, as the younger +author, not to inform Goldschmidt which day I would go to see him. + +I was very much cooled by reading this letter. I saw that I had wounded +Goldschmidt's vanity deeply by not going to him immediately upon receipt +of his communication; but my chief impression was one of surprise that +Goldschmidt should reveal himself such a poor psychologist in my case. +How could he believe that I would allow myself to be terrified by rough +treatment or won by tactless reprimands? How could he think that I +regarded the task he wished to allot me as such an honour that for that +reason I had not refused it? Could not Goldschmidt understand that it +was solely the appeal to my better feelings from an opponent, struck by +an untoward fate, that had determined my attitude? + +Simultaneously, though at first very faintly, a suspicion crossed my +mind. Was it possible that the whole touching story which had been +confided to me was a hoax calculated to disarm my antagonism, arouse my +sympathy and secure Goldschmidt a trumpeting herald? Was it possible +that the mysterious information about the flight to London was only an +untruth, the sole purpose of which was to get me into Goldschmidt's +service? + +I dismissed the thought at once as too improbable, but it recurred, for +I had learnt from experience that even distinguished authors sometimes +did not shrink from very daring means of securing the services of a +critic. A critic is like the rich heiress, who is always afraid of not +being loved for herself alone. Even then, I was very loth to believe +that any recognised author, much less a writer whose position was a +vexed question, would make advances to me from pure benevolence, for the +sake of my beautiful eyes, as they say in French. + +At any rate, I had now made up my mind not to have anything whatever to +do with the matter. I replied emphatically: + +"Lessons in politeness I take from no one, consequently return you the +enclosed papers. Be kind enough to appeal to some one else." + +This reply was evidently not the one the letter had been intended to +evoke. Steen rushed up to me at once to apologise, but I did not see +him. Twice afterwards he came with humble messages from Goldschmidt +asking me to "do him the honour" of paying him a visit. But my pride was +touchy, and my determination unwavering. Undoubtedly Steen's letter was +sent at Goldschmidt's wish, but it is equally undoubted that its form +had not been approved by him. That the alliance so cleverly led up to +came to nothing was evidently as unexpected by the poet as unpalatable +to him. + +Not long afterwards, I accidentally had strong confirmation of my +suspicion that the story of a flight from Denmark was merely an +invention calculated to trap me, and after the lapse of some time I +could no longer harbour a doubt that Goldschmidt had merely wished to +disarm a critic and secure himself a public crier. + +This did not make me feel any the more tenderly disposed towards +Goldschmidt, and my feeling lent a sharper tone than it would otherwise +have had to an essay I wrote shortly afterwards about him on the +production of his play _Rabbi and Knight_ at the Royal Theatre. + +Three years passed before our paths crossed again and a short-lived +association came about between us. + + +XVIII. + +In my public capacity about this time, I had many against me and no one +wholly for me, except my old protector Broechner, who, for one thing, was +very ill, and for another, by reason of his ponderous language, was +unknown to the reading world at large. Among my personal friends there +was not one who shared my fundamental views; if they were fond of me, it +was in spite of my views. That in itself was a sufficient reason why I +could not expect them, in the intellectual feud in which I was still +engaged, to enter the lists on my behalf. I did not need any long +experience to perceive that complete and unmixed sympathy with my +endeavours was a thing I should not find. Such a sympathy I only met +with in reality from one of my comrades, Emil Petersen, a young private +individual with no connection whatever with literature, and without +influence in other directions. + +Moreover, I had learnt long ago that, as a literary beginner in a +country on a Liliputian scale, I encountered prompt opposition at every +step, and that ill-will against me was always expressed much more +forcibly than good-will, was quickly, so to say, organised. + +I had against me at once every literary or artistic critic who already +held an assured position, from the influential men who wrote in _The +Fatherland_ or the _Berlin Times_ to the small fry who snapped +in the lesser papers, and if they mentioned me at all it was with the +utmost contempt, or in some specially disparaging manner. It was the +rival that they fought against. Thus it has continued to be all my life. +Certain "critics," such as Falkman in Denmark and Wirsen in Sweden, +hardly ever put pen to paper for some forty years without bestowing an +affectionate thought upon me. (Later, in Norway, I became Collin's +_idee fixe_.) + +Add to these all who feared and hated a train of thought which in their +opinion was dangerous to good old-fashioned faith and morality. + +Definite as were the limits of my articles and longer contributions to +the dispute concerning Faith and Science, and although, strictly +speaking, they only hinged upon an obscure point in Rasmus Nielsen's +philosophy, they alarmed and excited a large section of the +ecclesiastics of the country. I had carefully avoided saying anything +against faith or piety; I knew that Orthodoxy was all-powerful in +Denmark. However, I did not meet with refutations, only with the +indignation of fanaticism. As far back as 1867 Bjoernson had come forward +in print against me, had reproached the Daily Paper with giving my +contributions a place in their columns, and reported their contents to +the Editor, who was away travelling, on the supposition that they must +have been accepted against his wishes; and although the article did not +bear Bjoernson's name, this attack was not without weight. The innocent +remark that Soeren Kierkegaard was the Tycho Brahe of our philosophy, as +great as Tycho Brahe, but, like him, failing to place the centre of our +solar system in its Sun, gave Bjoernson an opportunity for the +statement,--a very dangerous one for a young author of foreign origin to +make,--that the man who could write like that "had no views in common +with other Danes, no Danish mind." + +The year after I was astonished by inflammatory outbursts on the part of +the clergy. One day in 1868 the much-respected Pastor Hohlenberg walked +into my friend Benny Spang's house, reprimanded her severely for +receiving such an undoubted heretic and heathen under her roof, and +demanded that she should break off all association with me. As she +refused to do so and turned a deaf ear to his arguments, losing all +self-control, he flung his felt hat on the floor, continued to rage and +rail against me, and, no result coming of it, dashed at last, in a +towering passion, out through the door, which he slammed behind him. +There was a farcical ending to the scene, since he was obliged to ring +at the door again for his hat, which, in his exasperation, he had +forgotten. This was a kind of private prologue to the ecclesiastical +drama which from the year 1871 upwards was enacted in most of the +pulpits of the country. Only the parsons instead of flinging their hats +upon the floor, beat their hands against the pulpit. + +But what surprised me, a literary beginner, still more, was the gift I +discovered in myself of hypnotising, by my mere existence, an ever- +increasing number of my contemporaries till they became as though +possessed by a hatred which lasted, sometimes a number of years, +sometimes a whole life long, and was the essential determining factor in +their careers and actions. By degrees, in this negative manner, I +succeeded in engaging the attentions of more than a score of persons. +For the time being, I encountered the phenomenon in the person of one +solitary genius-mad individual. For a failure of a poet and philosopher, +with whom I had nothing to do, and who did not interest me in the least, +I became the one enemy it was his business to attack. + +Rudolf Schmidt, who was a passionate admirer of Rasmus Nielsen, in whose +examination lectures he coached freshmen, was enraged beyond measure by +the objections, perfectly respectful, for that matter, in form, which I +had raised against one of the main points in Nielsen's philosophy. In +1866 he published a pamphlet on the subject; in 1867 a second, which, so +possessed was he by his fury against his opponent, he signed with the +latter's own initials, Gb. And from this time forth, for at least a +generation, it became this wretch's task in life to persecute me under +every possible pseudonym, and when his own powers were not sufficient, +to get up conspiracies against me. In particular, he did all he could +against me in Germany. + +Meanwhile, he started a magazine in order to bring before the public +himself and the ideas he was more immediately serving, viz.: those of R. +Nielsen; and since this latter had of late drawn very much nearer to the +Grundtvigian way of thinking, partly also those of Grundtvig. The +magazine had three editors, amongst them R. Nielsen himself, and when +one of them, who was the critic of the _Fatherland_, suddenly left +the country, Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson took his place. The three names, R. +Nielsen, B. Bjoernson, and Rudolph Schmidt, formed a trinity whose +supremacy did not augur well for the success of a beginner in the paths +of literature, who had attacked the thinker among them for ideal +reasons, and who had been the object of violent attacks from the two +others. The magazine _Idea and Reality_, was, as might be expected, +sufficiently unfavourable to my cause. + +The sudden disappearance of the critic of _The Fatherland_ from the +literary arena was, under the conditions of the time, an event. He had +no little talent, attracted by ideas and fancies that were sometimes +very telling, repelled by mannerisms and a curious, far-fetched style, +laid chief emphasis, in the spirit of the most modern Danish philosophy, +on the will, and always defended ethical standpoints. From the time of +Bjoernson's first appearance he had attached himself so enthusiastically +and inviolably to him that by the general public he was almost regarded +as Bjoernson's herald. At every opportunity he emphatically laid down +Bjoernson's importance and as a set-off fell upon those who might be +supposed to be his rivals. Ibsen, in particular, received severe +handling. His departure was thus a very hard blow for Bjoernson, but for +that matter, was also felt as a painful loss by those he opposed. + + +XIX. + +Not long after this departure, and immediately after the publication of +my long article on Goldschmidt, I received one day, to my surprise, a +letter of eight closely written pages from Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson, dated +April 15th, 1869. + +What had called it forth was my remark, in that article, that Bjoernson, +like Goldschmidt, sometimes, when talent failed, pretended to have +attained the highest, pretended that obscurity was the equivalent of +profundity. When writing this, I was thinking of the obscure final +speech about God in Heaven in Bjoernson's _Mary Stuart_, which I +still regard as quite vague, pretentious though it be as it stands +there; however, it was an exaggeration to generalise the grievance, as I +had done, and Bjoernson was right to reply. He considered that I had +accused him of insincerity, though in this he was wrong; but for that +matter, with hot-tempered eloquence, he also denied my real contention. +His letter began: + + Although I seldom read your writings, so that possibly I risk speaking + of something you have elsewhere developed more clearly, and thus making + a mistake, I nevertheless wish to make a determined protest against its + being called a characteristic of mine, in contrast to Oehlenschlaeger + (and Hauch!!), to strain my powers to reach what I myself only perceive + unclearly, and then intentionally to state it as though it were clear. I + am quite sure that I resemble Oehlenschlaeger in one thing, namely, that + the defects of my book are open to all, and are not glossed over with + any sort or kind of lie; anything unclear must for the moment have + seemed clear to me, as in his case. My motto has always been: "Be + faithful in _small_ things, and God shall make you ruler over great + things." And never, no, never, have I snatched after great material in + order to seem great, or played with words in order to seem clever, or + been silent, in order to appear deep. Never. The examples around me have + been appalling to me, and I am sure that they have been so because I + have from the very beginning been on my guard against lies. There are + passages in every work which will not yield immediately what one + impatiently demands of them;--and then I have always waited, never + tried; the thing has had to come itself unforced, and it is possible + that what I have received has been a deception; but I have believed in + it; to me it has been no deception. Before I finally conclude, I always, + it is true, go over again what I have written (as in the case of + _Synnoeve_, and _A Happy Boy, Between the Fights_, etc). I wish + to have the advantage of a better perception. Thus far, in what I have + gone through, I have seen weak places which I can no longer correct. + Lies I have never found. + + Unfortunately one is often exposed to the danger of being untrue; but it + is in moments of surprise and absolute passion, when something happens + to one's eye or one's tongue, that one feels is half mad, but when the + beast of prey within one, which shrinks at nothing, is the stronger. + Untrue in one's beautiful, poetic calm, one's confessional silence, at + one's work, I think very few are. + +This summing up, which does honour to Bjoernson and is not only a +striking self-verdict, but a valuable contribution to poetic psychology +in general, in its indication of the strength of the creative +imagination and its possibilities of error, was followed by a co- +ordinate attempt at a characterisation and appreciation of Goldschmidt: + + You are likewise unjust to Goldschmidt on this point, that I know with + certainty. Goldschmidt is of a naive disposition, susceptible of every + noble emotion. It is true that he often stages these in a comic manner, + and what you say about that is true; he does the same in private life, + but you have not recognised the source of this. In the last instance, it + is not a question of what we think, but of what we do. Just as this, on + the whole, is an error that you fall persistently into, it is in + particular an error here, where, for instance, his two brothers, with + the same qualifications and with the same dual nature, have both + developed into characters, the one indeed into a remarkable personality. + But Goldschmidt began as a corsair captain at seventeen; his courage was + the courage behind a pen that he fancied was feared, his happiness that + of the flatterer, his dread that of being vapid; and there were many + other unfavourable circumstances, for that matter.... He is now striving + hard towards what he feels has, during his life, been wasted in his + ability, both moral and intellectual qualities, and for my part, I + respect this endeavour more than his decisive success within narrow + limits. + +In this passage the distinction and contrast between contemplative life +and actual existence was quite in the Rasmus Nielsen spirit; the use +that was made of it here was strange. One would suppose that the example +adduced established that similar natural qualifications, similar family +and other conditions, in other words, the actual essential conditions of +life, were of small importance compared with one's mode of thought, +since the brothers could be so different; Bjoernson wished to establish, +hereby, that the mode of life was more important than the mode of +thought, although the former must depend on the latter. For the rest, he +alluded to Goldschmidt's weak points, even if in somewhat too superior a +manner, and without laying stress upon his great artistic importance, +with leniency and good-will. + +But if, in other things he touched upon, he had an eye for essentials, +this failed him sadly when the letter proceeded to a characterisation of +the addressee, in which he mixed up true and false in inextricable +confusion. Amongst other things, he wrote: + + Here, I doubtless touch upon a point that is distinctive of your + criticism. It is an absolute beauty worship. With that you can quickly + traverse our little literature and benefit no one greatly; for the poet + is only benefited by the man who approaches him with affection and from + his own standpoint; the other he does not understand, and the public + will, likely enough, pass with you through this unravelling of the + thousand threads, and believe they are growing; but no man or woman who + is sound and good lays down a criticism of this nature without a feeling + of emptiness. + + I chanced to read one of your travel descriptions which really became a + pronouncement upon some of the greatest painters. It was their nature in + their works (not their history or their lives so much as their natural + dispositions) that you pointed out,--also the influence of their time + upon them, but this only in passing; and you compared these painters, + one with another. In itself, much of this mode of procedure is correct, + but the result is merely racy. A single one of them, seized largely and + affectionately, shown in such manner that the different paintings and + figures became a description of himself, but were simultaneously the + unfolding of a culture, would have been five times as understandable. A + contrast can be drawn in when opportunity arises, but that is not the + essential task. Yes, this is an illustration of the form of your + criticism. It is an everlasting, and often very painful, juxtaposition + of things appertaining and contrasting, but just as poetry itself is an + absorption in the one thing that it has extracted from the many, so + comprehension of it is dependent on the same conditions. The individual + work or the individual author whom you have treated of, you have in the + same way not brought together, but disintegrated, and the whole has + become merely a piquant piece of effectiveness. Hitherto one might have + said that it was at least good-natured; but of late there have + supervened flippant expressions, paradoxical sentences, crude + definitions, a definite contumacy and disgust, which is now and again + succeeded by an outburst of delight over the thing that is peculiarly + Danish, or peculiarly beautiful. I cannot help thinking of P.L. Moeller, + as I knew him in Paris. + + There are a thousand things between Heaven and Earth that you understand + better than I. But for that very reason you can listen to me. It seems + to me now as if the one half of your powers were undoing what the other + half accomplishes. I, too, am a man with intellectual interests, but I + feel no cooperation. Might there not be other tasks that you were more + fitted for than that of criticism? I mean, that would be less of a + temptation to you, and would _build_ up on your personality, at the + same time as you yourself were building? It strikes me that even if you + do choose criticism, it should be more strongly in the direction of our + educating responsibilities and less as the arranger of technicalities, + the spyer out of small things, the dragger together of all and + everything which can be brought forward as a witness for or against the + author, which is all frightfully welcome in a contemporary critical + epidemic in Copenhagen, but, God help me, is nothing and accomplishes + nothing. + +This part of the letter irritated me intensely, partly by the mentor's +tone assumed in it, partly by a summing up of my critical methods which +was founded simply and solely on the reading of three or four articles, +more especially those on Rubens and Goldschmidt, and which quite missed +the point. I was far from feeling that I had been understood, and for +that reason warned against extremes; on the contrary, I saw myself only +caricatured, without even wit or humour, and could not forget that the +man who had sketched this picture of me had done his utmost to injure +me. And he compared me with P.L. Moeller! + +The fact that the conclusion of the letter contained much that was +conciliatory and beautiful consequently did not help matters. Bjoernson +wrote: + + When you write about the Jews, although I am not in agreement with you, + _altogether_ in agreement, you yet seem to me to touch upon a + domain where you might have much to offer us, many beautiful prospects + to open to us. In the same way, when you interpret Shakespeare (not when + you make poetry by the side of him), when you tranquilly expound, I seem + to see the beginnings of greater works, in any case of powers which I + could imagine essentially contributing to the introduction into our + culture of greater breadth of view, greater moral responsibility, more + affection. + +When I now read these words, I am obliged to transport myself violently +back, into the feelings and to the intellectual standpoint that were +mine at the time, in order to understand how they could to such a pitch +incense me. It was not only that, like all young people of any account, +I was irritable, sensitive and proud, and unwilling to be treated as a +pupil; but more than that, as the way of youth is, I confused what I +knew myself capable of accomplishing with what I had already +accomplished; felt myself rich, exuberantly rich, already, and was +indignant at perceiving myself deemed still so small. + +But the last straw was a sentence which followed: + + I should often have liked to talk all this over with you, when last I + was in Copenhagen, but I noticed I was so pried after by gossips that I + gave it up. + +The last time Bjoernson was in Copenhagen he had written that article +against me. Besides, I had been told that some few times he had read my +first articles aloud in public in friends' houses, and made fun of their +forced and tyro-like wording. And now he wanted me to believe that he +had at that time been thinking of visiting me, in order to come to an +understanding with me. And worse still, the fear of gossip had +restrained him! This hero of will-power so afraid of a little gossip! He +might go on as he liked now, I had done with him. He did go on, both +cordially and gracefully, but condescendingly, quite incapable of seeing +how wounding the manner of his advances was. He wished to make advances +to me and yet maintain a humiliating attitude of condescension: + + There are not many of us in literature who are in earnest; the few who + are ought not to be daunted by the accidental separation that opposed + opinions can produce, when there is a large field for mutual + understanding and co-operation. I sometimes get violently irate for a + moment; if this in lesser men, in whom there really is something base, + brings about a lifelong separation, it does not greatly afflict me. But + I should be very sorry if it should influence the individuals in whom I + feel there are both ability and will. And as far as you are concerned, I + have such a strong feeling that you must be standing at a parting of the + ways, that, by continuing your path further, you will go astray, that I + want to talk to you, and consequently am speaking from my heart to you + now. If you do not understand, I am sorry; that is all I can say. + + In the Summer I am going to Finmark, and involuntarily, as I write this, + the thought occurs to me what a journey it would be for you; away from + everything petty and artificial to a scenery which in its magnificent + loneliness is without parallel in the world, and where the wealth of + birds above us and fish beneath us (whales, and shoals of herrings, cod + and capelans often so close together that you can take them up in your + hands, or they press against the sides of the boat) are marvel upon + marvel, in the light of a Sun that does not set, while human beings up + there live quiet and cowed by Nature. If you will come with me, and meet + me, say, at Trondhjem, I know that you would not regret it. And then I + should get conversation again; here there are not many who hit upon just + that which I should like them to. Think about it. + +A paragraph relating to Magdalene Thoresen followed. But what is here +cited is the essential part of the letter. Had its recipient known +Bjoernson better, he would in this have found a foundation to build upon. +But as things were, I altogether overlooked the honestly meant +friendliness in it and merely seized upon the no small portion of it +that could not do other than wound. My reply, icy, sharp and in the +deeper sense of the word, worthless, was a refusal. I did not believe in +Bjoernson, saw in the letter nothing but an attempt to use me as a +critic, now that he had lost his former advocate in the Press. The +prospect of the journey to the North did not tempt me; in Bjoernson's +eyes it would have been Thor's journey with Loki, and I neither was Loki +nor wished to be. + +But even had I been capable of rising to a more correct and a fuller +estimate of Bjoernson's character, there was too much dividing us at this +time for any real friendship to have been established. Bjoernson was then +still an Orthodox Protestant, and in many ways hampered by his youthful +impressions; I myself was still too brusque to be able to adapt myself +to so difficult and masterful a personality. + +Eight years elapsed before the much that separated me from Bjoernson +crumbled away. But then, when of his own accord he expressed his regret +on a public occasion at the rupture between us, and spoke of me with +unprejudiced comprehension and good-will, I seized with warmth and +gratitude the hand stretched out to me. A hearty friendship, bringing +with it an active and confidential correspondence, was established +between us and remained unshaken for the next ten years, when it broke +down, this time through no fault of mine, but through distrust on +Bjoernson's part, just as our intimacy had been hindered the first time +through distrust on mine. + +The year 1869 passed in steady hard work. Among the many smaller +articles I wrote, one with the title of _The Infinitely Small and the +Infinitely Great in Poetry_, starting with a representment of +Shakespeare's Harry Percy, contained a criticism of the hitherto +recognised tendency of Danish dramatic poetry and pointed out into the +future. The paper on H.C. Andersen, which came into being towards +midsummer, and was read aloud in a clover field to a solitary listener, +was representative of my critical abilities and aims at that date. I had +then known Andersen socially for a considerable time. My cordial +recognition of his genius drew us more closely together; he often came +to see me and was very ready to read his new works aloud to me. It is +hardly saying too much to declare that this paper secured me his +friendship. + +The fundamental principles of the essay were influenced by Taine, the +art philosopher I had studied most deeply, and upon whom I had written a +book that was to be my doctor's thesis. Lightly and rapidly though my +shorter articles came into being, this larger task was very long in +hand. Not that I had little heart for my work; on the contrary, no +question interested me more than those on which my book hinged; but +there were only certain of them with which, as yet, I was equal to +dealing. + +First and foremost came the question of the nature of the producing +mind, the possibility of showing a connection between its faculties and +deriving them from one solitary dominating faculty, which would thus +necessarily reveal itself in every aspect of the mind. It puzzled me, +for example, how I was to find the source whence Pascal's taste, both +for mathematics and religious philosophy, sprang. Next came the question +of the possibility of a universally applicable scientific method of +criticism, regarded as intellectual optics. If one were to define the +critic's task as that of understanding, through the discovery and +elucidation of the dependent and conditional contingencies that occur in +the intellectual world, then there was a danger that he might approve +everything, not only every form and tendency of art that had arisen +historically, but each separate work within each artistic section. If it +were no less the critic's task to distinguish between the genuine and +the spurious, he must at any rate possess a technical standard by which +to determine greater or lesser value, or he must be so specially and +extraordinarily gifted that his instinct and tact estimate infallibly. + +Further, there was the question of genius, the point on which Taine's +theory roused decisive opposition in me. He regarded genius as a summing +up, not as a new starting-point; according to him it was the assemblage +of the original aptitudes of a race and of the peculiarities of a period +in which these aptitudes were properly able to display themselves. He +overlooked the originality of the man of genius, which could not be +explained from his surroundings, the new element which, in genius, was +combined with the summarising of surrounding particles. Before, when +studying Hegel, I had been repelled by the suggestion that what spoke to +us through the artist was only the universally valid, the universal +mind, which, as it were, burnt out the originality of the individual. In +Taine's teaching, nation and period were the new (although more +concrete) abstractions in the place of the universally valid; but here, +too, the particularity of the individual was immaterial. The kernel of +my work was a protest against this theory. + +I was even more actively interested in the fundamental question raised +by a scientific view of history. For some years I had been eagerly +searching Comte and Littre, Buckle, Mill and Taine for their opinions on +the philosophy of History. Here, too, though in another form, the +question of the importance of the individual versus the masses presented +itself. Statistics had proved to what extent conscious actions were +subordinated to uniform laws. We could foresee from one year to another +how many murders would be committed and how many with each kind of +instrument. The differences between men and men neutralised each other, +if we took the average of a very large number. But this did not prove +that the individual was not of considerable importance. If the victory +of Salamis depended on Themistocles, then the entire civilisation of +Europe henceforth depended on him. + +Another aspect of the question was: Did the consistent determinism of +modern Science, the discovery of an unalterable interdependency in the +intellectual, as in the physical worlds, allow scope for actions +proceeding otherwise than merely illusorily from the free purpose or +determination of the individual? Very difficult the question was, and I +did not feel confident of solving it; but it was some consolation to +reflect that the doubt as to the possibility of demonstrating a full +application of the law in the domain in which chance has sway, and +Ethics its sphere, was comparatively infinitesimal in the case of those +domains in which men make themselves felt by virtue of genius or talent +as producers of literary and artistic works. Here, where natural gifts +and their necessary deployment were of such extraordinary weight, the +probability of a demonstration of natural laws was, of course, much +greater. + +The general fundamental question was: Given a literature, a philosophy, +an art, or a branch of art, what is the attitude of mind that produces +it? What are its sufficing and necessary conditions? What, for instance, +causes England in the sixteenth century to acquire a dramatic poetry of +the first rank, or Holland in the seventeenth century a painting art of +the first rank, without any of the other branches of art simultaneously +bearing equally fine fruit in the same country? + +My deliberations resulted, for the time being, in the conviction that +all profound historical research was psychical research. + +That old piece of work, revised, as it now is, has certainly none but +historic interest; but for a doctor's thesis, it is still a tolerably +readable book and may, at any rate, introduce a beginner to reflection +upon great problems. + +After the fundamental scientific questions that engaged my attention, I +was most interested in artistic style. There was, in modern Danish +prose, no author who unreservedly appealed to me; in German Heinrich +Kleist, and in French Merimee, were the stylists whom I esteemed most. +The latter, in fact, it seemed to me was a stylist who, in unerring +sureness, terseness and plasticism, excelled all others. He had +certainly not much warmth or colour, but he had a sureness of line equal +to that of the greatest draughtsmen of Italian art. His aridity was +certainly not winning, and, in reading him, I frequently felt a lack of +breadth of view and horizon, but the compelling power of his line- +drawing captivated me. When my doctor's thesis was finished, towards the +middle of December, 1869, both it and the collection of articles bearing +the name _Criticisms and Portraits_ were placed in the printer's +hands. In the beginning of 1870 two hitherto unprinted pieces were +added, of which one was a paper written some time before on Kamma +Rahbek, which had been revised, the other, a new one on Merimee, which +in general shows what at that time I admired in style. + +It had long been settled that as soon as I had replied to the critics of +my thesis I should start on prolonged travels, the real educational +travels of a young man's life. I had a little money lying ready, a small +bursary, and a promise of a travelling allowance from the State, which +promise, however, was not kept. This journey had for a long time been +haunting my fancy. I cherished an ardent wish to see France again, but +even more especially to go to Italy and countries still farther South. +My hope of catching a glimpse of Northern Africa was only fulfilled +thirty-five years later; but I got as far as Italy, which was the actual +goal of my desires. I knew enough of the country, its history from +ancient days until then, and was sufficiently acquainted with its Art +from Roman times upwards and during the Renaissance, to be regarded as +passed for intellectual consecration in the South. + +When the thesis was done with and the printing of the second book was +nearing completion, not anxiety to travel, but melancholy and heavy- +heartedness at the thought of my departure, gained the upper hand. It +had been decided that I was to remain away at least a year, and it was +less to myself than to others whom I must necessarily leave behind, that +the time seemed immeasurably long. Professor Schioedte advised me rather +to take several short journeys than one long one; but that was +impracticable. I wanted to get quite away from the home atmosphere. As, +however, there were some who thought of my journey with disquiet and +dread, and from whom it was difficult for me to tear myself, I put off +my departure as long as I could. At last the remnant of work that still +bound me to Copenhagen was finished, and then all the new and enriching +prospects my stay in foreign countries was to bring me shone in a golden +light. Full of undaunted hope, I set out on my travels at the beginning +of April, 1870. + + + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +Hamburg--My Second Fatherland--Ernest Hello--_Le Docteur Noir_-- +Taine--Renan--Marcelin--Gleyre--Taine's Friendship--Renan at Home-- +Philarete Chasles' Reminiscences--_Le Theatre Francais_--Coquelin +--Bernhardt--Beginnings of _Main Currents_--The Tuileries--John +Stuart Mill--London--Philosophical Studies--London and Paris Compared-- +Antonio Gallenga and His Wife--Don Juan Prim--Napoleon III--London +Theatres--Gladstone and Disraeli in Debate--Paris on the Eve of War-- +First Reverses--Flight from Paris--Geneva, Switzerland--Italy--Pasquale +Villari--Vinnie Ream's Friendship--Roman Fever--Henrik Ibsen's +Influence--Scandinavians in Rome. + + +I. + +The first thing that impressed me was Hamburg, and by that I mean the +European views prevalent there. At that time, doubtless mainly for +national reasons, Denmark hated Hamburg. Different Danish authors had +recently written about the town, and in as depreciatory a strain as they +could. The description of one amounted to an assertion that in Hamburg +people only talked of two things, money and women; that of another +commenced: "Of all the places I have ever seen in my life, Hamburg is +the most hideous." + +The situation of the town could not be compared with that of Copenhagen, +but the Alster quarter was attractive, the architecture and the street +life not uninteresting. What decided me, however, was not the externals +of the town, but the spirit I noticed pervading the conversation. The +idea underlying things was that a young man must first and foremost +learn to keep himself well and comfortably; if he could not do this in +Hamburg, then as soon as possible he must set off to some place across +the sea, to Rio, or New York, to the Argentine, or Cape Colony, and +there make his way and earn a fortune. The sons of the families I was +invited to visit, or heard talked about, had long been away; in the +houses I went to, the head of the family had seen other parts of the +world. The contrast with Copenhagen was obvious; there the young sons of +the middle classes were a burden on their families sometimes until they +were thirty, had no enterprise, no money of their own to dispose of, +were often glued, as it were, to the one town, where there was no +promotion to look forward to and no wide prospect of any sort. + +It was a long time since I had been so much struck by anything as by an +expression that a Hamburg lady, who had been to Copenhagen and had +stayed there some time, used about the young Danish men, namely, that +they had _l'apparence chetive_. I tried to persuade her that life +in Copenhagen had only accidentally appeared so wretched to her; but I +did not convince her in the least. She demonstrated to me, by numerous +examples, to what an extent enterprise was lacking in Denmark, and I was +obliged to restrict myself to explaining that the tremendous pressure of +political pettiness and weakness had brought a general slackness with +it, without people feeling or suspecting it, and had robbed nearly every +one of daring and success. The result of the conversation was that +Denmark was shown to me in a fresh light. + +A Hamburg merchant who had lived for a long time in Mexico invited me to +dinner, and at his house I had the same impression of apparent +happiness, comfort, enterprise and wide outlook, in contrast to the +cares and the narrowness at home, where only the few had travelled far +or collected material which might by comparison offer new points of view +and give one a comprehensive experience of life. My psychological +education in Danish literature, with its idolising of "thoroughness" had +imprinted on my mind that whoever thoroughly understood how to observe a +man, woman and child in a Copenhagen backyard had quite sufficient +material whence to brew a knowledge of human nature. It now dawned upon +me that comparative observation of a Mexican and a North German family, +together with their opinions and prejudices, might nevertheless +considerably advance one's knowledge of human nature, should such +comparisons constantly obtrude themselves upon one. + +The same man let fall an observation which set me thinking. When the +conversation turned upon the strained relations between France and +Prussia since the battle of Koeniggratz, and I expressed myself confident +that, in the event of a war, France would be victorious, as she +generally was victorious everywhere, he expressed well-supported doubts. +Prussia was a comparatively young state, extremely well organised and +carefully prepared for war; antiquated routine held great sway in the +French army; the Emperor himself, the esteem in which he was held, and +his management were on the down grade. These were words that I had never +heard in Denmark. The possibility of France being defeated in a war with +Prussia was not even entertained there. This merchant showed me an +original photograph of the execution of the Emperor Maximilian, taken on +the spot a moment before the word to fire was given, and a second taken +immediately afterwards. The calm bearing of the Emperor and the two +generals compelled admiration. This was the first time I had seen +photography taken into the service of history. + +In the Hamburg Zoological Gardens I was fascinated by the aquarium, with +its multitudes of aquatic animals and fish. There, for the first time in +my life, I saw an elephant, and did not tire of gazing at the mighty +beast. I was struck by the strange caprice with which the great Being we +call Nature goes to work, or, more correctly, by the contrast between +the human point of view and Nature's mode of operations. To us, the +elephant's trunk was burlesque, its walk risibly clumsy; the eagle and +the kite seemed to us, as they sat, to have a severe appearance and a +haughty glance; the apes, picking lice from one another and eating the +vermin, were, to our eyes, contemptible and ridiculous at the same time; +but Nature took everything equally seriously, neither sought nor avoided +beauty, and to her one being was not more central than another. That +must be deemed Nature's central point which is equidistant from the +lowest and from the highest being; it was not impossible, for instance, +that the _harefish_, a great, thick, odd-looking creature, was the +real centre of terrestrial existence, in the same way as our celestial +sphere has its centre, through which a line reaches the pole of the +zodiac in the constellation of the Dragon. And I smiled as I thought of +R. Nielsen and his pupils always speaking as if they stood on the most +intimate footing with the "central point" of existence, and pouring +contempt on others who, it was to be supposed, could not approach it. + +I was very unfavourably impressed in Hamburg by German drama and German +dramatic art. + +At the town theatre, Hebbel's _Judith_ was being performed, with +Clara Ziegler in the leading part. At that time this lady enjoyed a +considerable reputation in Germany, and was, too, a tall, splendid- +looking female, with a powerful voice, a good mimic, and all the rest of +it, but a mere word-machine. The acting showed up the want of taste in +the piece. Holofernes weltered knee-deep in gore and bragged +incessantly; Judith fell in love with his "virility," and when he had +made her "the guardian of his slumbers" murdered him, from a long +disremembered loyalty to the God of Israel. + +At the Thalia Theatre, Raupach's _The School of Life_ was being +produced, a lot of silly stuff, the theme of it, for that matter, allied +to the one dealt with later by Drachmann in _Once upon a Time_. A +Princess is hard-hearted and capricious. To punish her, the King, her +father, shuts a man into her bedroom, makes a feigned accusation against +her, and actually drives her out of the castle. She becomes a waiting- +maid, and passes through various stages of civil life. The King of +Navarra, whose suit she had haughtily rejected, disguised as a +goldsmith, marries her, then arrays himself in silks and velvets, to +tempt her to infidelity. When she refuses, he allows every possible +injustice to be heaped upon her, to try her, makes her believe that the +King, on a false accusation, has had her husband's eyes put out, and +then himself goes about with a bandage before his eyes, and lets her +beg. She believes everything and agrees to everything, until at last, +arrived at honour and glory, she learns that it has all been only play- +acting, trial, and education. + +This nonsense was exactly on a par with taste in Germany at the time, +which was undeniably considerably below the level of that in France and +Denmark, and it was acted by a group of actors, some very competent, at +the chief theatre of Hamburg. Slowly though business life pulsated in +Denmark, we were superior to Germany in artistic perception. + +The low stage of artistic development at which Hamburg had then arrived +could not, however, efface the impression its superiority over +Copenhagen in other respects had made upon me. Take it all together, my +few days in Hamburg were well spent. + + +II. + +And then I set foot once more in the country which I regarded as my +second fatherland, and the overflowing happiness of once more feeling +French ground under my feet returned undiminished and unchanged. I had +had all my letters sent to Mlle. Louise's address, so fetched them +shortly after my arrival and saw the girl again. Her family invited me +to dinner several times during the very first week, and I was associated +with French men and women immediately upon my arrival. + +They were well-brought-up, good-natured, hospitable bourgeois, very +narrow in their views. Not in the sense that they took no interest in +politics and literature, but in that questions for them were decided +once and for all in the clerical spirit. They did not regard this as a +party standpoint, did not look upon themselves as adherents of a party; +their way of thinking was the right one; those who did not agree with +them held opinions they ought to be ashamed of, and which they probably, +in private, were ashamed of holding and expressing. + +Mlle. Louise had a cousin whom she used to speak of as a warm-hearted +man with peculiar opinions, eager and impetuous, who would like to make +the acquaintance of her friend from the North. The aunts called him a +passionate Catholic, and an energetic writer in the service of the +Church Militant. Shortly after my arrival, I met him at dinner. He was a +middle-aged, pale, carelessly dressed man with ugly, irregular features, +and a very excitable manner. With him came his wife, who though pale and +enthusiastic like himself, yet looked quite terrestrial. He introduced +himself as Ernest Hello, contributor to Veuillot's then much talked of +Romish paper, _L'Univers_, which, edited with no small talent by a +noted stylist, adopted all sorts of abusive methods as weapons in every +feud in which the honour of the Church was involved. It was against +Veuillot that Augier had just aimed the introduction to his excellent +comedy, _Le Fils de Giboyer_, and he made no secret of the fact +that in the Deodat mentioned in the piece he had had this writer of holy +abuse in his mind. Hello was in everything Veuillot's vassal. + +He was one of the martial believers who despised and hated the best free +research men, and who knew himself in a position to confute them. He +possessed some elements of culture, and had early had thoroughly drilled +into him what, in comparison with the views of later times on History +and Religion, was narrow and antiquated in Voltaire's education, and for +this reason regarded, not only Voltaire's attack on the Church, but all +subsequent philosophy inimical to the Church, as belonging to a bygone +age. He was a fanatic, and there was a sacristy odour about all that he +said. But there was in his disposition an enthusiastic admiration for +weakness in fighting against external strength, and for courage that +expressed itself in sheer defiance of worldly prudence, that made him +feel kindly towards the young Dane. Denmark's taking up arms, with its +two million inhabitants, against a great power like Prussia, roused his +enthusiasm. "It is great, it is Spartan!" he exclaimed. It must +certainly be admitted that this human sympathy was not a prominent +characteristic, and he wearied me with his hateful verdicts over all +those whom I, and by degrees, all Europe, esteemed and admired in +France. + +As an instance of the paradoxicalness to which Huysmans many years later +became addicted, the latter tried to puff up Hello as being a man of +remarkable intellect; and an instance of the want of independence with +which the new Catholic movement was carried on in Denmark is to be found +in the fact that the organ of Young Denmark, _The Tower_, could +declare: "Hello is one of the few whom all men of the future are agreed +to bow before.... Hello was,--not only a Catholic burning with religious +ardour,--but a genius; these two things explain everything." + +When Hello invited me to his house, I regarded it as my duty to go, that +I might learn as much as possible, and although his circle was +exceedingly antipathetic to me, I did not regret it; the spectacle was +highly instructive. + +Next to Hello himself, who, despite his fanaticism and restlessness, +impressed one as very inoffensive at bottom, and not mischievous if one +steered clear of such names as Voltaire or Renan, the chief member of +his circle was the black doctor, (_le Docteur noir_,) so much +talked of in the last years of the Empire, and who is even alluded to in +Taine's _Graindorge_. His real name was Vries. He was a negro from +the Dutch West Indies, a veritable bull, with a huge body and a black, +bald physiognomy, made to stand outside a tent at a fair, and be his own +crier to the public. His conversation was one incessant brag, in +atrocious French. Although he had lived seventeen years in France, he +spoke almost unintelligibly. + +He persuaded himself, or at least others, that he had discovered +perpetual motion, vowed that he had made a machine which, "by a simple +mechanism," could replace steam power and had been declared practicable +by the first engineers in Paris; but of course he declined to speak +freely about it. Columbus and Fulton only were his equals; he knew all +the secrets of Nature. He had been persecuted--in 1859 he had been +imprisoned for eleven months, on a charge of quackery--because all great +men were persecuted; remember our Lord Jesus Christ! He himself was the +greatest man living. _Moi vous dire le plus grand homme d'universe_. +Hello and the ladies smiled admiringly at him, and never grew tired of +listening to him. This encouraged him to monopolise the conversation: +He, Vries, was a man possessed of courage and wisdom; he understood +Phrenology, Allopathy, Homoeopathy, Engineering Science, Metereology +--like Moliere's doctors and Holberg's Oldfux. His greatest and most +special gift was that of curing cancer. Like writing-masters, who hang +out specimens of how people wrote when they came to them, and of their +caligraphy after they had benefited by their instruction, he had his +cancer patients photographed before and after his treatment, looking +ghastly the first time, and as fresh as a flower the second, and these +pictures hung on view in his house. No wonder, therefore, that Napoleon +III--so Vries said--had his portrait in an album containing, besides, +only portraits of European sovereigns. + +He pretended that he had made many important prophecies. This was a bond +between him and Hello, who claimed the same extraordinary power, and had +foretold all sorts of singular events. He performed miraculous cures; +this appealed to Hello, who was suspicious of all rational Science and +ready to believe any mortal thing. He could read everybody's characters +in their faces. This was a pretext for the most barefaced flattery of +Hello, his wife, and their friends of both sexes, and of course +everything was swallowed with alacrity. To me he said: "Monsieur is +gentle, very calm, very indulgent, and readily forgives an injury." + +Hideous though he was, his powerful brutality had a great effect on the +ladies of the circle. They literally hung upon his words. He seized them +by the wrists, and slid his black paws up their bare arms. The married +women whispered languishingly: "You have a marvellous power over women." +The husbands looked on smilingly. + +Now when Hello and he and their friends and the ladies began to talk +about religious matters and got steam up, it was a veritable witches' +Sabbath, and no mistake, every voice being raised in virulent cheap Jack +denunciation of freedom, and common sense. Satan himself had dictated +Voltaire's works; now Voltaire was burning in everlasting fire. +Unbelievers ought to be exterminated; it would serve them right. Renan +ought to be hanged on the first tree that would bear him; the Black +Doctor even maintained that in Manila he would have been shot long ago. +It was always the Doctor who started the subject of the persecution of +heretics. Hello himself persecuted heretics with patronising scorn, but +was already ready to drop into a hymn of praise to the Madonna. + +I had then read two of Hello's books, _Le Style_ and _M. Renan, +L'Allemagne et l'Atheisme au 19me Siecle_. Such productions are +called books, because there is no other name for them. As a matter of +fact, idle talk and galimatias of the sort are in no wise literature. +Hello never wrote anything but Roman Catholic sermons, full of +theological sophistries and abuse of thinking men. In those years his +books, with their odour of incense, made the small, flat inhabitants of +the sacristy wainscotting venture out of their chinks in the wall in +delight; but they obtained no applause elsewhere. + +It was only after his death that it could occur to a morbid seeker after +originality, with a bitter almond in place of a heart, like Huysmans, to +make his half-mad hero, Des Esseintes, who is terrified of the light, +find satisfaction in the challenges to common sense that Hello wrote. +Hello was a poor wretch who, in the insane conviction that he himself +was a genius, filled his writings with assertions concerning the +marvellous, incomprehensible nature of genius, and always took up the +cudgels on its behalf. During the Empire, his voice was drowned. It was +only a score of years later that the new Catholic reaction found it to +their advantage to take him at his word and see in him the genius that +he had given himself out to be. He was as much a genius as the madman in +the asylum is the Emperor. + + +III. + +A few days after my arrival, I called upon Taine and was cordially +received. He presented me with one of his books and promised me his +great work, _De l'Intelligence_, which was to come out in a few +days, conversed with me for an hour, and invited me to tea the following +evening. He had been married since I had last been at his house, and his +wife, a young, clear-skinned lady with black plaits, brown eyes and an +extremely graceful figure, was as fresh as a rose, and talked with the +outspoken freedom of youth, though expressing herself in carefully +selected words. + +After a few days, Taine, who was generally very formal with strangers, +treated me with conspicuous friendliness. He offered at once to +introduce me to Renan, and urgently advised me to remain six months in +Paris, in order to master the language thoroughly, so that I might +enlighten Frenchmen on the state of things in the North, as well as +picture the French to my fellow-countrymen. Why should I not make French +my auxiliary language, like Turgenieff and Hillebrandt! + +Taine knew nothing of German belles lettres. As far as philosophy was +concerned, he despised German Aesthetics altogether, and laughed at me +for believing in "Aesthetics" at all, even one day introducing me to a +stranger as "A young Dane who does not believe in much, but is weak +enough to believe in Aesthetics." I was not precisely overburdened by +the belief. But a German Aesthetic, according to Taine's definition, was +a man absolutely devoid of artistic perception and sense of style, who +lived only in definitions. If you took him to the theatre to see a sad +piece, he would tear his hair with delight, and exclaim: "_Voila das +Tragische!_" + +Of the more modern German authors, Taine knew only Heine, of whom he was +a passionate admirer and whom, by reason of his intensity of feeling, he +compared with Dante. A poem like the _Pilgrimage to Kevlaar_ roused +his enthusiasm. Goethe's shorter poems, on the other hand, he could not +appreciate, chiefly no doubt because he did not know German sufficiently +well. He was not even acquainted with the very best of Goethe's short +things, and one day that I asked him to read one poem aloud, the words +in his mouth rang very French. + +_Lieber dur Laydenn moecht ee mee schlag'e, als so feel Froedenn des +Laybengs airtrah'ge_, was intended to be-- + + Lieber durch Leiden, + Moecht ich mich schlagen + Als so viel Freuden + Des Lebens ertragen. + +Goethe's prose he did not consider good, but heavy and prolix, and +lacking in descriptive power. He would praise Voltaire's prose at his +expense. "You perceive the figure and its movements far more clearly," +he said. The German romanticists disgusted him; their style, also, was +too inartistic for him (_ils ne savent pas ecrire, cela me degoute +d'eux_). + +I frequently met friends at his house, amongst others, Marcelin, who had +been his friend from boyhood, and upon whom, many years later, he wrote +a melancholy obituary. This man, the proprietor of that supremely +worldly paper, _La Vie Parisienne_, was a powerful, broad- +shouldered, ruddy-cheeked man, who looked the incarnation of health and +very unlike one's preconception of the editor of the most frivolous and +fashionable weekly in Paris. He was a draughtsman and an author, had +studied the history of the last few centuries in engravings, and himself +owned a collection of no fewer than 300,000. What Taine had most admired +in him was the iron will with which, left, at nineteen years of age, +penniless, and defectively educated, as head of his family, he had kept +his mother and brothers and sisters by his work. Next to that Taine +admired his earnestness. Marcelin, who was generally looked upon as +belonging to gay Paris, was a solitary-minded man, an imaginative +recreator of the peoples of the past, as they were and went about, of +their ways and customs. He it was who opened Taine's eyes to the wealth +of contributions to history locked up in collections of engravings, more +especially perhaps as regarded people's external appearance, and what +the exterior revealed. Another friend who came to Taine at all sorts of +times was Gleyre, the old painter, who had been born in French +Switzerland, but was otherwise a Parisian. And he was not the only +deeply idealistic artist with whom Taine was connected in the bonds of +friendship. Although a fundamental element of Taine's nature drew him +magnetically to the art that was the expression of strength, tragic or +carnal strength, a swelling exuberance of life, there was yet room in +his soul for sympathy with all artistic endeavour, even the purely +emotional. That which drew him to the idealistic painters was, at +bottom, the same quality as drew him to Beethoven and Chopin. + +Gleyre's best-known picture is the painting in the Louvre, somewhat weak +in colouring, but showing much feeling, a Nile subject representing a +man sitting on the banks of the river and watching the dreams of his +youth, represented as beautiful women, fleeing from him on a decorated +dahabeah, which is disappearing. The title is _Lost Illusions_. +There is more strength in the painting, much reproduced in engraving, of +a Roman army, conquered by Divico the Helvetian, passing under the yoke +--a picture which, as an expression of the national pride of the Swiss, +has been placed in the Museum at Lausanne. + +Still, it was the man himself, rather than his pictures, that Taine +thought so much of. Intellectually, Taine was in his inmost heart an +admirer of the Italian and the English Renaissance, when most pagan and +most unrestrained; his intellectual home was the Venice of the sixteenth +century; he would have been in his right place at one of the festivals +painted by Veronese, and should have worn the rich and tasteful costume +of that period. But socially, and as a citizen, he was quite different, +was affectionate and subdued and calm, excessively conventional; +temperate in all his judgments, as in his life. + +If I succeeded in winning his good-will, it was most emphatically not +because I had written a book about him, which, for that matter, he could +not understand; he barely glanced through it; he read, at most, the +appreciative little review that Gaston Paris did me the honour to write +upon it in the _Revue Critique_. But it appealed to him that I had +come to France from pure love of knowledge, that I might become +acquainted with men and women and intellectual life, and that I had +spent my youth in study. + +He grew fond of me, advised me as a father or an elder brother might +have done, and smiled at my imprudences--as for instance when I almost +killed myself by taking too strong a sleeping draught--(_vous etes +imprudent, c'est de votre age_). He sometimes reproached me with not +jotting down every day, as he did, whatever had struck me; he talked to +me about his work, about the projected Essay on Schiller that came to +nothing on account of the war, of his _Notes sur l'Angleterre_, +which he wrote in a little out-of-the-way summer-house containing +nothing save the four bare whitewashed walls, but a little table and a +chair. He introduced into the book a few details that I had mentioned to +him after my stay in England. + +When we walked in the garden at his country-house at Chatenay, he +sometimes flung his arm round my neck--an act which roused great +astonishment in the Frenchmen present, who could scarcely believe their +eyes. They knew how reserved he usually was. + +It quite irritated Taine that the Danish Minister did nothing for me, +and introduced me nowhere, although he had had to procure me a free pass +to the theatre. Again and again he reverted to this, though I had never +mentioned either the Minister or the Legation to him. But the +revolutionary blood in him was excited at what he regarded as a slight +to intellectual aristocracy. "What do you call a man like that? A +Junker?" I said no. "Never mind! it is all the same. One feels that in +your country you have had no revolution like ours, and know nothing +about equality. A fellow like that, who has not made himself known in +any way whatever, looks down on you as unworthy to sit at his table and +does not move a finger on your behalf, although that is what he is there +for. When I am abroad, they come at once from the French Embassy to +visit me, and open to me every house to which they have admittance. I am +a person of very small importance in comparison with Benedetti, but +Benedetti comes to see me as often as I will receive him. We have no +lording of it here." + +These outbursts startled me, first, because I had never in the least +expected or even wished either to be received by the Danish Minister or +to be helped by him; secondly, because it revealed to me a wide +difference between the point of view in the Romance countries, in France +especially, and that in the North. In Denmark, I had never had the +entree to Court or to aristocratic circles, nor have I ever acquired it +since, though, for that matter, I have not missed it in the least. But +in the Romance countries, where the aristocratic world still +occasionally possesses some wit and education, it is taken as a matter +of course that talent is a patent of nobility, and, to the man who has +won himself a name, all doors are open, indeed, people vie with one +another to secure him. That a caste division like that in the North was +quite unknown there, I thus learnt for the first time. + + +IV. + +Through Taine, I very soon made the acquaintance of Renan, whose +personality impressed me very much, grand and free of mind as he was, +without a trace of the unctuousness that one occasionally meets in his +books, yet superior to the verge of paradox. + +He was very inaccessible, and obstinately refused to see people. But if +he were expecting you, he would spare you several hours of his valuable +time. + +His house was furnished with exceeding simplicity. On one wall of his +study hung two Chinese water-colours and a photograph of Gerome's +_Cleopatra before Caesar_; on the opposite wall, a very beautiful +photograph of what was doubtless an Italian picture of the Last Day. +That was all the ornamentation. On his table, there always lay a Virgil +and a Horace in a pocket edition, and for a long time a French +translation of Sir Walter Scott. + +What surprised me most in Renan's bearing was that there was nothing +solemn about it and absolutely nothing sentimental. He impressed one as +being exceptionally clever and a man that the opposition he had met with +had left as it found him. He enquired about the state of things in the +North. When I spoke, without reserve, of the slight prospect that +existed of my coming to the front with my opinions, he maintained that +victory was sure. (_Vous l'emporterez! vous l'emporterez_!) Like +all foreigners, he marvelled that the three Scandinavian countries did +not try to unite, or at any rate to form an indissoluble Union. In the +time of Gustavus Adolphus, he said, they had been of some political +importance; since then they had retired completely from the historical +stage. The reason for it must very probably be sought for in their +insane internecine feuds. + +Renan used to live, at that time, from the Spring onwards, at his house +in the country, at Sevres. So utterly unaffected was the world-renowned +man, then already forty-seven years of age, that he often walked from +his house to the station with me, and wandered up and down the platform +till the train came. + +His wife, who shared his thoughts and worshipped him, had chosen her +husband herself, and, being of German family, had not been married after +the French manner; still, she did not criticise it, as she thought it +was perhaps adapted to the French people, and she had seen among her +intimate acquaintances many happy marriages entered into for reasons of +convenience. They had two children, a son, Ary, who died in 1900 after +having made a name for himself as a painter, and written beautiful poems +(which, however, were only published after his death), and a daughter, +Noemi (Madame Psichari) who, faithfully preserving the intellectual +heritage she has received from her great father, has become one of the +centres of highest Paris, a soul of fire, who fights for Justice and +Truth and social ideas with burning enthusiasm. + + +V. + +A source of very much pleasure to me was my acquaintance with the old +author and College de France Professor, Philarete Chasles. Gregoire +introduced me to him and I gradually became at home, as it were, in his +house, was always a welcome visitor, and was constantly invited there. +In his old age he was not a man to be taken very seriously, being +diffusive, vague and vain. But there was no one else so communicative, +few so entertaining, and for the space of fifty years he had known +everybody who had been of any mark in France. He was born in 1798; his +father, who was a Jacobin and had been a member of the Convention, did +not have him baptised, but brought him up to believe in Truth, (hence +the name Philarete,) and apprenticed him to a printer. At the +Restoration of the Royal Family, he was imprisoned, together with his +father, but released through the influence of Chateaubriand; he then +went to England, where he remained for full seven years (1819-1826), +working as a typographer, and made a careful study of English +literature, then almost unknown in France. After having spent some +further time in Germany, he returned to Paris and published a number of +historical and critical writings. + +Philarete Chasles, as librarian to the Mazarin Library, had his +apartments in the building itself, that is, in the very centre of Paris; +in the Summer he lived in the country at Meudon, where he had had his +veranda decorated with pictures of Pompeian mosaic. He was having a +handsome new house with a tower built near by. He needed room, for he +had a library of 40,000 volumes. + +His niece kept house for him; she was married to a German from Cologne, +Schulz by name, who was a painter on glass. The pair lived apart. Madame +Schulz was pretty, caustic, spiteful, and blunt. Her daughter, the +fourteen-year-old Nanni, was enchantingly lovely, as developed and +mischievous as a girl of eighteen. Everyone who came to the house was +charmed with her, and it was always full of guests, young students from +Alsace and Provence, young negroes from Hayti, young ladies from +Jerusalem, and poetesses who would have liked to read their poems aloud +and would have liked still better to induce Chasles to make them known +by an article. + +Chasles chatted with everyone, frequently addressing his conversation to +me, talking incessantly about the very men and women that I most cared +to hear about, of those still living whom I most admired, such as George +Sand, and Merimee, and, in fact, of all the many celebrities he had +known. As a young man, he had been taken to the house of Madame +Recamier, and had there seen Chateaubriand, an honoured and adored old +man, and Sainte-Beuve an eager and attentive listener, somewhat +overlooked on account of his ugliness, in whom there was developing that +lurking envy of the great, and of those women clustered round, which he +ought to have combatted, to produce just criticism. + +Chasles had known personally Michelet and Guizot, the elder Dumas and +Beyle, Cousin and Villemain, Musset and Balzac; he knew the Comtesse +d'Agoult, for so many years the friend of Liszt, and Madame Colet, the +mistress, first of Cousin, then of Musset, and finally of Flaubert, of +whom my French uncle, who had met her on his travels, had drawn me a +very unattractive picture. Chasles was on terms of daily intimacy with +Jules Sandeau; even as an old man he could not forget George Sand, who +had filched the greater part of his name and made it more illustrious +than the whole became. Sandeau loved her still, forty years after she +had left him. + +Chasles was able, in a few words, to conjure up very vividly the images +of the persons he was describing to his listener, and his anecdotes +about them were inexhaustible. He took me behind the scenes of +literature and I saw the stage from all its sides. The personal history +of his contemporaries was, it is quite true, more particularly its +chronicle of scandals, but his information completed for me the severe +and graceful restraint of all Taine said. And side by side with his +inclination for gay and malicious gossip, Chasles had a way of sketching +out great synopses of intellectual history, which made one realise, as +one reflected,' the progress of development of the literatures with +which one was familiar. Those were pleasant evenings, those moonlight +Spring evenings in the open veranda out there at Meudon, when the old +man with the sharp-pointed beard and the little skull-cap on one side of +his head, was spokesman. He had the aptest and most amusing way of +putting things. For instance, to my question as to whether Guizot had +really been as austere by nature as he was in manner, he replied: "It is +hard to say; when one wishes to impress, one cannot behave like a +harlequin." + +Although I had a keen enough eye for Philarete Chasles' weaknesses, I +felt exceedingly happy in his house. There I could obtain without +difficulty the information I wished for, and have the feeling of being +thoroughly "in Paris." Paris was and still is the only city in the world +that is and wishes to be the capital not only of its own country but of +Europe; the only one that takes upon itself as a duty, not merely to +meet the visitor half-way by opening museums, collections, buildings, to +him, but the only one where people habitually, in conversation, initiate +the foreigner in search of knowledge into the ancient, deep culture of +the nation, so that its position with regard to that of other races and +countries is made clear to one. + + +VI. + +I had not let a single day elapse before I took my seat again in the +_Theatre Francais_, to which I had free admission for an indefinite +period. The first time I arrived, the doorkeeper at the theatre merely +called the sub-officials together; they looked at me, noted my +appearance, and for the future I might take my seat wherever I liked, +when the man at the entrance had called out his _Entree_. They were +anything but particular, and in the middle of the Summer, after a visit +of a month to London, I found my seat reserved for me as before. + +The first evening after my arrival, I sat, quietly enjoying +_Hernani_ (the lyric beauty of which always rejoiced my heart), +with Mounet-Sully in the leading role, Bressant as Charles V, and as +Dona Sol, Mlle. Lloyd, a minor actress, who, however, at the conclusion +of the piece, rose to the level of the poetry. The audience were so much +in sympathy with the spirit of the piece that a voice from the gallery +shouted indignantly: "_Le roi est un lache!_" Afterwards, during +the same evening, I saw, in a transport of delight, Mme. de Girardin's +charming little piece, _La Joie fait Peur_. A certain family +believe that their son, who is a young naval officer, fallen in the far +East, has been cruelly put to death. He comes back, unannounced, to his +broken-hearted mother, his despairing bride, his sister, and an old man- +servant. This old, bent, faithful retainer, a stock dramatic part, was +played by Regnier with the consummate art that is Nature itself staged. +He has hidden the returned son behind a curtain for fear that his +mother, seeing him unexpectedly, should die of joy. The sister comes in. +Humming, the servant begins to dust, to prevent her going near the +curtain; but unconsciously, in his delight, his humming grows louder and +louder, until, in a hymn of jubilation, tratara-tratara! he flings the +broom up over his head, then stops short suddenly, noticing that the +poor child is standing there, mute with astonishment, not knowing what +to think. Capital, too, was the acting of a now forgotten actress, Mlle. +Dubois, who played the young girl. Her exclamation, as she suddenly sees +her brother, "_Je n'ai pas peur, va_!" was uttered so lightly and +gaily, that all the people round me, and I myself, too, burst into +tears. + +I was much impressed by Edmond Thierry, then director of the _Theatre +Francais_. I thought him the most refined man I had so far met, +possessed of all the old French courtesy, which seemed to have died out +in Paris. A conversation with him was a regular course in Dramaturgy, +and although a young foreigner like myself must necessarily have been +troublesome to him, he let nothing of this be perceptible. I was so +charmed by him that nearly two years later I introduced a few +unimportant words of his about Moliere's _Misanthrope_ into my +lectures on the first part of _Main Currents in European +Literature_, simply for the pleasure of mentioning his name. + +It was, moreover, a very pleasant thing to pay him a visit, even when he +was interrupted. For actors streamed in and out of his house. One day, +for instance, the lovely Agar burst into the room to tell her tale of +woe, being dissatisfied with the dress that she was to wear in a new +part. I saw her frequently again when war had been declared, for she it +was who, every evening, with overpowering force and art, sang the +_Marseillaise_ from before the footlights. + +The theatrical performances were a delight to me. I had been charmed as +much only by Michael Wiehe and Johanne Luise Heiberg in my salad days +when they played together in Hertz's _Ninon_. But my artistic +enjoyment went deeper here, for the character portrayal was very much +more true to life. The best impressions I had brought with me of Danish +art were supremely romantic, Michael Wiehe as Henrik in _The +Fairies_, as the Chevalier in _Ninon_, as Mortimer in Schiller's +_Mary Stuart_. But this was the real, living thing. + +One evening I saw _Ristori_ play the sleep-walking scene in Macbeth +with thrilling earnestness and supreme virtuosity. You felt horror to +the very marrow of your bones, and your eyes filled with tears of +emotion and anxiety. Masterly was the regular breathing that indicated +slumber, and the stiff fingers when she washed her hands and smelt them +to see if there were blood upon them. But Mme. Favart, who with artistic +self-restraint co-ordinated herself into the whole, without any +virtuosity at all, produced no less an effect upon me. As the leading +character in Feuillet's _Julie_, she was perfection itself; when I +saw her, it seemed to me as though no one at home in Denmark had any +idea of what feminine characterisation was. What had been taken for such +(Heiberg's art, for instance,) only seemed like a graceful and brilliant +convention, that fell to pieces by the side of this. + +The performances at the _Theatre Francais_ lasted longer than they +do now. In one evening you could see Gozlan's _Tempete dans un verre +d'Eau_, Augier's _Gabrielle_, and Banville's _Gringoire_. +When I had seen Mme. Favart and Regnier in _Gabrielle_, Lafontaine +as Louis XI, his wife as Loyse, Mlle. Ponsin as Nicole, and Coquelin, at +that time still young and fresh, as Gringoire, I felt that I had enjoyed +one of the greatest and most elevating pleasures the world had to offer. +I went home, enraptured and enthusiastic, as much edified as the +believer returning from his church. I could see _Gringoire_ a dozen +times in succession and find only one expression for what I felt: "This +is holy." + +The piece appealed to me so much, no doubt, because it was more in +agreement than the rest with what in Denmark was considered true poetry. +But during the three years since I had last seen him, Coquelin had made +immense strides in this role. He rendered it now with an individuality, +a heartfelt sincerity and charm, that he had not previously attained; in +contrast to harsh King Louis and unfeeling Loyse, was so poor, and +hungry, and ill and merry and tender and such a hero and such a genius-- +that I said to myself: "Who, ever has seen this, has lived." + +Quite a short while after my arrival--April 12, 1870--I saw for the +first time Sarah Bernhardt, who had just begun to make a name at the +Odeon. She was playing in George Sand's beautiful and mutinous drama +_L'autre_, from which the great-grandmother in Bjoernson's +_Leonarda_ is derived. The piece is a plea for the freedom of love, +or rather, for indulgence with regard to what are branded by society as +the sins of love. Sarah Bernhardt was the young girl who, in her +innocence, judges all moral irregularities with the utmost severity, +until her eyes are opened to what the world really is. She is, without +knowing it, the child of unlawful love, and the father's curse is that +of not daring to be anything to his child--whom he has educated and over +whom he watches--not daring to claim his right to her affection, as he +would otherwise stain her mother's memory. In his presence, the young +girl utters all the hard words that society has for those who break her +laws; she calls her unknown father false and forsworn. George Sand has +collected all the justified protests and every prejudice for this young +girl to utter, because in her they inspire most respect, and are to +their best advantage.--So far her father has not revealed himself. Then +at last it dawns upon her that it is he, her benefactor, who is the +_other one_ whom she has just condemned, and as the curtain falls +she flings herself, melted, into his arms. + +Sarah played the part with great modesty, with what one might assume to +be the natural melancholy of the orphan, and the enthusiasm of the young +virgin for strict justice, and yet in such wise that, through all the +coldness, through the expressive uncertainty of her words, and +especially through the lovely, rich ring of her voice, one suspected +tenderness and mildness long held back. + + +VII. + +I tried, while I was in Paris, to understand something of the +development of French literature since the beginning of the century, to +arrange it in stages, and note the order of their succession; I wanted, +at the same time, to form for myself a similar general view of Danish +literature, and institute parallels between the two, being convinced +beforehand that the spirit of the age must be approximately the same in +two European countries that were, so to speak, intellectually allied. +This was my first naive attempt to trace The Main Currents in Nineteenth +Century Literature. + +The French poetry of the nineteenth century seemed to me to fall into +three groups: Romanticism, the School of Common Sense, the Realistic +Art. I defined them as follows: + +I. What the French call _Romanticism_ has many distinguishing +marks. It is, firstly, a _break with Graeco-Roman antiquity_. It +therefore harks back to the Gallic, and to the Middle Ages. It is a +resurrection of the poets of the sixteenth century. But the attempt is a +failure, for Ronsard and the Pleiad [Footnote: The poets who formed the +first and greater Pleiad were, besides Ronsard, Dubellay, Remi, Belleau, +Jodelle, Dorat, Baif and Pontus de Thiard.] are also Greek-taught, are +Anacreontics. If we except the _Chanson de Roland_, there is no +original mediaeval literature that can be compared with the Icelandic. +For that reason the choice of subjects is extended from the Middle Ages +in France to the Middle Ages in other countries, for instance, Germany, +whence Victor Hugo derives his drama _Les Burgraves_. The poets +select foreign matter, Alfred de Vigny treats Chatterton and Musset +Italian and Spanish themes. Merimee harks back to the French Middle Ages +(The Peasant Rising), but as he there finds too little originality, he +flees, as a poet, to less civilised nationalities, Spaniards, South +Americans, Corsicans, Russians, etc. Romanticism becomes ethnographical. + +Its second distinguishing mark is _tempestuous violence_. It is +connected with the 1830 revolution. It attacks society and the +conditions of property (Saint Simon, Fourier, Proudhon), attacks +marriage and the official verdict upon sexual relations (Dumas) +Antony Rousseau's old doctrine that Nature is good, the natural state +the right one, and that society alone has spoilt everything. George Sand +in particular worships Rousseau, and writes in essential agreement with +him. + +In the later French literature the influence of Voltaire and that of +Rousseau are alternately supreme. Voltaire rules until 1820, Rousseau +again until 1850, then Voltaire takes the reins once more with About, +Taine, and Sarcey. In Renan Voltaire is merged with Rousseau, and now, +later still, Diderot has taken the place of both. + +II. The _School of Common Sense_ (_l'ecole de bon sens_) follows upon +Romanticism. As the latter worshipped passion, so the School of Common +Sense pays homage to sound human intelligence. In certain individuals it +is possible to trace the transition--Musset's _Un Caprice_ in +contrast with the wanton works of his youth. George Sand's village +novels, in contrast with her novels on Marriage. The popular tone and +the landscape drawing here, which, for that matter, are all derived from +Rousseau, lead on into a tranquil idyl. Works like Ponsard's +_Lucrece_ and Augier's _Gabrielle_ show the reaction from +Romanticism. In the tragedy it is Lucrece, in the modern play, +Gabrielle, upon whom the action hinges. In Ponsard and Augier common +sense, strict justice, and a conventional feeling of honour, are +acclaimed. Marriage is glorified in all of Ponsard, Augier and Octave +Feuillet's dramas. Literature has no doubt been influenced in some +degree by the ruling orders of the monarchy of July. Louis Philippe was +the bourgeois King. An author like Scribe, who dominates the stages of +Europe, is animated by the all-powerful bourgeois spirit, educated and +circumscribed as it was. Cousin, in his first manner, revolutionary +Schellingism, corresponded to romanticism; his eclecticism as a +moralising philosopher corresponds to the School of Common Sense. The +distinctive feature which they have in common becomes a so-called +Idealism. Ponsard revives the classical traditions of the seventeenth +century. In criticism this endeavour in the direction of the sensible +and the classical, is represented by Nisard, Planche, and Sainte-Beuve +in his second manner. + +III. The third tendency of the century Is _Realistic Art_, with +physiological characteristics. It finds its support in positivist +philosophy; Herbart in Germany, Bentham and Mill in England, Comte and +Littre in France. In criticism, Sainte-Beuve's third manner. On the +stage, the younger Dumas. In novels, the brothers Goncourt, and +Flaubert. In Art, a certain brutality in the choice of subject, +_Gerome and Regnault_. In politics, the accomplished fact (_le +fait accompli_), the Empire, the brutal pressure from above and +general levelling by universal suffrage from below. In lyric poetry, the +strictly technical artists of form of the _Parnasse_, Coppee, who +describes unvarnished reality, and the master workmen (_les maitres de +la facture_), Leconte Delisle, Gautier and his pupils, who write +better verse than Lamartine and Hugo, but have no new thoughts or +feelings--the poetic language materialists. + +In conclusion, a great many indistinct beginnings, of which it is as yet +impossible to say whither they are tending. + +This, my first attempt to formulate for myself a general survey of one +of the great literatures of the nineteenth century, contained much that +was true enough, but revealed very plainly the beginner's lack of +ability to estimate the importance of phenomena, an inclination to over- +estimate purely evanescent apparitions, and a tendency to include that +which was merely externally similar, under one heading. The +insignificant School of Common Sense could not by any means be regarded +as marking an epoch. Neither, with any justice, could men like Augier +and Dumas be placed in different groups. The attempt to point out +realism in the lyric art was likewise exceedingly audacious. + +However, this division and grouping seemed to me at that time to be a +great discovery, and great was my disappointment when one day I +consulted Chasles on the subject and he thought it too forced, and +another day submitted it to Renan, who restricted himself to the reply: + +"No! no! Things do not proceed so systematically!" + +As this survey of the literature of France was also intended to guide me +with regard to the Danish, I groped my way forward in the following +manner: + +I. _Romanticism_. Oehlenschlaeger's attitude towards the past +corresponds exactly to Victor Hugo's; only that the resurrection of the +Middle Ages in poetry is much more successful (_Earl Hakon, The Gods +of the North_), by reason of the fresh originality in Snorre and the +_Edda_. Grundtvig's _Scenes from the Lives of the Warriors of the +North_ likewise owes all its value to the Edda and the Sagas. +Oehlenschlaeger's _Aladdin_ is the Northern pendant to Hugo's _Les +Orientales_. Gautier, as a poet, Delacroix as a painter, affect the +East, as Oehlenschlaeger does in _Ali and Gulhyndi_. Steffens and +Sibbern, as influenced by Schelling, correspond to Cousin. Hauch not +infrequently seeks his poetic themes in Germany, as do Nodier and Gerard +de Nerval. Ingemann's weak historical novels correspond to the French +imitations of Sir Walter Scott (Alfred de Vigny's _Cinq-Mars_, +Dumas' _Musketeers_). Oehlenschlaeger's tragedies correspond to the +dramas of Victor Hugo. With the Danes, as with the French, hatred of +intelligence, as cold; only that the Danes glorify imagination and +enthusiasm, the French, passion. Romanticism lasts in Denmark (without +Revolutions and Restorations) until about 1848, as in France. + +II. The _School of Common Sense_ is in Denmark partly a worship of +the sound sense of the people, partly a moralising tendency. Grundtvig, +with his popular manner, his appreciation of the unsophisticated peasant +nature, had points of contact with the pupils of Rousseau. Moralising +works are Heiberg's _A Soul after Death_, Paludan-Mueller's _Adam +Homo_, and Kierkegaard's _Either-Or_. The funny thing about the +defence of marriage contained in this last book is that it defends what +no one in Denmark attacks. It can only be understood from the +contemporary movement in the intellectual life of Europe, which is now +asserting the universal validity of morality, as it formerly did the +right of passion. Its defence of Protestantism corresponds to Octave +Feuillet's defence of Catholicism, only that Feuillet is conciliatory, +Kierkegaard vehement. Bjoernson's peasant novels, which are a +continuation of Grundtvig and Blicher, are, by their harmony and their +peaceable relations to all that is, an outcome of love of common sense; +they have the same anti-Byronic stamp as the School of Common Sense. The +movement comes to us ten years later. But Bjoernson has simultaneously +something of Romanticism and something of Realism. We have not men to +place separately in the various frames. + +III. _Realistic Art_. There is so far only an attempt at a +realistic art. + +Thus, in Bjoernson's _Arne_ and _Sigurd Slembe_. Note also an +attempt in Bergsoee's clumsy use of realistic features, and in his +seeking after effect. Richardt corresponds in our lyric art as an artist +in language to the poets of the _Parnasse_, while Heiberg's +philosophy and most of his poetry may be included in the School of +Common Sense. Broechner's _Ideal Realism_ forms the transitional +stage to the philosophy of Reality. Ibsen's attack upon the existing +state of things corresponds to realism in the French drama. He is Dumas +on Northern soil. In the _Love Comedy_, as a scoffer he is +inharmonious. In _Peer Gynt_, he continues in the moralising +tendency with an inclination to coarse and brutal realistic effects +(relations with Anitra). + +In Germany we find ourselves at the second stage still, sinking deeper +and deeper into dialect and popular subjects (from Auerbach to Claus +Groth and Fritz Reuter). + +It is unnecessary to point out to readers of the present day how +incomplete and arbitrary this attempt at a dissection of Danish +literature was. I started from the conviction that modern intellectual +life in Europe, in different countries, must necessarily in all +essentials traverse the same stages, and as I was able to find various +unimportant points of similarity in support of this view, I quite +overlooked the fact that the counterbalancing weight of dissimilarities +rendered the whole comparison futile. + + +IX. + +As, during my first stay in Paris, I had frequently visited Madame +Victorine, the widow of my deceased uncle, and her children, very +cordial relations had since existed between us, especially after my +uncle's faithless friend had been compelled to disgorge the sums sent +from Denmark for her support, which he had so high-handedly kept back. +There were only faint traces left of the great beauty that had once been +hers; life had dealt hardly with her. She was good and tender-hearted, +an affectionate mother, but without other education than was usual in +the Parisian small bourgeois class to which she belonged. All her +opinions, her ideas of honour, of propriety, of comfort and happiness, +were typical of her class. + +Partly from economy, partly from a desire not to waste the precious +time, I often, in those days, restricted my midday meal. I would buy +myself, at a provision dealer's, a large veal or ham pie and eat it in +my room, instead of going out to a restaurant. One day Victorine +surprised me at a meal of this sort, and exclaimed horrified: +_"Comment? vous vous nourrissez si mal!"_ To her, it was about the +same as if I had not had any dinner at all. To sit at home without a +cloth on the table, and cut a pie in pieces with a paper knife, was to +sink one's dignity and drop to poor man's fare. + +Her thoughts, like those of most poor people in France and elsewhere, +centred mostly on money and money anxieties, on getting on well in the +world, or meeting with adversity, and on how much this man or the other +could earn, or not earn, in the year. Her eldest son was in St. +Petersburg, and he was doing right well; he was good and kind and sent +his mother help when he had a little to spare. He had promised, too, to +take charge of his next brother. But she had much anxiety about the +little ones. One of them was not turning out all that he should be, and +there were the two youngest to educate. + +There was a charming celebration in the poor home when little Emma went +to her first communion, dressed all in white, from head to foot, with a +long white veil and white shoes, and several other little girls and boys +came just as smartly dressed, and presents were given and good wishes +offered. Little Henri looked more innocent than any of the little girls. + +Victorine had a friend whom she deemed most happy; this was Jules +Claretie's mother, for, young though her son was, he wrote in the +papers, wrote books, too, and earned money, so that he was able to +maintain his mother altogether. He was a young man who ought to be held +in high estimation, an author who was all that he should be. There was +another author whom she detested, and that was P.L. Moeller, the Dane: + +"Jacques, as you know, was always a faithful friend of Monsieur Moeller; +he copied out a whole book for him, [Footnote: _The Modern Drama in +France and Denmark_, which won the University Gold Medal for Moeller.] +when he himself was very busy. But then when Jacques died--_pauvre +homme!_--he came and paid visits much too often and always at more and +more extraordinary times, so that I was obliged to forbid him the house." + + +X. + +In a students' hotel near the Odeon, where a few Scandinavians lived, I +became acquainted with two or three young lawyers and more young abbes +and priests. If you went in when the company were at table in the dining +room, the place rang again with their noisy altercations. The advocates +discussed politics, literature and religion with such ardour that the +air positively crackled. They were apparently practising to speak one +day at the Bar or in the Chamber. It was from surroundings such as these +that Gambetta emerged. + +The young abbes and priests were very good fellows, earnest believers, +but so simple that conversations with them were only interesting because +of their ignorance and lack of understanding. Scandinavians in Paris who +knew only Roman Catholic priests from _Tartufe_ at the theatre, had +very incorrect conceptions regarding them. Bressant was the cold, +elegant hypocrite, Lafontaine the base, coarse, but powerful cleric, +Leroux the full-blooded, red-faced, voluptuary with fat cheeks and +shaking hands, whose expression was now angry, now sickly sweet. +Northern Protestants were very apt to classify the black-coated men whom +they saw in the streets and in the churches, as belonging to one of +these three types. But my ecclesiastical acquaintances were as free from +hypocrisy as from fanaticism. They were good, honest children of the +commonalty, with, not the cunning, but the stupidity, of peasants. + +Many a day I spent exploring the surroundings of Paris in their company. +We went to St. Cloud and Sevres, to Versailles and St. Germain, to Saint +Denis, to Montmorency and Enghien, or to Monthlery, a village with an +old tower from the thirteenth century, and then breakfasted at +Longjumeau, celebrated for its postillion. There Abbe Leboulleux +declared himself opposed to cremation, for the reason that it rendered +the resurrection impossible, since God himself could not collect the +bones again when the body had been burnt. It was all so amiable that one +did not like to contradict him. At the same meal another was giving a +sketch of the youth of Martin Luther; he left the church--_on se +demande encore pourquoi_. In the innocence of his heart this abbe +regarded the rebellion of Luther less as an unpermissible than as an +inexplicable act. + + +XI. + +The society of the Italian friends of my first visit gave me much +pleasure. My first call at the Pagellas' was a blank; at the next, I was +received like a son of the house and heaped with reproaches for not +having left my address; they had tried to find me at my former hotel, +and endeavoured in vain to learn where I was staying from Scandinavians +whom they knew by name; now I was to spend all the time I could with +them, as I used to do in the old days. They were delighted to see me +again, and when I wished to leave, drove me home in their carriage. I +resumed my former habit of spending the greater part of my spare time +with Southerners; once more I was transported to Southern Europe and +South America. The very first day I dined at their house I met a jovial +old Spaniard, a young Italian, who was settled in Egypt, and a very +coquettish young Brazilian girl. The Spaniard, who had been born in +Venezuela, was an engineer who had studied conditions in Panama for +eleven years, and had a plan for the cutting of the isthmus. He talked a +great deal about the project, which Lesseps took up many years +afterwards. + +Pagella, too, was busy with practical plans, setting himself technical +problems, and solving them. Thus he had discovered a new method of +constructing railway carriages on springs, with a mechanism to prevent +collisions. He christened this the _Virginie-ressort_, after his +wife, and had had offers for it from the Russian government. + +An Italian engineer, named Casellini, who had carried out the +construction for him, was one of the many bold adventurers that one met +with among the Southerners in Paris. He had been sent to Spain the year +before by Napoleon III to direct the counter-revolution there. Being an +engineer, he knew the whole country, and had been in constant +communication with Queen Isabella and the Spanish Court in Paris. He +gave illuminating accounts of Spanish corruptibility. He had bribed the +telegraph officials in the South of Spain, where he was, and saw all +political telegrams before the Governor of the place. In Malaga, where +he was leading the movement against the Government, he very narrowly +escaped being shot; he had been arrested, his despatches intercepted and +1,500 rifles seized, but he bribed the officials to allow him to make +selection from the despatches and destroy those that committed him. In +Madrid he had had an audience of Serrano, after this latter had +forbidden the transmission from the town of any telegrams that were not +government telegrams; he had taken with him a telegram drawn up by the +French party, which sounded like an ordinary business letter, and +secured its being sent off together with the government despatches. +Casellini had wished to pay for the telegram, but Serrano had dismissed +the suggestion with a wave of his hand, rung a bell and given the +telegram to a servant. It was just as in Scribe's _Queen Marguerite's +Novels_, the commission was executed by the enemy himself. + +Such romantic adventures did not seem to be rare in Spain. Prim himself +had told the Pagellas how at the time of the failure of the first +insurrection he had always, in his flight, (in spite of his defective +education, he was more magnanimous and noble-minded than any king), +provided for the soldiers who were sent out after him, ordered food and +drink for them in every inn he vacated, and paid for everything +beforehand, whereas the Government let their poor soldiers starve as +soon as they were eight or ten miles from Madrid. + +I often met a very queer, distinguished looking old Spaniard named Don +Jose Guell y Rente, who had been married to a sister of King Francis, +the husband of King Isabella, but had been separated from her after, as +he declared, she had tried to cut his throat. As witness to his +connubial difficulties, he showed a large scar across his throat. He was +well-read and, amongst other things, enthusiastically admired +Scandinavian literature because it had produced the world's greatest +poet, Ossian, with whom he had become acquainted in Cesarotti's Italian +translation. It was useless to attempt to explain to him the difference +between Scandinavia and Scotland. They are both in the North, he would +reply. + + +XII. + +A young American named Olcott, who visited Chasles and occasionally +looked me up, brought with him a breath from the universities of the +great North American Republic. A young German, Dr. Goldschmidt, a +distinguished Sanscrit scholar, a man of more means than I, who had a +pretty flat with a view over the Place du Chatelet, and dined at good +restaurants, came, as it were, athwart the many impressions I had +received of Romance nature and Romance intellectual life, with his +violent German national feeling and his thorough knowledge. As early as +the Spring, he believed there would be war between Germany and France +and wished in that event to be a soldier, as all other German students, +so he declared, passionately wished. He was a powerfully built, +energetic, well-informed man of the world, with something of the rich +man's habit of command. He seemed destined to long life and quite able +to stand fatigue. Nevertheless, his life was short. He went through the +whole of the war in France without a scratch, after the conclusion of +peace was appointed professor of Sanscrit at the University of conquered +Strasburg, but died of illness shortly afterwards. + +A striking contrast to his reticent nature was afforded by the young +Frenchmen of the same age whom I often met. A very rich and very +enthusiastic young man, Marc de Rossieny, was a kind of leader to them; +he had 200,000 francs a year, and with this money had founded a weekly +publication called "_L'Impartial_," as a common organ for the +students of Brussels and Paris. The paper's name, _L'Impartial_, +must be understood in the sense that it admitted the expression of every +opinion with the exception of defence of so-called revealed religion. +The editorial staff was positivist, Michelet and Chasles were patrons of +the paper, and behind the whole stood Victor Hugo as a kind of honorary +director. The weekly preached hatred of the Empire and of theology, and +seemed firmly established, yet was only one of the hundred ephemeral +papers that are born and die every day in the Latin quarter. When it had +been in existence a month, the war broke out and swept it away, like so +many other and greater things. + + +XIII. + +Of course I witnessed all that was accessible to me of Parisian public +life. I fairly often found my way, as I had done in 1866, to the Palais +de Justice to hear the great advocates plead. The man I enjoyed +listening to most was Jules Favre, whose name was soon to be on every +one's lips. The younger generation admired in him the high-principled +and steadfast opponent of the Empire in the Chamber, and he was regarded +as well-nigh the most eloquent man in France. As an advocate, he was +incomparable. His unusual handsomeness,--his beautiful face under a +helmet of grey hair, and his upright carriage,--were great points in his +favour. His eloquence was real, penetrating, convincing, inasmuch as he +piled up fact upon fact, and was at the same time, as the French manner +is, dramatic, with large gesticulations that made his gown flutter +restlessly about him like the wings of a bat. It was a depressing fact +that afterwards, as the Minister opposed to Bismarck, he was so unequal +to his position. + +I was present at the _Theatre Francais_ on the occasion of the +unveiling of Ponsard's bust. To the Romanticists, Ponsard was nothing +less than the ass's jawbone with which the Philistines attempted to slay +Hugo. But Emile Chasles, a son of my old friend, gave a lecture upon +him, and afterwards _Le lion amoureux_ was played, a very tolerable +little piece from the Revolutionary period, in which, for one thing, +Napoleon appears as a young man. There are some very fine revolutionary +tirades in it, of which Princess Mathilde, after its first +representation, said that they made her _Republican_ heart +palpitate. The ceremony in honor of this little anti-pope to Victor Hugo +was quite a pretty one. + +Once, too, I received a ticket for a reception at the French Academy. +The poet Auguste Barbier was being inaugurated and Silvestre de Sacy +welcomed him, in academic fashion, in a fairly indiscreet speech. +Barbier's _Jamber_ was one of the books of poems that I had loved +for years, and I knew many of the strophes by heart, for instance, the +celebrated ones on Freedom and on Napoleon; I had also noticed how +Barbier's vigour had subsided in subsequent collections of poems; in +reality, he was still living on his reputation from the year 1831, and +without a doubt most people believed him to be dead. And now there he +stood, a shrivelled old man in his Palm uniform, his speech revealing +neither satiric power nor lofty intellect. It was undoubtedly owing to +his detestation of Napoleon (_vide_ his poem _L'Idole_) that +the Academy, who were always agitating against the Empire, had now, so +late in the day, cast their eyes upon him. Bald little Silvestre de +Sacy, the tiny son of an important father, reproached him for his verses +on Freedom, as the bold woman of the people who was not afraid to shed +blood. + +"That is not Freedom as I understand it," piped the little man,--and one +believed him,--but could not refrain from murmuring with the poet: + + C'est que la Liberte n'est pas une comtesse + Du noble Faubourg St. Germain, + Une femme qu'un cri fait tomber en faiblesse, + Qui met du blanc et du carmin; + C'est une forte femme. + + +XIV. + +A very instructive resort, even for a layman, was the Record Office, for +there one could run through the whole history of France in the most +entertaining manner with the help of the manuscripts placed on view, +from the most ancient papyrus rolls to the days of parchment and paper. +You saw the documents of the Feudal Lords' and Priests' Conspiracies +under the Merovingians and the Capets, the decree of divorce between +Philip Augustus and Ingeborg, and letters from the most notable +personages of the Middle Ages and the autocracy. The period of the +Revolution and the First Empire came before one with especial vividness. +There was Charlemagne's monogram stencilled in tin, and that of Robert +of Paris, reproduced in the same manner, those of Louis XIV. and +Moliere, of Francis the Catholic and Mary Stuart. There were letters +from Robespierre and Danton, requests for money and death-warrants from +the Reign of Terror, Charlotte Corday's last letters from prison and the +original letters of Napoleon from St. Helena. + +In June I saw the annual races at Longchamps for the first time. Great +was the splendour. From two o'clock in the afternoon to six there was an +uninterrupted stream of carriages, five or six abreast, along the Champs +Elysees; there were thousands of _lorettes_ (as they were called at +that time) in light silk gowns, covered with diamonds and precious +stones, in carriages decorated with flowers. Coachmen and footmen wore +powdered wigs, white or grey, silk stockings and knee-breeches and a +flower in the buttonhole matching the colour of their livery and the +flowers which hung about the horses' ears. Some of the carriages had no +coachman's box or driver, but were harnessed to four horses ridden by +postillions in green satin or scarlet velvet, with white feathers in +their caps. + +The only great _demi-mondaine_ of whom I had hitherto caught a +glimpse was the renowned Madame de Paiva, who had a little palace by the +side of the house in which Froelich the painter lived, in the Champs +Elysees. Her connection with Count Henckel v. Donnersmark permitted her +to surround herself with regal magnificence, and, to the indignation of +Princess Mathilde, men like Gautier and Renan, Sainte-Beuve and +Goncourt, Saint-Victor and Taine, sat at her table. The ladies here were +younger and prettier, but socially of lower rank. The gentlemen went +about among the carriages, said _tu_ without any preamble to the +women, and squeezed their hands, while their men-servants sat stolid, +like wood, seeming neither to hear nor see. + +This race-day was the last under the Empire. It is the one described in +Zola's _Nana_. The prize for the third race was 100,000 francs. +After English horses had been victorious for several years in +succession, the prize was carried off in 1870--as in _Nana_--by a +native-born horse, and the jubilation was great; it was a serious +satisfaction to national vanity. + +At that time, the Tuileries were still standing, and I was fond of +walking about the gardens near closing time, when the guard beat the +drums to turn the people out. It was pleasant to hear the rolling of the +drums, which were beaten by two of the Grenadier Guard drummers and a +Turco. Goldschmidt had already written his clever and linguistically +very fine piece of prose about this rolling of the drums and what it +possibly presaged: Napoleon's own expulsion from the Tuileries and the +humiliation of French grandeur before the Prussians, who might one day +come and drum this grandeur out. But Goldschmidt had disfigured the +pretty little piece somewhat by relating that one day when, for an +experiment, he had tried to make his way into the gardens after the +signal for closing had sounded, the Zouave had carelessly levelled his +bayonet at him with the words: _"Ne faites pas des betises!"_ This +levelling of the bayonet on such trivial provocation was too tremendous, +so I made up my mind one evening to try myself. The soldier on guard +merely remarked politely: "_Ferme, monsieur, on va sortir._" + +I little dreamed that only a few months later the Empress would steal +secretly out of the palace, having lost her crown, and still less that +only six months afterwards, during the civil war, the Tuileries would be +reduced to ashes, never to rise again. + + +XV. + +At that time the eyes of the Danes were fixed upon France in hope and +expectation that their national resuscitation would come from that +quarter, and they made no distinction between France and the Empire. +Although the shortest visit to Paris was sufficient to convince a +foreigner not only that the personal popularity of the Emperor was long +since at an end, but that the whole government was despised, in Denmark +people did not, and would not, know it. In the Danish paper with the +widest circulation, the Daily Paper, foreign affairs were dealt with by +a man of the name of Prahl, a wildly enthusiastic admirer of the Empire, +a pleasant man and a brainy, but who, on this vital point, seemed to +have blinkers on. From all his numerous foreign papers, he deduced only +the opinions that he held before, and his opinions were solely +influenced by his wishes. He had never had any opportunity of procuring +information at first hand. He said to me one day: + +"I am accused of allowing my views to be influenced by the foreign +diplomatists here, I, who have never spoken to one of them. I can +honestly boast of being unacquainted with even the youngest attache of +the Portuguese Ministry." His remarks, which sufficiently revealed this +fact, unfortunately struck the keynote of the talk of the political +wiseacres in Denmark. + +Though the Danes were so full of the French, it would be a pity to say +that the latter returned the compliment. It struck me then, as it must +have struck many others, how difficult it was to make people in France +understand that Danes and Norsemen were not Germans. From the roughest +to the most highly educated, they all looked upon it as an understood +thing, and you could not persuade them of anything else. As soon as they +had heard Northerners exchange a few words with each other and had +picked up the frequently recurring _Ja_, they were sufficiently +edified. Even many years after, I caught the most highly cultured +Frenchmen (such as Edmond de Concourt), believing that, at any rate on +the stage, people spoke German in Copenhagen. + +One day in June I began chatting on an omnibus with a corporal of +Grenadiers. When he heard that I was Danish, he remarked: "German, +then." I said: "No." He persisted in his assertion, and asked, +cunningly, what _oui_ was in Danish. When I told him he merely +replied, philosophically, "Ah! then German is the mother tongue." It is +true that when Danes, Norwegians and Swedes met abroad they felt each +other to be compatriots; but this did not prevent them all being classed +together as Germans; that they were not Englishmen, you saw at a glance. +Even when there were several of them together, they had difficulty in +asserting themselves as different and independent; they were a Germanic +race all the same, and people often added, "of second-class importance," +since the race had other more pronounced representatives. + +The only strong expression of political opinion that was engineered in +France then was the so-called plebiscite of May, 1870; the government +challenged the verdict of the entire male population of France upon the +policy of Napoleon III. during the past eighteen years, and did so with +the intention, strangely enough not perceived by Prime Minister +Ollivier, of re-converting the so-called constitutional Empire which had +been in existence since January 1, 1870, into an autocracy. Sensible +people saw that the plebiscite was only an objectionable comedy; a +favourable reply would be obtained all over the country by means of +pressure on the voters and falsification of votes; the oppositionist +papers showed this up boldly in articles that were sheer gems of wit. +Disturbances were expected in Paris on the 9th of May, and here and +there troops were collected. But the Parisians, who saw through the +farce, remained perfectly indifferent. + +The decision turned out as had been expected; the huge majority in Paris +was _against_, the provincial population voted _for_, the Emperor. + + +XVI. + +On July 5th I saw John Stuart Mill for the first time. He had arrived in +Paris the night before, passing through from Avignon, and paid a visit +to me, unannounced, in my room in the Rue Mazarine; he stayed two hours +and won my affections completely. I was a little ashamed to receive so +great a man in so poor a place, but more proud of his thinking it worth +his while to make my acquaintance. None of the French savants had ever +had an opportunity of conversing with him; a few days before, Renan had +lamented to me that he had never seen him. As Mill had no personal +acquaintances in Paris, I was the only person he called upon. + +To talk to him was a new experience. The first characteristic that +struck me was that whereas the French writers were all assertive, he +listened attentively to counter-arguments; it was only when his attitude +in the woman question was broached that he would not brook contradiction +and overwhelmed his adversaries with contempt. + +At that time Mill was without any doubt, among Europe's distinguished +men, the greatest admirer of French history and French intellectual life +to be found outside of France; but he was of quite a different type from +the French, even from those I esteemed most highly. The latter were +comprehensive-minded men, bold and weighty, like Taine, or cold and +agile like Renan, but they were men of intellect and thought, only +having no connection with the practical side of life. They were not +adapted to personal action, felt no inclination to direct interference. + +Mill was different. Although he was more of a thinker than any of them, +his boldness was not of the merely theoretic kind. He wished to +interfere and re-model. None of those Frenchmen lacked firmness; if, +from any consideration, they modified their utterances somewhat, their +fundamental views, at any rate, were formed independently; but their +firmness lay in defence, not in attack; they wished neither to rebuke +nor to instigate; their place was the lecturer's platform, rather than +the tribune. Mill's firmness was of another kind, hard as steel; both in +character and expression he was relentless, and he went to work +aggressively. He was armed, not with a cuirass, but a glaive. + +Thus in him I met, for the first time in my life, a figure who was the +incarnation of the ideal I had drawn for myself of the great man. This +ideal had two sides; talent and character: great capacities and +inflexibility. The men of great reputation whom I had met hitherto, +artists and scientists, were certainly men richly endowed with talents; +but I had never hitherto encountered a personality combining talents +with gifts of character. Shortly before leaving home, I had concluded +the preface to a collection of criticisms with these words: "My +watchword has been: As flexible as possible, when it is a question of +understanding, as inflexible as possible, when it is a question of +speaking," and I had regarded this watchword as more than the motto of a +little literary criticism. Now I had met a grand inflexibility of ideas +in human form, and was impressed for my whole life long. + +Unadapted though I was by nature to practical politics, or in fact to +any activity save that of ideas, I was far from regarding myself as mere +material for a scholar, an entertaining author, a literary historian, or +the like. I thought myself naturally fitted to be a man of action. But +the men of action I had hitherto met had repelled me by their lack of a +leading principle. The so-called practical men at home, lawyers and +parliamentarians, were not men who had made themselves masters of any +fund of new thoughts that they wished to reduce to practical effect; +they were dexterous people, well-informed of conditions at their elbow, +not thinkers, and they only placed an immediate goal in front of +themselves. In Mill I learnt at last to know a man in whom the power of +action, disturbance, and accomplishment were devoted to the service of +modern sociological thought. + +He was then sixty-four years old, but his skin was as fresh and clear as +a child's, his deep blue eyes young. He stammered a little, and nervous +twitches frequently shot over his face; but there was a sublime nobility +about him. + +To prolong the conversation, I offered to accompany him to the Windsor +Hotel, where he was staying, and we walked the distance. As I really had +intended to go over to England at about that time, Mill proposed my +crossing with him. I refused, being afraid of abusing his kindness, but +was invited to visit him frequently when I was in England, which I did +not fail to do. A few days afterwards I was in London. + + +XVII. + +My French acquaintances all said the same thing, when I told them I +wanted to go over to England: "What on earth do you want there?" Though +only a few hours' journey from England, they had never felt the least +curiosity to see the country. "And London! It was said to be a very dull +city; it was certainly not worth putting one's self out to go there." Or +else it was: "If you are going to London, be careful! London is full of +thieves and rascals; look well to your pockets!" + +Only a few days later, the Parisians were shaken out of their calm, +without, however, being shaken out of their self-satisfaction. The Duc +de Grammont's speech on the 6th of July, which amounted to the statement +that France was not going to stand any Hohenzollern on the throne of +Spain, made the people fancy themselves deeply offended by the King of +Prussia, and a current of martial exasperation ran through the irritable +and misled people, who for four years had felt themselves humiliated by +Prussia's strong position. All said and believed that in a week there +would be war, and on both sides everything was so ordered that there +might be. There was still hope that common sense might get the better of +warlike madness in the French Government; but this much was clear, there +was going to be a sudden downfall of everything. + +Between Dover and Calais the waves beat over the ship. From Dover, the +train went at a speed of sixty miles an hour, and made one think him a +great man who invented the locomotive, as great as Aristotle and Plato +together. It seemed to me that John Stuart Mill was that kind of man. He +opened, not roads, but railroads; his books were like iron rails, +unadorned, but useful, leading to their goal. And what will there was in +the English locomotive that drew our train,--like the driving instinct +of England's character! + +Two things struck me on my journey across, a type of mechanical +Protestant religiosity which was new to me, and the knowledge of the two +languages along the coasts. A pleasant English doctor with whom I got +into conversation sat reading steadily in a little Gospel of St. John +that he carried with him, yawning as he read. The seamen on the ship and +the coast dwellers both in England and France spoke English and French +with about equal ease. It is probably the same in all border countries, +but it occurred to me that what came about here quite naturally will in +time be a possibility all over the world, namely, the mastery of a +second and common language, in addition to a people's own. + +I drove into London through a sea of houses. When I had engaged a room, +changed my clothes, and written a letter that I wanted to send off at +once, the eighteen-year-old girl who waited on me informed me that no +letters were accepted on Sundays. As I had some little difficulty in +making out what she said, I supposed she had misunderstood my question +and thought I wanted to speak to the post-official. For I could not help +laughing at the idea that even the letterboxes had to enjoy their +Sabbath rest. But I found she was right. At the post-office, even the +letter-box was shut, as it was Sunday; I was obliged to put my letter in +a pillar-box in the street. + +In Paris the Summer heat had been oppressive. In London, to my surprise, +the weather was fresh and cool, the air as light as it is in Denmark in +Autumn. My first visit was to the Greek and Assyrian collections in the +British Museum. In the Kensington Museum and the Crystal Palace at +Sydenham, I added to my knowledge of Michael Angelo, to whom I felt +drawn by a mighty affection. The admiration for his art which was to +endure undiminished all my life was even then profound. I early felt +that although Michael Angelo had his human weaknesses and limitations, +intellectually and as an artist he is one of the five or six elect the +world has produced, and scarcely any other great man has made such an +impression on my inner life as he. + +In the British Museum I was accosted by a young Dane with whom I had +sometimes ridden out in the days of my riding lessons; this was Carl +Bech, now a landed proprietor, and in his company I saw many of the +sights of London and its environs. He knew more English than I, and +could find his way anywhere. That the English are rigid in their +conventions, he learnt one day to his discomfort; he had put on a pair +of white trousers, and as this was opposed to the usual precedent and +displeased, we were stared at by every man, woman and child we met, as +if the young man had gone out in his underclothing. I had a similar +experience one day as I was walking about the National Gallery with a +young German lady whose acquaintance I had made. An Englishwoman stopped +her in one of the rooms to ask: + +"Was it you who gave up a check parasol downstairs?" and receiving an +answer in the affirmative, she burst out laughing in her face and went +off. + +On July 16th came the great daily-expected news. War was declared, and +in face of this astounding fact and all the possibilities it presented, +people were struck dumb. The effect it had upon me personally was that I +made up my mind to return as soon as possible to France, to watch the +movement there. In London, where Napoleon III. was hated, and in a +measure despised, France was included in the aversion felt for him. +Everywhere, when I was asked on which side my sympathies were, they +broke in at once: "We are all for Prussia." + + +XVIII. + +As often as I could, I took the train to Blackheath to visit John Stuart +Mill. He was good and great, and I felt myself exceedingly attracted by +his greatness. There were fundamental features of his thought and mode +of feeling that coincided with inclinations of my own; for instance, the +Utilitarian theory, as founded by Bentham and his father and developed +by him. I had written in 1868: "What we crave is no longer to flee from +society and reality with our thoughts and desires. On the contrary, we +wish to put our ideas into practice in society and life. That we may not +become a nation of poetasters, we will simply strive towards actuality, +the definite goal of Utility, which the past generation mocked at. Who +would not be glad to be even so little useful?" + +Thus I found myself mentally in a direction that led me towards Mill, +and through many years' study of Comte and Littre, through an +acquaintance with Mill's correspondence with Comte, I was prepared for +philosophical conversations concerning the fundamental thoughts of +empiric philosophy as opposed to speculative philosophy, conversations +which, on Mill's part, tended to represent my entire University +philosophical education at Copenhagen as valueless and wrong. + +But what drew me the most strongly to Mill was not similarity of +thought, but the feeling of an opposed relationship. All my life I had +been afraid of going further in a direction towards which I inclined. I +had always had a passionate desire to perfect my nature--to make good my +defects. Julius Lange was so much to me because he was so unlike me. Now +I endeavoured to understand Mill's nature and make it my own, because it +was foreign to mine. By so doing I was only obeying an inner voice that +perpetually urged me. When others about me had plunged into a subject, a +language, a period, they continued to wrestle with it to all eternity, +made the thing their speciality. That I had a horror of. I knew French +well; but for fear of losing myself in French literature, which I could +easily illustrate, I was always wrestling with English or German, which +presented greater difficulties to me, but made it impossible for me to +grow narrow. I had the advantage over the European reading world that I +knew the Northern languages, but nothing was further from my thoughts +than to limit myself to opening up Northern literature to Europe. Thus +it came about that when the time in my life arrived that I felt +compelled to settle outside Denmark I chose for my place of residence +Berlin, the city with which I had fewest points in common, and where I +could consequently learn most and develop myself without one-sidedness. + +Mill's verbally expressed conviction that empiric philosophy was the +only true philosophy, made a stronger impression upon me than any +assertion of the kind that I had met with in printed books. The results +of empiric philosophy seemed to me much more firmly based than those of +the newer German philosophy. At variance with my teachers, I had come to +see that Hume had been right rather than Kant. But I could not conform +to the principle of empiric philosophy. After all, our knowledge is not +ultimately based merely on experience, but on that which, prior to +experience, alone renders experience possible. Otherwise not even the +propositions of Mathematics can be universally applicable. In spite of +my admiration for Mill's philosophical works, I was obliged to hold to +the rationalistic theory of cognition; Mill obstinately held to the +empiric. "Is not a reconciliation between the two possible?" I said. "I +think that one must _choose_ between the theories," replied Mill. I +did not then know Herbert Spencer's profoundly thoughtful reconciliation +of the teachings of the two opposing schools. He certainly maintains, as +does the English school, that all our ideas have their root in +experience, but he urges at the same time, with the Germans, that there +are innate ideas. The conscious life of the individual, that cannot be +understood from the experience of the individual, becomes explicable +from the inherited experience of the race. Even the intellectual form +which is the condition of the individual's apprehension is gradually +made up out of the experience of the race, and consequently innate +without for that reason being independent of foregoing experiences. But +I determined at once, incited thereto by conversations with Mill, to +study, not only his own works, but the writings of James Mill, Bain, and +Herbert Spencer; I would endeavour to find out how much truth they +contained, and introduce this truth into Denmark. + +I was very much surprised when Mill informed me that he had not read a +line of Hegel, either in the original or in translation, and regarded +the entire Hegelian philosophy as sterile and empty sophistry. I +mentally confronted this with the opinion of the man at the Copenhagen +University who knew the history of philosophy best, my teacher, Hans +Broechner, who knew, so to speak, nothing of contemporary English and +French philosophy, and did not think them worth studying. I came to the +conclusion that here was a task for one who understood the thinkers of +the two directions, who did not mutually understand one another. + +I thought that in philosophy, too, I knew what I wanted, and saw a road +open in front of me. + +However, I never travelled it. The gift for abstract philosophical +thought which I had possessed as a youth was never developed, but much +like the tendency to verse-making which manifested itself even earlier, +superseded by the historio-critical capacity, which grew strong in me. +At that time I believed in my natural bent for philosophy, and did so +even in July, 1872, when I sketched out and began a large book: "_The +Association of Ideas, conceived and put forward as the fundamental +principle of human knowledge_," but the book was never completed. The +capacity for abstraction was too weak in me. + +Still, if the capacity had no independent development, it had a +subservient effect on all my criticism, and the conversations with Mill +had a fertilising and helpful influence on my subsequent intellectual +life. + + +XIX. + +Some weeks passed in seeing the most important public buildings in +London, revelling in the treasures of her museums and collections, and +in making excursions to places in the neighbourhood and to Oxford. I was +absorbed by St. Paul's, saw it from end to end, and from top to bottom, +stood in the crypt, where Sir Christopher Wren lies buried,--_Si +monumentum requiris, circumspice_--mentally compared Wellington's +burial-place here with that of Napoleon on the other side of the +Channel, then went up to the top of the building and looked out to every +side over London, which I was already so well acquainted with that I +could find my way everywhere alone, take the right omnibuses, and the +right trains by the underground, without once asking my way. I spent +blissful hours in the National Gallery. This choice collection of +paintings, especially the Italian ones, afforded me the intense, +overwhelming delight which poetry, the masterpieces of which I knew +already, could no longer offer me. At the Crystal Palace I was +fascinated by the tree-ferns, as tall as fruit-trees with us, and by the +reproductions of the show buildings of the different countries, an +Egyptian temple, a house from Pompeii, the Lions' den from the Alhambra. +Here, as everywhere, I sought out the Zoological Gardens, where I +lingered longest near the hippopotami, who were as curious to watch when +swimming as when they were on dry land. Their clumsiness was almost +captivating. They reminded me of some of my enemies at home. + +Oxford, with the moss-grown, ivy-covered walls, with all the poetry of +conservatism, fascinated me by its dignity and its country freshness; +there the flower of the English nature was expressed in buildings and +trees. The antiquated and non-popular instruction, however, repelled me. +And the old classics were almost unrecognisable in English guise, for +instance, the anglicised _veni, vidi, vici_, which was quoted by a +student. + +The contrast between the English and the French mind was presented to me +in all its force when I compared Windsor Castle with Versailles. The +former was an old Northern Hall, in which the last act of +Oehlenschlaeger's _Palnatoke_ would have been well staged. + +I saw all that I could: the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Hall and +Abbey, the Tower and the theatres, the Picture Gallery at Dulwich with +Rembrandt's _Girl at the Window_, the one at Hampton Court, with +the portrait of Loyola ascribed to Titian, sailed down the river to +Greenwich and lingered in the lovely Gardens at Kew, which gave me a +luxuriant impression of English scenery. I also saw the Queen's model +farm. Every animal was as splendid a specimen as if it had been intended +for an agricultural show, the dairy walls were tiled all over. The +bailiff regretted that Prince Albert, who had himself made the drawings +for a special kind of milk containers, had not lived to see them made. +It was not without its comic aspect to hear him inform you sadly, +concerning an old bullock, that the Queen herself had given it the name +of _Prince Albert_. + +For me, accustomed to the gay and grotesque life deployed in an evening +at the dancing-place of the Parisian students in the _Closerie des +lilas_, it was instructive to compare this with a low English +dancing-house, the Holborn Casino, which was merely sad, stiff, and +repulsive. + +Poverty in London was very much more conspicuous than in Paris; it +spread itself out in side streets in the vicinity of the main arteries +in its most pitiable form. Great troops, regular mobs of poor men, women +and children in rags, dispersed like ghosts at dawn, fled away hurriedly +and vanished, as soon as a policeman approached and made sign to them to +pass on. There was nothing corresponding to it to be seen in Paris. +Crime, too, bore a very different aspect here. In Paris, it was decked +out and audacious, but retained a certain dignity; here, in the evening, +in thickly frequented streets, whole swarms of ugly, wretchedly dressed, +half or wholly drunken women could be seen reeling about, falling, and +often lying in the street. + +Both the tendency of the English to isolate themselves and their social +instincts were quite different from those of the French. I was permitted +to see the comfortably furnished Athenaeum Club in Pall Mall, membership +of which was so much desired that people of high standing would have +their names on the list for years beforehand, and these clubs +corresponded to the cafes in Paris, which were open to every passer-by. +I noticed that in the restaurants the tables were often hidden behind +high screens, that the different parties who were dining might not be +able to see one another. + + +XX. + +The house in London where I was happiest was Antonio Gallenga's. A +letter from the Hauchs was my introduction there, and I was received and +taken up by them as if they had known me and liked me for years. + +Antonio Gallenga, then a man of seventy, who nevertheless gave one an +impression of youthfulness, had a most eventful life behind him. He had +been born at Parma, was flung into prison at the age of twenty as a +conspirator under Mazzini, was banished from Piedmont, spent some time +at Malta, in the United States and in England, where he earned his +living as a journalist and teacher of languages, and in 1848 returned to +Italy, where he was active as a liberal politician. After the battle of +Novara, he was again obliged to take refuge in London; but he was +recalled to Piedmont by Cavour, who had him elected deputy for +Castellamonte. He wrote an Italian Grammar in English, and, likewise in +English, the _History of Piedmont_, quarrelled with Mazzini's +adherents, withdrew from parliamentary life, and in preference to +settling down permanently in Italy elected to be war correspondent to +the _Times_. In that capacity he took part from 1859 onwards in the +campaigns in Italy, in the North American States, in Denmark, and in +Spain. His little boy was still wearing the Spanish national costume. +Now he had settled down in London, on the staff of the _Times_, and +had just come into town from the country, as the paper wished him to be +near, on account of the approaching war. Napoleon III., to whom Gallenga +had vowed an inextinguishable hatred, had been studied so closely by him +that the Emperor might be regarded as his specialty. He used the +energetic, violent language of the old revolutionary, was with all his +heart and soul an Italian patriot, but had, through a twenty years' +connection with England, acquired the practical English view of +political affairs. Towards Denmark, where he had been during the most +critical period of the country's history, he felt kindly; but our war +methods had of course not been able to excite his admiration; neither +had our diplomatic negotiations during the war. + +Gallenga was a well-to-do man; he owned a house in the best part of +London and a house in the country as well. He was a powerful man, with +passionate feelings, devoid of vanity. It suited him well that the +_Times_, as the English custom is, printed his articles unsigned; +he was pleased at the increased influence they won thereby, inasmuch as +they appeared as the expression of the universal paper's verdict. His +wife was an Englishwoman, pleasant and well-bred, of cosmopolitan +education and really erudite. Not only did she know the European +languages, but she wrote and spoke Hindustani. She was a splendid +specimen of the English housekeeper, and devoted herself +enthusiastically to her two exceedingly beautiful children, a boy of +eleven and a little girl of nine. The children spoke English, Italian, +French, and German with equal facility and correctness. + +Mrs. Gallenga had a more composite and a deeper nature than her husband, +who doubted neither the truth of his ideas, nor their salutary power. +She shared his and my opinions without sharing our confidence in them. +When she heard me say that I intended to assert my ideas in Denmark, and +wage war against existing prejudices, she would say, in our long +conversations: + +"I am very fond of Denmark; the people there seem to me to be happy, +despite everything, and the country not to be over-populated. In any +case, the population finds ample means of outlet in sea-life and +emigration. Denmark is an idyllic little country. Now you want to +declare war there. My thoughts seek down in dark places, and I ask +myself whether I really believe that truth does any good, whether in my +secret heart I am convinced that strife is better than stagnation? I +admire Oliver Cromwell, but I sympathise with Falkland, who died with +'Peace! Peace!' [Footnote: Sir Lucius Cary, second Viscount Falkland, +who fell at Newbury, Sept. 20, 1643.] on his lips. I am afraid that you +will have to bear a great deal. You will learn that the accoutrements of +truth are a grievously heavy coat of mail. You will call forth reaction. +Even that is the least. But reaction will come about in your own mind; +after a long time, I mean. Still, you are strong; it will be a reaction +of the kind that keeps aloof in order to spring farther and better. Your +unity will not go to pieces. You are a kind of cosmos." + +When the conversation turned upon England and English conditions, she +protested against the opinion prevalent on the continent since Byron's +day, that English society was infested with hypocrisy. + +"I do not think that hypocrisy is characteristic of English thought. We +have, of course, like every serious people, our share of hypocrites; in +a frivolous nation hypocrisy has no pretext for existence. But its +supremacy amongst us is over. Apathetic orthodoxy, and superficial ideas +of the correct thing, ruled England during the first half of the +century. The intellectual position of the country is different now. No +one who has not lived in England has any idea how serious and real the +belief here is in the tough doctrine of the Trinity, who, in human form, +walked about in Galilee. Good men, noble men, live and work for this +dogma, perform acts of love for it. We, you and I, have drunk from other +sources; but for these people it is the fountain of life. Only it is +depressing to see this doctrine in its Roman Catholic form winning +greater power everywhere every day. In Denmark, intellectual stagnation +has hindered it hitherto; you have political, but not yet religious, +freedom. Belgium has both, and Belgium is at the present time the most +fiery Catholic power there is. France is divided between extreme +materialism and Madonna worship. When European thought--between 1820 and +1860, let us say--rebelled against every kind of orthodoxy, and, as +always happens with rebellion, made mistakes and went too far, France +played a wretched role. It is a Celtic land, and Celtic it will remain; +it desires, not personal freedom, but a despotic levelling, not equality +before the law, but the base equality which is inimical to excellence, +not the brotherhood that is brotherly love, but that which gives the bad +the right to share with the good. That is why the Empire could be +victorious in France, and that is why the Roman Catholic Church, even in +its most modern, Byzantine form, is triumphant there." + +So thoroughly English was Anna Gallenga's way of looking at things, in +spite of an education which had included the chief countries in Europe. +So blindly did she share the prejudice that the French are essentially +Celtic. And so harshly did she judge, in spite of a scepticism, feminine +though it was, that was surprising in a woman. + + +XXI. + +Don Juan Prim, Count of Reus, Marques de los Castillejos, would now be +forgotten outside Spain were it not that Regnault's splendid equestrian +picture of him, as he is receiving the homage of the people (on a fiery +steed, reminding one of Velasquez), keeps his memory green in everyone +who visits the Gallery of the Louvre. At that time his name was on every +tongue. The victorious general and revolutionary of many years' standing +had since 1869 been Prime Minister of Spain, and had eagerly endeavoured +to get a foreign prince for the throne who would be dependent upon him +and under whom he would be able to keep the power in his own hands. He +had now offered the throne of Spain to Leopold of Hohenzollern, but +without having assured himself of the consent of the Powers. That of +Prussia was of course safe enough, and for six weeks Napoleon had looked +on benevolently at the negotiations, and acted as though the arrangement +had his approval, which Prim had the more reason to suppose since +Leopold was related to the Murat family, and the Emperor had raised no +objection to a Hohenzollern ascending the throne of Roumania. +Consequently, Prim was thunderstruck when France suddenly turned round +and seized upon this trivial pretext for a breach of the peace. + +He was in regular correspondence with the Gallengas, whom he had seen a +good deal of during the years, after the unsuccessful rebellion against +Queen Isabella, that he had spent in London. At that time he had been a +man of fifty, and, with his little body and large head, had looked very +strange among Englishmen. He was of modest birth, but denied the fact. +He was now a Spanish grandee of the first class, but this was through a +patent bestowed on him for courage in the war with Morocco; he had +little education, did not know a word of English, wrote French with a +purely fantastic orthography, but had excellent qualities as a Liberal, +an army chief, and a popular leader. Still, he was not pleased that +Regnault had painted him greeted by the enthusiastic cheers of an +untidy, ragged mob of rebels; he would have preferred to be receiving +the acclamations of regular troops, and of the highest men and women in +the nation, as now, at the conclusion of his career, he really was. Only +a few months later (in December, 1870), he was shot by an assassin in +the streets of Madrid. + +In Prim's communications to Gallenga, the attitude of the French +government appeared to me in a most unfavourable light. Ollivier, the +Premier, I had long despised; it did not need much political acumen to +see that he was an ambitious and conceited phrase-monger, who would let +himself be led by the nose by those who had disarmed him. The Emperor +himself was a wreck. I had had no doubt of that since I had one day seen +him at very close quarters in the Louvre, where he was inspecting some +recently hung, decorative paintings. It was quite evident that he could +not walk alone, but advanced, half-sliding, supported by two tall +chamberlains, who each gave him an arm. His eyes were half-closed and +his gaze absolutely dulled. The dressed and waxed moustache, which ran +to a needle-like point, looked doubly tasteless against his wax mask of +a face. He was the incarnation of walking decrepitude, vapid and slack. +Quite evidently he had committed the blunder of trusting to a split in +Germany. In his blindness he explained that he had come to free the +Germans, who had, against their will, been incorporated into Prussia, +and all Germany rose like one man against him. And in his foolish +proclamation he declared that he was waging this war for the sake of the +civilising ideals of the first Republic, as if Germany were now going to +be civilised for the first time, and as if he, who had made an end of +the second Republic by a _coup d'etat_, could speak in the name of +Republican freedom. His whole attitude was mendacious and mean, and the +wretched pretext under which he declared war could not but prejudice +Europe against him. In addition to this, as they knew very well in +England, from the earlier wars of the Empire, he had no generals; his +victories had been soldier victories. + +I was very deeply impressed, in the next place, by the suicide of +Prevost-Paradol. I had studied most carefully his book, _La France +Nouvelle_; I had seen in this friend and comrade of Taine and of +Renan the political leader of the future in France. No one was so well +acquainted with its resources as he; no one knew better than he what +policy ought to be followed. If he had despaired, it was because he +foresaw that the situation was hopeless. He had certainly made mistakes; +first, in believing that in January it had been Napoleon's serious +intention to abrogate personal control of the state, then that of +retaining, despite the long hesitation so well known to me, his position +as French Envoy to North America, after the plebiscite. That he should +now have turned his pistol against his own forehead told me that he +regarded the battle as lost, foresaw inevitable collapse as the outcome +of the war. When at first all the rumours and all the papers announced +the extreme probability of Denmark's taking part in the war as France's +ally, I was seized with a kind of despair at the thought of the folly +she seemed to be on the verge of committing. I wrote to my friends, +would have liked, had I been permitted, to write in every Danish paper a +warning against the martial madness that had seized upon people. It was +only apparently shared by the French. Even now, only a week after the +declaration of war, and before a single collision had taken place, it +was clear to everyone who carefully followed the course of events that +in spite of the light-hearted bragging of the Parisians and the Press, +there was deep-rooted aversion to war. And I, who had always counted +Voltaire's _Micromegas_ as one of my favourite tales, thought of +where Sirius, the giant, voices his supposition that the people on the +earth are happy beings who pass their time in love and thought, and of +the philosopher's reply to him: "At this moment there are a hundred +thousand animals of our species, who wear hats, engaged in killing a +hundred thousand more, who wear turbans, or in being killed by them. And +so it has been all over the earth from time immemorial." Only that this +time not a hundred thousand, but some two million men were being held in +readiness to exterminate each other. + +What I saw in London of the scenic art at the Adelphi Theatre, the +Prince of Wales' Theatre and the Royal Strand Theatre was disheartening. +Moliere was produced as the lowest kind of farce, Sheridan was acted +worse than would be permitted in Denmark at a second-class theatre; but +the scenic decorations, a greensward, shifting lights, and the like, +surpassed anything that I had ever seen before. + +More instructive and more fascinating than the theatres were the +parliamentary debates and the trials in the Law Courts. I enjoyed in +particular a sitting of the Commons with a long debate between Gladstone +and Disraeli, who were like representatives of two races and two opposed +views of life. Gladstone was in himself handsomer, clearer, and more +open, Disraeli spoke with a finer point, and more elegantly, had a +larger oratorical compass, more often made a witty hit, and evoked more +vigorous response and applause. Their point of disagreement was the +forthcoming war; Disraeli wished all the documents regarding it to be +laid before parliament; Gladstone declared that he could not produce +them. In England, as elsewhere, the war that was just breaking out +dominated every thought. + + +XXII. + +The Paris I saw again was changed. Even on my way from Calais I heard, +to my astonishment, the hitherto strictly forbidden _Marseillaise_ +hummed and muttered. In Paris, people went arm in arm about the streets +singing, and the _Marseillaise_ was heard everywhere. The voices +were generally harsh, and it was painful to hear the song that had +become sacred through having been silenced so long, profaned in this +wise, in the bawling and shouting of half-drunken men at night. But the +following days, as well, it was hummed, hooted, whistled and sung +everywhere, and as the French are one of the most unmusical nations on +earth, it sounded for the most part anything but agreeable. + +In those days, while no collision between the masses of troops had as +yet taken place, there was a certain cheerfulness over Paris; it could +be detected in every conversation; people were more lively, raised their +voices more, chatted more than at other times; the cabmen growled more +loudly, and cracked their whips more incessantly than usual. + +Assurance of coming victory was expressed everywhere, even among the +hotel servants in the Rue Racine and on the lips of the waiters at every +restaurant. Everybody related how many had already volunteered; the +number grew from day to day; first it was ten thousand, then seventy- +five thousand, then a hundred thousand. In the Quartier Latin, the +students sat in their cafes, many of them in uniform, surrounded by +their comrades, who were bidding them good-bye. It was characteristic +that they no longer had their womenfolk with them; they had flung them +aside, now that the matter was serious. Every afternoon a long stream of +carriages, filled with departing young soldiers, could be seen moving +out towards the Gare du Nord. From every carriage large flags waved. +Women, their old mothers, workwomen, who sat in the carriages with them, +held enormous bouquets on long poles. The dense mass of people through +which one drove were grave; but the soldiers for the most part retained +their gaiety, made grimaces, smoked and drank. + +Nevertheless, the Emperor's proclamation had made a very poor +impression. It was with the intention of producing an effect of +sincerity that he foretold the war would be long and grievous, +(_longue et penible_); with a people of the French national +character it would have been better had he been able to write "terrible, +but short." Even now, when people had grown accustomed to the situation, +this proclamation hung like a nightmare over them. I was all the more +astonished when an old copy of the _Daily Paper_ for the 30th of +July fell into my hands, and I read that their correspondent (Topsoee, +recently arrived in Paris) had seen a bloused workman tear off his hat, +after reading the proclamation, and heard him shout, "_Vive la +France_!" So thoughtlessly did people continue to feed the Danish +public with the food to which it was accustomed. + +Towards the 8th or 9th of August I met repeatedly the author of the +article. He told me that the Duc de Cadore had appeared in Copenhagen on +a very indefinite errand, but without achieving the slightest result. +Topsoee, for that matter, was extraordinarily ignorant of French affairs, +had only been four weeks in France altogether, and openly admitted that +he had touched up his correspondence as well as he could. He had never +yet been admitted to the _Corps legislatif_, nevertheless he had +related how the tears had come into the eyes of the members and the +tribunes the day when the Duc de Grammont "again lifted the flag of +France on high." He said: "I have been as unsophisticated as a child +over this war," and added that Bille had been more so than himself. + + +XXIII. + +One could hardly praise the attitude of the French papers between the +declaration of war and the first battles. Their boasting and exultation +over what they were going to do was barely decent, they could talk of +nothing but the victories they were registering beforehand, and, first +and last, the entry into Berlin. The insignificant encounter at +Saarbruecken was termed everywhere the _premiere victoire!_ The +caricatures in the shop-windows likewise betrayed terrible arrogance. +One was painfully reminded of the behaviour of the French before the +battle of Agincourt in Shakespeare's _Henry V._ + +It was no matter for surprise that a populace thus excited should parade +through the streets in an evening, shouting _"A Berlin! A Berlin!"_ + +National enthusiasm could vent itself in the theatres, in a most +convenient manner, without making any sacrifice. As soon as the audience +had seen the first piece at the Theatre Francais, the public clamoured +for _La Marseillaise_, and brooked no denial. A few minutes later +the lovely Mlle. + +Agar came in, in a Greek costume. Two French flags were held over her +head. She then sang, quietly, sublimely, with expression at the same +time restrained and inspiring, the _Marseillaise_. The countless +variations of her voice were in admirable keeping with her animated and +yet sculptural gesticulation, and the effect was thrilling, although +certain passages in the song were hardly suitable to the circumstances +of the moment, for instance, the invocation of Freedom, the prayer to +her to fight for her defenders. When the last verse came, she seized the +flag and knelt down; the audience shouted, "_Debout_!" All rose and +listened standing to the conclusion, which was followed by mad applause. + +People seized upon every opportunity of obtruding their patriotism. One +evening _Le lion amoureux_ was given. In the long speech which +concludes the second act, a young Republican describes the army which, +during the Revolution, crossed the frontier for the first time and +utterly destroyed the Prussian armies. The whole theatre foamed like the +sea. + + +XXIV. + +Those were Summer days, and in spite of the political and martial +excitement, the peaceful woods and parks in the environs of Paris were +tempting. From the Quartier Latin many a couple secretly found their way +to the forests of St. Germain, or the lovely wood at Chantilly. In the +morning one bought a roast fowl and a bottle of wine, then spent the +greater part of the day under the beautiful oak-trees, and sat down to +one's meal in the pleasant green shade. Now and again one of the young +women would make a wreath of oak leaves and twine it round her +companion's straw hat, while he, bareheaded, lay gazing up at the tree- +tops. For a long time I kept just such a wreath as a remembrance, and +its withered leaves roused melancholy reflections some years later, for +during the war every tree of the Chantilly wood had been felled; the +wreath was all that remained of the magnificent oak forest. + + +XXV. + +The news of the battle of Weissenburg on August 4th was a trouble, but +this chiefly manifested itself in profound astonishment. What? They had +suffered a defeat? But one did not begin to be victorious at once; +victory would soon follow now. And, indeed, next morning, the news of a +victory ran like lightning about the town. It had been so confidently +expected that people quite neglected to make enquiries as to how and to +what extent it was authenticated. There was bunting everywhere; all the +horses had flags on their heads, people went about with little flags in +their hats. As the day wore on it turned out to be all a false report, +and the depression was great. + +Next evening, as I came out of the _Theatre Francais_, there stood +the Emperor's awful telegram to read, several copies of it posted up on +the columns of the porch: "Macmahon has lost a battle. Frossard is +retreating. Put Paris in a condition of defence as expeditiously as +possible!" Then, like everyone else, I understood the extent of the +misfortune. Napoleon had apparently lost his head; it was very +unnecessary to publish the conclusion of the telegram. + +Immediately afterwards was issued the Empress' proclamation, which was +almost silly. "I am with you," it ran--a charming consolation for the +Parisians. + +Astonishment produced a kind of paralysis; anger looked round for an +object on which to vent itself, but hardly knew whom to select. Besides, +people had really insufficient information as to what had happened. The +_Siecle_ printed a fairly turbulent article at once, but no +exciting language in the papers was required. Even a foreigner could +perceive that if it became necessary to defend Paris after a second +defeat, the Empire would be at an end. + +The exasperation which had to vent itself was directed at first against +the Ministers, and ridiculously enough the silence imposed on the Press +concerning the movements of the troops (_le mutisme_) was blamed +for the defeat at Weissenburg; then the exasperation swung back and was +directed against the generals, who were dubbed negligent and incapable, +until, ponderously and slowly, it turned against the Emperor himself. + +But with the haste that characterises French emotion, and the rapidity +with which events succeeded one another, even this exasperation was of +short duration. It raged for a few days, and then subsided for want of +contradiction of its own accord, for the conviction spread that the +Emperor's day was irrevocably over and that he continued to exist only +in name. A witness to the rapidity of this _volte face_ were three +consecutive articles by Edmond About in _Le Soir_. The first, +written from his estate in Saverne, near Strassburg. was extremely +bitter against the Emperor; it began: "_Napoleone tertio feliciter +regnante_, as people said in the olden days, I have seen with my own +eyes, what I never thought to see: Alsace overrun by the enemy's +troops." The next article, written some days later, in the middle of +August, when About had come to Paris, called the Emperor, without more +ado, "The last Bonaparte," and began: "I see that I have been writing +like a true provincial; in the provinces at the moment people have two +curses on their lips, one for the Prussians, and one for those who began +the war; in Paris, they have got much farther; there they have only one +curse on their lips, one thought, and one wish; there are names that are +no more mentioned in Paris than if they belonged to the twelfth +century." + +What he wrote was, at the moment, true and correct. I was frequently +asked in letters what the French now said about the government and the +Emperor. The only answer was that all that side of the question was +antiquated in Paris. If I were to say to one of my acquaintances: +_"Eh! bien, que dites-vous de l'empereur_?" the reply would be: +_"Mais, mon cher, je ne dis rien de lui. Vous voyez si bien que moi, +qu'il ne compte plus. C'est un homme par terre. Tout le monde le sait; +la gauche meme ne l'attaque plus."_ Even General Trochu, the Governor +of the capital, did not mention Napoleon's name in his proclamation to +Paris. He himself hardly dared to send any messages. After having been +obliged to surrender the supreme command, he followed the army, like a +mock emperor, a kind of onlooker, a superfluous piece on the board. +People said of him: "_On croit qu'il se promene un peu aux environs de +Chalons._" + +As can be seen from this, the deposition of the Emperor had taken place +in people's consciousness, and was, so to speak, publicly settled, +several weeks before the battle of Sedan brought with it his surrender +to the King of Prussia and the proclamation of the French Republic. The +Revolution of September 4th was not an overturning of things; it was +merely the ratification of a state of affairs that people were already +agreed upon in the capital, and had been even before the battle of +Gravelotte. + +In Paris preparations were being made with the utmost energy for the +defence of the city. All men liable to bear arms were called up, and +huge numbers of volunteers were drilled. It was an affecting sight to +see the poor workmen drilling on the Place du Carrousel for enrolment in +the volunteer corps. Really, most of them looked so bloodless and +wretched that one was tempted to think they went with the rest for the +sake of the franc a day and uniform. + + +XXVI. + +Anyone whose way led him daily past the fortifications could see, +however technically ignorant he might be, that they were exceedingly +insignificant. Constantly, too, one heard quoted Trochu's words: "I +don't delude myself into supposing that I can stop the Prussians with +the matchsticks that are being planted on the ramparts." Strangely +enough, Paris shut herself in with such a wall of masonry that in +driving through it in the Bois de Boulogne, there was barely room for a +carriage with two horses. They bored loop-holes in these walls and +ramparts, but few doubted that the German artillery would be able to +destroy all their defences with the greatest ease. + +Distribute arms to the civil population, as the papers unanimously +demanded, from readily comprehensible reasons, no one dared to do. The +Empress' Government had to hold out for the existing state of things; +nevertheless, in Paris,--certainly from about the 8th August,--people +were under the impression that what had been lost was lost irrevocably. + +I considered it would be incumbent upon my honour to return to Denmark, +if we were drawn into the war, and I lived with this thought before my +eyes. I contemplated with certainty an approaching revolution in France; +I was vexed to think that there was not one conspicuously great and +energetic man among the leaders of the Opposition, and that such a poor +wretch as Rochefort was once more daily mentioned and dragged to the +front. Of Gambetta no one as yet thought, although his name was +respected, since he had made himself felt the last season as the most +vehement speaker in the Chamber. But it was not speakers who were +wanted, and people did not know that he was a man of action. + +The Ministry that followed Ollivier's inspired me with no confidence. +Palikao, the Prime Minister, was termed in the papers an _iron man_ +(the usual set phrase). It was said that he "would not scruple to clear +the boulevards with grape"; but the genius needed for such a performance +was not overwhelming. What he had to do was to clear France of the +Germans, and that was more difficult. + +Renan had had to interrupt the journey to Spitzbergen which he had +undertaken in Prince Napoleon's company; the Prince and his party had +only reached Tromsoee, when they were called back on account of the war, +and Renan was in a state of the most violent excitement. He said: "No +punishment could be too great for that brainless scoundrel Ollivier, and +the Ministry that has followed his is worse. Every thinking man could +see for himself that the declaration of this war was madness. (_A-t-on +jamais vu pareille folie, mon Dieu, mon Dieu, c'est navrant. Nous sommes +un peuple desarconne._)" In his eyes, Palikao was no better than a +robber, Jerome David than a murderer. He considered the fall of +Strasburg imminent. He was less surprised than I at the unbounded +incapacity shown by the French fleet under the difficult conditions; all +plans for a descent on Northern Germany had already been given up, and +the French fleet was unable to set about even so much as a blockade of +the ports, such as the Danes had successfully carried out six years +before. + +Taine was as depressed as Renan. He had returned from Germany, where he +had gone to prepare a treatise on Schiller, on account of the sudden +death of Madame Taine's mother. As early as August 2d, when no battle +had as yet been fought, he felt exceedingly anxious, and he was the +first Frenchman whom I heard take into consideration the possibility of +the defeat of France; he expressed great sorrow that two nations such as +France and Germany should wage national war against each other as they +were doing. "I have just come from Germany," he remarked, "where I have +talked with many brave working-men. When I think of what it means for a +man to be born into the world, nursed, brought up, instructed, and +equipped; when I think what struggling and difficulties he must go +through himself to be fit for the battle of life, and then reflect how +all that is to be flung into the grave as a lump of bleeding flesh, how +can I do other than grieve! With two such statesmen as Louis Philippe, +war could certainly have been averted, but with two quarrelsome men like +Bismarck and Napoleon at the head of affairs, it was, of course, +inevitable." + +Philarete Chasles saw in the defeats a confirmation of the theory that +he proclaimed, day in, day out, namely: that the Latin races were on the +rapid down-grade; Spain and Portugal, Italy, Roumania, the South +American republics, were, in his opinion, in a state of moral +putrefaction, France a sheer Byzantium. It had been a piece of +foolhardiness without parallel to try to make this war a decisive racial +struggle between the nation that, as Protestant, brought free research +in its train and one which had not yet been able to get rid of the Pope +and political despotism. Now France was paying the penalty. + +Out in the country at Meudon, where he was, there had--probably from +carelessness--occurred repeated explosions, the last time on August +20th. Twenty cases of cartridges had just been sent to Bazaine; a +hundred still remained, which were to start the day that they were +urgently required. They blew up, and no one in the town doubted that the +explosion was the work of Prussian spies. For things had come to such a +pass that people saw Prussian spies everywhere. (During the first month +of the war all Germans were called Prussians.) Importance was attached +to the fact that General Frossard's nephew, a young lieutenant who lay +wounded in Chasles' tower-house, from a sword-thrust in the chest, and +was usually delirious, at the crash had jumped up and come to his +senses, crying out: "It is treachery! It is Chamber No. 6 blowing up!" +As a matter of fact, that was where the cartridges were. It was said +that at Meudon traces had been found of the same explosive as had been +used in bombs against the Emperor during the first days of May (a plot +that had probably been hatched by the police). The perpetrator, +however,--doubtless for good reasons--was not discovered. + +Whatever vanity there was about old Philarete Chasles left him +altogether during this critical time, which seemed to make good men +better still. His niece, too, who used to be loud-voiced and conceited, +was quite a different person. One day that I was at their house at +Meudon, she sat in a corner for a long time crying quietly. Out there, +they were all feverishly anxious, could not rest, craved, partly to hear +the latest news, partly to feel the pulse of Paris. One day after +dinner, Chasles invited me to go into town with him, and when we arrived +he took a carriage and drove about with me for two hours observing the +prevailing mood. We heard countless anecdotes, most of them apocryphal, +but reflecting the beliefs of the moment: The Empress had sent three +milliards (!) in French gold to the Bank of England. The Emperor, who +was jealous of Macmahon since the latter had rescued him at Magenta, had +taken the command of the Turcos from the Marshal, although the latter +had said in the Council of War: "The Turcos must be given to me, they +will not obey anyone else." And true it was that no one else had any +control over them. If one had committed theft, or misbehaved himself in +any other way, and Macmahon. whom they called only "Our Marshal," rode +down the front of their lines and scolded them, they began to cry, +rushed up and kissed his feet, and hung to his horse, like children +asking for forgiveness. And now someone had made the great mistake of +giving them to another general. And, the commander being anxious to +dazzle the Germans with them, they and the Zouaves had been sent first +into the fire, in spite of Bazaine's very sensible observation: "When +you drive, you do not begin at a galop." And so these picked troops were +broken up in their first engagement. It was said that of 2,500 Turcos, +only 29 were left. + +An anecdote like the following, which was told to us, will serve to show +how popular legends grow up, in virtue of the tendency there is to +reduce a whole battle to a collision between two generals, just as in +the Homeric age, or in Shakespeare: The Crown Prince of Prussia was +fighting very bravely at Woerth, in the front ranks. That he threw the +Turcos into confusion was the result of a ray of sunlight falling on the +silver eagle on his helmet. The Arabs thought it a sign from Heaven. +Macmahon, who was shooting in the ranks, was so near the Crown Prince +that the latter shouted to him in French: "_Voila un homme!_" but +the Frenchman surpassed him in chivalrous politeness, for he saluted, +and replied: "_Voila un heros!_" + + +XXVII. + +After my return to Paris, I had taken lessons from an excellent language +teacher, Mademoiselle Guemain, an old maid who had for many years taught +French to Scandinavians, and for whom I wrote descriptions and remarks +on what I saw, to acquire practise in written expression. She had known +most of the principal Northerners who had visited Paris during the last +twenty years, had taught Magdalene Thoresen, amongst others, when this +latter as a young woman had stayed in Paris. She was an excellent +creature, an unusual woman, intellectual, sensitive, and innocent, who +made an unforgettable impression upon one. Besides the appointed lesson- +times, we sometimes talked for hours together. How sad that the lives of +such good and exceptional women should vanish and disappear, without any +special thanks given to them in their life-times, and with no one of the +many whom they have benefitted to tell publicly of their value. She +possessed all the refinement of the French, together with the modesty of +an old maid, was both personally inexperienced, and by virtue of the +much that she had seen, very experienced in worldly things. I visited +her again in 1889, after the lapse of nineteen years, having learned her +address through Jonas Lie and his wife, who knew her. I found her older, +but still more charming, and touchingly humble. It cut me to the heart +to hear her say: _"C'est une vraie charite que vous me faites de venir +me voir."_ + +Mlle. Guemain was profoundly affected, like everyone else, by what we +were daily passing through during this time of heavy strain. As a woman, +she was impressed most by the seriousness which had seized even the most +frivolous people, and by the patriotic enthusiasm which was spreading in +ever wider circles. She regarded it as deeper and stronger than as a +rule it was. + + +XXVIII. + +The temper prevailing among my Italian friends was very different. The +Italians, as their way was, were just like children, laughed at the +whole thing, were glad that the Prussians were "drubbing" the French, to +whom, as good patriots, they wished every misfortune possible. The +French had behaved like tyrants in Italy; now they were being paid out. +Besides which, the Prussians would not come to Paris. But if they did +come, they would be nice to them, and invite them to dinner, like +friends. Sometimes I attempted to reply, but came off badly. One day +that I had ventured a remark to a large and ponderous Roman lady, on the +ingratitude of the Italians towards the French, the good lady jumped as +if a knife had been stuck into her, and expatiated passionately on the +infamy of the French. The Romans were,--as everyone knew,--the first +nation on earth. The French had outraged them, had dared to prevent them +making their town the capital of Italy, by garrisoning it with French +soldiers who had no business there, so that they had themselves asked +for the Nemesis which was now overtaking them, and which the Italians +were watching with flashing eyes. She said this, in spite of her anger, +with such dignity, and such a bearing, that one could not but feel that, +if she were one day called upon to adorn a throne, she would seat +herself upon it as naturally, and as free from embarrassment, as though +it were nothing but a Roman woman's birthright. + + +XXIX. + +In the meantime, defeats and humiliations were beginning to confuse the +good sense of the French, and to lead their instincts astray. The crowd +could not conceive that such things could come about naturally. The +Prussians could not possibly have won by honourable means, but must have +been spying in France for years. Why else were so many Germans settled +in Paris! The French were paying now, not for their faults, but for +their virtues, the good faith, the hospitality, the innocent welcome +they had given to treacherous immigrants. They had not understood that +the foreigner from the North was a crafty and deceitful enemy. + +It gradually became uncomfortable for a foreigner in Paris. I never went +out without my passport. But even a passport was no safeguard. It was +enough for someone to make some utterly unfounded accusation, express +some foolish, chance suspicion, for the non-Frenchman to be maltreated +as a "spy." Both in Metz and in Paris, in the month of August, people +who were taken for "Prussians" were hanged or dismembered. In the latter +part of August the papers reported from the Dordogne that a mob there +had seized a young man, a M. de Moneys, of whom a gang had asserted that +he had shouted _"Vive la Prusse!"_ had stripped him, bound him with +ropes, carried him out into a field, laid him on a pile of damp wood, +and as this would not take fire quick enough, had pushed trusses of +straw underneath all round him, and burnt him alive. From the +_Quartier La Vilette_ in Paris, one heard every day of similar +slaughter of innocent persons who the people fancied were Prussian +spies. Under such circumstances, a trifle might become fatal. One +evening at the end of August I had been hearing _L'Africaine_ at the +grand opera, and at the same time Marie Sass' delivery of the +_Marseillaise_--she sang as though she had a hundred fine bells in +her voice, but she sang the national anthem like an aria. Outside the +opera-house I hailed a cab. The coachman was asleep; a man jogged him to +wake him, and he started to drive. I noticed that during the drive he +looked at his watch and then drove on for all that he was worth, as fast +as the harness and reins would stand. When I got to the hotel I handed +him his fare and a four sous' tip. He bawled out that it was not enough; +he had been _de remise_; he had taken me for someone else, being +waked so suddenly; he had been bespoken by another gentleman. I laughed +and replied that that was his affair, not mine; what had it got to do with +me? But as all he could demand, if he had really been _de remise_, +was two sous more, and as, under the ordinances prevailing, it was +impossible to tell whether he was or not, I gave him the two sous; but no +tip with it, since he had no right to claim it, and I had not the +slightest doubt that he was lying. Then he began to croak that it was a +shame not to give a _pourboire_, and, seeing that did not help +matters, as I simply walked up the hotel steps, he shouted in his +ill-temper, first _"Vous n'etes pas Francais!"_ and then _"Vous +etes Prussien!"_ No sooner had he said it than all the hotel servants +who were standing in the doorway disappeared, and the people in the street +listened, stopped, and turned round. I grasped the danger, and flew into a +passion. In one bound I was in the road, I rushed at the cabman, seized +him by the throat and shook my hand, with its knuckle-duster upon it, +threateningly at his head. Then he forgot to abuse me and suddenly whined: +_"Ne frappez pas, monsieur!"_ mounted his box, and drove very tamely +away. In my exasperation I called the hotel waiters together and poured +scorn on them for their cowardice. + +In spite of the season, it was uncomfortable weather, and the temper of +the town was as uncomfortable as the weather. As time went on, few +people were to be seen about the streets, but there was a run on the +gunmakers' and sword-smiths'. By day no cheerful shouts or songs rang +out, but children of six or seven years of age would go hand in hand in +rows down the street in the evenings, singing _"Mourir pour la +patrie,"_ to its own beautiful, affecting melody. But these were the +only gentle sounds one heard. Gradually, the very air seemed to be +reeking with terror and frenzy. Exasperation rolled up once more, like a +thick, black stream, against the Emperor, against the ministers and +generals, and against the Prussians, whom people thought they saw +everywhere. + + +XXX. + +Foreigners were requested to leave Paris, so that, in the event of a +siege, the city might have no unnecessary mouths to feed. +Simultaneously, in Trochu's proclamation, it was announced that the +enemy might be outside the walls in three days. Under such +circumstances, the town was no longer a place for anyone who did not +wish to be shut up in it. + +One night at the end of August, I travelled from Paris to Geneva. At the +departure station the thousands of German workmen who had been expelled +from Paris were drawn up, waiting, herded together like cattle,--a +painful sight. These workmen were innocent of the war, the defeats, and +the spying service of which they were accused; now they were being +driven off in hordes, torn from their work, deprived of their bread, and +surrounded by inimical lookers-on. + +As it had been said that trains to the South would cease next day, the +Geneva train was overfilled, and one had to be well satisfied to secure +a seat at all. My travelling companions of the masculine gender were +very unattractive: an impertinent and vulgar old Swiss who, as it was a +cold night, and he had no travelling-rug, wrapped himself up in four or +five of his dirty shirts--a most repulsive sight; a very precise young +Frenchman who, without a vestige of feeling for the fate of his country +and nation, explained to us that he had long had a wish to see Italy, +and had thought that now, business being in any case at a standstill, +the right moment had arrived. + +The female travellers in the compartment were a Parisian, still young, +and her bright and charming fifteen-year-old daughter, whose beauty was +not unlike that of Mlle. Massin, the lovely actress at the _Theatre du +Gymnase_. The mother was all fire and flame, and raved, almost to +tears, over the present pass, cried shame on the cowardice of the +officers for not having turned out the Emperor; her one brother was a +prisoner at Koenigsberg; all her male relations were in the field. The +daughter was terror-struck at the thought that the train might be +stopped by the enemy--which was regarded as very likely--but laughed at +times, and was divided between fear of the Prussians and exceeding +anxiety to see them: _"J'aimerais bien pouvoir dire que j'aie vu des +Prussiens!"_ + +At one station some soldiers in rout, with torn and dusty clothes, got +into our carriage; they looked repulsive, bespattered with mud and clay; +they were in absolute despair, and you could hear from their +conversation how disorganised discipline was, for they abused their +officers right and left, called them incapable and treacherous, yet +themselves gave one the impression of being very indifferent soldiers. +The young sergeant major who was leading them was the only one who was +in anything like spirits, and even he was not much to boast of. It was +curious what things he believed: Marshal Leboeuf had had a Prussian +officer behind his chair, disguised as a waiter, at Metz, and it had +only just been discovered. Russia had lent troops to Prussia, and put +them into Prussian uniforms; otherwise there could not possibly be so +many of them. But Rome, too, was responsible for the misfortunes of +France; the Jesuits had planned it all, because the country was so +educated; they never liked anybody to learn anything. + +After Culoz commenced the journey through the lovely Jura mountains. On +both sides an immense panorama of high, wooded mountain ridges, with +poverty-stricken little villages along the mountain sides. At Bellegarde +our passports were demanded; no one was allowed to cross the frontier +without them--a stupid arrangement. The Alps began to bound our view. +The train went on, now through long tunnels, now between precipices, now +again over a rocky ridge, whence you looked down into the valley where +the blue-green Rhone wound and twined its way between the rocks like a +narrow ribbon. The speed seemed to be accelerating more and more. The +first maize-field. Slender poplars, without side-branches, but wholly +covered with foliage, stood bent almost into spirals by the strong wind +from the chinks of the rocks. The first Swiss house. + + +XXXI. + +There was Geneva, between the Alps, divided by the southern extremity of +Lake Leman, which was spanned by many handsome bridges. In the centre, a +little isle, with Rousseau's statue. A little beyond, the Rhone rushed +frothing and foaming out of the lake. From my window I could see in the +distance the dazzling snow peak of Mont Blanc. + +After Paris, Geneva looked like a provincial town. The cafes were like +servants' quarters or corners of cafes. There were no people in the +streets, where the sand blew up in clouds of dust till you could hardly +see out of your eyes, and the roads were not watered. In the hotel, in +front of the mirror, the New Testament in French, bound in leather; you +felt that you had come to the capital of Calvinism. + +The streets in the old part of the town were all up and down hill. In +the windows of the booksellers' shops there were French verses against +France, violent diatribes against Napoleon III. and outbursts of +contempt for the nation that had lost its virility and let itself be +cowed by a tyrant. By the side of these, portraits of the Freethinkers +and Liberals who had been driven from other countries and found a refuge +in Switzerland. + +I sailed the lake in every direction, enraptured by its beauty and the +beauty of the surrounding country. Its blueness, to which I had never +seen a parallel, altogether charmed me in the changing lights of night +and day. On the lake I made the acquaintance of a very pleasant Greek +family, the first I had encountered anywhere. The eldest daughter, a +girl of fourteen, lost her hat. I had a new silk handkerchief packed +amongst my things, and offered it to her. She accepted it and bound it +round her hair. Her name was Maria Kumelas. I saw for the first time an +absolutely pure Greek profile, such as I had been acquainted with +hitherto only from statues. One perfect, uninterrupted line ran from the +tip of her nose to her hair. + + +XXXII. + +I went for excursions into Savoy, ascended La Grande Saleve on donkey- +back, and from the top looked down at the full length of the Leman. + +I drove to the valley of Chamounix, sixty-eight miles, in a diligence +and four; about every other hour we had relays of horses and a new +driver. Whenever possible, we went at a rattling galop. Half-way I heard +the first Italian. It was only the word _quattro_; but it filled me +with delight. Above the high, wooded mountains, the bare rock projected +out of the earth, at the very top. The wide slopes up which the wood +ascended, until it looked like moss on stone, afforded a view miles in +extent. The river Arve, twisting itself in curves, was frequently +spanned by the roadway; it was of a greyish white, and very rapid, but +ugly. Splendid wooden bridges were thrown over it, with abysms on both +sides. Midway, after having for some time been hidden behind the +mountains, Mont Blanc suddenly appeared in its gleaming splendour, +positively tiring and paining the eye. It was a new and strange feeling +to be altogether hemmed in by mountains. It was oppressive to a plain- +dweller to be shut in thus, and not to be able to get away from the +immutable sheet of snow, with its jagged summits. Along the valley of +the stream, the road ran between marvellously fresh walnut-trees, plane- +trees, and avenues of apple trees; but sometimes we drove through +valleys so narrow that the sun only shone on them two or three hours of +the day, and there it was cold and damp. Savoy was plainly enough a poor +country. The grapes were small and not sweet; soil there was little of, +but every patch was utilised to the best advantage. In one place a +mountain stream rushed down the rocks; at a sharp corner, which jutted +out like the edge of a sloping roof, the stream was split up and +transformed into such fine spray that one could perceive no water at +all; afterwards the stream united again at the foot of the mountain, and +emptied itself with frantic haste into the river, foaming greyish white, +spreading an icy cold around. The changes of temperature were striking. +Under shelter, hot Summer, two steps further, stern, inclement Autumn, +air that penetrated to the very marrow of your bones. You ran through +every season of the year in a quarter of an hour. + +The other travellers were English people, all of one pattern, +unchangeable, immovable. If one of them had buttoned up his coat at the +beginning of the drive, he did not unbutton it on the way, were he never +so warm, and if he had put leather gloves on, for ten hours they would +not be off his hands. The men yawned for the most part; the young ladies +jabbered. The English had made the whole country subservient to them, +and at the hotels one Englishman in this French country was paid more +attention to than a dozen Frenchmen. + +Here I understood two widely different poems: Hauch's Swiss Peasant, and +Bjoernson's Over the Hills and Far Away. Hauch had felt this scenery and +the nature of these people, by virtue of his Norwegian birth and his +gift of entering into other people's thought; Bjoernson had given +unforgettable expression to the feeling of imprisoned longing. But for +the man who had been breathing street dust and street sweepings for four +months, it was good to breathe the strong, pure air, and at last see +once more the clouds floating about and beating against the mountain +sides, leaning, exhausted, against a declivity and resting on their +journey. Little children of eight or ten were guarding cattle, children +such as we know so well in the North, when they come with their marmots; +they looked, without exception, like tiny rascals, charming though they +were. + +I rode on a mule to Montanvert, and thence on foot over the Mer de +Glace, clambered up the steep mountain side to Chapeau, went down to the +crystal Grotto and rode from there back to Chamounix. The ride up in the +early hours of the morning was perfect, the mountain air so light; the +mists parted; the pine-trees round the fresh mountain path exhaled a +penetrating fragrance. An American family with whom I had become +acquainted took three guides with them for four persons. One worthy old +gentleman who was travelling with his young daughter, would not venture +upon this feat of daring, but his daughter was so anxious to accompany +us that when I offered to look after her she was entrusted to my care. I +took two mules and a guide, thinking that sufficient. From Montanvert +and down to the glacier, the road was bad, a steep, rocky path, with +loose, rolling stones. When we came to the Ice Sea, the young lady, as +was natural, took the guide's hand, and I, the last of the caravan, +strode cautiously along, my alpenstock in my hand, over the slippery, +billow-like ice. But soon it began to split up into deep crevasses, and +farther on we came to places where the path you had to follow was no +wider than a few hands' breadth, with yawning precipices in the ice on +both sides. I grew hot to the roots of my hair, and occasionally my +heart stood still. It was not that I was actually afraid. The guide +shouted to me: "Look neither to right nor left; look at your feet, and +turn out your toes!" I had only one thought--not to slip!--and out on +the ice I grew burningly hot. When at last I was across, I noticed that +I was shaking. Strangely enough, I was trembling at the _thought_ +of the blue, gaping crevasses on both sides of me, down which I had +barely glanced, and yet I had passed them without a shudder. The +beginning of the crossing had been comparatively easy; it was only that +at times it was very slippery. But in the middle of the glacier, +progress was very uncomfortable; moraines, and heaps of gigantic blocks +lay in your path, and all sorts of stone and gravel, which melted +glaciers had brought down with them, and these were nasty to negotiate. +When at last you had them behind you, came le _Mauvais Pas_, which +corresponded to its name. You climbed up the precipitous side of the +rock with the help of an iron railing drilled into it. But foothold was +narrow and the stone damp, from the number of rivulets that rippled and +trickled down. Finally it was necessary at every step to let go the +railing for a few seconds. The ascent then, and now, was supposed to be +quite free from danger, and the view over the glaciers which one gained +by it, was a fitting reward for the inconvenience. Even more beautiful +than the summit of Mont Blanc itself, with its rounded contours, were +the steep, gray, rocky peaks, with ice in every furrow, that are called +_l'Aiguille du Dru_. These mountains, which as far as the eye could +range seemed to be all the same height, although they varied from 7,000 +to 14,800 feet, stretched for miles around the horizon. + +The ice grotto here was very different from the sky-blue glacier grotto +into which I had wandered two years earlier at Grindelwald. Here the ice +mass was so immensely high that not the slightest peep of daylight +penetrated through it into the excavated archway that led into the ice. +It was half-dark inside, and the only light proceeded from a row of +little candles stuck into the crevices of the rock. The ice was jet +black in colour, the light gleaming with a golden sheen from all the +rounded projections and jagged points. It was like the gilt +ornamentation on a velvet pall. + +When I returned from Chamounix to Geneva, the proprietor of the hotel +was standing in the doorway and shouted to me: "The whole of the French +army, with the Emperor, has been taken prisoner at Sedan!"-- +"Impossible!" I exclaimed. "It is quite certain," he replied; "it was in +the German telegrams, and so far there has not come a single unveracious +telegram from the Germans." + +The next day a Genevese paper published the news of the proclamation of +the Republic in France. + +Simultaneously arrived a letter from Julius Lange, attacking me for my +"miserly city politics," seriously complaining that "our declaration of +war against Prussia had come to nothing," and hoping that my stay in +France had by now made me alter my views. + +In his opinion, we had neglected "an opportunity of rebellion, that +would never recur." + + +XXXIII. + +Lake Leman fascinated me. All the scenery round looked fairy-like to me, +a dream land, in which mighty mountains cast their blue-black shadows +down on the turquoise water, beneath a brilliant, sparkling sunshine +that saturated the air with its colouring. My impressions of Lausanne, +Chillon, Vevey, Montreux, were recorded in the first of my lectures at +the University the following year. The instruments of torture at +Chillon, barbaric and fearsome as they were, made me think of the still +worse murderous instruments being used in the war between France and +Germany. It seemed to me that if one could see war at close quarters, +one would come to regard the earth as peopled by dangerous lunatics. +Political indifference to human life and human suffering had taken the +place of the premeditated cruelty of the Middle Ages. Still, if no +previous war had ever been so frightful, neither had there ever been so +much done to mitigate suffering. While fanatic Frenchwomen on the +battlefields cut the noses off wounded Germans, and mutilated them when +they could, and while the Germans were burning villages and killing +their peaceful inhabitants, if one of them had so much as fired a shot, +in all quietness the great societies for the care of the wounded were +doing their work. And in this Switzerland especially bore the palm. +There were two currents then, one inhuman and one humane, and of the +two, the latter will one day prove itself the stronger. Under Louis XIV. +war was still synonymous with unlimited plundering, murder, rape, +thievery and robbery. Under Napoleon I. there were still no such things +as ambulances. The wounded were carted away now and again in waggons, +piled one on the top of each other, if any waggons were to be had; if +not, they were left as they lay, or were flung into a ditch, there to +die in peace. Things were certainly a little better. + + +XXXIV. + +In Geneva, the news reached me that--in spite of a promise Hall, as +Minister, had given to Hauch, when the latter asked for it for me--I was +to receive no allowance from the Educational Department. To a repetition +of the request, Hall had replied: "I have made so many promises and +half-promises, that it has been impossible to remember or to keep them." +This disappointment hit me rather hard; I had in all only about L50 +left, and could not remain away more than nine weeks longer without +getting into debt, I, who had calculated upon staying a whole year +abroad. Circumstances over which I had no control later obliged me, +however, to remain away almost another year. But that I could not +foresee, and I had no means whatever to enable me to do so. Several of +my acquaintances had had liberal allowances from the Ministry; Krieger +and Martensen had procured Heegaard L225 at once, when he had been +anxious to get away from Rasmus Nielsen's influence. It seemed to me +that this refusal to give me anything augured badly for the appointment +I was hoping for in Denmark. I could only earn a very little with my +pen: about 11_s_. 3_d_. for ten folio pages, and as I did not +feel able, while travelling, to write anything of any value, I did not +attempt it. It was with a sort of horror that, after preparing for long +travels that were to get me out of the old folds, I thought of the +earlier, narrow life I had led in Copenhagen. All the old folds seemed, +at this distance, to have been the folds of a strait-waistcoat. + + +XXXV. + +With abominable slowness, and very late, "on account of the war," the +train crawled from Geneva, southwards. Among the travellers was a +rhetorical Italian master-mason, from Lyons, an old Garibaldist, the +great event of whose life was that Garibaldi had once taken lunch alone +with him at Varese. He preserved in his home as a relic the glass from +which the general had drunk. He was talkative, and ready to help +everyone; he gave us all food and drink from his provisions. Other +travellers told that they had had to stand in queue for fully twelve +hours in front of the ticket office in Paris, to get away from the town. + +The train passed the place where Rousseau had lived, at Madame de +Warens'. In an official work on Savoy, written by a priest, I had +recently read a summary dismissal of Rousseau, as a calumniator of his +benefactress. According to this author, it certainly looked as though, +to say the least of it, Rousseau's memory had failed him amazingly +sometimes. The book asserted, for instance, that the Claude of whom he +speaks was no longer alive at the time when he was supposed to be +enjoying Madame de Warens' favours. + +We passed French volunteers in blouses bearing a red cross; they shouted +and were in high good humour; passed ten districts, where numbers of +cretins, with their hideous excrescences, sat by the wayside. At last we +arrived,--several hours behind time,--at St. Michel, at the foot of Mont +Cenis; it was four o'clock in the afternoon, and I was beginning to feel +tired, for I had been up since four in the morning. At five o'clock we +commenced the ascent, to the accompaniment of frightful groanings from +the engine; all the travellers were crowded together in three wretched +little carriages, the small engine not being able to pull more. Gay +young French girls exulted at the idea of seeing "Italy's fair skies." +They were not particularly fair here; the weather was rough and cloudy, +in keeping with abysms and mountain precipices. But late at night the +journey over Mont Cenis was wonderful. High up on the mountain the +moonlight gleamed on the mountain lake. And the way was dominated, from +one rocky summit, by the castle of Bramans with its seven imposing +forts. + +The locomotive stopped for an hour, for want of water. We were thus +obliged to sleep at the little Italian town of Susa (in a glorious +valley under Mont Cenis), the train to Turin having left three hours +before. Susa was the first Italian town I saw. When the train came in +next morning to the station at Turin, a crowd of Italian soldiers, who +were standing there, shouted: "The Prussians for ever!" and winked at +me. "What are they shouting for?" I asked a young Turin fellow with whom +I had had some long conversations. "It is an ovation to you," he +replied. "People are delighted at the victory of the Prussians, and they +think you are a Prussian, because of your fair moustache and beard." + + +XXXVI. + +An overwhelming impression was produced upon me by the monuments of +Turin, the River Po, and the lovely glee-singing in the streets. For the +first time, I saw colonnades, with heavy curtains to the street, serve +as pavements, with balconies above them. Officers in uniforms gleaming +with gold, ladies with handkerchiefs over their heads instead of hats, +the mild warmth, the brown eyes, brought it home to me at every step +that I was in a new country. + +I hurried up to Costanza Blanchetti. _Madame la comtesse est a la +campagne. Monsieur le comte est sorti._ Next morning, as I was +sitting in my room in the Hotel Trombetta, Blanchetti rushed in, pressed +me to his bosom, kissed me on both cheeks, would not let me go, but +insisted on carrying me off with him to the country. + +We drove round the town first, then went by rail to Alpignano, where +Costanza was staying with a relative of the family, Count Buglioni di +Monale. Here I was received like a son, and shown straight to my room, +where there stood a little bed with silk hangings, and where, on the +pillow, there lay a little, folded-up thing, likewise of white silk, +which was an enigma to me till, on unfolding it, I found it was a night- +cap, the classical night-cap, tapering to a point, which you see at the +theatre in old comedies. The Buglionis were gentle, good-natured people, +rugged and yet refined, an old, aristocratic country gentleman and his +wife. Nowhere have I thought grapes so heavy and sweet and aromatic as +there. The perfume from the garden was so strong and fragrant. +Impossible to think of a book or a sheet of paper at Alpignano. We +walked under the trees, lay among the flowers, enjoyed the sight and the +flavour of the apricots and grapes, and chatted, expressing by smiles +our mutual quiet, deep-reaching sympathy. + +One evening I went into Turin with Blanchetti to see the play. The lover +in _La Dame aux Camelias_ was played by a young Italian named +Lavaggi, as handsome as an Antinous, a type which I often encountered in +Piedmont. With his innate charm, restful calm, animation of movement and +the fire of his beauty, he surpassed the acting of all the young lovers +I had seen on the boards of the French theatres. The very play of his +fingers was all grace and expression. + + +XXXVII. + +On my journey from Turin to Milan, I had the mighty Mont Rosa, with its +powerful snow mass, and the St. Bernard, over which Buonaparte led his +tattered troops, before my eyes. We went across maize fields, through +thickets, over the battlefield of Magenta. From reading Beyle, I had +pictured Milan as a beautiful town, full of free delight in life. Only +to see it would be happiness. And it was,--the cupola gallery, the dome, +from the roof of which, immediately after my arrival, I looked out over +the town, shining under a pure, dark-blue sky. In the evening, in the +public gardens, I revelled in the beauty of the Milanese women. Italian +ladies at that time still wore black lace over their heads instead of +hats. Their dresses were open in front, the neck being bare half-way +down the chest. I was struck by the feminine type. Upright, slender- +waisted women; delicate, generally bare hands; oval faces, the eyebrows +of an absolutely perfect regularity; narrow noses, well formed, the +nostrils curving slightly upwards and outwards--the models of Leonardo +and Luini. + +The _Last Supper_, in the church of St. Maria delle Grazie, and the +drawings in the Ambrose Library, brought me closer to Leonardo than I +had ever been able to get before, through reproductions; I saw the true +expression in the face of the Christ in the _Last Supper_, which +copies cannot avoid distorting. + + +XXXVIII. + +A violent affection for Correggio, and a longing to see his works where +they are to be found in greatest number, sent me to Parma. + +I reached the town at night; no gas, no omnibus from any hotel. An out- +porter trotted with my portmanteau on his back through wide, pitch-dark, +deserted, colonnaded streets, past huge palaces, until, after half an +hour's rapid walk, we arrived at the hotel. The day before my arrival +dall'Ongaro had unveiled the beautiful and beautifully situated statue +of Correggio in the Market Square. I first investigated the two domes in +the Cathedral and San Giovanni Evangelista, then the ingratiating +pictorial decoration of the convent of San Paolo. In the Museum, where I +was pretty well the only visitor, I was so eagerly absorbed in studying +Correggio and jotting down my impressions, that, in order to waste no +time, I got the attendant to buy my lunch, and devoured it,--bread, +cheese, and grapes,--in the family's private apartments. They were +pleasant, obliging people, and as I bought photographs for a +considerable amount from them, they were very hospitable. They talked +politics to me and made no secret of their burning hatred for France. + +There were other things to see at Parma besides Correggio, although for +me he dominated the town. There was a large exhibition of modern Italian +paintings and statuary, and the life of the people in the town and round +about. In the streets stood carts full of grapes. Four or five fellows +with bare feet would stamp on the grapes in one of these carts; a trough +led from the cart down to a vat, into which the juice ran, flinging off +all dirt in fermentation. + +It was pleasant to walk round the old ramparts of the town in the +evening glow, and it was lively in the ducal park. One evening little +knots of Italian soldiers were sitting there. One of them sang in a +superb voice, another accompanied him very nicely on the lute; the +others listened with profound and eager attention. + + +XXXIX. + +After this came rich days in Florence. Everything was a delight to me +there, from the granite paving of the streets, to palaces, churches, +galleries, and parks. I stood in reverence before the Medici monuments +in Michael Angelo's sanctuary. The people attracted me less; the women +seemed to me to have no type at all, compared with the lovely faces and +forms at Milan and Parma. The fleas attracted me least of all. + +Dall 'Ongaro received every Sunday evening quite an international +company, and conversation consequently dragged. With the charming +Japanese wife of the English consul, who spoke only English and +Japanese, neither of her hosts could exchange a word. There were +Dutchmen and Swiss there with their ladies; sugar-sweet and utterly +affected young Italian men; handsome young painters and a few prominent +Italian scientists, one of whom, in the future, was to become my friend. + +I had a double recommendation to the Danish Minister at Florence, from +the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and from an old and intimate friend of +his in Copenhagen. When I presented my letters, he exclaimed, in +annoyance: "These special recommendations again! How often must I +explain that they are unnecessary, that all Danes, as such, are welcome +to my house!"--This was the delicate manner in which he let me +understand that he was not inclined to do anything whatever for me. +Moreover, he began at once with regrets that his family were absent, so +that he was not in housekeeping, and could not entertain anyone. + +At a production of Emile Augier's _Le Fils de Giboyer_, at which +all the foreign diplomatists were present, he, too, turned up. While the +other diplomatists greeted each other silently with a nod, he made more +of the meeting than any one else did, went from place to place in the +stalls, shook hands, spoke French, German, English and Italian by turns, +was all things to all men, then came and sat down by me, made himself +comfortable, and in a moment was fast asleep. When he began to snore, +one after another of his colleagues turned their heads, and smiled +faintly. He slept through two acts and the intervals between them, in +spite of the voices from the stage and the loud talking between the +acts, and woke up in the middle of the third act, to mumble in my ear, +"It is not much pleasure to see the piece played like this." + +At my favourite restaurant, _Trattoria dell'antiche carrozze_, I +was one day witness to a violent dispute between a Polish noble who, for +political reasons, had fled from Russian Poland, and Hans Semper, a +Prussian, author of a book on Donatello. The latter naturally worshipped +Bismarck, the former warmly espoused the cause of Denmark. When I left, +I said politely to him: + +"I thank you for having so warmly defended my country; I am a Dane." The +next day the Pole came to look for me at the restaurant, and a closer +acquaintance resulted. We went for many walks together along the +riverside; he talking like a typical Polish patriot, I listening to his +dreams of the resuscitated Poland that the future was to see. I mention +this only because it affords an example of the remarkable coincidences +life brings about, which make one so easily exclaim: "How small the +world is!" This Pole became engaged several years afterwards to a young +Polish girl and left her, without any explanation, having got entangled +with a Russian ballet dancer. I made her acquaintance at Warsaw fifteen +years after I had met him at Florence. She was then twenty-six years of +age, and is one of the women who have taught me most; she told me the +story of her early youth and of the unengaging part my acquaintance of +1870 had played in it. + +At Florence I saw Rossi as Hamlet. The performance was a disappointment +to me, inasmuch as Rossi, with his purely Italian nature, had done away +with the essentially English element in Hamlet. The keen English humour, +in his hands, became absurd and ridiculous. Hamlet's hesitation to act, +he overlooked altogether. Hamlet, to him, was a noble young man who was +grieved at his mother's ill-behaviour. The details he acted like a +virtuoso. For instance, it was very effective during the mimic play, +when, lying at Ophelia's feet, he crushes her fan in his hands at the +moment when the King turns pale. I derived my chief enjoyment, not from +the acting, but from the play. It suddenly revealed itself to me from +other aspects, and I fell prostrate in such an exceeding admiration for +Shakespeare that I felt I should never rise again. It was touching to +hear the Italians' remarks on _Hamlet_. The piece was new to them. +You frequently heard the observation: "It is a very philosophical +piece." As people changed from place to place, and sat wherever they +liked, I overheard many different people's opinions of the drama. The +suicide monologue affected these fresh and alert minds very powerfully. + +That evening, moreover, I had occasion to observe human cowardice, which +is never accounted so great as it really is. There was a noise behind +the scene during the performance, and immediately afterwards a shout of +_Fuoco!_ The audience were overmastered by terror. More than half +of them rushed to the doors, pulled each other down, and trampled on the +fallen, in their endeavours to get out quickly enough; others rushed up +on the stage itself. As there was not the least sign of fire visible, I +of course remained in my seat. A few minutes later one of the actors +came forward and explained that there had been no fire; a fight between +two of the scene-shifters had been the cause of all the alarm. The good- +humoured Italians did not even resent the fellows having thus disturbed +and interrupted the performance. + +John Stuart Mill had given me an introduction to Pasquale Villari, who, +even at that time, was _commendatore professore_, and held a high +position on the Board of Education, but was still far from having +attained the zenith of his fame and influence. When the reserve of the +first few days had worn off, he was simply splendid to me. When anything +I said struck him as being to the point, he pressed my hands with all +the ardour of youth, and he applauded every joke I attempted with +uproarious laughter. + +Some twenty years were to elapse before I saw him again. Then he called +upon me in Copenhagen, wishing to make my acquaintance, without in the +least suspecting that I was the young man who, so long before, had come +to him from Mill. He looked with amazement at books in which he had +written with his own hand, and at old letters from himself which I +produced. I visited him again in 1898. His books on Machiavelli and +Savonarola entitle him to rank among the foremost students and exponents +of Italy. + +I went one day to the great annual fair at Fiesole. Shouting and +shrieking, the people drove down the unspeakably dusty road with such +haste, carelessness and high spirits that conveyances struck against +each other at every moment. It was the life represented in Marstrand's +old-time pictures. In crowded Fiesole, I saw the regular Tuscan country +type, brown eyes, yellow or clear, white skin, thin, longish face, brown +or fair, but never black hair, strong, healthy bodies. The masculine +type with which I was acquainted from the soldiers, was undeniably +handsomer than our own, in particular, was more intelligent; the young +women were modest, reserved in their manner, seldom entered into +conversation with the men, and despite the fire in their eyes, +manifested a certain peasant bashfulness, which seems to be the same +everywhere. + + +XL. + +Vines twine round the fruit-trees; black pigs and their families make +their appearance in tribes; the lake of Thrasymene, near which Hannibal +defeated the Romans, spreads itself out before us. The train is going +from Florence to Rome. Towards mid-day a girl enters the carriage, +apparently English or North American, with brown eyes and brown hair, +that curls naturally about her head; she has her guitar-case in her +hand, and flings it up into the net. Her parents follow her. As there is +room in the compartment for forty-eight persons without crowding, she +arranges places for her parents, and after much laughter and joking the +latter settle off to sleep. The Italians stare at her; but not I. I sit +with my back to her. She sits down, back to back with me, then turns her +head and asks me, in Italian, some question about time, place, or the +like. I reply as best I can. She (in English): "You are Italian?" On my +reply, she tells me: "I hardly know twenty words in Italian; I only +speak English, although I have been living in Rome for two years." + +She then went on to relate that she was an American, born of poor +parents out on the Indian frontier; she was twenty-six years old, a +sculptor, and was on her way from Carrara, where she had been +superintending the shipment of one of her works, a statue of Lincoln, +which the Congress at Washington had done her the honour of ordering +from her. It was only when she was almost grown up that her talent had +been discovered by an old sculptor who happened to pay a visit and who, +when he saw her drawing, had, half in jest, given her a lump of clay and +said: "Do a portrait of me!" She had then never seen a statue or a +painting, but she evinced such talent that before long several +distinguished men asked her to do busts of them, amongst others, +Lincoln. She was staying at his house that 14th April, 1865, when he was +murdered, and was consequently selected to execute the monument after +his death. She hesitated for a long time before giving up the modest, +but certain, position she held at the time in a post-office; but, as +others believed in her talent, she came to Europe, stayed first in +Paris, where, to her delight, she made the acquaintance of Gustave Dore, +and where she modelled a really excellent bust of Pere Hyacinthe, +visited London, Berlin, Munich, Florence, and settled down in Rome. +There she received plenty of orders, had, moreover, obtained permission +to execute a bust of Cardinal Antonelli, was already much looked up to, +and well-to-do. In a few weeks she was returning to America. + +As she found pleasure in talking to me, she exclaimed without more ado: +"I will stay with you," said a few polite things to me, and made me +promise that I would travel with her to Rome from the place where we +were obliged to leave the train, the railway having been broken up to +prevent the Italian troops entering the Papal States. At Treni a Danish +couple got into the train, a mediocre artist and his wife, and with +national astonishment and curiosity watched the evident intimacy between +the young foreigner and myself, concerning which every Scandinavian in +Rome was informed a few days later. + +From Monte Rotondo, where the bridge had been blown up, we had to walk a +long distance, over bad roads, and were separated in the throng, but she +kept a place for me by her side. Thus I drove for the first time over +the Roman Campagna, by moonlight, with two brown eyes gazing into mine. +I felt as though I had met one of Sir Walter Scott's heroines, and won +her confidence at our first meeting. + + +XLI. + +Vinnie Ream was by no means a Scott heroine, however, but a genuine +American, and doubly remarkable to me as being the first specimen of a +young woman from the United States with whom I became acquainted. Even +after I had seen a good deal of her work, I could not feel wholly +attracted by her talent, which sometimes expressed itself rather in a +pictorial than a plastic form, and had a fondness for emotional effects. +But she was a true artist, and a true woman, and I have never, in any +woman, encountered a will like hers. She was uninterruptedly busy. +Although, now that the time of her departure was so near, a few boxes +were steadily being packed every day at her home, she received every day +visits from between sixteen and twenty-five people, and she had so many +letters by post that I often found three or four unopened ones amongst +the visiting cards that had been left. Those were what she had +forgotten, and if she had read them, she had no time to reply to them. +Every day she sat for a few hours to the clever American painter Healy, +who was an admirer of her talent, and called her abilities genius. Every +day she worked at Antonelli's bust. To obtain permission to execute it, +she had merely, dressed in her most beautiful white gown, asked for an +audience of the dreaded cardinal, and had at once obtained permission. +Her intrepid manner had impressed the hated statesman of the political +and ecclesiastical reaction, and in her representation of him he +appeared, too, in many respects nobler and more refined than he was. But +besides modelling the cardinal's bust, she put the finishing touches to +two others, saw to her parents' household affairs and expenses, and +found time every day to spend a few hours with me, either in a walk or +wandering about the different picture-galleries. + +She maintained the family, for her parents had nothing at all. But when +the statue of Lincoln had been ordered from her, Congress had +immediately advanced ten thousand dollars. So she was able to live free +from care, though for that matter she troubled not at all about money. +She was very ignorant of things outside her own field, and the words +_my work_ were the only ones that she spoke with passion. What she +knew, she had acquired practically, through travel and association with +a multiplicity of people. She hardly knew a dozen words of any language +besides English, and was only acquainted with English and American +writers; of poets, she knew Shakespeare and Byron best; from life and +books she had extracted but few general opinions, but on the other hand, +very individual personal views. These were based upon the theory that +the lesser mind must always subordinate itself to the higher, and that +the higher has a right to utilise freely the time and strength of the +lesser, without being called to account for doing so. She herself was +abjectly modest towards the artists she looked up to. Other people might +all wait, come again, go away without a reply. + +Rather small of stature, strong and healthy,--she had never been ill, +never taken medicine,--with white teeth and red cheeks, quick in +everything, when several people were present she spoke only little and +absently, was as cold, deliberate and composed as a man of strong +character; but at the same time she was unsuspecting and generous, and +in spite of her restlessness and her ambitious industry, ingratiatingly +coquettish towards anyone whose affection she wished to win. It was +amusing to watch the manner in which she despatched the dutifully +sighing Italians who scarcely crossed the threshold of her studio before +they declared themselves. She replied to them with a superabundance of +sound sense and dismissed them with a jest. + +One day that I went to fetch her to the Casino Borghese, I found her +dissolved in tears. One of the two beautiful doves who flew about the +house and perched on her shoulders, and which she had brought with her +from Washington, had disappeared in the night. At first I thought that +her distress was half jest, but nothing could have been more real; she +was beside herself with grief. I realised that if philologians have +disputed as to how far Catullus' poem of the girl's grief over the dead +sparrow were jest or earnest, it was because they had never seen a girl +weep over a bird. Catullus, perhaps, makes fun a little of the grief, +but the grief itself, in his poem too, is serious enough. + +In the lovely gardens of the Villa Borghese, Vinnie Ream's melancholy +frame of mind was dispersed, and we sat for a long time by one of the +handsome fountains and talked, among other things, of our pleasure in +being together, which pleasure was not obscured by the prospect of +approaching parting, because based only on good-fellowship, and with no +erotic element about it. Later in the evening, she had forgotten her +sorrow altogether in the feverish eagerness with which she worked, and +she kept on, by candle-light, until three o'clock in the morning. + +A poor man, an Italian, who kept a little hotel, came in that evening +for a few minutes; he sometimes translated letters for Vinnie Ream. As +he had no business with me, I did not address any of my remarks to him; +she, on the contrary, treated him with extreme kindness and the greatest +respect, and whispered to me: "Talk nicely to him, as you would to a +gentleman, for that he is; he knows four languages splendidly; he is a +talented man. Take no notice of his plain dress. We Americans do not +regard the position, but the man, and he does honour to his position." I +had not been actuated by the prejudices she attributed to me, +nevertheless entered into conversation with the man, as she wished, and +listened with pleasure to his sensible opinions. (He spoke, among other +things, of Northern art, and warmly praised Carl Bloch's +_Prometheus_.) + + +XLII. + +Vinnie Ream's opinion of me was that I was the most impolitic man that +she had ever known. She meant, by that, that I was always falling out +with people (for instance, I had at once offended the Danes in Rome by +some sharp words about the wretched Danish papers), and in general made +fewer friends and more enemies all the time. She herself won the +affection of everyone she wished, and made everyone ready to spring to +do her bidding. She pointed out to me how politic she had had to be over +her art. When she had wished to become a sculptor, everyone in her +native place had been shocked at the un-femininity of it, and people +fabled behind her back about her depraved instincts. She, for her part, +exerted no more strength than just enough to carry her point, let people +talk as much as they liked, took no revenge on those who spread +calumnies about her, showed the greatest kindliness even towards the +evil-disposed, and so, she said, had not an enemy. There was in her a +marvellous commingling of determination to progress rapidly, of self- +restraint and of real good-heartedness. + +On October 20th there was a great festival in Rome to celebrate the +first monthly anniversary of the entry of the Italians into the town. +Young men went in the evening with flags and music through the streets. +Everybody rushed to the windows, and the ladies held out lamps and +candles. In the time of the popes this was only done when the Host was +being carried in solemn procession to the dying; it was regarded +therefore as the greatest honour that could be paid. Everyone clapped +hands and uttered shouts of delight at the improvised illumination, +while the many beautiful women looked lovely in the flickering +lamplight. The 23d again was a gala day, being the anniversary of the +death of Enrico Cairoli--one of the celebrated brothers; he fell at +Mentana;--and I had promised Vinnie Ream to go to see the fete with her; +but she as usual having twenty callers just when we ought to have +started, we arrived too late. Vinnie begged of me to go with her instead +to the American chapel; she must and would sing hymns, and really did +sing them very well. + +The chapel was bare. On the walls the ten commandments and a few other +quotations from Holy Writ, and above a small altar, "Do this in +remembrance of me," in Gothic lettering. I had to endure the hymns, the +sermon (awful), and the reading aloud of the ten commandments, with +muttered protestations and Amens after each one from the reverent +Americans. When we went out I said nothing, as I did not know whether +Vinnie might not be somewhat moved, for she sang at the end with great +emotion. However, she merely took my arm and exclaimed: "That minister +was the most stupid donkey I have ever heard in my life; but it is nice +to sing." Then she began a refutation of the sermon, which had hinged +chiefly on the words: "_Thy sins are forgiven thee_," and of the +unspeakable delight it should be to hear this. Vinnie thought that no +rational being would give a fig for forgiveness, unless there followed +with it a complete reinstatement of previous condition. What am I +benefitted if ever so many heavenly beings say to me: "I _pretend_ +you have not done it" if I know that I have! + +The last week in October we saw marvellous Northern Lights in Rome. The +northern half of the heavens, about nine o'clock in the evening, turned +a flaming crimson, and white streaks traversed the red, against which +the stars shone yellow, while every moment bluish flashes shot across +the whole. When I discovered it I went up to the Reams' and fetched +Vinnie down into the street to see it. It was an incredibly beautiful +atmospheric phenomenon. Next evening it manifested itself again, on a +background of black clouds, and that was the last beautiful sight upon +which Vinnie and I looked together. + +Next evening I wrote: + + Vinnie Ream leaves to-morrow morning; I said good-bye to her this + evening. Unfortunately a great many people were there. She took my hand + and said: "I wish you everything good in the world, and I know that you + wish me the same." And then: Good-bye. A door opens, and a door closes, + and people never meet again on this earth, never again, never--and + human language has never been able to discover any distinction between + good-bye for an hour, and good-bye forever. People sit and chat, smile + and jest. Then you get up, and the story is finished. Over! over! And + that is the end of all stories, says Andersen. + + All one's life one quarrels with people as dear to one as Ploug is to + me. I have a well-founded hope that I may see Rudolph Schmidt's profile + again soon, and a hundred times again after that; but Vinnie I shall + never see again. + + I did not understand her at first; I had a few unpleasant conjectures + ready. I had to have many conversations with her before I understood her + ingenuousness, her ignorance, her thorough goodness, in short, all her + simple healthiness of soul. Over! + + When I was teasing her the other day about all the time I had wasted in + her company, she replied: "_People do not waste time with their + friends_," and when I exclaimed: "What do I get from you?" she + answered, laughing: + + "_Inspiration_." And that was the truth. Those great brown eyes, + the firm eyebrows, the ringleted mass of chestnut brown hair and the + fresh mouth--all this that I still remember, but perhaps in three months + shall no longer be able to recall, the quick little figure, now + commanding, now deprecating, is to me a kind of inspiration. I have + never been in love with Vinnie; but most people would think so, to hear + the expressions I am now using. But I love her as a friend, as a mind + akin to my own. There were thoughts of our brains and strings of our + hearts, which always beat in unison. Peace be with her! May the cursed + world neither rend her nor devour her; may she die at last with the + clear forehead she has now! I am grateful to her. She has communicated + to me a something good and simple that one cannot see too much of and + that one scarcely ever sees at all. Finally, she has shown me again the + spectacle of a human being entirely happy, and good because happy, a + soul without a trace of bitterness, an intellect whose work is not a + labour. + + It is not that Vinnie is--or rather was, since she is dead for me--an + educated girl in the Copenhagen sense of the word. The verdict of the + Danish educational establishments upon her would be that she was a + deplorably uneducated girl. She was incomprehensibly dull at languages. + She would be childishly amused at a jest or joke or compliment as old as + the hills (such as the Italians were fond of using), and think it new, + for she knew nothing of the European storehouse of stereotyped remarks + and salted drivel. Her own conversation was new; a breath of the + independence of the great Republic swept through it. She was no fine + lady, she was _an American girl_, who had not attained her rank by + birth, or through inherited riches, but had fought for it herself with a + talent that had made its way to the surface without early training, + through days and nights of industry, and a mixture of enthusiasm and + determination. + + She was vain; she certainly was that. But again like a child, delighted + at verses in her honour in the American papers, pleased at homage and + marks of distinction, but far more ambitious than vain of personal + advantages. She laughed when we read in the papers of Vinnie Ream, that, + in spite of the ill-fame creative lady artists enjoy, far from being a + monster with green eyes, she ventured to be beautiful. + + She was a good girl. There was a certain deep note about all that her + heart uttered. She had a mind of many colours. And there was the very + devil of a rush and Forward! March! about her, _always in a hurry_. + + And now--no Roman elegy--I will hide her away in my memory: + + Here lies + VINNIE REAM + Sculptor + of Washington, U.S.A. + Six-and-twenty years of age + This recollection of her is retained by + One who knew her + for seventeen days + and will never forget her. + +I have really never seen Vinnie Ream since. We exchanged a few letters +after her departure, and the rest was silence. + +Her statue of Abraham Lincoln stands now in a rotunda on the Capitol, +for which it was ordered. Later, a Congress Committee ordered from her a +statue of Admiral Farragut, which is likewise erected in Washington. +These are the only two statues that the government of the United States +has ever ordered from a woman. Other statues of hers which I have seen +mentioned bear the names of _Miriam, The West, Sappho, The Spirit of +Carnival_, etc. Further than this, I only know that she married +Richard L. Hoxie, an engineer, and only a few years ago was living in +Washington. + + +XLIII. + +It was a real trouble to me that the Pope, in his exasperation over the +conquest of Rome--in order to make the accomplished revolution recoil +also on the heads of the foreigners whom he perhaps suspected of +sympathy with the new order of things--had closed the Vatican and all +its collections. Rome was to me first and foremost Michael Angelo's +Sistine Chapel, Raphael's Stanzas and Loggias, and now all this +magnificent array, which I had travelled so far to see, was closed to me +by an old man's bad temper. + +But there was still enough to linger over in Rome. The two palaces that +seemed to me most deserving of admiration were the Farnese and the +Cancellaria, the former Michael Angelo's, the latter Bramante's work, +the first a perpetuation in stone of beauty and power, the second, of +grace and lightness. I felt that if one were to take a person with no +idea of architecture and set him in front of these buildings, there +would fall like scales from his eyes, and he would say: "Now I know what +the building art means." + +Luini's exquisite painting, _Vanity and Modesty_, in the Galleria +Sciarra, impressed me profoundly. It represented two women, one nun- +like, the other magnificently dressed. The latter is Leonardo's well- +known type, as a magically fascinating personality. Its essential +feature is a profoundly serious melancholy, but the beauty of the figure +is seductive. She is by no means smiling, and yet she looks as though a +very slight alteration would produce a smile, and as though the heavens +themselves would open, if smile she did. The powerful glance of the dark +blue eyes is in harmony with the light-brown hair and the lovely hands. +"It would be terrible to meet in real life a woman who looked like +that," I wrote; "for a man would grow desperate at his inability to win +her and desperate because the years must destroy such a marvel. That is +why the gracious gods have willed it otherwise; that is why she does not +exist. That is why she is only a vision, a revelation, a painting, and +that is why she was conceived in the brain of Leonardo, the place on +earth most favoured by the gods, and executed by Luini, that all +generations might gaze at her without jealousy, and without dread of the +molestations of Time." + +One day, at the Museo Kircheriano, where I was looking at the admirable +antiquities, I made acquaintance with a Jesuit priest, who turned out to +be exceedingly pleasant and refined, a very decent fellow, in fact. He +spoke Latin to me, and showed me round; at an enquiry of mine, he +fetched from his quarters in the Collegio Romano a book with +reproductions from the pagan section of the Lateran Museum, and +explained to me some bas-reliefs which I had not understood. His +obligingness touched me, his whole attitude made me think. Hitherto I +had only spoken to one solitary embryo Jesuit,--a young Englishman who +was going to Rome to place himself at the service of the Pope, and who +was actuated by the purest enthusiasm; I was struck by the fact that +this second Jesuit, too, seemed to be a worthy man. It taught me how +independent individual worth is of the nature of one's convictions. + +Most of the Italians I had so far been acquainted with were simple +people, my landlord and his family, and those who visited them, and I +sometimes heard fragments of conversation which revealed the common +people's mode of thought to me. In one house that I visited, the +mistress discovered that her maid was not married to her so-called +husband, a matter in which, for that matter, she was very blameless, +since her parents had refused their consent, and she had afterwards +allowed herself to be abducted. Her mistress reproached her for the +illegal relations existing. She replied, "If God wishes to plunge anyone +into misery, that person is excused."--"We must not put the blame of +everything upon God," said the mistress.--"Yes, yes," replied the girl +unabashed; "then if the Devil wishes to plunge a person into misery, the +person is excused."--"Nor may we put the blame of our wrongdoing on the +Devil," said the mistress.--"Good gracious," said the girl, "it must be +the fault of one or other of them, everybody knows that. If it is not +the one, it is the other." + +At the house of the Blanchettis, who had come to Rome, I met many Turin +and Roman gentlemen. They were all very much taken up by an old Sicilian +chemist of the name of Muratori, who claimed that he had discovered a +material which looked like linen, but was impervious to bullets, sword- +cuts, bayonet-thrusts, etc. Blanchetti himself had fired his revolver at +him at two paces, and the ball had fallen flat to the ground. There +could be no question of juggling; Muratori was an honourable old +Garibaldist who had been wounded in his youth, and now went about on +crutches, but, since we have never heard of its being made practical use +of, it would seem that there was nothing in it. + +I did not care to look up all the Italians to whom I had introductions +from Villari. But I tried my luck with a few of them. The first was Dr. +Pantaleoni, who had formerly been banished from the Papal States and who +left the country as a radical politician, but now held almost +conservative views. He had just come back, and complained bitterly of +all the licentiousness. "Alas!" he said, "we have freedom enough now, +but order, order!" Pantaleoni was a little, eager, animated man of +fifty, very much occupied, a politician and doctor, and he promised to +introduce me to all the scholars whose interests I shared. As I felt +scruples at taking up these gentlemen's time, he exclaimed wittily: "My +dear fellow, take up their time! To take his time is the greatest +service you can render to a Roman; he never knows what to do to kill +it!" + +The next man I went to was Prince Odescalchi, one of the men who had +then recently risen to the surface, officially termed the hero of the +Young Liberals. Pantaleoni had dubbed him a blockhead, and he had not +lied. He turned out to be a very conceited and frothy young man with a +parting all over his head, fair to whiteness, of strikingly Northern +type, with exactly the same expressionless type of face as certain of +the milksops closely connected with the Court in Denmark. + + +XLIV. + +There were a great many Scandinavians in Rome; they foregathered at the +various eating-houses and on a Saturday evening at the Scandinavian +Club. Some of them were painters, sculptors and architects, with their +ladies, there were some literary and scientific men and every +description of tourists on longer or shorter visits to the Eternal City. +I held myself aloof from them. Most of them had their good qualities, +but they could not stand the test of any association which brought them +into too close contact with one another, as life in a small town does. +They were divided up into camps or hives, and in every hive ruled a lady +who detested the queen bee of the next one. So it came about that the +Scandinavians lived in perpetual squabbles, could not bear one another, +slandered one another, intrigued against one another. When men got drunk +on the good Roman wine at the _osterie_, they abused one another +and very nearly came to blows. Moreover, they frequently got drunk, for +most of them lost their self-control after a few glasses. Strangely +enough, in the grand surroundings, too much of the Northern pettiness +came to the surface in them. One was continually tempted to call out to +the ladies, in Holberg's words: "Hold your peace, you good women!" and +to the men: "Go away, you rapscallions, and make up your quarrels!" + +There were splendid young fellows among the artists, but the painters, +who were in the majority, readily admitted that technically they could +learn nothing at all in Rome, where they never saw a modern painting; +they said themselves that they ought to be in Paris, but the authorities +in Christiania and Copenhagen were afraid of Paris: thence all bad and +dangerous influences proceeded, and so the painters still journey to +Rome, as their fathers did before them. + + +XLV. + +Towards the middle of November the Pope opened the Vatican. But in face +of the enormous conflux of people, it was not easy to get a +_permesso_ from the consul, and that could not be dispensed with. I +had just made use of one for the Vatican sculpture collection, one day, +when I felt very unwell. I ascribed my sensations at first to the +insufferable weather of that month, alternately sirocco and cold sleet, +or both at once; then I was seized with a dread of the climate, of Rome, +of all these strange surroundings, and I made up my mind to go home as +quickly as possible. The illness that was upon me was, without my +knowing it, the cause of my fear. The next day I was carried downstairs +by two vile-smelling labourers and taken by Vilhelm Rosenstand the +painter, who was one of the few who had made friends with me and shown +me kindness, to the Prussian hospital on the Tarpeian Rock, near the +Capitol. + +Here a bad attack of typhoid fever held me prisoner in my bed for some +few months, after a compatriot, who had no connection whatever with me, +had been so inconsiderate as to inform my parents by telegraph how ill I +was, and that there was little hope for me. + +The first month I was not fully conscious; I suffered from a delusion of +coercion. Thus it seemed to me that the left side of my bed did not +belong to me, but to another man, who sometimes took the place; and that +I myself was divided into several persons, of which one, for instance, +asked my legs to turn a little to the one side or the other. One of +these persons was Imperialist, and for that reason disliked by the +others, who were Republicans; nevertheless, he performed great +kindnesses for them, making them more comfortable, when it was in his +power. Another strangely fantastic idea that held sway for a long time +was that on my head, the hair of which had been shorn by the hospital +attendant rather less artistically than one cuts a dog's, there was a +clasp of pearls and precious stones, which I felt but could not see. + +Afterwards, all my delusions centred on food. + +I was very much neglected at the hospital. The attendance was wretched. +The highly respected German doctor, who was appointed to the place, had +himself an immense practice, and moreover was absolutely taken up by the +Franco-Prussian war. Consequently, he hardly ever came, sometimes stayed +away as long as thirteen days at a stretch, during all which time a +patient who might happen to be suffering, say, from constipation, must +lie there without any means of relief. My bed was as hard as a stone, +and I was waked in the night by pains in my body and limbs; the pillow +was so hard that the skin of my right ear was rubbed off from the +pressure. There were no nurses. There was only one custodian for the +whole hospital, a Russian fellow who spoke German, and who sometimes had +as many as fourteen patients at a time to look after, but frequently +went out to buy stores, or visit his sweetheart, and then all the +patients could ring at once without any one coming. After I had passed +the crisis of my illness, and consequently began to suffer terribly from +hunger, I was ordered an egg for my breakfast; I sometimes had to lie +for an hour and a half, pining for this egg. Once, for three days in +succession, there were no fresh eggs to be had. So he would bring for my +breakfast nothing but a small piece of dry bread. One day that I was +positively ill with hunger, I begged repeatedly for another piece of +bread, but he refused it me. It was not malice on his part, but pure +stupidity, for he was absolutely incapable of understanding how I felt. +And to save fuel, he let me suffer from cold, as well as from hunger; +would never put more than one wretched little stick at a time into the +stove. Everything was pinched to an incredible extent. Thus it was +impossible for me to get a candle in the evening before it was +absolutely dark, and then never more than one, although it made my eyes +water to try to read. Candles and firing, it appears, were not put down +in the bill. And yet this hospital is kept up on subscriptions from all +the great Powers, so there must be someone into whose pockets the money +goes. Most of us survived it; a few died who possibly might have been +kept alive; one was preserved for whom the Danish newspapers have +beautiful obituaries ready. + +Over my head, in the same building, there lived a well-known German +archaeologist, who was married to a Russian princess of such colossal +physical proportions that Roman popular wits asserted that when she +wished to go for a drive she had to divide herself between two cabs. +This lady had a great talent for music. I never saw her, but I became +aware of her in more ways than one: whenever she crossed the floor on +the third story, the ceiling shook, and the boards creaked, in a manner +unbearable to an invalid. And just when I had settled myself off, and +badly wanted to sleep, towards eleven o'clock at night, the heavy lady +above would sit down at her grand piano, and make music that would have +filled a concert hall resound through the place. + +After a month had passed, the doctor declared that I had "turned the +corner," and might begin to take a little food besides the broth that up +till then had been my only nourishment. A little later, I was allowed to +try to get up. I was so weak that I had to begin to learn to walk again; +I could not support myself on my legs, but dragged myself, with the help +of the custodian, the four or five steps from the bed to a sofa. + +Just at this time I received two letters from Copenhagen, containing +literary enquiries and offers. The first was from the editor of the +_Illustrated Times_, and enquired whether on my return home I would +resume the theatrical criticisms in the paper; in that case they would +keep the position open for me. I gave a negative reply, as I was tired +of giving my opinion on a Danish drama. The second letter, which +surprised me more, was from the editor of the, at that time, powerful +_Daily Paper_, Steen Bille, offering me the entire management of +the paper after the retirement of Molbech, except so far as politics +were concerned, the editor naturally himself retaining the latter. As +Danish things go, it was a very important offer to a young man. It +promised both influence and income, and it was only my profound and +ever-increasing determination not to give myself up to journalism that +made me without hesitation dictate a polite refusal. I was still to weak +to write. My motive was simply and solely that I wished to devote my +life to knowledge. But Bille, who knew what power in a little country +like Denmark his offer would have placed in my hands, hardly understood +it in this way, and was exceedingly annoyed at my refusal. It gave the +first impulse to his altered feeling toward me. I have sometimes +wondered since whether my fate in Denmark might not have been different +had I accepted the charge. It is true that the divergence between what +the paper and I, in the course of the great year 1871, came to +represent, would soon have brought about a split. The Commune in Paris +caused a complete _volte face_ of the liberal bourgeoisie in +Denmark, as elsewhere. + + +XLVI. + +While I was still too weak to write, I received a letter from Henrik +Ibsen (dated December 20, 1870), which impressed me greatly. Henrik +Ibsen and I had been on friendly terms with one another since April, +1866, but it was only about this time that our intimacy began to emit +sparks, an intimacy which was destined to have a very widening influence +upon me, and which is perhaps not without traces on the stages of his +poetical progress. + +Ibsen thought I had already recovered, and wrote to me as to a +convalescent. He complained bitterly of the conquest of Rome by the +Italians: Rome was now taken from "us men" and given over to the +"politicians"; it had been a spot sacred to peace, and was so no +longer.--This assertion was at variance with my religion. It seemed to +me unpermissible to desire, for aesthetic reasons, to see the +restoration of an ecclesiastical regime, with its remorseless system of +oppression. Human happiness and intellectual progress were worth more +than the retention of the idylls of naivete. I replied to him by +declaring my faith in freedom and soon he outdid me in this, as in other +domains. + +But there was one other part of the letter that went to my heart and +rejoiced me. It was where Ibsen wrote that what was wanted was a revolt +in the human mind, and in that I ought to be one of the leaders. These +words, which were in exact agreement with my own secret hope, fired my +imagination, ill though I was. It seemed to me that after having felt +myself isolated so long, I had at last met with the mind that understood +me and felt as I did, a real fellow-fighter. As soon as I was once more +fit to use my pen, I wrote a flaming reply in verse (headed, The +Hospital in Rome, the night of January 9, 1871). In it I described how +solitary I had been, in my intellectual fight and endeavour, and +expressed my contentment at having found a brother in him. + + +XLVII. + +Among the Danes, and there were not many of them, who frequently came to +see me at the hospital, I must mention the kind and tactful musician +Niels Ravnkilde, whom I had known when I was a child. He had been living +in Rome now for some twenty years. He was gentle and quiet, good- +looking, short of stature, modest and unpretending, too weak of +character not to be friends with everyone, but equipped with a natural +dignity. When a young music master in Copenhagen, he had fallen in love +with a young, wealthy girl, whose affections he succeeded in winning in +return, but he was turned out of the house by her harsh, purse-proud +father, and in desperation had left Denmark to settle down in Rome. As +his lady-love married soon after and became a contented wife and mother, +he remained where he was. He succeeded in making his way. + +He gradually became a favourite teacher of music among the ladies of the +Roman aristocracy, who sometimes invited him to their country-houses in +the Summer. He was on a good footing with the native maestros most in +request, who quickly understood that the modest Dane was no dangerous +rival. Graceful as Ravnkilde was in his person, so he was in his art; +there was nothing grand about him. But he was clever, and had a natural, +unaffected wit. His difficult position as a master had taught him +prudence and reserve. He was obligingness personified to travelling +Scandinavians, and was proud of having, as he thought, made the +acquaintance in Rome of the flower of the good society of the Northern +countries. Even long after he had come to the front, he continued to +live in the fourth storey apartment of the Via Ripetta, where he had +taken up his abode on his arrival in Rome, waited upon by the same +simple couple. His circumstances could not improve, if only for the +reason that he sent what he had to spare to relatives of his in +Copenhagen, who had a son who was turning out badly, and lived by +wasting poor Ravnkilde's savings. After having been the providence of +all Danish travellers to Rome for thirty years, certain individuals who +had influence with the government succeeded in obtaining a distinction +for him. The government then gave him, not even the poor little +decoration that he ought to have had twenty years before, but--brilliant +idea!--awarded him the title of _Professor_, which in Italian, of +course, he had always been, and which was a much more insignificant +title than _Maestro_, by which he was regularly called. + +Ravnkilde wrote my letters at the hospital for me, and the day I came +out we drove away together to the French restaurant to celebrate the +occasion by a dinner. + +I went from there up to Monte Pincio in a glorious sunshine, rejoiced to +see the trees again, and the people in their Sunday finery, and the +lovely women's faces, as well as at being able to talk to people once +more. It was all like new life in a new world. I met a good many +Scandinavians, who congratulated me, and a young savant, Giuseppe +Saredo, who, as professor of law, had been removed from Siena to Rome, +and with whom, at the house of dall'Ongaro at Florence, I had had some +delightful talks. We decided that we would keep in touch with one +another. + + +XLVIII. + +It was only this one day, however, that happiness and the sun shone upon +me. On the morrow pains in my right leg, in which there was a vein +swollen, made me feel very unwell. So ignorant was the doctor that he +declared this to be of no importance, and gave me a little ointment with +which to rub my leg. But I grew worse from day to day, and after a very +short time my leg was like a lump of lead. I was stretched once more for +some months on a sick-bed, and this weakened me the more since very +heroic measures were used in the treatment of the complaint, a violent +attack of phlebitis. The leg was rubbed every day from the sole of the +foot to the hip with mercury ointment, which could not be without its +effect on my general health. + +Still, I kept up my spirits finely. Among the Scandinavians who showed +me kindness at this time I gratefully remember the Danish painters +Rosenstand and Mackeprang, who visited me regularly and patiently, and +my friend Walter Runeberg, the Finnish sculptor, whose cheerfulness did +me good. + +Other Scandinavians with whom I was less well acquainted came to see me +now and again, but they had one very annoying habit. It was customary at +that time for all letters to be addressed, for greater security, to the +Danish consulate, which served the purpose of a general Scandinavian +consulate. Anyone who thought of coming to see me would fetch what +letters had arrived for me that day and put them in his pocket to bring +me. The letters I ought to have had at ten o'clock in the morning I +generally received at seven in the evening. But these gentlemen often +forgot to pay their visit at all, or did not get time, and then it would +happen that after having gone about with the letters in their pockets +for a few days, they took them back to the consulate, whence they were +sent to me, once, three days late. As my whole life on my sick-bed was +one constant, painful longing for letters from home, the more so as my +mother, all the time I was in bed, was lying dangerously ill, I felt +vexed at the thoughtless behaviour of my compatriots. + +However, I had not travelled so far to meet Northmen, and I learnt far +more from the one Italian who sat by my bedside day after day, Giuseppe +Saredo. It was amusing to note the difference between his ways and the +Northmen's. He did not come in; he exploded. At six o'clock in the +evening, he would rush in without knocking at the door, shouting at one +and the same time Italian to the people of the house, and French to me. +He talked at a furious rate, and so loudly that people who did not know +might have fancied we were quarrelling, and he changed his seat once a +minute, jumped up from the easy chair and seated himself half in the +window, began a sentence there and finished it sitting on my bed. And +every second or third day he either himself brought books to entertain +me or sent large parcels by a messenger. + +He had risen to be professor at the University of the the capital, +without ever having been either student or graduate. His family were too +poor for him to study. For many years, when a lad, he had never eaten +dinner. His occupation, when at last he began to get on, was that of +proof-reader in a printing establishment, but he tried to add to his +income by writing melodramas for the boulevard theatres in Turin. + +He thought he had written over fifty. He told me: "The manager generally +came to me on a Sunday, when we were at liberty, and said: 'We must have +a new play for next Sunday.' On Monday the first act was finished, on +Tuesday the second, etc.; and every act was delivered as it was written, +and the parts allotted. Sometimes the last act was only finished on +Saturday morning, which, however, would not prevent the piece being +played on Sunday evening." In a number of the _Revue des deux +Mondes_ for 1857 we found Saredo mentioned among the melodramatists +of Italy. This must have been ferreted out privately, since he always +wrote these melodramas anonymously, he having determined, with naive +conceit, "not to stain his future reputation." When he was twenty-one, +he tried to raise himself from this rank to that of a journalist, and +succeeded; he sent all sorts of articles to three newspapers. From his +twenty-first to his twenty-fourth year he wrote for the daily papers, +and wrote gay accounts of the volatile lives of young Italian +journalists with the ladies of the theatres. Then he fell in love with +the lady who later became his wife (known as a novelist under the +pseudonym of Ludovico de Rosa), and from that time forth never looked at +another woman. All his life he cherished a great admiration for his wife +and gratitude towards her. + +When he had commenced his legal work, he strained every nerve to the +utmost, and obtained his professorships in the various towns through +competition, without having followed the usual University path. "I have +always had the most unshaken faith in my star," he said one day, "even +when, from hunger or despair, thoughts of suicide occurred to me. When I +broke my black bread, I said to myself: 'The day will come when I shall +eat white.'" + +Like all Italians at that time, Saredo detested and despised modern +France. As far as reconquered Rome was concerned, he regarded her with +sorrowful eyes. "There are only nobility, ecclesiastics, and workmen +here," he said; "no middle classes, no industry and no trade. Absurd +tariff laws have up till now shut off the Papal States from the +surrounding world. And what a government! A doctor, who after his second +visit did not make his patient confess to a priest, lost his official +post, if he happened to hold one, and was in any case sent to prison for +five months. A doctor who did not go to Mass a certain number of times +during the week was prohibited practising. The huge number of tied-up +estates made buying and selling very difficult. The new government has +struck the nobility a fatal blow by abolishing entailed property and +lands. The calling in of the ecclesiastical property by the State is +giving the towns a chance to breathe." + +Whenever I revisited Italy, I saw Saredo. His heroism during the +inquiries into the irregularities in Naples in 1900-1901 made his name +beloved and himself admired in his native country. He died in 1902, the +highest life official in Italy; since 1897 he had been President of the +Council. + + +XLIX. + +I came under an even greater debt of gratitude than to Saredo, to the +good-natured people in whose house I lay ill. I was as splendidly looked +after as if I had made it a specified condition that I should be nursed +in case of illness. + +My landlady, Maria, especially, was the most careful nurse, and the best +creature in the world, although she had the physiognomy of a regular +Italian criminal, when her face was in repose. The moment she spoke, +however, her features beamed with maternal benevolence. After the +hospital, it was a decided change for the better. I was under no one's +tyranny and did not feel as though I were in prison; I could complain if +my food was bad, and change _trattoria_, when I myself chose. +Everything was good. + +As long as I was well, I had taken hardly any notice of the people in +the house, hardly exchanged a word with them; I was out all day, and +either hastily asked them to do my room, or to put a little on the fire. +It was only when I fell ill that I made their acquaintance. + +Let me quote from my notes at the time: + +Maria is forty, but looks nearly sixty. Her husband is a joiner, a +stout, good-looking man, who works all day for his living, and has a +shop. Then there is Maria's niece, the nineteen-year-old Filomena, a +tall, handsome girl. Every evening they have fine times, laugh, sing, +and play cards. On Sunday evening they go out to the fair (_alla +fiera_) and look at the things without buying. Others have to pay a +lire to go in, but they go in free, as they know some of the people. On +festival occasions Maria wears a silk dress. + +There is a crucifix over my bed, an oleograph of the Madonna and child +and a heart, embroidered with gold on white, horribly pierced by the +seven swords of pain, which were supposed to be nails; on the centre of +the heart, you read, partly in Latin, partly in Greek letters: + +JESU XPI PASSIO. + +All the same, Maria is very sceptical. Yesterday, on the evening of my +birthday, we had the following conversation: + +_Myself_: "Here you celebrate your saints' day; not your birthday; +but, you know, up in the North we have not any saints"--and, thinking it +necessary to add a deep-drawn religious sigh, I continued: "We think it +enough to believe in God." "Oh! yes," she said slowly, and then, a +little while after: "That, too, is His own business." "How?" "Well," she +said, "You know that I am dreadfully ignorant; I know nothing at all, +but I think a great deal. There are these people now who are always +talking about the Lord. I think it is all stuff. When I married, they +said to me: 'May it please the Lord that your husband be good to you.' I +thought: If I had not been sensible enough to choose a good husband, it +would not help me much what should please the Lord. Later on they said: +'May it please the Lord to give you sons.' I had some, but they died +when they were little ones. Then I thought to myself: 'If my husband and +I do not do something in the matter, it won't be much use for the Lord +to be pleased to give them to us. Nature, too, has something to say to +it. (_Anche la natura e una piccola cosa_.) You have no idea, sir, +how we have suffered from priests here in the Papal State. Everyone had +to go to Confession, and as of course they did not wish to confess their +own sins, they confessed other people's,--and told lies, too,--and in +that way the priests knew everything. If the priest had heard anything +about a person, he or she would get a little ticket from him: 'Come to +me at such and such a time! 'Then, when the person went, he would say: +'Are you mad to live with such and such a person without being +married!'--and all the while he himself had a woman and a nest full of +children. Then he would say: 'I won't have you in my parish,' and he +would publish the poor thing's secret to the whole world. Or, if he were +more exasperated, he would say: 'Out of the Pope's country!' and send +for a few carabineers; they would take one to a cart and drive one to +the frontier; there, there were fresh carabineers, who took one farther +--and all without trial, or any enquiry. Often the accusation was false. +But we were ruled by spies, and all their power was based on the +confessional, which is nothing but spying. Shortly before Easter, a +priest came and counted how many there were in the house. If afterwards +there were one who did not go to mass, then his name was stuck up on the +church door as an infidel, in disgrace. It is many years now since I +have been to any confessor. When I die, I shall say: 'God, forgive me my +sins and my mistakes,' and shall die in peace without any priest." + +Whatever we talk about, Maria always comes back to her hatred of the +priests. The other day, we were speaking of the annoyance I had been +subjected to by a compatriot of mine, K.B., who came to see me, but +looked more particularly at a large _fiasco_ I had standing there, +containing four bottles of Chianti. He tasted the wine, which was very +inferior, declared it 'nice,' and began to drink, ten glasses straight +off. At first he was very polite to me, and explained that it was +impossible to spend a morning in a more delightful manner than by +visiting the Sistine Chapel first, and me in my sick-room afterwards, +but by degrees he became ruder and ruder, and as his drunkenness +increased I sank in his estimation. At last he told me that I was +intolerably conceited, and started abusing me thoroughly. Lying +defenceless in bed, and unable to move, I was obliged to ring for Maria, +and whisper to her to fetch a few gentlemen from the Scandinavian Club, +who could take the drunken man home, after he had wasted fully six hours +of my day. I managed in this way to get him out of the door. He was +hardly gone than Maria burst out: "_Che porcheria!_" and then +added, laughing, to show me her knowledge of languages: "_Cochonnerie, +Schweinerei!_" She has a remarkable memory for the words she has +heard foreigners use. She knows a number of French words, which she +pronounces half like Italian, and she also knows a little Russian and a +little German, having, when a young girl, kept house for a Russian +prince and his family. + +"I feel," she said to me, "that I could have learnt both French and +German easily, if I could have _compared_ them in a book. But I can +neither read nor write. These wretched priests have kept us in +ignorance. And now I am old and good for nothing. I was forty a little +while ago, and that is too old to learn the alphabet. Do you know, +signore, how it originally came about that I did not believe, and +despised the priests? I was twelve years old, and a tall girl, and a +very good-looking girl, too, though you cannot see that, now that I am +old and ugly." (You can see it very plainly, for her features are haughty +and perfectly pure of line; it is only that her expression, when she +sits alone, is sinister.) "I lost my father when I was five years old. +About that time my mother married again, and did not trouble herself any +more about me, as she had children with her new husband. So I was left +to myself, and ran about the streets, and became absolutely +ungovernable, from vivacity, life, and mischief, for I was naturally a +very lively child. Then one day I met a mule, alone; the man had left +it; I climbed up, and seated myself upon it, and rode about, up and down +the street, until a dog came that frightened the mule and it kicked and +threw me over its head. There I lay, with a broken collar-bone, and some +of the bone stuck out through the skin. Then a doctor came and wanted to +bind it up for me, but I was ashamed for him to see my breast, and would +not let him. He said: 'Rubbish! I have seen plenty of girls.' So I was +bound up and for six weeks had to lie quite still. In the meantime a +priest, whom they all called Don Carlo--I do not know why they said Don +--came to see me, and when I was a little better and only could not move +my left arm, he said to me one day, would I go and weed in his garden, +and he would give me money for it. So I went every day into the garden, +where I could very well do the work with one arm. He came down to me, +brought me sweets and other things, and asked me to be his friend. I +pretended not to understand. He said, too, how pretty I was, and such +things. Then at last one day, he called me into his bedroom, and first +gave me sweets, and then set me on his knee. I did not know how to get +away. Then I said to him: 'It is wrong, the Madonna would not like it.' +Do you know, sir, what he replied? He said: 'Child! there is no Madonna +(_non c'e Madonna_) she is only a bridle for the common people' +(_e un freno per il populo basso_). Then I was anxious to run +away, and just then my mother passed by the garden, and as she did not +see me there, called, 'Anna Maria! Anna Maria!' I said: 'Mother is +calling me,' and ran out of the room. Then mother said to me: 'What did +the priest say to you, and what did he do to you? You were in his +bedroom.' I said: 'Nothing'; but when my mother went to confession, +instead of confessing her sins, she said over and over again to him: +'What have you done to my daughter? I will have my daughter examined, to +see what sort of a man you are.' He declared: 'I will have you shot if +you do' (_una buona schioppettata_). So mother did not dare to go +farther in the matter. But she would not believe me." + +Here we were interrupted by the Russian woman from next door coming in; +she is married, more or less, to a waiter, and she complained of his +volatility, and cried with jealousy. "Once I was just as weak," said +Maria. "When I was newly married I was so jealous of my husband, that I +could neither eat nor drink if any one came to me and said: 'This +evening he is with such and such a one.' If I tried to eat, I was sick +at once. I am just as fond of him as I was then, but I am cured now. If +I saw his infidelity with my own eyes, I should not feel the least bit +hurt about it. Then, I could have strangled him." + + + + +FILOMENA + +Italian Landladies--The Carnival--The Moccoli Feast--Filomena's Views + + +Filomena sings lustily from early morning till late at night, and her +name suits her. The Greek Philomela has acquired this popular form, and +in use is often shortened to Filome. + +The other day I made her a present of a bag of English biscuits. Her +face beamed as I have never besides seen anything beam but the face of +my _cafetiere_--he is a boy of twelve--when now and again he gets a +few _soldi_ for bringing me my coffee or tea. Anyone who has only +seen the lighting up of Northern faces has no conception,--as even +painters admit,--of such transfiguration. Yes, indeed! Filomena's tall +figure and fresh mountain blood would freshen up the Goldschmidtian +human race to such an extent that they would become better men and women +in his next books. + +I have seen a little of the Carnival. This morning Filomena came to my +room, to fetch a large Italian flag which belongs there. "I am going to +wave it on Thursday," she said, and added, with blushing cheeks, "then I +shall have a mask on." But this evening she could not restrain herself. +For the first time during the five months I have lived here, and for the +first time during the month I have been ill, she came in without my +having called or rung for her. She had a red silk cap on, with a gold +border. "What do you say to that, sir!" she said, and her clear laughter +rang through the room. It revived my sick self to gaze at ease at so +much youth, strength and happiness; then I said a few kind words to her, +and encouraged by them she burst into a stream of eloquence about all +the enjoyment she was promising herself. This would be the first +carnival she had seen; she came from the mountains and was going back +there this Spring. She was in the seventh heaven over her cap. She +always reminds me, with her powerful frame, of the young giantess in the +fairy tale who takes up a peasant and his plough in the hollow of her +hand. + +Filomena is as tall as a moderately tall man, slenderly built, but with +broad shoulders. She impresses one as enjoying life thoroughly. She has +herself made all she wears--a poor little grey woollen skirt with an +edging of the Italian colours, which has been lengthened some nine +inches at the top by letting in a piece of shirting. A thin red-and- +black-striped jacket that she wears, a kind of loose Garibaldi, is +supposed to hide this addition, which it only very imperfectly does. Her +head is small and piquant; her hair heavy, blue-black; her eyes light +brown, of exquisite shape, smiling and kind. She has small, red lips, +and the most beautiful teeth that I remember seeing. Her complexion is +brown, unless she blushes; then it grows darker brown. Her figure is +unusually beautiful, but her movements are heavy, so that one sees at +once she is quite uneducated. Still, she has a shrug of the shoulders, +ways of turning and twisting her pretty head about, that are absolutely +charming. + +I have sent Filomena into the town to buy a pound of figs for me and one +for herself. While she is away, I reflect that I cannot sufficiently +congratulate myself on my excellent landlady, and the others. As a rule, +these Roman lodging-house keepers are, judging by what one hears, +perfect bandits. When F., the Norwegian sculptor, lay dangerously ill, +the woman in whose house he was did not even speak to him; she went out +and left him alone in the house. When the Danish dilettante S. was at +death's door, his landlady did not enter his room once a day, or give +him a drink of water, and he was obliged to keep a servant. V.'s +landlady stole an opera-glass, a frock-coat, and a great deal of money +from him. Most foreigners are swindled in a hundred different ways; if +they make a stain on the carpet, they must pay for a new one. Maria +looks after me like a mother. Every morning she rubs me with the +ointment the doctor has prescribed. When I have to have a bath, she +takes me in her arms, without any false shame, and puts me in the water; +then takes me up and puts me to bed again; after my sojourn in the +hospital, I am not very heavy. What I am most astonished at is the +indulgent delicacy of these people. For instance, Maria has forbidden +her good-natured husband, whom, like Filomena, I like to call _Zio_ +(uncle), to eat garlic (the favourite food of the Romans) while I am +ill, that I may not be annoyed in my room by the smell. I have only to +say a word, and she and her niece run all my errands for me. Indeed, the +other day, Maria exclaimed, quite indignantly: "Sir, do not say +'_when_ you go into the town, will you buy me this or that?' Are we +robbers, are we scoundrels? Only say, 'go,' and I will go." I never say +to her: "Will you do me a favour?" without her replying: "Two, sir." +Yes, and she heaps presents upon me; she and Filomena bring me, now a +bundle of firewood, now a glass of good wine, now macaroni, etc. All the +Danes who come here are astonished, and say: "You have got deucedly good +people to look after you." + +Maria's greatest pleasure is talking. She has no time for it in the day. +In the evening, however, she tidies my room slowly, entertaining me all +the time. When she has quite finished, at the time of day when others +are drowsy or go to bed, she still likes to have just a little more +conversation, and she knows that when I see she has put the last thing +into its place, her task for the day is ended, and I shall dismiss her +with a gracious _Buona sera, bon riposo!_ To put off this moment as +long as possible, she will continue to hold some object in her hand, +and, standing in the favourite position of the Romans, with her arms +akimbo, and some toilet article under her arm, will hold a long +discourse. She sometimes looks so indescribably comic that I almost +choke with suppressed laughter as we talk. + +To-day is the first day of the Carnival. So even Filomena has been out +this evening in tri-coloured trousers. + +... I am interrupted by the inmates of all the floors returning from the +Carnival, all talking at once, and coming straight in to me to show me +their dress. Amongst them from the Carnival, all talking at once, and +coming straight in to me to show me their dress. Amongst them are guests +from the mountains, tall, dark men, in exceedingly fantastic garb. They +tell me how much they have enjoyed themselves. Filomena has naively made +me a present of a few burnt almonds with sugar upon them, that she has +had in her trouser pockets, and informs me with impetuous volubility how +she has talked to all the people she met, "who do not know her and whom +she does not know." She has had one of my white shirts on, which she had +embroidered all over with ribbons till it looked like a real costume. +She is beaming with happiness. The tambourine tinkles all the evening in +the street; they are dancing the tarantella to it down below, and it is +difficult to go to sleep. Maria stays behind, when the others have gone, +to finish her day's work. It is a sight for the gods to see her doing it +with a gold brocade cap on her head, and in red, white and green +trousers! + +None of them guess what a torment it is to me to lie and hear about the +Carnival, which is going on a few streets from where I am lying, but +which I cannot see. When shall I spend a Winter in Rome again? And no +other Carnival will be to compare with this one after the Romans for ten +years have held altogether aloof from it, and one hardly even on +_Moccoli Eve_ saw more than two carriages full of silly Americans +pelting one another with confetti, while the porters and the French +soldiers flung jibes and dirt at each other. Now Rome is free, +jubilation breaks out at all the pores of the town, and I, although I am +in Rome, must be content to see the reflection of the festival in a few +ingenuous faces. + +It is morning. I have slept well and am enjoying the fresh air through +the open windows. Heavens! what a lovely girl is standing on the balcony +nearly opposite, in a chemise and skirt! I have never seen her there +before. Olive complexion, blue-black hair, the most beautiful creature; +I cannot see her features distinctly. Now they are throwing something +across to her from the house next door to us, on a piece of twine; I +think they are red flowers. They almost touch her, and yet she cannot +catch them, and laughing stretches out both hands a second, a third and +fourth time, equally unsuccessfully. Why, it is our Filomena, visiting +the model the other side the street. She gives up the attempt with a +little grimace, and goes in. + +Loud voices are singing the Bersagliere hymn as a duet under my window. +Verily, things are alive in _Purificazione_ to-day. The contagion +of example affects a choir of little boys who are always lying outside +the street door, and they begin to sing the Garibaldi march for all they +are worth. Our singers at the theatre at home would be glad of such +voices. The whole street is ringing now; all are singing one of Verdi's +melodies. + +I am sitting up in bed. At the side of my bed, Filomena, with her black, +heavy hair well dressed, and herself in a kind of transitional toilette; +her under-garment fine, the skirt that of a festival gown, on account of +the preparations for the Carnival; her top garment the usual red jacket. +She is standing with her hand on her hip, but this does not make her +look martial or alarming. + +_I_--You ate _magro_ to-day? (It was a fast day.) + +_She_--Good gracious! _Magro_ every day just now! + +_I_--Do you know, Filomena, that I eat _grasso_? + +_She_--Yes, and it is your duty to do so. + +_I_--Why? + +_She_--Because you are ill, and you must eat meat; the Pope himself +ate meat when he was ill. Religion does not mean that we are to injure +our health. + +_I_--How do you know, Filomena, what Religion means? + +_She_--From my Confessor. I had a little headache the other day, +and he ordered me at once to eat meat. + +_I_--The worst of it is that I have no Confessor and do not go to +church. Shall I be damned for that? + +_She_--Oh! no, sir, that does not follow! Do you think I am so +stupid as not to see that you others are far better Christians than we? +You are good; the friends who come to see you are good. The Romans, on +the other hand, who go to church one day, kill people the next, and will +not let go about the streets in peace. + +I am quite sorry that she is to go home at Easter; I shall miss her face +about the house. But I have missed more. + +Late evening. They have come back from the Carnival. Filomena came in +and presented me with an object the use of which is an enigma to me. A +roll of silver paper. Now I see what it is, a Carnival cap. My Danish +friend R. declares she has got it into her head that when I am better I +shall marry her, or rather that Maria has put it into her head. I +thought I would see how matters stood. I began talking to Maria about +marriages with foreigners. Maria mentioned how many girls from Rome and +Capri had married foreigners, but added afterwards, not without +significance, addressing me: "It is not, as you believe, and as you said +once before, that a girl born in a warm country would complain of being +taken to a cold one. If she did, she would be stupid. But a Roman girl +will not do for a foreign gentleman. The Roman girls learn too little." + +Much, the lower classes certainly do not learn. Before I came, Filomena +did not know what ink was. Now I have discovered that she does not know +what a watch is. She reckons time by the dinner and the Ave Maria. Not +long ago her uncle spent a week in trying to teach this great child to +make and read figures, but without success. Not long ago she had to +write to her mother in the mountains, so went to a public writer, and +had it done for her. She came in to me very innocently afterwards to +know whether the right name and address were upon it. I told her that +she could very well have let me write the letter. Since then, all the +people in the house come to me when there is anything they want written, +and ask me to do it for them. + +The news of my skill has spread. Apropos of letters, I have just read +the four letters that I received to-day. Filomena is perpetually +complaining of my sweetheart's uncontrollable passion as revealed in +this writing madness. She imagines that all the letters I receive from +Denmark are from one person, and that person, of course, a woman. She +herself hardly receives one letter a year. + +I have (after careful consideration) committed a great imprudence, and +escaped without hurt. I had myself carried down the stairs, drove to the +Corso, saw the Carnival, and am back home again. I had thought first of +driving up and down the Corso in a carriage, but did not care to be +wholly smothered with confetti, especially as I had not the strength to +pelt back. Nor could I afford to have the horses and carriage decorated. +So I had a good seat in a first-floor balcony engaged for me, first row. +At 3 o'clock I got up, dressed, and was carried down. I was much struck +by the mild Summer air out of doors (about the same as our late May), +and I enjoyed meeting the masked people in the streets we passed +through. The few but rather steep stairs up to the balcony were a +difficulty. But at last I was seated, and in spite of sickness and +weakness, enjoyed the Carnival in Rome on its most brilliant day. I was +sitting nearly opposite to the high box of Princess Margharita, from +which there was not nearly so good a view as from my seat. This was what +I saw: All the balconies bedecked with flags; red, white and green +predominating. In the long, straight street, the crowd moving in a tight +mass. In between them, an up and a down stream of carriages, drawn at a +walking pace by two horses, and forced at every moment to stop. The +streets re-echoed with the jingle of the horses' bells, and with shouts +of glee at a magnificently decorated carriage, then at some unusually +beautiful women, then at a brisk confetti fight between two carriages, +or a carriage and a balcony. And this air, re-echoing with the ring of +bells, with shouting, and with laughter, was no empty space. Anyone +reaching the Corso, as I had done, after the play had only been going on +for an hour and a half, found themselves in the midst of a positive +bombardment of tiny little aniseed balls, or of larger plaster balls, +thrown by hand, from little tin cornets, or half-bushel measures, and +against which it is necessary to protect one's self by a steel wire mask +before the face. For whilst some gentle young ladies almost pour the +confetti down from their carriages, so that it falls like a soft shower +of rain, many of the Romans fling it with such force that without a mask +the eyes might suffer considerably. The brim of one's hat, and every +fold in one's clothes, however, are full of little balls. Most people go +about with a huge, full bag by their side, others on the balconies have +immense baskets standing, which are hardly empty before they are re- +filled by eager sellers. All the ladies standing in the windows, who +were disguised as Turkish ladies, or workwomen from the port, had a deep +wooden trough, quite full, brought outside their windows, and into this +supply dipped continually--in the street, which had been covered with +soil for the sake of the horse-racing, was a crowd of people in fancy +dress, many of them having great fun, and being very amusing. One old +woman in a chemise was amongst the best. A young fellow, dressed +entirely in scarlet, more particularly amused himself by putting the +officers of the National Guard, who were walking about to keep order, +out of countenance. When they were looking especially stern, he would go +up to them and tickle them on the cheeks, and talk baby talk to them, +and they had to put the best face they could on it. The street life and +the pedestrians, however, did not attract much attention. All the +interest was centred on the carriages, and the games between them and +the windows and balconies. The people in carriages were all in fancy +dress. Amongst them one noticed charming groups of Roman ladies in light +cloaks of red silk with a red steel wire mask before their faces, +through which one could catch a glimpse of their features; there was a +swarm of delightful figures, certainly half of them in men's clothes, +armed young sailors, for instance. Fine, happy faces! And the young men, +how handsome! Not flashing eyes, as people affectedly say, but happy +eyes; a good, healthy physique, an expression which seemed to say that +they had breathed in sunshine and happiness and all the beatitude of +laziness, all the mild and good-humoured comfort of leisure, all their +lives long. One party had a colossal cart with outriders and postilions, +and hung in the yards and stood on the thwarts of a large cutter poised +upon it, in becoming naval officers' dress, flinging magnificent +bouquets to all the beautiful ladies who drove past. The bouquets would +have cost several lire each, and they flung them by the hundred, so they +must have been young fellows of means. The throwing of confetti is +merely bellicose and ordinary. Infinitely more interesting is the +coquettish, ingratiating, genuinely Italian flinging backwards and +forwards of bouquets. The grace and charm of the manner in which they +are flung and caught, nothing can surpass; there may be real passion in +the way in which six or seven bouquets in succession are flung at one +and the same lady, who never omits to repay in similar coin. One +carriage was especially beautiful; it had a huge square erection upon +it, entirely covered with artificial roses and greenery, which reached +almost to the second storey of the houses, and upon it, in two rows, +facing both sides of the streets, stood the loveliest Roman girls +imaginable, flinging bouquets unceasingly. Most of the carriages have +tall poles sticking up with a crossway bar at the top, and there are +bouquets on every bar, so there is a constant supply to draw from. +Beautiful Princess Margharita was, of course, the object of much homage, +although her balcony was on the second floor. One form this took was +very graceful. A few young gentlemen in blue and white drove slowly +past; one of them had a large flat basket filled with lovely white +roses; he stuck a long halberd through the handle and hoisted the basket +up to the Princess, being richly rewarded with bouquets. One wag hit +upon an idea that was a brilliant success. At five o'clock he sent a +bladder, in the shape of a huge turkey, up in the flickering sunlight. +It was so fixed up as to move its head about, with an expression of +exceedingly ridiculous sentimentality, now to the right, now caressingly +to the left, as it ascended. The whole Corso rang again with laughter +and clapping. The horse-racing at the end was not of much account. The +horses start excited by the rocket let off at their tails, and by all +the sharp pellets hanging around about them, to say nothing of the +howling of the crowd. At six o'clock I was at home and in bed. + +K.B. has been here to see me; Filomena hates and despises him from the +bottom of her heart since the day that he got drunk on my wine. When he +was gone she said: "_Brutta bestia_, I forgot to look whether he +was clean to-day." She and Maria declare that he is the only one of all +my acquaintances who does not wear clean linen. This point of +cleanliness is a mild obsession of Filomena's just now. She prides +herself greatly on her cleanliness, and asks me every day whether she is +clean or not. She is a new convert to cleanliness, and renegades or +newly initiated people are in all religions the most violent. When I +came to the house, her face was black and she washed her hands about +once a day. R--- then remarked about her--which was a slight +exaggeration--that if one were to set her up against the wall, she would +stick fast. She noticed with unfeigned astonishment how many times I +washed myself, and asked for fresh water, how often I had clean shirts, +etc. This made a profound impression on her young mind, and after I came +back from the hospital she began in earnest to rub her face with a +sponge and to wash herself five or six times a day, likewise to wash the +handkerchiefs she wears round her neck. Maria looks on at all this with +surprise. She says, like the old woman in Tonietta, by Henrik Hertz: "A +great, strong girl like that does not need to wash and splash herself +all over like an Englishwoman." The lectures she has given me every time +I have wanted to wash myself, on the harm water does an invalid, are +many and precious. Whenever I ask for water I might be wanting to commit +suicide; it is only after repeated requests that she brings it, and then +with a quiet, resigned expression, as if to say: "I have done my best to +prevent this imprudence: I wash my hands of all responsibility." +Filomena, in her new phase of development, is quite different. She looks +at my shirt with the eyes of a connoisseur, and says: "It will do for +to-morrow; a clean one the day after to-morrow!" or, "Did you see what +beautiful cuffs the tall, dark man (M. the painter) had on yesterday?" +or, "Excuse my skirt being so marked now, I am going to have a clean one +later in the day," or, "Is my cheek dirty? I don't think so, for I have +washed myself twice to-day; you must remember that I am very dark- +complexioned, almost like a Moor." Or else there will be a triumphal +entry into my room, with a full water-can in her hand, one of the very +large ones that are used here. "What is that, Filomena? What am I to do +with that?" "Look, sir, it is full." "Well, what of that?" "It is the +waiter's water-can; it has been standing there full for ten days +(scornfully): he is afraid of water; he only uses it for his coffee." +She has forgotten how few months it is since she herself was afraid of +water. + +She came in while I was eating my supper, and remarked: "You always read +at your meals; how can you eat and read at the same time? I do not know +what reading is like, but I thought it was more difficult than that. It +is a great misfortune for me that I can neither read nor write. +Supposing I were to be ill like you, how should I pass away the time! +There was no school at Camarino, where I was born, and I lived in the +country till I was eighteen, and learnt nothing at all. We were nine +brothers and sisters; there was seldom any food in the house; sometimes +we worked; sometimes we lay on the ground. It is unfortunate that I +cannot read, for I am not at all beautiful; if I could only do +something, I should be able to get a husband." + +"Don't you know any of the letters, Filomena?" + +"No, sir." "Don't trouble about that. You are happier than I, who know a +great deal more than you. You laugh and sing all day long; I neither +laugh nor sing." "Dear sir, you will laugh, and sing as well, when you +get home. Then your little girl (_ragazza_) who is so _appassionato_ +that she writes four letters a day, will make _fete_ for you, and I +think that when you go to the _osteria_ with your friends you laugh. +It is enough now for you to be patient." As she had spoken about getting +a husband, I asked: "Are your sisters married?" "They are all older than +I, and married." (Saving her pride in the first part of her reply.) After +a few minutes' reflection she went on: "I, for my part, will not have a +husband under thirty; the young ones all beat their wives." Shortly +afterwards, I put an end to the audience. We had had a few short +discussions, and I had been vanquished, apparently by her logic, but +chiefly by reason of her better mastery of the language, and because I +defended all sorts of things in joke. At last I said: "Have you noticed, +Filomena, that when we argue it is always you who silence me? So you can +see, in spite of all my reading, that you have better brains than I." This +compliment pleased her; she blushed and smiled, without being able to find +a reply. + +She realises the Northern ideal of the young woman not spoilt by novel- +reading. Nor does she lack intelligence, although she literally does not +know what North and South mean; she is modest, refined in her way, and +happy over very little. For the moment she is engaged in making the +little dog bark like mad by aggravatingly imitating the mewing of a cat. + +Later. The boy from the cafe brings me my supper. What has become of +Filomena? I wonder if she is out? I cannot hear her having her evening +fight with the boy in the passage. She likes to hit him once a day for +exercise. + +Maria comes in. "Do you hear the cannon, sir? What do you think it is?" +I reply calmly: "It is war; the Zouaves (papal troops) are coming." +Maria goes out and declares the reply of the oracle in the next room. +Some cannon salutes really were being fired. Maria hurries down into the +street to hear about it and Filomena comes in to me. "I am afraid," she +says. "Do you mean it?" She was laughing and trembling at the same time. +I saw that the fear was quite real. "Is it possible that you can be so +afraid? There is not really any war or any Zouaves, it was only a joke." +That pacified her. "I was afraid, if you like," said she, "when the +Italians (the Romans never call themselves Italians) marched into Rome. +One shell came after another; one burst on the roof of the house +opposite." "Who are you for, the Pope or Vittorio?" "For neither. I am a +stupid girl; I am for the one that will feed and clothe me. But I have +often laughed at the Zouaves. One of them was standing here one day, +taking pinch after pinch of snuff, and he said to me: 'The Italians will +never enter Rome.' I replied: 'Not if they take snuff, but they will if +they storm the town.'" "Do you think that the Pope will win?" "No, I +think his cause is lost. Perhaps there will even come a time when no one +goes to churches here." _She_: "Who goes to church! The girls to +meet their lovers; the young men to see a pretty shop-girl. We laugh at +the priests." "Why?" "Because they are ridiculous: if it thunders, they +say at once that it is a sign from God. The sky happens to be flaming +red, like it was last October. That was because the Italians entered +Rome in September. Everything is a sign from God, a sign of his anger, +his exasperation. He is not angry, that is clear enough. If he had not +wanted the Italians to come in, they would not have come, but would all +have died at once." She said this last with great earnestness and +pathos, with an upward movement of her hand, and bowed her head, like +one who fears an unknown power. Maria returned, saying people thought +the shots meant that Garibaldi had come. Said I: "There, he is a brave +man. Try to be like him, Filomena. It is not right for a big strong girl +to tremble." _She_: "I am not strong, but still, I am stronger than +you, who have been weakened so much by your illness,--and yet, who +knows, you have been much better the last few days. Shall we try?" I +placed my right hand in hers, first tested her strength a little, and +then found to my surprise that her arm was not much stronger than that +of an ordinary lady; then I bent my fingers a little, and laid her very +neatly on the floor. I was sitting in bed; she was on her knees in front +of the bed, but I let her spring up. It was a pretty sight; the blue- +black hair, the laughing mouth with the fine, white teeth, the brown, +smiling eyes. As she got up, she said: "You are well now; I am not sorry +to have been conquered." + + * * * * * + +Have taken my second flight. I have been at the Moccoli fete, had myself +carried and driven there and back, like last time. Saredo had taken a +room on the Corso; I saw everything from there, and now I have the +delightful impressions of it all left. What exuberant happiness! What +jubilation! What childlike gaiety! It is like going into a nursery and +watching the children play, hearing them shout and enjoy themselves like +mad, as one can shout and enjoy things one's self no longer. + +I arrived late and only saw the end of the processions; far more +carriages, wilder shouting, more madness,--bacchantic, stormy,--than +last time. The whole length of the Corso was one shriek of laughter. And +how many lovely faces at the windows, on the balconies and verandas! +Large closed carriages with hidden music inside and graceful ladies on +the top. As _i preti_ (the Catholic papers) had said that all who +took part in the Carnival were paid by the government, a number of men +and women, in the handsomest carriages--according to the _Nuova +Roma_ for to-day, more than 20,000--had the word _pagato_ (paid) +fastened to their caps, which evoked much amusement. Then the lancers +cleared the street at full galop for the horse races (_barberi_), +and at once an immense procession of Polichinelli and ridiculous +equestrians in Don Quixote armour organised itself and rode down the +Corso at a trot in parody. Then came the mad, snorting horses. Then a +few minutes,--and night fell over the seven heights of Rome, and the +Corso itself lay in darkness. Then the first points of light began to +make their appearance. Here below, one little shimmer of light, and up +there another, and two there, and six here, and ten down there to the +left, and hundreds on the right, and then thousands, and many, many +thousands. From one end of the great long street to the other, from the +first floor to the roof of every house and every palace, there is one +steady twinkling of tiny flames, of torches, of large and small lights; +the effect is surprising and peculiar. As soon as the first light +appeared, young men and girls ran and tried to blow each other's candles +out. Even the children took part in the game; I could see into several +houses, where it was going on briskly. Then, from every side-street +decorated carriages began to drive on to the Corso again, but this time +every person held a candle in his hand. Yes, and that was not all! at +least every other of the large waggons--they were like immense boxes of +flowers--had, on poles, or made fast, Bengal fire of various colours, +which lighted up every house they went past, now with a red, now with a +green flare. And then the thousands of small candles, from every one in +the throng, from carriages, balconies, verandas, sparkled in the great +flame, fighting victoriously with the last glimmer of daylight. People +ran like mad down the Corso and fanned out the lights in the carriages. +But many a Roman beauty found a better way of lighting up her features +without exposing herself to the risk of having her light put out. +Opposite me, for instance, on the second floor, a lovely girl was +standing in a window. In the shutter by her side she had fixed one of +those violent red flares so that she stood in a bright light, like +sunlight seen through red glass, and it was impossible not to notice +her. Meanwhile, the people on the balconies held long poles in their +hands, with which they unexpectedly put out the small candles in the +carriages. You heard incessantly, through the confusion, the shouts of +individuals one to another, and their jubilation when a long-attempted +and cleverly foiled extinguishing was at length successful, and the +clapping and shouts of _bravo!_ at an unusually brightly lighted +and decorated carriage. The pickpockets meanwhile did splendid business; +many of the Danes lost their money. + +At eight o'clock I was in bed again, and shortly afterwards the people +of the house came home for a moment. Filomena looked splendid, and was +very talkative. "_Lei e ingrassato_," she called in through the +door. It is her great pleasure that the hollows in my cheeks are +gradually disappearing. She was now ascribing a special efficacy in this +direction to Moccoli Eve. + + * * * * * + +At half-past ten in the morning, there is a curious spectacle in the +street here. At that time Domenico comes and the lottery begins. +Lotteries are forbidden in Rome, but Domenico earns his ten lire a day +by them. He goes about this and the neighbouring streets bawling and +shouting until he has disposed of his ninety tickets. + +Girls and women lean out through the windows and call out the numbers +they wish to have--in this respect they are boundlessly credulous. They +do not believe in the Pope; but they believe that there are numbers +which they must become possessed of that day, even at the highest price, +which is two soldi. The soldi are thrown out through the window, and +each one remembers her own number. Then Domenico goes through all the +numbers in a loud voice, that there may be no cheating. A child draws a +number out of the bag, and Domenico shouts: "Listen, all Purificazione, +No. 34 has won, listen, Purificazione, 34 ... 34." The disappointed +faces disappear into the houses. All those who have had 33, 35 and 36 +rail against unjust Fate, in strong terms. + +At the first rattle of the lottery bag, Filomena rushes in here, opens +the window, and calls for a certain number. If anyone else wants it, she +must manage to find two soldi in her pocket. If I fling a few soldi from +my bed towards the window, this facilitates the search. However, we +never win. Filomena declares that I have indescribable ill-luck in +gambling, and suggests a reason. + + * * * * * + +She was again singing outside. I called her, wanting to know what it was +she kept singing all the time. "They are songs from the mountains," she +replied, "all _canzone d'amore_." "Say them slowly, Filomena. I +will write them down." I began, but was so delighted at the way she +repeated the verses, her excellent declamatory and rhythmic sense, that +I was almost unable to write. And to my surprise, I discovered that they +were all what we call ritornellos. But written down, they are dull +larvae, compared with what they are with the proper pronunciation and +expression. What is it Byron says?: + + I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, + Which melts like kisses from a female mouth, + And sounds as if it should be writ on satin. + +I shall really feel a void when Filomena goes away. The unfortunate part +of it is that her dialect pronunciation is so difficult to make out, and +that she swallows so many syllables in order to make the metre right, as +there are generally too many feet, and it is only the delicacy of her +declamation that makes up for the incorrectness of the rhymes and the +verses. For instance, she constantly says _lo_ instead of _il_ +(_lo soldato_), and she can never tell me how many words there are +in a line, since neither she nor Maria knows what a single word, as +opposed to several, is, and because it is no use spelling the word to +her and asking: "Is that right?" since she cannot spell, and does not +recognise the letters. Saredo tells me that a driver who once drove him +and his wife about for five days in Tuscany sang all day long like +Filomena, and improvised all the time. This is what she, too, does +continually; she inserts different words which have about the same +meaning, and says: "It is all the same" (_c'e la stessa cosa_). On +the other hand, she always keeps to the metre, and that with the most +graceful intonation; never a faulty verse: + + Fior di giacinto! + La donna che per l'uomo piange tanto-- + Il pianto delle donne e pianto finto. + + Amore mio! + Non prendite le fiori di nessuno, + Se vuoi un garofletto, lo do io. + + Fior di limone! + Limone e agra, e le fronde son' amare, + Ma son' piu' amare le pene d'amor'. + + Lo mi' amore che si chiama Peppe, + Lo primo giuocatore delle carte + Prende 'sto cuore e giuoca a tre-sette. + +[Footnote: + + Flower of the hyacinth! + The woman who weeps so much for the man's sake-- + Yet, the complaint of women is a feigned one. + + My love! + Do not accept flowers from anyone. + If thou wilt have a wall-flower, I will give it thee. + + Flower of the lemon! + The lemon is sharp, and its leaves are bitter; + But more bitter are the torments of love. + + My beloved, whose name is Peppe, + He is the first to play cards, + He has taken this heart and is playing a game of Three to Seven with + it.] + +In this way I wrote out some scores. + + * * * * * + +Spent an hour teaching Filomena her large letters up to N, and making +her say them by rote, and with that end in view have divided them into +three portions--ABCD--EFG--ILMN. She manages all right, except that she +always jumps E and L. Lesson closed: "Were you at church to-day, +Filomena?" "No, I have nothing to confess." "Did you go to church last +Sunday?" "No, I have not been for six weeks now. I have committed no +sin. What wrong do I do? I have no love affair, nothing." "What used you +to confess?" "A few bad words, which had slipped out. Now I do nothing +wrong." "But one can go wrong, without committing any sin, when one is +high-minded, for instance." "I am not high-minded. If you, on the other +hand, were to imagine yourself better than the friends who come to visit +you, that would be quite natural; for you are better." + + * * * * * + +The day has been long. This evening the girl had errands to do for me. +She came in here after her Sunday walk in the Campagna. I said: "Shall +we read?" (Just then a band of young people passed along the street with +a harmonica and a lot of castanets, and commenced a song in honour of +Garibaldi. With all its simplicity, it sounded unspeakably affecting; I +was quite softened.) She replied: "With pleasure." I thought to myself: +"Now to see whether she remembers a word of what I said to her +yesterday." But she went on at once: "Signore, I have been industrious." +She had bought herself an ABC and had taught herself alone not only all +the large letters, but also all the little ones, and had learnt them all +off by heart as well. I was so astonished that I almost fell back in the +bed. "But what is this, Filomena? Have you learnt to read from someone +else?" "No, only from you yesterday. But for five years my only wish has +been to learn to read, and I am so glad to be able to." I wanted to +teach her to spell. "I almost think I can a little." And she was already +so far that--without spelling first--she read a whole page of two-letter +spellings, almost without a mistake. She certainly very often said: "Da +--ad," or read _fo_ for _of_, but her progress was amazing. +When she spells, she takes the words as a living reality, not merely as +words, and adds something to them, for instance, _s--a, sa; l--i, li; +r--e, re; salire alle scale_, (jump down the stairs.) "Filomena, I +could teach you to read in three weeks." _She_: "I have always +thought it the greatest shame for a man or woman not to be able to +read." I told her something about the progress of the human race, that +the first men and women had been like animals, not at all like Adam and +Eve. "Do you think I believe that Eve ate an apple and that the serpent +could speak? _Non credo mente_. Such things are like _mal'occhi_ +(belief in the evil eye)." And without any transition, she begins, +_sempre allegra_, as she calls herself--to sing a gay song. Just +now she is exceedingly delighted with a certain large red shawl. There +came a pedlar to the door; she sighed deeply at the sight of the +brilliant red; so I gave it her. + +She is a great lover and a connoisseur of wine, like myself. We taste +and drink together every dinner-time. As she always waits upon me, I +often give her a little cake and wine while I am eating. Now we have +begun a new wine, white Roman muscat. But I change my wine almost every +other day. Filomena had taken the one large bottle and stacked up +newspapers round it on the table, so that if K.B. came he should not see +it. It so happened that he came to-day, whilst I was dining and she +eating with me. There was a ring; she wanted to go. "Stay; perhaps it is +not for me at all; and in any case, I do not ask anyone's permission for +you to be here." He came in, and said in Danish, as he put his hat down: +"Oh, so you let the girl of the house dine with you; I should not care +for that." Filomena, who noticed his glance in her direction, and his +gesture, said, with as spiteful a look, and in as cutting a voice as she +could muster: "_Il signore prende il suo pranzo con chi lui pare e +piace._" (The gentleman eats with whomsoever he pleases.) "Does she +understand Danish?" he asked, in astonishment. "It looks like it," I +replied. When he had gone, her _furia_ broke loose. I saw her +exasperated for the first time, and it sat very comically upon her. "Did +you ask him whom _he_ eats with? Did he say I was ugly? Did you ask +him whether his _ragazza_ was prettier?" (She meant a Danish lady, +a married woman, with whom she had frequently met K.B. in the street.) + +She said to me yesterday: "There is one thing I can do, sir, that you +cannot. I can carry 200 pounds' weight on my head. I can carry two +_conchas_, or, if you like to try me, all that wood lying there." +She has the proud bearing of the Romans. + +Read with Filomena for an hour and a half. She can now spell words with +three letters fairly well. This language has such a sweet ring that her +spelling is like music. And to see the innocent reverence with which she +says _g-r-a, gra_,--it is what a poet might envy me. And then the +earnest, enquiring glance she gives me at the end of every line. It is +marvellous to see this complete absorption of a grown-up person in the +study of _a-b, ab_, and yet at the same time there is something +almost great in this ravenous thirst for knowledge, combined with +incredulity of all tradition. It is a model such as this that the poets +should have had for their naive characters. In Goethe's _Roman Elegies_, +the Roman woman's figure is very inconspicuous; she is not drawn as a +genuine woman of the people, she is not naive. He knew a Faustina, but +one feels that he afterwards slipped a German model into her place. +Filomena has the uncompromising honesty and straightforwardness of an +unspoilt soul. Her glance is not exactly pure, but free--how shall I +describe it? Full, grand, simple. With a _concha_ on her head, she would +look like a caryatid. If I compare her mentally with a feminine character +of another poet, Lamartine's Graziella, an Italian girl of the lower +classes, like herself, I cannot but think Graziella thin and poetised, +down to her name. The narrator, if I remember rightly, teaches her to +read, too; but Graziella herself does not desire it; it is he who +educates her. Filomena, on the contrary, with her anxiety to learn, is +an example and a symbol of a great historic movement, the poor, oppressed +Roman people's craving for light and knowledge. Of Italy's population of +twenty-six millions, according to the latest, most recent statistics, +seventeen millions can neither read nor write. She said to me to-day: +"What do you really think, sir, do you not believe that the Holy Ghost +is _una virtu_ and cannot be father of the child?" "You are right, +Filomena." "That is why I never pray." "Some day, when you are very +unhappy, perhaps you will pray." "I have been very unhappy; when I was +a child I used to suffer horribly from hunger. I had to get up at five +o'clock in the morning to work and got eight _soldi_ for standing all day +long in a vineyard in the sun and digging with a spade, and as corn was +dear and meat dear, we seven children seldom had a proper meal. Last year, +too, I was hungry often, for it was as the proverb says: 'If I eat, I +cannot dress myself, and if I dress myself I cannot eat.' (What a sad and +illuminating proverb!) Sir, if there were any Paradise, you would go +there, for what you do for me. If I can only read and write, I can earn +twice as much as I otherwise could. Then I can be a _cameriera_, +and bring my mistress a written account of expenditure every week." + +Filomena knows that Saredo is a professor at the University. But she +does not know what a professor or a University is. She puts her question +like this: "Probably my idea of what a university is, may not be quite +correct?" + +No one comes now. An invalid is very interesting at first, and arouses +sympathy. If he continue ill too long, people unconsciously think it +impossible for him to get well, and stay away. So the only resource left +me all day is to chat with Filomena, to whom Maria has entrusted the +nursing of me. Every evening I read with her; yesterday she had her +fourth lesson, and could almost read straight off. Her complexion and +the lower part of her face are like a child's; her undeveloped mental +state reveals itself, thus far, in her appearance. I told her yesterday, +as an experiment, that there were five continents and in each of them +many countries, but she cannot understand yet what I mean, as she has no +conception of what the earth looks like. She does not even know in what +direction from Rome her native village, Camerino, lies. I will try to +get hold of a map, or a globe. Yesterday, we read the word +_inferno_. She said: "There is no hell; things are bad enough on +earth; if we are to burn afterwards, there would be two hells." "Good +gracious! Filomena, is life so bad? Why, you sing all day long." "I sing +because I am well; that is perfectly natural, but how can I be content?" +"What do you wish for then?" "So much money (_denari_) that I +should be sure of never being hungry again. You do not know how it +hurts. Then there is one other thing I should like, but it is +impossible. I should like not to die; I am so horribly afraid of death. +I should certainly wish there were a Paradise. But who can tell! Still, +my grandmother lived to be a hundred all but three years, and she was +never ill for a day; when she was only three years from being a hundred +she still went to the fields like the rest of us and worked, and was +like a young woman (_giovanotta_). Mother is forty-two, but +although she is two years older than my aunt, she looks quite young. +_Chi lo sa!_ Perhaps I may live to be a hundred too, never be ill-- +I never have been yet, one single day,--and then go in and lie down on +the bed like she did and be dead at once." + +"She really is sweet!" said R. this evening. The word does not fit. Her +laugh, her little grimaces, her witticisms, quaint conceits and gestures +are certainly very attractive, but her mode of expression, when she is +talking freely, is very unreserved, and if I were to repeat some of her +remarks to a stranger, he would perhaps think her coarse or loose. "We +shall see what sort of a girl you bring home to us when you are well +again, and whether you have as good taste as our Frenchman. Or perhaps +you would rather visit her? I know how a fine gentleman behaves, when he +visits his friend. She is often a lady, and rich. He comes, knocks +softly at the door, sits down, and talks about difficult and learned +things. Then he begs for a kiss, she flings her arms round his neck; +_allora, il letto rifatto, va via."_ She neither blushes nor feels +the slightest embarrassment when she talks like this. "How do you know +such things, when you have no experience?" "People have told me; I know +it from hearsay. I myself have never been in love, but I believe that it +is possible to love one person one's whole life long, and never grow +tired of him, and never love another. You said the other day (for a +joke?) that people ought to marry for a year or six months; but I +believe that one can love the same person always." + +In such chat my days pass by. I feel as though I had dropped down +somewhere in the Sabine Mountains, been well received in a house--Maria +is from Camarino, too,--and were living there hidden from the world +among these big children. + +Yesterday, Uncle had his National Guard uniform on for the first time. +He came in to show himself. I told him that it suited him very well, +which delighted him. Filomena exhibited him with admiration. When Maria +came home later on, she asked the others at once: "Has the +_signore_ seen him? What did he say? Does not he want to see him +again?" + +Written down a score of ritornellos; I have chosen the best of them. +Many of them are rather, or very, indecent. But, as Filomena says: "You +do not go to Hell for singing _canzone_; you cannot help what they +are like." The indecent ones she will only say at a terrific rate, and +not a second time. But if one pay attention, they are easy to +understand. They are a mixture of audacity and simple vulgarity. They +all begin with flowers. She is too undeveloped to share the educated +girl's abhorrence of things that are in bad taste; everything natural, +she thinks, can be said, and she speaks out, quite unperturbed. Still, +now she understands that there are certain things--impossible things-- +that I do not like to hear her say. + +I was sitting cutting a wafer (to take powders with) into oblates. +_She_: "You must not cut into consecrated things, not even put the +teeth into it. The priest says: 'Thou shalt not bite Christ.'" +Unfortunately, she has not any real impression of religion, either of +its beauty or its underlying truth. None of them have any idea of what +the New Testament is or contains; they do not know its best-known +quotations and stories. Religion, to them, is four or five rigmaroles, +which are printed in our _Abecedario_, the Creed, the Ave Maria, +the various Sacraments, etc., which they know by heart. These they +reject, but they have not the slightest conception of what Christianity +is. If I quote a text from the New Testament, they have never heard it. + +But they can run the seven cardinal virtues, and the seven other +virtues, off by rote. One of these last, that of instructing the +ignorant, is a virtue which the priesthood (partly for good reasons) +have not practised to any remarkable extent in this country. + +Yesterday Maria came home in a state of great delight, from a +_trattoria_, where a gentleman had spoken _tanto bene, tanto +bene_ against religion and the Pope and the priests; there were a few +_Caccialepri_ present (a derogatory expression for adherents of the +priests), who had just had to come down a peg or two. When she had +finished, to my astonishment, she said to me, _exactly this_: "It +is Nature that is God, is it not so?" + +An expression almost symbolical of the ignorance and credulity of the +Romans is their constant axiom, _Chi lo sa?_ (Who knows?) I said to +Maria the other day, after she had said it for the fourth time in a +quarter of an hour: "My good Maria! The beginning of wisdom is not to +fear God, but to say _Perche_? (why?), instead of _Chi lo sa_?" + +Yesterday, while I was eating my dinner, I heard Filomena's story. She +came to Rome last December: "You think I came because Maria wanted to +help mother. I came to Rome because there was a man who wanted to marry +me." "What was his name?" "His name was Peppe." _"Lo mi' amore, che si +chiama Peppe."_... "Ah, I do not love him at all. No, the thing is +that at Camerino all the men beat their wives. My sister, for instance, +has always a black eye, and red stripes on her back. My friend Marietta +always gets beaten by her husband, and the more he beats her, the more +she loves him: sometimes she goes away from him for a few days to her +sister, but she always goes back again." "What has that to do with our +friend Peppe?" "Well, you see, mother knew that Peppe's brother beat his +wife all day and all night; so she would not give me to him." "Yes, it +was bad, if it were a family failing." "So one evening father said to +me: 'Your aunt has written to us from Rome, to ask whether you will pay +her a visit of a few days.' And he showed me a false letter. Aunt cannot +write and knew nothing about any letter. I did not want to, much, said I +would not, but came here all the same, and found that I was to stay +here, and that mother did not want me to have Peppe. So I began to cry, +and for five whole days I cried all the time and would neither eat nor +drink. Then I thought to myself: It is all over between Peppe and me. +Shall I cry myself to death for a man? So I left off crying, and very +soon forgot all about him. And after a week's time I did not care +anything about the whole matter, and sang and was happy, and now I want +to stay in Rome always." + +Last night I got up for a little, read with Filomena, and determined to +go in and have supper with the family in their little room. Filomena +opened the door wide, and called out along the corridor: +_"Eccolo!"_ and then such a welcome as there was for the invalid, +now that he had at last got up! and I was obliged to drink two large +beer-glasses of the home-grown wine. First Maria told how it was that I +had always had everything so punctually whilst I was ill. It was because +Filomena had made the little boy from the _cafe_ believe that I was +going to give him my watch when I got well, if he never let anything get +cold. So the boy ran as though possessed, and once fell down the stairs +and broke everything to atoms. "He is delirious," said Filomena one day, +"and talks of nothing but of giving you his watch." "How can he be so +ill," said the boy suspiciously, "when he eats and drinks?" "Do you want +the watch or not?" said Filomena, and off the lad ran. I let the others +entertain me. Maria said: "You told Filomena something yesterday about +savages; I know something about them, too. Savage people live in China, +and the worst of all are called Mandarins. Do you know what one of them +did to an Italian lady? She was with her family over there; suddenly +there came a Mandarin, carried her off, and shut her up in his house. +They never found her again. Then he had three children by her; but one +day he went out and forgot to shut the door; she ran quickly out of the +house, down to the water, and saw a ship far away. Do you know what the +mandarin did, sir, when he came home and found that his wife was gone? +He took the three children, tore them through the middle, and threw the +pieces out into the street." It reminded one of Lucidarius, and other +mediaeval legends. Then our good _zio_, the honest uncle, began, +and told Maria and Filomena the history of Napoleon I., fairly +correctly. He had heard it from his master Leonardo, who taught him his +trade; the man had taken part in five of the campaigns. The only +egregious mistake he made was that he thought the Austrians had +gradually poisoned the Duke of Reichstadt, because he threatened to +become even more formidable than his father. But that the old grenadier +might easily have believed. The thing that astonished me was that the +narrative did not make the slightest impression upon either Maria or +Filomena. I asked Filomena if she did not think it was very remarkable. +But she clearly had a suspicion that it was all lies, besides, what has +happened in the world before her day is of as little importance to her +as what goes on in another planet; finally, she abominates war. +_Zio_ concluded his story with childlike self-satisfaction: "When I +learnt about all this, I was only an apprentice; now I am _mastro +Nino_." + +These last few days that I have been able to stumble about the room a +little, I have had a feeling of delight and happiness such as I have +hardly experienced before. The very air is a fete. The little black- +haired youngsters, running about this picturesquely steep street, are my +delight, whenever I look out of the window. All that is in front of me: +the splendours of Rome, the Summer, the art of Italy, Naples in the +South, Venice in the North, makes my heart beat fast and my head swim. I +only need to turn round from the window and see Filomena standing behind +me, knitting, posed like a living picture by Kuechler to feel, with +jubilation: I am in Rome. Saredo came to-day at twelve o'clock, and saw +me dressed for the first time. I had put on my nicest clothes. I called +Filomena, had three dinners fetched, and seated between him and her, I +had my banquet. I had just said: "I will not eat any soup to-day, unless +it should happen to be _Zuppa d'herba_." Filomena took the lid off +and cried: _"A punto."_ This is how all my wishes are fulfilled +now. I had a fine, light red wine. It tasted so good that if the gods +had known it they would have poured their nectar into the washtub. +Filomena poured it out, singing: + + L'acqua fa mare, + Il vino fa cantare; + Il sugo della gresta + Fa gira' la testa. + + (Water is bad for one; + Wine makes one sing; + The juice of the grape + Makes the head swim.) + +To-morrow I may go out. After Sunday, I shall leave off dining at home. +On Sunday Filomena goes to Camerino. + + + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +(_Continued_) + +Reflections on the Future of Denmark--Conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo--Frascati--Native Beauty--New Susceptibilities--Georges +Noufflard's Influence--The Sistine Chapel and Michael Angelo--Raphael's +Loggias--A Radiant Spring. + + +I + +Saredo said to me one day: "I am not going to flatter you--I have no +interest in doing so; but I am going to give you a piece of advice, +which you ought to think over. Stay in Italy, settle down here, and you +will reach a far higher position than you can possibly attain in your +own country. The intellectual education you possess is exceedingly rare +in Italy; what I can say, without exaggeration, is that in this country +it is so extraordinary that it might be termed an active force. Within +two years you would be a power in Italy, at home, you will never be more +than a professor at a University. Stay here! Villari and I will help you +over your first difficulties. Write in French, or Italian, which you +like, and as you are master of the entire range of Germanic culture, +which scarcely any man in Italy is, you will acquire an influence of +which you have not the least conception. A prophet is never honoured in +his own country. We, on the other hand, need you. So stay here! Take Max +Mueller as an example. It is with individuals as with nations; it is only +when they change their soil that they attain their full development and +realise their own strength." + +I replied: "I am deaf to that sort of thing. I love the Danish language +too well ever to forsake it. Only in the event of my settlement in +Denmark meeting with opposition, and being rendered impossible, shall I +strap on my knapsack, gird up my loins, and hie me to France or Italy; I +am glad to hear that the world is not so closed to me as I had formerly +believed." + +My thoughts were much engaged on my sick-bed by reflections upon the +future of Denmark. The following entry is dated March 8, 1871: + + What do we mean by _our national future_, which we talk so much + about? We do not purpose to extend our borders, to make conquests, or + play any part in politics. For that, as is well comprehensible, we know + we are too weak. I will leave alone the question as to whether it is + possible to live without, in one way or another, growing, and ask: What + do we want? _To continue to exist_. How exist? We want to get + Slesvig back again, for as it is we are not _existing_; we are + sickening, or else we are living like those lower animals who even when + they are cut in pieces, are quite nimble; but it is a miserable life. We + are in a false position with regard to Germany. The centripetal force + that draws the individual members of one nationality together, and which + we in Denmark call Danishness, that which, further, draws nationalities + of the same family together, and which in Denmark is called + _Scandinavianism_, must logically lead to a sympathy for the + merging of the entire race, a kind of _Gothogermanism_. If we seek + support from France, we shall be behaving like the Poles, turning for + help to a foreign race against a nation of our own. I accuse us, not of + acting imprudently, but of fighting against a natural force that is + stronger than we. We can only retard, we cannot annihilate, the + attraction exerted by the greater masses on the lesser. We can only hope + that we may not live to feel the agony. + + Holland and Denmark are both threatened by Germany, for in this + geography is the mighty ally of Germany. The most enlightened Dane can + only cherish the hope that Denmark, conquered, or not conquered, will + brave it out long enough for universal civilisation, by virtue of the + level it has reached, to bring our independence with it. As far as the + hope which the majority of Danes cherish is concerned (including the + noble professors of philosophy), of a time when Nemesis (reminiscence of + theology!), shall descend on Prussia, this hope is only an outcome of + foolishness. And even a Nemesis upon Prussia will never hurt Germany, + and thus will not help us. + + But the main question is this: If we--either through a peaceable + restoration of Slesvig, or after fresh wars, or through the dawning of + an era of peace and civilisation--regain our integrity and independence, + shall we exist then? Not at all. Then we shall sicken again. A country + like Denmark, even including Slesvig, is nowadays no country at all. A + tradesman whose whole capital consists of ten rigsdaler is no tradesman. + The large capitals swallow up the small. The small must seek their + salvation in associations, partnerships, joint-stock companies, etc. + + Our misfortune lies in the fact that there is no other country with + which we can enter into partnership except Sweden and Norway, a little, + unimportant state. By means of this association, which for the time + being, is our sheet-anchor, and which, by dint of deploying enormous + energy, might be of some importance, we can at best retard our + destruction by a year or two. But the future! Has Denmark any future? + + It was France who, to her own unspeakable injury, discovered, or rather, + first proclaimed, the principle of nationality, a principle which at + most could only give her Belgium and French Switzerland, two neutral + countries, guaranteed by Europe, but which gave Italy to Piedmont, + Germany to Prussia, and which one day will give Russia supremacy over + all the Slavs. + + Even before the war, France was, as it were, squeezed between bucklers; + she had no possible chance of gaining anything through her own precious + principle, and did not even dare to apply it to the two above-mentioned + points. While she fearfully allowed herself to be awarded Savoy and + Nice, Prussia grew from nineteen million inhabitants to fifty millions; + and probably in a few years the Germans of Austria will fall to Germany + as well. Then came the war, and its outcome was in every particular what + Prevost-Paradol, with his keen foresight, had predicted: "Afterwards," + he wrote, "France, with Paris, will take up in Europe the same position + as Hellas with Athens assumed in the old Roman empire; it will become + the city of taste and the noble delights; but it will never be able to + regain its power." It has, in fact, been killed by this very theory of + nationality; for the only cognate races, Spain and Italy, are two + countries of which the one is rotten, the other just entered upon the + convalescent stage. Thus it is clear that Germany will, for a time, + exercise the supreme sway in Europe. But the future belongs neither to + her nor to Russia, but, if not to England herself, at any rate to the + Anglo-Saxon race, which has revealed a power of expansion in comparison + with which that of other nations is too small to count. Germans who go + to North America, in the next generation speak English. The English have + a unique capacity for spreading themselves and introducing their + language, and the power which the Anglo-Saxon race will acquire cannot + be broken in course of time like that of ancient Rome; for there are no + barbarians left, and their power is based, not on conquest, but on + assimilation, and the race is being rejuvenated in North America. + + How characteristic it is of our poor little country that we always hear + and read of it as "one of the oldest kingdoms in the world." That is + just the pity of it. If we were only a young country! There is only one + way by which we can rejuvenate ourselves. First, to merge ourselves into + a Scandinavia; then, when this is well done and well secured, to + approach the Anglo-Saxon race to which we are akin. Moral: Become an + Anglo-Saxon and study John Stuart Mill! + +And I studied Mill with persevering attention, where he was difficult, +but instructive, to follow, as in the _Examination of Hamilton's +Philosophy_, which renews Berkeley's teachings, and I read him with +delight where, accessible and comprehensible, he proclaims with +freshness and vigour the gospel of a new age, as in the book _On +Liberty_ and the one akin to it, _Representative Government_. + + +II + +During the months of February and March, my conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo had been all I lived for. We discussed all the questions which +one or both of us had at heart, from the causes of the expansion of +Christianity, to the method of proportionate representation which Saredo +knew, and correctly traced back to Andrae. When I complained that, by +reason of our different nationality, we could hardly have any +recollections in common, and by reason of our different languages, could +never cite a familiar adage from childhood, or quote a common saying +from a play, that the one could not thoroughly enjoy the harmony of +verses in the language of the other, Saredo replied: "You are no more a +Dane than I am an Italian; we are compatriots in the great fatherland of +the mind, that of Shakespeare and Goethe, John Stuart Mill, Andrae, and +Cavour. This land is the land of humanity. Nationality is milk, humanity +is cream. What is there in all the world that we have not in common? It +is true that we cannot enjoy together the harmony of some Northern +verses, but we can assimilate together all the great ideas, and we have +for each other the attraction of the relatively unknown, which fellow- +countrymen have not." + +He very acutely characterised his Italian compatriots: "Our intelligence +amounts to prudence and common sense. At a distance we may appear self- +luminous; in reality we are only passivity and reflected light. +Solferino gave us Lombardy, Sadowa gave us Venice, Sedan gave us Rome. +We were just active enough to take advantage of fortunate circumstances, +and passively clever enough not to wreck our advantage by stupidity. In +foreign novels we are scoundrels of the deepest dye, concocters of +poisons and wholesale swindlers. In reality we are indifferent and +indolent. _Dolce far niente_, these words, which, to our shame, are +repeated in every country in Italian, are our watchword. But things +shall be different, if it means that the few amongst us who have a +little share of head and heart have to work themselves to death--things +shall be different. Massimo d'Azeglio said: 'Now we have created an +Italy; there remains to create Italians.' That was a true saying. Now we +are creating the new people, and what a future there is before us! Now +it is we who are taking the leadership of the Latin race, and who are +giving back to our history its brilliance of the sixteenth century. At +present our Art is poor because we have no popular type; but wait! In a +few years Italy will show a profile no less full of character than in +the days of Michael Angelo, and Benvenuto Cellini." + + +III + +Then the moment arrived when all abstract reflections were thrust aside +once more by convalescence. I was well again, after having been shut up +for over four months. I still felt the traces of the mercury poisoning, +but I was no longer tied to my bed, and weak though I was, I could walk. + +And on the very first day,--it was March 25th--armed with a borrowed +stick (I possessed none, having never used a stick before), and equipped +with a little camp-stool, I took the train to Frascati, where there was +a Madonna Fete. + +It was life opening out before me again. All that I saw, witnessed to +its splendour. First, the scenery on the way, the Campagna with its +proud ruins, and the snow-covered Sabine Mountains, the whole +illuminated by a powerful Summer sun; the villas of old Romans, with +fortress-like thick walls, and small windows; then the fertile lava +soil, every inch of which was under vineyard cultivation. At last the +mountains in the neighborhood of Frascati. A convent crowned the highest +point; there, in olden days, the first Italian temple to Jupiter had +stood, and there Hannibal had camped. Underneath, in a hollow, like an +eagle's nest, lay Rocca di Papa. By the roadside, fruit-trees with +violet clusters of blossoms against a background of stone-pines, +cypresses, and olive-groves. + +I reached Frascati station. There was no carriage to be had up to the +town, so I was obliged to ascend the hill slowly on foot, a test which +my leg stood most creditably. In the pretty market-place of Frascati, +with its large fountain which, like Acqua Paola, was divided into three +and flung out a tremendous quantity of water, I went into an +_osteria_ and asked for roast goat with salad and Frascati wine, +then sat down outside, as it was too close within. Hundreds of people in +gay costumes, with artificial flowers and silver feathers in their +headgear, filled the square in front of me, crowded the space behind me, +laughed and shouted. + +The people seemed to be of a grander type, more lively, animated and +exuberant, than at the fair at Fiesole. The women were like Junos or +Venuses, the men, even when clad in abominable rags, looked like +Vulcans, blackened in their forges; they were all of larger proportions +than Northern men and women. A Roman beau, with a riding-whip under his +arm, was making sheep's eyes at a young local beauty, his courtship +accompanied by the whines of the surrounding beggars. A _signora_ +from Albano was lecturing the waiter with the dignity of a queen for +having brought her meat that was beneath all criticism, yes, she even +let the word _porcheria_ escape her. A brown-bearded fellow came +out of the inn with a large bottle of the heavenly Frascati wine, which +the landlords here, even on festival occasions, never mix with water, +and gave a whole family, sitting on donkeys, to drink out of one glass; +then he went to two little ones, who were holding each other round the +waist, sitting on the same donkey; to two youths who were riding +another; to a man and wife, who sat on a third, and all drank, like the +horsemen in Wouwerman's pictures, without dismounting. + +I got into an old, local omnibus, pulled by three horses, to drive the +two miles to Grotta Ferrata, where the fair was. But the vehicle was +hardly about to start up-hill when, with rare unanimity, the horses +reared, behaved like mad, and whirled it round four or five times. The +driver, a fellow with one eye and a grey cap with a double red camelia +in it, being drunk, thrashed the horses and shouted, while an old +American lady with ringlets shrieked inside the omnibus, and bawled out +that she had paid a franc beforehand, and now wanted to get out. The +road was thronged with people walking, and there was just as many riding +donkeys, all of them, even the children, already heated with wine, +singing, laughing, and accosting everybody. Many a worthy woman +supported her half-drunk husband with her powerful arm. Many a +substantial _signora_ from Rocca di Papa sat astride her mule, +showing without the least bashfulness her majestic calves. + +At Grotta Ferrata, the long, long street presented a human throng of +absolute density without the slightest crush, for no one stuck his +elbows into his neighbour's sides. The eye could only distinguish a mass +of red, yellow and white patches in the sunlight, and in between them a +few donkeys' heads and mules' necks. The patches were the kerchiefs on +the women's heads. Folk stood with whole roast pigs in front of them on +a board, cutting off a piece with a knife for anyone who was hungry; +there were sold, besides, fruits, knives, ornaments, provisions, and +general market wares. One _osteria_, the entrance to which was hung +all over with sausages, onions and vegetables, in garlands, had five +huge archways open to the street. Inside were long tables, at which +people sat, not on benches, but on trestles, round bars supported by two +legs, and ate and drank in the best of good spirits, and the blackest +filth, for the floor was the black, sodden, trampled earth. Just over +the way, arbours had been made from trees, by intertwining their +branches and allowing them to grow into one another; these were quite +full of gay, beautiful girls, amongst them one with fair hair and brown +eyes, who looked like a Tuscan, and from whom it was difficult to tear +one's eyes away. + +After having inspected the courtyard of an old monastery, the lovely +pillars of which rejoiced my heart, I sat down a little on one side in +the street where the fair was, on my little camp-stool, which roused the +legitimate curiosity of the peasant girls. They walked round me, looked +at me from behind and before, and examined with grave interest the +construction of my seat. In front of me sat an olive and lemon seller. +Girls bargained with him as best they could in the press, others stood +and looked on. I had an opportunity here of watching their innate +statuesque grace. When they spoke, the right arm kept time with their +speech. When silent, they generally placed one hand on the hip, bent, +but not clenched. There were various types. The little blonde, blue-eyed +girl with the mild Madonna smile, and absolutely straight nose, and the +large-made, pronounced brunette. But the appearance of them all was such +that an artist or a poet could, by a slight transformation, have +portrayed from them whatever type of figure or special characteristic he +required. In my opinion, the form Italian beauty took, and the reason of +the feeling one had in Italy of wading in beauty, whereas one hardly +ever saw anything in the strict sense of the word beautiful in +Copenhagen, and rarely in Paris, was, that this beauty was the beauty of +the significant. All these women looked to be unoppressed, fullblown, +freely developed. All that makes woman ugly in the North: the cold, the +thick, ugly clothes that the peasant women wear, the doublet of +embarrassment and vapidity which they drag about with them, the strait- +waistcoat of Christiansfeldt morality in which they are confined by the +priests, by protestantism, by fashion, by custom and convention--none of +this oppressed, confined or contracted women here. These young peasant +girls looked as if they had never heard such words as "You must not," or +"You shall not," and as here in Italy there is none of the would-be +witty talk, the grinning behind people's backs, which takes the life out +of all intrepidity in the North, no one thought: "What will people say?" +Everyone dressed and deported himself with complete originality, as he, +or rather as she, liked. Hence eyes were doubly brilliant, blood coursed +twice as red, the women's busts were twice as rounded and full. + + +IV + +From this time forth I had a strange experience. I saw beauty +everywhere. If I sat at the window of a cafe on the Corso on a Sunday +morning, as the ladies were going to Mass, it seemed to me that all the +beauty on earth was going past. A mother and her three daughters went +by, a mere grocer's wife from the Corso, but the mother carried herself +like a duchess, had a foot so small that it could have lain in the +hollow of my hand, and the youngest of the three daughters was so +absolutely lovely that people turned to look after her; she might +perhaps have been fifteen years of age, but there was a nobility about +her austere profile, and she had a way of twisting her perfect lips into +a smile, that showed her to be susceptible to the sweetest mysteries of +poetry and music. My long illness had so quickened the susceptibility of +my senses to impressions of beauty that I lived in a sort of +intoxication. + +In the Scandinavian Club I was received with endless expressions of +sympathy, courteous remarks, and more or less sincerely meant +flatteries, as if in compensation for the suffering I had been through. +All spoke as though they had themselves been deeply distressed, and +especially as though Copenhagen had been sitting weeping during my +illness. I certainly did not believe this for a moment, but all the same +it weighed down a little, the balance of my happiness, and the first +meetings with the Northern artists in these glorious surroundings were +in many respects very enjoyable. The Scandinavian Club was in the +building from which you enter the Mausoleum of Augustus, a colossal +building in the form of a cross, several storeys in height. A festival +had been got up on the flat roof for a benevolent object one of the +first evenings in April. You mounted the many flights of stairs and +suddenly found yourself, apparently, in an immense hall, but with no +roof save the stars, and brilliantly illuminated, but with lights that +paled in the rays of the Italian moon. We took part in the peculiarly +Italian enjoyment of watching balloons go up; they rose by fire, which +exhausted the air inside them and made them light. Round about the moon +we could see red and blue lights, like big stars; one balloon ignited up +in the sky, burst into bright flames, and looked very impressive. + +Troops of young women, too, were sitting there, and dazzled anew a young +man who for a second time had given the slip to the old gentleman with +the scythe. There was one young servant girl from the country, in +particular, a child of thirteen or fourteen, to whom I called the +attention of the painters, and they went into ecstasies over her. The +type was the same as that which Raphael has reproduced in his Sistine +Madonna. Her clear, dark blue eyes had a look of maidenly shyness, and +of the most exquisite bashfulness, and yet a look of pride. She wore a +string of glass beads round her lovely neck. We ordered two bottles of +wine to drink her health, and, while we were drinking it, the rotunda +was lighted up from a dozen directions with changing Bengal fire. The +ladies looked even handsomer, the glass lamps dark green in the gleam, +the fire-borne balloons rose, the orchestra played, the women smiled at +the homage of their friends and lovers--all on the venerable Mausoleum +of Augustus. + + +V + +I made the acquaintance that evening of a young and exceedingly engaging +Frenchman, who was to become my intimate friend and my travelling +companion. He attracted me from the first by his refined, reserved, and +yet cordial manner. + +Although only thirty-five years of age, Georges Noufflard had travelled +and seen surprisingly much. He was now in Italy for the second time, +knew France and Germany, had travelled through Mexico and the United +States, had visited Syria, Egypt, Tunis, and Algiers to the last oasis. +When the conversation touched upon Art and Music, he expressed himself +in a manner that revealed keen perception, unusual knowledge, and a very +individual taste. + +The following morning, when we met on the Corso, he placed himself at my +disposal, if he could be of use to me; there was nothing he had arranged +to do. He asked where I was thinking of going; as he knew Rome and its +neighbourhood as well as I knew my mother's drawing-room, I placed +myself in his hands. We took a carriage and drove together, first to the +baths of Caracalla, then to the Catacombs, where we very nearly lost our +way, and thought with a thrill of what in olden times must have been the +feelings of the poor wretches who fled there, standing in the dark and +hearing footsteps in the distance, knowing that it was their pursuers +coming, and that they were inevitably going to be murdered, where there +was not even room to raise a weapon in their own defence. Next we drove +to _San Paolo fuori le mure_, of the burning of which Thorwaldsen's +Museum possesses a painting by Leopold Robert, but which at that time +had been entirely re-built in the antique style. It was the most +beautiful basilica I had ever seen. We enjoyed the sight of the +courtyard of the monastery nearly 1,700 years old, with its fine +pillars, all different, and so well preserved that we compared, in +thought, the impressions produced by the two mighty churches, San Paolo +and San Pietro. Then we dined together and plunged into interminable +discussions until darkness fell. From that day forth we were +inseparable. Our companionship lasted several months, until I was +obliged to journey North. But the same cordial relations continued to +subsist between us for more than a quarter of a century, when Death +robbed me of my friend. + +Georges Noufflard was the son of a rich cloth manufacturer at Roubaix, +and at an early age had come into possession of a considerable fortune. +This, however, was somewhat diminished through the dishonesty of those +who, after the death of his father, conducted the works in his name. He +had wanted to become a painter, but the weakness of his eyes had obliged +him to give up Art; now he was an Art lover, and was anxious to write a +book on the memorials and works of art in Rome, too great an +undertaking, and for that reason never completed; but at the same time, +he pursued with passion the study of music, played Beethoven, Gluck and +Berlioz, for me daily, and later on published books on Berlioz and +Richard Wagner. + +As a youth he had been an enthusiast such as, in the Germanic countries, +they fancy is impossible elsewhere, to such an extent indeed as would be +regarded even there as extraordinary. At seventeen years of age he fell +in love with a young girl who lived in the same building as himself. He +was only on terms of sign language with her, had not even secured so +much as a conversation with her. None the less, his infatuation was so +great that he declared to his father that he wished to marry her. The +father would not give his consent, and her family would not receive him +unless he was presented by his father. The latter sent him to America +with the words: "Forget your love and learn what a fine thing +industrialism is." He travelled all over the United States, found all +machinery loathsome, since he had not the most elementary knowledge of +the principles of mechanics, and no inclination for them, and thought +all the time of the little girl from whom they wished to separate him. +It did not help matters that the travelling companion that had been +given him lived and breathed in an atmosphere of the lowest debauchery, +and did his best to initiate the young man into the same habits. On his +return home he declared to his father that he persisted in his choice. +"Good," said his father, "Asia Minor is a delightful country, and so is +Northern Africa; it will also do you good to become acquainted with +Italy." So he set off on his travels again, and this time was charmed +with everything he saw. Then his father died, and he became pretty much +his own master and free to do as he liked. Then he learned that the +father of the girl had been guilty of a bank fraud. His family would not +receive hers, if, indeed, herself. So he gave up his intention; he did +not wish to expose her to humiliation and did not wish himself to have a +man of ill-fame for his father-in-law; he set off again on his travels, +and remained a long time away. "The proof that I acted wisely by so +doing," he said in conclusion, "is that I have completely forgotten the +girl; my infatuation was all fancy." + +When he commenced by telling me that for three years he had loved, and +despite all opposition, wished to marry a girl to whom he had never +spoken, I exclaimed: "Why, you are no Frenchman!" When he concluded by +telling me that after remaining constant for three years he had +abandoned her for a fault that not she, but her father, had committed, I +exclaimed: "How French you are, after all!" + +While mutual political, social, and philosophical interests drew me to +Giuseppe Saredo, all the artistic side of my nature bound me to Georges +Noufflard. Saredo was an Italian from a half-French part,--he was born +at Savona, near Chambery,--and his culture was as much French as +Italian; Noufflard was a Frenchman possessed by such a love for Italy +that he spoke the purest Florentine, felt himself altogether a +Southerner, and had made up his mind to take up his permanent abode in +Italy. He married, too, a few years afterwards, a lovely Florentine +woman, and settled down in Florence. + +What entirely won my heart about him was the femininely delicate +consideration and unselfish devotion of his nature, the charm there was +about his manner and conversation, which revealed itself in everything +he did, from the way in which he placed his hat upon his head, to the +way in which he admired a work of art. But I could not have associated +with him day after day, had I not been able to learn something from him. +When we met again ten years later, it turned out that we had nothing +especially new to tell each other. I had met him just at the right +moment. + +It was not only that Noufflard was very well and widely informed about +the artistic treasures of Italy and the places where they were to be +found, but his opinions enriched my mind, inasmuch as they spurred me on +to contradiction or surprised me and won my adherence. Fresh as Julius +Lange's artistic sense had been, there was nevertheless something +doctrinaire and academic about it. An artist like Bernini was horrible, +and nothing else to him; he had no sympathy for the sweet, half-sensual +ecstasy of some of Bernini's best figures. He was an enemy of +eighteenth-century art in France, saw it through the moral spectacles +which in the Germanic countries had come into use with the year 1800. It +was easy for Noufflard to remain unbiased by Northern doctrines, for he +did not know them; he had the free eye of the beauty lover for every +revelation of beauty, no matter under what form, and had the +intellectual kinship of the Italianised Frenchman for many an artist +unappreciated in the North. On the other hand, he naturally considered +that we Northmen very much over-estimated our own. It was impossible to +rouse any interest in him for Thorwaldsen, whom he considered absolutely +academic. "You cannot call him a master in any sense," he exclaimed one +day, when we had been looking at Thorwaldsen bas-reliefs side by side +with antiques. I learnt from my intimacy with Noufflard how little +impression Thorwaldsen's spirit makes on the Romance peoples. That +indifference to him would soon become so widespread in Germany, I did +not yet foresee. + +Noufflard had a very alert appreciation of the early Renaissance, +especially in sculpture; he was passionately in love with the natural +beauties of Italy, from North to South, and he had a kind of national- +psychological gift of singling out peculiarly French, Italian or German +traits. He did not know the German language, but he was at home in +German music, and had studied a great deal of German literature in +translation; just then he was reading Hegel's "Aesthetics," the +abstractions in which veritably alarmed him, and to which he very much +preferred modern French Art Philosophy. In English Science, he had +studied Darwin, and he was the first to give me a real insight into the +Darwinian theory and a general summary of it, for in my younger days I +had only heard it attacked, as erroneous, in lectures by Rasmus Nielsen +on teleology. + +Georges Noufflard was the first Frenchman of my own age with whom I had +been intimate and whose character I partly understood and entered into, +partly absorbed into my own. If many of the various opinions evident in +my first lectures were strikingly emancipated from Danish national +prejudices which no one hitherto had attempted to disturb, I owed this +in a great measure to him. Our happy, harmonious intimacy in the Sabine +Hills and in Naples was responsible, before a year was past, for whole +deluges of abuse in Danish newspapers. + + +VI + +One morning, the Consul's man-servant brought me a _permesso_ for +the Collection of Sculpture in the Vatican for the same day, and a +future _permesso_ for the Loggias, Stanzas, and the Sistine Chapel. +I laid the last in my pocket-book. It was the key of Paradise. I had +waited for it so long that I said to myself almost superstitiously: "I +wonder whether anything will prevent again?" The anniversary of the day +I had left Copenhagen the year before, I drove to the Vatican, went at +one o'clock mid-day up the handsome staircase, and through immense, in +part magnificently decorated rooms to the Sistine Chapel. I had heard so +much about the disappointment it would be that not the very slightest +suggestion of disappointment crossed my mind. Only a feeling of supreme +happiness shot through me: at last I am here. I stood on the spot which +was the real goal of my pilgrimage. I had so often examined +reproductions of every figure and I had read so much about the whole, +that I knew every note of the music beforehand. Now I heard it. + +A voice within me whispered: So here I stand at last, shut in with the +mind that of all human minds has spoken most deeply home to my soul. I +am outside and above the earth and far from human kind. This is his +earth and these are his men, created in his image to people his world. +For this one man's work is a world, which, though that of one man only, +can be placed against the productions of a whole nation, even of the +most splendid nation that has ever lived, the Greeks. Michael Angelo +felt more largely, more lonely, more mightily than any other. He created +out of the wealth of a nature that in its essence was more than earthly. +Raphael is more human, people say, and that is true; but Michael Angelo +is more divine. + +After the lapse of about an hour, the figures detached themselves from +the throng, to my mental vision, and the whole composition fixed itself +in my brain. I saw the ceiling, not merely as it is to-day, but as it +was when the colours were fresh, for in places there were patches, the +bright yellow, for instance, which showed the depth of colouring in +which the whole had been carried out. It was Michael Angelo's intention +to show us the ceiling pierced and the heavens open above it. Up to the +central figures, we are to suppose that the walls continue straight up +to the ceiling, as though the figures sat upright. Then all confusion +disappears, and all becomes one perfect whole. + +The principal pictures, such as the creation of Adam, Michael Angelo's +most philosophical and most exquisite painting, I had had before my eyes +upon my wall every day for ten years. The expression in Adam's face was +not one of languishing appeal, as I had thought; he smiled faintly, as +if calmly confident of the dignity of the life the finger of God is +about to bestow upon him. The small, bronze-painted figures, expressed +the suspension and repose of the ceiling; they were architectonic +symbols. The troops of young heroes round about the central pillars were +Michael Angelo's ideals of Youth, Beauty and Humanity. The one resting +silently and thoughtfully on one knee is perhaps the most splendid. +There is hardly any difference between his build and that of Adam. Adam +is the more spiritual brother of these young and suffering heroes. + +I felt the injustice of all the talk about the beginnings of +grotesqueness in Michael Angelo's style. There are a few somewhat +distorted figures, Haman, the knot of men and women adoring the snake, +Jonas, as he flings himself backwards, but except these, what calm, what +grandiose perfection! And which was still more remarkable, what imposing +charm! Eve, in the picture of "The Fall," is perhaps the most adorable +figure that Art has ever produced; her beauty, in the picture on the +left, was like a revelation of what humanity really ought to have been. + +It sounded almost like a lie that one man had created this in twenty-two +months. Would the earth ever again produce frescoes of the same order? +The 360 years that had passed over it had damaged this, the greatest +pictorial work on earth, far less than I had feared. + +A large aristocratic English family came in: man, wife, son, daughter, +another daughter, the governess, all expensively and fashionably +dressed. They stood silent for a moment at the entrance to the hall. +Then they came forward as far as about the middle of the hall, looked up +and about a little, said to the custodian: "Will you open the door for +us?" and went out again very gracefully. + + +VII + +I knew Raphael's Loggias from copies in _l'Ecole des Beaux Arts_ in +Paris. But I was curious to see how they would appear after this, and +so, although there was only three-quarters of an hour left of the time +allotted to me on my _permesso_, I went up to look at them. My +first impression, as I glanced down the corridor and perceived these +small ceiling pictures, barely two feet across, was: "Good gracious! +This will be a sorry enjoyment after Michael Angelo!" I looked at the +first painting, God creating the animals, and was quite affected: There +goes the good old man, saying paternally: "Come up from the earth, all +of you, you have no idea how nice it is up here." My next impression +was: "How childish!" But my last was: "What genius!" How charming the +picture of the Fall, and how lovely Eve! And what grandeur of style +despite the smallness of the space. A God a few inches high separates +light from darkness, but there is omnipotence in the movement of His +arm. Jacob sees the ladder to Heaven in his dream; and this ladder, +which altogether has six angels upon it, seems to reach from Earth to +Heaven, infinitely long and infinitely peopled; above, we see God the +Father, at an immense distance, spread His gigantic embrace (which +covers a space the length of two fingers). There was the favourite +picture of my childhood, Abraham prostrated before the Angels, even more +marvellous in the original than I had fancied it to myself, although it +is true that the effect of the picture is chiefly produced by its beauty +of line. And there was Lot, departing from Sodom with his daughters, a +picture great because of the perfect illusion of movement. They go on +and on, against the wind and storm, with Horror behind them and Hope in +front, at the back, to the right, the burning city, to the left, a +smiling landscape. How unique the landscapes on all these pictures are, +how marvellous, for instance, that in which Moses is found on the Nile! +This river, within the narrow limits of the picture, looked like a huge +stream, losing itself in the distance. + +It was half-past five. My back was beginning to ache in the place which +had grown tender from lying so long; without a trace of fatigue I had +been looking uninterruptedly at pictures for four hours and a half. + + +VIII + +Noufflard's best friend in Rome was a young lieutenant of the +Bersaglieri named Ottavio Cerrotti, with whom we were much together. +Although a Roman, he had entered the Italian army very young, and had +consequently been, as it were, banished. Now, through the breach at +Porta Pia, he had come back. He was twenty-four years of age, and the +naivest Don Juan one could possibly meet. He was beloved by the +beautiful wife of his captain, and Noufflard, who frequented their +house, one day surprised the two lovers in tears. Cerrotti was crying +with his lady-love because he had been faithless to her. He had +confessed to her his intimacy with four other young ladies; so she was +crying, and the end of it was that he cried to keep her company. + +At meals, he gave us a full account of his principal romance. He had one +day met her by chance in the gardens of the Palazzo Corsini, and since +that day, they had had secret meetings. But the captain had now been +transferred to Terni, and tragedy had begun. Letters were constantly +within an ace of being intercepted, they committed imprudences without +count. He read aloud to us, without the least embarrassment, the letters +of the lady. The curious thing about them was the moderation she +exercised in the expression of her love, while at the same time her +plans for meetings were of the most foolhardy, breakneck description. + +Another fresh acquaintance that I made in those days was with three +French painters, Hammon, Sain and Benner, who had studios adjoining one +another. Hammon and Sain both died long since, but Benner, whom I met +again in Paris in 1904, died, honoured and respected, in 1905. I was +later on at Capri in company with Sain and Benner, but Hammon I saw only +during this visit to Rome. His pretty, somewhat sentimental painting, +_Ma soeur n'y est pas_, hung, reproduced in engraving, in every +shop-window, even in Copenhagen. He was painting just then at his clever +picture, _Triste Rivage_. + +Hammon was born in Brittany, of humble, orthodox parents, who sent him +to a monastery. The Prior, when he surprised him drawing men and women +out of his head, told him that painting was a sin. The young man himself +then strongly repented his inclination, but, as he felt he could not +live without following it, he left the monastery, though with many +strong twinges of conscience. + +Now that he was older, he was ruining himself by drink, but had +manifested true talent and still retained a humorous wit. One day that I +was with him, a young man came to the studio and asked for his opinion +of a painting; the man talked the whole time of nothing but his mother, +of how much he loved her and all that he did for her. Hammon's patience +gave out at last. He broke out: "And do you think, sir, that _I_ +have murdered my mother? I love her very much, I assure you, _not +enough to marry her_, I grant, but pretty well, all the same." After +that he always spoke of him as "the young man who loves his mother." + + +IX + +I felt as though this April, this radiant Spring, were the most glorious +time in my life, I was assimilating fresh impressions of Art and Nature +every hour; the conversations I was enjoying with my Italian and French +friends set me day by day pondering over new thoughts; I saw myself +restored to life, and a better life. At the beginning of April, +moreover, some girls from the North made their triumphal entry into the +Scandinavian Club. Without being specially beautiful or remarkable, they +absolutely charmed me. It was a full year since the language of home had +sounded in my ears from the lips of a girl, since I had seen the smile +in the blue eyes and encountered the heart-ensnaring charm, in jest, or +earnest, of the young women of the North. I had recently heard the +entrancing castrato singing at St. Peter's, and, on conquering my +aversion, could not but admire it. Now I heard once more simple, but +natural, Danish and Swedish songs. Merely to speak Danish again with a +young woman, was a delight. And there was one who, delicately and +unmistakably and defencelessly, showed me that I was not indifferent to +her. That melted me, and from that time forth the beauties of Italy were +enhanced tenfold in my eyes. + +All that I was acquainted with in Rome, all that I saw every day with +Georges Noufflard, I could show her and her party, from the most +accessible things, which were nevertheless fresh to the newcomers, such +as the Pantheon, Acqua Paola, San Pietro in Montorio, the grave of +Cecilia Metella, and the grottoes of Egeria, to the great collections of +Art in the Vatican, or the Capitol, or in the wonderful Galleria +Borghese. All this, that I was accustomed to see alone with Noufflard, +acquired new splendour when a blonde girl walked by my side, asking +sensible questions, and showing me the gratitude of youth for good +instruction. With her nineteen years I suppose she thought me +marvellously clever. But the works of Art that lay a little outside the +beaten track, I likewise showed to my compatriots. I had never been able +to tolerate Guido Reni; but his playing angels in the chapel of San +Gregorio excited my profound admiration, and it was a satisfaction to me +to pour this into the receptive ear of a girl compatriot. These angels +delighted me so that I could hardly tear myself away from them. The fine +malice, the mild coquetry, even in the expression of the noblest purity +and the loftiest dignity, enchanted us. + +I had been in the habit of going out to the environs of Rome with +Georges Noufflard, for instance, to the large, handsome gardens of the +Villa Doria Pamfili, or the Villa Madama, with its beautiful frescoes +and stucco-work, executed by Raphael's pupils, Giulio Romano and others, +from drawings by that master. But it was a new delight to drive over the +Campagna with a girl who spoke Danish by my side, and to see her +Northern complexion in the sun of the South. With my French friend, I +gladly joined the excursions of her party to Nemi, Albano, Tivoli. + +Never in my life had I felt so happy as I did then. I was quite +recovered. Only a fortnight after I had risen from a sick-bed that had +claimed me four months and a half, I was going about, thanks to my +youth, as I did before I was ill. For my excursions, I had a comrade +after my own heart, well-bred, educated, and noble-minded; I fell in +love a little a few times a week; I saw lakes, fields, olive groves, +mountains, scenery, exactly to my taste. I had always a _permesso_ +for the Vatican collections in my pocket. I felt intoxicated with +delight, dizzy with enjoyment. + +It seemed to me that of all I had seen in the world, Tivoli was the most +lovely. The old "temple of the Sibyl" on the hill stood on consecrated +ground, and consecrated the whole neighbourhood. I loved those +waterfalls, which impressed me much more than Trollhaettan [Footnote: +Trollhaettan, a celebrated waterfall near Goeteborg in Sweden.], had done +in my childhood. In one place the water falls down, black and boiling, +into a hollow of the rock, and reminded me of the descent into Tartarus; +in another the cataract runs, smiling and twinkling with millions of +shining pearls, in the strong sunlight. In a third place, the great +cascade rushes down over the rocks. There, where it touches the nether +rocks, rests the end of the enormous rainbow which, when the sun shines, +is always suspended across it. Noufflard told me that Niagara itself +impressed one less. We scrambled along the cliff until we stood above +the great waterfall, and could see nothing but the roaring, foaming +white water, leaping and dashing down; it looked as though the seething +and spraying masses of water were springing over each other's heads in a +mad race, and there was such power, such natural persuasion in it, that +one seemed drawn with it, and gliding, as it were, dragged into the +abyss. It was as though all Nature were disembodied, and flinging +herself down. + +Like a Latin, Noufflard personified it all; he saw the dance of nymphs +in the waves, and their veils in the clouds of spray. My way of +regarding Nature was diametrically opposite, and pantheistic. I lost +consciousness of my own personality, felt myself one with the falling +water and merged myself into Nature, instead of gathering it up into +figures. I felt myself an individuality of the North, conscious of my +being. + + +X + +One afternoon a large party of us had taken our meal at an inn on the +lake of Nemi. The evening was more than earthly. The calm, still, +mountain lake, the old, filled-up crater, on the top of the mountain, +had a fairy-like effect. I dropped down behind a boulder and lay for a +long time alone, lost in ecstasy, out of sight of the others. All at +once I saw a blue veil fluttering in the breeze quite near me. It was +the young Danish girl, who had sat down with me. The red light of the +evening, Nemi and she, merged in one. Not far away some people were +setting fire to a blaze of twigs and leaves; one solitary bird warbled +across the lake; the cypresses wept; the pines glowered; the olive trees +bathed their foliage in the mild warmth; one cloud sailed across the +sky, and its reflection glided over the lake. One could not bear to +raise the voice. + +It was like a muffled, muffled concert. Here were life, reality and +dreams. Here were sun, warmth and light. Here were colour, form and +line, and in this line, outlined by the mountains against the sky, the +artistic background of all the beauty. + +Noufflard and I accompanied our Northern friends from Albano to the +station; they were going on as far as Naples, and thence returning home. +We said good-bye and walked back to Albano in the mild Summer evening. +The stars sparkled and shone bright, Cassiopaeia showed itself in its +most favourable position, and Charles's Wain stood, as if in sheer high +spirits, on its head, which seemed to be its recreation just about this +time. + +It, too, was evidently a little dazed this unique, inimitable Spring. + + + + +INDEX + + +Aagesen, Professor +Aarestrup, Emil +About, Edmond +Adam +_Adam Homo_ +_Adventures on a Walking Tour_ +Aeneid, The +Aeschylus +Agar, Mlle. +_Aladdin_ +Alcibiades +Algreen-Ussing, Frederik +Algreen-Ussing, Otto +_Ali and Gulhyndi_ +Alibert, Mr. +Andersen, H.C. +_Angelo_ +Angelo, Michael +_Antony_ +Apel +Aristotle +_Arne_ +Arrest, Professor d' +Art, Danish, French, German dramatic +Astronomy +Auerbach, Berthold +Augier +Augustenborg, Duke of + +Baagoee +Baggesen +Bain +Banville +Barbier, Auguste +Bazaine +Beaumarchais +Bech, Carl +Bendix, Victor +Benner +Bentham +Bergen, Carl von +Bergh, Rudolp +Bergsoee +Bernhardt, Sarah +Bible, The +Bille +Bismarck +Bissen, Wilhelm +Bjoernson +Blanchetti, Costanza +Blicher +Bluhme, Geheimeraad +Borup +Bov +_Boy, A Happy_ +_Brand_ +Bretteville +Broechner, H. +Brohan, The Sisters +Brussels +Bruun, Emil +_Buch der Lieder_ +_Burgraves, Les_ +Byron + +Caesar +_Caprice, Un_ +Caro +Casellini +Catullus +Cerrotti, Ottavio +Chamounix +Chanson de Roland +Chasles, Emile +Chasles, Philarete +Chatterton +Choteau, Marie +Christian VIII. +Christian IX. +Christianity +Cinq-Mars +Claretie, Jules +Clausen +Cologne +Comte +Copenhagen +Coppee +Coquelin +Corday, Charlotte +Correggio +Cousin +Criticisms and Portraits +Crone + +Dame aux Camelias, La +Danish Literature +Dante +Darwin +David, C.N. +David, Ludvig +Delacroix +Delisle +Devil, The +Dichtung und Wahrheit +Disraeli, +Divina Commedia +Don Juan +Don Quixote +Doerr, Dr. +Drachmann +Drama, German +Driebein +Dualism in Our Modern Philosophy +Dubbels +Dubois, Mlle. +Dumas +Dumas, The Younger + +Eckernfoerde +Edda, The +Edward, Uncle +Either-Or +Esselbach, Madam +Ethica +Euripides + +Falkman +Farum +Faust +Favart, Madame +Favre, Jules +Feuerbach, Ludwig +Feuillet, Octave +Fights, Between the +Filomena +Fils de Giboyer, Le +Fisher Girl, The +Flaubert +Florence +Fontane, M. +For Self-Examination +For Sweden and Norway +Fourier +France Nouvelle, La +Frascati +Frederik VII +French Literature +French Philosophers of the Nineteenth Century, The +French Revolution +Frithiof's Saga +Frossard +_Gabrielle_ +Gallenga, Antonio +Gambetta +Gautier +_Geneva_ +Gerhard +Germany +Gerome +_Gerusalemme liberata_, Tasso's +_Ghost Letters_ +_Ghosts_ +Girardin +Gladstone +Gleyre +God +_Gods of the North, The_ +Goethe +Goldschmidt, Dr. +Goldschmidt, M. +Goncourt, the brothers; Edmond de +_Government, Representative_ +Gram, Professor +Grammont, The Duc de +Gregoire +_Gringoire_ +Groenbeck, +Groth, Claus +Grundtvig +Guell y Rente, Don Jose +Guemain, Mademoiselle +Guizot + +Hage, Alfred +Hagemeister, Mr. +_Hakon, Earl_ +Hall +Hamburg +_Hamilton's Philosophy, Examination of_ +_Hamlet_ +Hammerich +Hammon +Hansen, Octavius +Hauch; Rinna +Hebbel +Hegel +Heiberg, Johan Ludvig +Heiberg, Johanne Louise +Heine +Hello, Ernest +Henrietta +Herbart +_Hernani_ +_Hero of Our Time, A_ +Hertz, Henrik +History, The Philosophy of +_History of English Literature,_ +Hobbema +Hohlenberg, Pastor +Holberg +Holst, Professor H.P. +Homer +Hoppe, Mr. +Horace +Hoeyen +Hugo, Victor +Hume +Huysmann +Hvasser + +Ibsen +_Indiana_ +Ingeborg +Ingemann +Inger +_Inheritance, The_ +_Intelligence, De l'_ + +Jacob, Uncle +_Jacques_ +_Jamber_ +Janet +Jens. +Jesus. +_Jesus, Life of_. +Jews. +_Joie fait Peur, La_. +Judaism. +_Judith_. +Julius, Uncle. +Jutland. + +Kaalund. +Kant. +Kappers. +Karoline. +Key, Ellen. +Kierkegaard, Soeren. +_King Svorre_. +Krieger. +Klareboderne. +Kleist, Heinrich. +_Knowledge and Faith, On_. + +Lafontaine, Mr. +Lamartine. +Lange, Julius. +_Laocoon_. +_Last Supper, Leonardo's_. +Lavaggi. +Law. +_Law, Interpretation of the_. +Leconte. +Lehmann, Orla. +Leman, Lake. +Leonardo. +Leopold of Hohenzollern. +Lermontof. +Lessing. +Leveque. +_Liberty, On_. +_Lion Amoureux, Le_. +Literature; + Danish; + European; + French. +_Literature, History of_, Thortsen's. +Little Red Riding-Hood. +Littre. +Logic of Fundamental Ideas. +Louise, Mademoiselle. +_Love Comedy_. +_Lucrece_. +Ludvig. +Luini. +Lund, Joergen. +Lund, Troels. + +M., Mademoiselle Mathilde. +_Macbeth_. +Machiavelli. +Mackeprang. +Macmahon. +_Madvig_. +Malgren. +Manderstroem, Count. +Marat. +Marcelin. +Maren. +Margharita, Princess. +Maria. +_Mariage de Figaro, Le_. +Marmier, Xavier. +Martensen, Bishop. +Martial. +Mary. +Mathilde, Princess. +Maximilian, Emperor. +Merimee. +Meza, General de. +Michelet. +Micromegas. +Milan. +Mill, James. +Mill, John Stuart +_Misanthrope, Le_ +Moehl +Moliere +Moeller, Kristian +Moeller, Poul +Moeller, P.L. +Monrad +Mounet-Sully +Muddie +_Musketeers, Les Trois_ +Musset, Alfred de + +_Nana_ +Napoleon III +Nerval, Gerard de +_Niebelungenlied, The_ +Niels +Nielsen, Frederik +Nielsen, Rasmus +Nina K. +Nisard +Nodier +Noerregaard +_Notes sur l'Angleterre_ +_Notre Dame de Paris_ +Noufflard, Georges +Nutzhorn, Frederick +Nybboel +Nycander + +Odescalchi, Prince +Odyssey, The +Oehlenschlaeger +Oersted, Anders Sandoee +Olcott +Ollivier, Prime Minister +_Once upon a Time_ +_Orientales, Les_ +_Over the Hills and Far Away_ +Ovid + +P.P. +Pagella +Paiva, Madame de +Palikao +Paludan-Mueller, Caspar +Paludan-Mueller, Frederick +Paludan-Mueller, Jens +Pantaleoni, Dr. +Pantheism +Paris +Paris, Gaston +Pascal +Patti, Adelina +Paulsen, Harald +Peer +_Peer Gynt_ +Per +Petersen, Emil +Philippe, Louis +Philoctetes +Philosophy +Piedmont, History of +Pilgrimage to Kevlaar +Pindar +Planche +Plato +Plautus +Ploug, Carl +_Poetry, The Infinitely Small and the Infinitely Great in_ +Ponsard +Prahl +Prevost-Paradol +Prim, Don Juan +Prose Writings, Heiberg's +Proudhon + +_Rabbi and Knight_ +Raphael +Raupach +Ravnkilde, Niels +Realism, Ideal +Ream, Vinnie +Regnault +Regnier +Relling +Rembrandt +Renan +Renan, M., L'Allemagne et l'Atheisme au 19me Siecle +Reuter, Fritz +Reventlow, Counts +Ribbing +Richardt, Christian +Ristori +Rochefort +Rode, Gotfred +Rode, Vilhelm +Roman Elegies +Rome +Rosenstand, Vilhelm +Rosette, Aunt +Rosieny, Marc de +Rossi +Rothe, Clara +Rousseau +Rubens +Runeberg, Walter +Ruysdael + +Sacy, Silvestre de +Sain +Saint Simon +Saint-Victor +Sainte-Beuve +Sand, George +Sarah, Aunt +Saredo, Giuseppe +Savonarola +Savoy +Scenes from the Lives of the Warriors of the North +Schandorph +Schaetzig +Schelling +Schioedte, J.C. +Schleswig +Schmidt, Rudolf +School of Life, The +Scott, Sir Walter +Scribe +Sebastian +Serrano +Shakespeare +Sheridan +Sibbern +Sickness unto Death +Signe's Story +Sigurd Slembe +Slesvig +Snoilsky, Carl +Snorre +Socrates +Sofus +Sommer, Major +Sophocles +Soul after Death, A +Spang, Pastor +Spang, The Sisters +Spencer, Herbert +Spendthrift, A +Spinoza +Stebbins +Steen, Bookseller +Stockholm +Stuart, Mary +Student, The +Studies in Aesthetics +Style, Le +Subjection of Women +Supplice d'une Femme, Le +Swiss Peasant +Switzerland +Synnoeve + +Taine +_Tartuffe_ +Tasso +Terence +Testa, Costanza +Theocritus +Thierry, Edmond +Thomsen, Grimur +Thomsen, Wilhelm. +Thoresen, Magdalene +Thortsen +Thorwaldsen +_Tonietta_ +Topsoee, V. +_Tragic Fate, The Idea of_ +Trepka, Alma +Trier, Ernst +Trochu, General +Ussing, Dean + +Valdemar +_Valentine_ +_Vanity and Modesty_, Luini's +Veuillot +Victorine, Aunt +Vigny, Alfred de +Villari, Pasquale +Vilsing +Virgil +Vischer, Fr. Th. +Voltaire +Voltelen +Vries + +Wickseil, Knut +Wiehe, Michael +_Wild Duck_ +Winckelmann +Winther, Christian +Wirsen +_Without a Center_ + +Ziegler, Clara +Zola + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH *** + +This file should be named 7rchy10.txt or 7rchy10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 7rchy11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 7rchy10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we usually do not +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +We are now trying to release all our eBooks one year in advance +of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing. +Please be encouraged to tell us about any error or corrections, +even years after the official publication date. + +Please note neither this listing nor its contents are final til +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg eBooks is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. + +Most people start at our Web sites at: +http://gutenberg.net or +http://promo.net/pg + +These Web sites include award-winning information about Project +Gutenberg, including how to donate, how to help produce our new +eBooks, and how to subscribe to our email newsletter (free!). + + +Those of you who want to download any eBook before announcement +can get to them as follows, and just download by date. This is +also a good way to get them instantly upon announcement, as the +indexes our cataloguers produce obviously take a while after an +announcement goes out in the Project Gutenberg Newsletter. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05 or +ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext05 + +Or /etext04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, +91 or 90 + +Just search by the first five letters of the filename you want, +as it appears in our Newsletters. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours +to get any eBook selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. Our +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If the value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour in 2002 as we release over 100 new text +files per month: 1240 more eBooks in 2001 for a total of 4000+ +We are already on our way to trying for 2000 more eBooks in 2002 +If they reach just 1-2% of the world's population then the total +will reach over half a trillion eBooks given away by year's end. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away 1 Trillion eBooks! +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only about 4% of the present number of computer users. + +Here is the briefest record of our progress (* means estimated): + +eBooks Year Month + + 1 1971 July + 10 1991 January + 100 1994 January + 1000 1997 August + 1500 1998 October + 2000 1999 December + 2500 2000 December + 3000 2001 November + 4000 2001 October/November + 6000 2002 December* + 9000 2003 November* +10000 2004 January* + + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been created +to secure a future for Project Gutenberg into the next millennium. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +As of February, 2002, contributions are being solicited from people +and organizations in: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, +Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, +Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, +Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New +Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, +Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South +Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West +Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. + +We have filed in all 50 states now, but these are the only ones +that have responded. + +As the requirements for other states are met, additions to this list +will be made and fund raising will begin in the additional states. +Please feel free to ask to check the status of your state. + +In answer to various questions we have received on this: + +We are constantly working on finishing the paperwork to legally +request donations in all 50 states. If your state is not listed and +you would like to know if we have added it since the list you have, +just ask. + +While we cannot solicit donations from people in states where we are +not yet registered, we know of no prohibition against accepting +donations from donors in these states who approach us with an offer to +donate. + +International donations are accepted, but we don't know ANYTHING about +how to make them tax-deductible, or even if they CAN be made +deductible, and don't have the staff to handle it even if there are +ways. + +Donations by check or money order may be sent to: + + PROJECT GUTENBERG LITERARY ARCHIVE FOUNDATION + 809 North 1500 West + Salt Lake City, UT 84116 + +Contact us if you want to arrange for a wire transfer or payment +method other than by check or money order. + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been approved by +the US Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) organization with EIN +[Employee Identification Number] 64-622154. Donations are +tax-deductible to the maximum extent permitted by law. As fund-raising +requirements for other states are met, additions to this list will be +made and fund-raising will begin in the additional states. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +You can get up to date donation information online at: + +http://www.gutenberg.net/donation.html + + +*** + +If you can't reach Project Gutenberg, +you can always email directly to: + +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +Prof. Hart will answer or forward your message. + +We would prefer to send you information by email. + + +**The Legal Small Print** + + +(Three Pages) + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN EBOOKS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this eBook, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you may distribute copies of this eBook if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS EBOOK +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +eBook, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this eBook by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this eBook on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM EBOOKS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBook, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBooks, +is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor Michael S. Hart +through the Project Gutenberg Association (the "Project"). +Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this eBook +under the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +Please do not use the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark to market +any commercial products without permission. + +To create these eBooks, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's eBooks and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other eBook medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] Michael Hart and the Foundation (and any other party you may +receive this eBook from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBook) disclaims +all liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this eBook within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS EBOOK IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE EBOOK OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold Michael Hart, the Foundation, +and its trustees and agents, and any volunteers associated +with the production and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm +texts harmless, from all liability, cost and expense, including +legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the +following that you do or cause: [1] distribution of this eBook, +[2] alteration, modification, or addition to the eBook, +or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this eBook electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + eBook or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this eBook in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word + processing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The eBook, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The eBook may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the eBook (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + eBook in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the eBook refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Foundation of 20% of the + gross profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation" + the 60 days following each date you prepare (or were + legally required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent + periodic) tax return. Please contact us beforehand to + let us know your plans and to work out the details. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +Project Gutenberg is dedicated to increasing the number of +public domain and licensed works that can be freely distributed +in machine readable form. + +The Project gratefully accepts contributions of money, time, +public domain materials, or royalty free copyright licenses. +Money should be paid to the: +"Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +If you are interested in contributing scanning equipment or +software or other items, please contact Michael Hart at: +hart@pobox.com + +[Portions of this eBook's header and trailer may be reprinted only +when distributed free of all fees. Copyright (C) 2001, 2002 by +Michael S. Hart. Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be +used in any sales of Project Gutenberg eBooks or other materials be +they hardware or software or any other related product without +express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN EBOOKS*Ver.02/11/02*END* + diff --git a/old/7rchy10.zip b/old/7rchy10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..208085d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/7rchy10.zip diff --git a/old/8rchy10.txt b/old/8rchy10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5c028df --- /dev/null +++ b/old/8rchy10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,15198 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth +by George Brandes + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth + +Author: George Brandes + +Release Date: May, 2005 [EBook #8160] +[This file was first posted on June 23, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: iso-8859-1 + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH *** + + + + +E-text prepared by Eric Eldred, Tonya Allen, Charles Franks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +[Etext producer's note: Chapter sub-headings in SECOND LONGER STAY +ABROAD are misnumbered in the original hard copy, skipping from VII +to IX.] + + + + +RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH + +BY + +GEORGE BRANDES + +AUTHOR OF "WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE," ETC. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: DR. GEORGE BRANDES _From a Sketch by G. Rump_] + +DISCOVERING THE WORLD + +First Impressions--Going to Bed--My Name--Fresh Elements--School--The +King--Town and Country--The King's Gardens--The Friendly World--Inimical +Forces--The World Widens--The Theatre--Progress--Warlike Instincts-- +School Adventures--Polite Accomplishments--My Relations + + +BOYHOOD'S YEARS + +Our House--Its Inmates--My Paternal Grandfather--My Maternal Grandfather +--School and Home--Farum--My Instructors--A Foretaste of Life--Contempt +for the Masters--My Mother--The Mystery of Life--My First Glimpse of +Beauty--The Head Master--Religion--My Standing in School--Self-esteem +--An Instinct for Literature--Private Reading--Heine's _Buch der +Lieder_--A Broken Friendship + + +TRANSITIONAL YEARS + +School Boy Fancies--Religion--Early Friends--_Daemonic Theory_--A +West Indian Friend--My Acquaintance Widens--Politics--The Reactionary +Party--The David Family--A Student Society--An Excursion to Slesvig-- +Temperament--The Law--Hegel--Spinoza--Love for Humanity--A Religious +Crisis--Doubt--Personal Immortality--Renunciation + + +ADOLESCENCE + +Julius Lange--A New Master--Inadaption to the Law--The University Prize +Competition--An Interview with the Judges--Meeting of Scandinavian +Students--The Paludan-Müllers--Björnstjerne Björnson--Magdalene +Thoresen--The Gold Medal--The Death of King Frederik VII--The Political +Situation--My Master of Arts Examination--War--_Admissus cum laude +praecipua_--Academical Attention--Lecturing--Music--Nature--A Walking +Tour--In Print--Philosophical Life in Denmark--Death of Ludwig David-- +Stockholm + + +FIRST LONG SOJOURN ABROAD + +My Wish to See Paris--_Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_--A +Journey--Impressions of Paris--Lessons in French--Mademoiselle Mathilde +--Taine + + +EARLY MANHOOD + +Feud in Danish Literature--Riding--Youthful Longings--On the Rack--My +First Living Erotic Reality--An Impression of the Miseries of Modern +Coercive Marriage--Researches on the Comic--Dramatic Criticism--A Trip +to Germany--Johanne Louise Heiberg--Magdalene Thoresen--Rudolph Bergh-- +The Sisters Spang--A Foreign Element--The Woman Subject--Orla Lehmann-- +M. Goldschmidt--Public Opposition--A Letter from Björnstjerne Björnson-- +Hard Work + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +Hamburg--My Second Fatherland--Ernest Hello--_Le Docteur Noir_-- +Taine--Renan--Marcelin--Gleyre--Taine's Friendship--Renan at Home-- +Philarète Chasles' Reminiscences--_Le Théâtre Français_--Coquelin +--Bernhardt--Beginnings of _Main Currents_--The Tuileries--John +Stuart Mill--London--Philosophical Studies--London and Paris Compared-- +Antonio Gallenga and His Wife--Don Juan Prim--Napoleon III--London +Theatres--Gladstone and Disraeli in Debate--Paris on the Eve of War-- +First Reverses--Flight from Paris--Geneva, Switzerland--Italy--Pasquale +Villari--Vinnie Ream's Friendship--Roman Fever--Henrik Ibsen's +Influence--Scandinavians in Rome + + +FILOMENA + +Italian Landladies--The Carnival--The Moccoli Feast--Filomena's Views + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD _Continued_ + +Reflections on the Future of Denmark--Conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo--Frascati--Native Beauty--New Susceptibilities--Georges +Noufflard's Influence--The Sistine Chapel and Michael Angelo--Raphael's +Loggias--A Radiant Spring + + + + +RECOLLECTIONS OF + +MY CHILDHOOD + +AND YOUTH + + + + +DISCOVERING THE WORLD + +First Impressions--Going to Bed--My Name--Fresh Elements--School--The +King--Town and Country--The King's Gardens--The Friendly World--Inimical +Forces--The World Widens--The Theatre--Progress--Warlike Instincts-- +School Adventures--Polite Accomplishments--My Relations. + + +I. + +He was little and looked at the world from below. All that happened, +went on over his head. Everyone looked down to him. + +But the big people possessed the enviable power of lifting him to their +own height or above it. It might so happen that suddenly, without +preamble, as he lay on the floor, rummaging and playing about and +thinking of nothing at all, his father or a visitor would exclaim: +"Would you like to see the fowls of Kjöge?" And with the same he would +feel two large hands placed over his ears and the arms belonging to them +would shoot straight up into the air. That was delightful. Still, there +was some disappointment mingled with it. "Can you see Kjöge now?" was a +question he could make nothing of. What could Kjöge be? But at the other +question: "Do you see the fowls?" he vainly tried to see something or +other. By degrees he understood that it was only a phrase, and that +there was nothing to look for. + +It was his first experience of empty phrases, and it made an impression. + +It was just as great fun, though, when the big people said to him: +"Would you like to be a fat lamb? Let us play at fat lamb." He would be +flung over the man's shoulder, like a slaughtered lamb, and hang there, +or jump up and ride with his legs round the man's hips, then climb +valiantly several steps higher, get his legs round his shoulders, and +behold! be up on the giddy height! Then the man would take him round the +waist, swing him over, and after a mighty somersault in the air, he +would land unscathed on his feet upon the floor. It was a composite kind +of treat, of three successive stages: first came the lofty and +comfortable seat, then the more interesting moment, with a feeling, +nevertheless, of being on the verge of a fall, and then finally the +jump, during which everything was upside down to him. + +But, too, he could take up attitudes down on the floor that added to his +importance, as it were, and obliged the grown-up people to look at him. +When they said: "Can you stand like the Emperor Napoleon?" he would draw +himself up, bring one foot a little forward, and cross his arms like the +little figure on the bureau. + +He knew well enough just how he had to look, for when his stout, broad- +shouldered Swedish uncle, with the big beard and large hands, having +asked his parents about the little fellow's accomplishments, placed +himself in position with his arms crossed and asked: "Who am I like?" he +replied: "You are like Napoleon's lackey." To his surprise, but no small +delight, this reply elicited a loud exclamation of pleasure from his +mother, usually so superior and so strict, and was rewarded by her, who +seldom caressed, with a kiss. + + +II. + +The trying moment of the day was when he had to go to bed. His parents +were extraordinarily prejudiced about bedtime, just when he was enjoying +himself most. When visitors had arrived and conversation was well +started--none the less interesting to him because he understood +scarcely half of what was said--it was: "Now, to bed!" + +But there were happy moments after he was in bed, too. When Mother came +in and said prayers with him, and he lay there safely fenced in by the +tall trellis-work, each bar of which, with its little outward bend in +the middle, his fingers knew so well, it was impossible to fall out +through them. It was very pleasant, the little bed with its railing, and +he slept in it as he has never slept since. + +It was nice, too, to lie on his back in bed and watch his parents +getting ready to go to the theatre, Father in a shining white shirt and +with his curly hair beautifully parted on one side Mother with a crêpe +shawl over her silk dress, and light gloves that smelled inviting as she +came up to say goodnight and good-bye. + + +III. + +I was always hearing that I was pale and thin and small. That was the +impression I made on everyone. Nearly thirty years afterwards an +observant person remarked to me: "The peculiarity about your face is its +intense paleness." Consequently I looked darker than I was; my brown +hair was called black. + +Pale and thin, with thick brown hair, difficult hair. That was what the +hairdresser said--Mr. [Footnote: Danish _Herre_.] Alibert, who +called Father Erré: "Good-morning, Erré," "Good-bye, Erré." And all his +assistants, though as Danish as they could be, tried to say the same. +Difficult hair! "There is a little round place on his crown where the +hair will stand up, if he does not wear it rather long," said Mr. +Alibert. + +I was forever hearing that I was pale and small, pale in particular. +Strangers would look at me and say: "He is rather pale." Others remarked +in joke: "He looks rather green in the face." And so soon as they began +talking about me the word "thin" would be uttered. + +I liked my name. My mother and my aunts said it in such a kindly way. +And the name was noteworthy because it was so difficult to pronounce. No +boy or girl smaller than I could pronounce it properly; they all said +_Gayrok_. + +I came into the world two months too soon, I was in such a hurry. My +mother was alone and had no help. When the midwife came I had arrived +already. I was so feeble that the first few years great care had to be +taken of me to keep me alive. I was well made enough, but not strong, +and this was the source of many vexations to me during those years when +a boy's one desire and one ambition is to be strong. + +I was not clumsy, very agile if anything; I learnt to be a good high +jumper, to climb and run well, was no contemptible wrestler, and by +degrees became an expert fighter. But I was not muscularly strong, and +never could be compared with those who were so. + + +IV. + +The world, meanwhile, was so new, and still such an unknown country. +About that time I was making the discovery of fresh elements. + +I was not afraid of what I did not like. To overcome dislike of a thing +often satisfied one's feeling of honour. + +"Are you afraid of the water?" asked my brisk uncle from Fünen one day. +I did not know exactly what there was to be afraid of, but answered +unhesitatingly: "No." I was five years old; it was Summer, consequently +rainy and windy. + +I undressed in the bathing establishment; the old sailor fastened a cork +belt round my waist. It was odiously wet, as another boy had just taken +it off, and it made me shiver. Uncle took hold of me round the waist, +tossed me out into the water, and taught me to take care of myself. +Afterwards I learnt to swim properly with the help of a long pole +fastened to the cork belt and held by the bathing-man, but my +familiarity with the salt element dated from the day I was flung out +into it like a little parcel. Without by any means distinguishing myself +in swimming, any more than in any other athletic exercise, I became a +very fair swimmer, and developed a fondness for the water and for +bathing which has made me very loth, all my life, to miss my bath a +single day. + +There was another element that I became acquainted with about the same +time, and which was far more terrifying than the water. I had never seen +it uncontrolled: fire. + +One evening, when I was asleep in the nursery, I was awaked by my mother +and her brother, my French uncle. The latter said loudly: "We must take +the children out of bed." + +I had never been awaked in the night before. I opened my eyes and was +thrilled by a terror, the memory of which has never been effaced. The +room was brightly illuminated without any candle having been lighted, +and when I turned my head I saw a huge blaze shoot up outside the +window. Flames crackled and sparks flew. It was a world of fire. It was +a neighbouring school that was burning. Uncle Jacob put his hand under +my "night gown," a long article of clothing with a narrow cotton belt +round the waist, and said laughing: "Do you have palpitations of the +heart when you are afraid?" I had never heard of palpitations of the +heart before. I felt about with my hand and for the first time found my +heart, which really was beating furiously. Small though I was, I asked +the date and was told that it was the 25th of November; the fright I had +had was so great that I never forgot this date, which became for me the +object of a superstitious dread, and when it drew near the following +year, I was convinced that it would bring me fresh misfortune. This was +in so far the case that next year, at exactly the same time, I fell ill +and was obliged to spend some months in bed. + + +V. + +I was too delicate to be sent to school at five years old, like other +boys. My doctor uncle said it was not to be thought of. Since, however, +I could not grow up altogether in ignorance, it was decided that I +should have a tutor of my own. + +So a tutor was engaged who quickly won my unreserved affection and made +me very happy. The tutor came every morning and taught me all I had to +learn. He was a tutor whom one could ask about anything under the sun +and he would always know. First, there was the ABC. That was mastered in +a few lessons. I could read before I knew how to spell. Then came +writing and arithmetic and still more things. I was soon so far advanced +that the tutor could read _Frithiof's Saga_ aloud to me in Swedish +and be tolerably well understood; and, indeed, he could even take a +short German extract, and explain that I must say _ich_ and not +_ish_, as seemed so natural. + +Mr. Voltelen was a poor student, and I quite understood from the +conversation of my elders what a pleasure and advantage it was to him to +get a cup of coffee extra and fine white bread and fresh butter with it +every day. On the stroke of half-past ten the maid brought it in on a +tray. Lessons were stopped, and the tutor ate and drank with a relish +that I had never seen anyone show over eating and drinking before. The +very way in which he took his sugar--more sugar than Father or Mother +took--and dissolved it in the coffee before he poured in the cream, +showed what a treat the cup of coffee was to him. + +Mr. Voltelen had a delicate chest, and sometimes the grown-up people +said they were afraid he could not live. There was a report that a rich +benefactor, named Nobel, had offered to send him to Italy, that he might +recover in the warmer climate of the South. It was generous of Mr. +Nobel, and Mr. Voltelen was thinking of starting. Then he caught another +complaint. He had beautiful, brown, curly hair. One day he stayed away; +he had a bad head, he had contracted a disease in his hair from a dirty +comb at a bathing establishment. And when he came again I hardly +recognised him. He wore a little dark wig. He had lost every hair on his +head, even his eyebrows had disappeared. His face was of a chalky +pallor, and he coughed badly too. + +Why did not God protect him from consumption? And how could God find it +in His heart to give him the hair disease when he was so ill already? +God was strange. He was Almighty, but He did not use His might to take +care of Mr. Voltelen, who was so good and so clever, and so poor that he +needed help more than anyone else. Mr. Nobel was kinder to Mr. Voltelen +than God was. God was strange, too, in other ways; He was present +everywhere, and yet Mother was cross and angry if you asked whether He +was in the new moderator lamp, which burnt in the drawing-room with a +much brighter light than the two wax candles used to give. God knew +everything, which was very uncomfortable, since it was impossible to +hide the least thing from Him. Strangest of all was it when one +reflected that, if one knew what God thought one was going to say, one +could say something else and His omniscience would be foiled. But of +course one did not know what He thought would come next. The worst of +all, though, was that He left Mr. Voltelen in the lurch so. + + +VI. + +Some flashes of terrestrial majesty and magnificence shone on my modest +existence. Next after God came the King. As I was walking along the +street one day with my father, he exclaimed: "There is the King!" I +looked at the open carriage, but saw nothing noticeable there, so fixed +my attention upon the coachman, dressed in red, and the footman's plumed +hat. "The King wasn't there!" "Yes, indeed he was--he was in the +carriage." "Was that the King? He didn't look at all remarkable--he had +no crown on." "The King is a handsome man," said Father. "But he only +puts on his state clothes when he drives to the Supreme Court." + +So we went one day to see the King drive to the Supreme Court. A crowd +of people were standing waiting at the Naval Church. Then came the +procession. How splendid it was! There were runners in front of the +horses, with white silk stockings and regular flower-pots on their +heads; I had never seen anything like it; and there were postillions +riding on the horses in front of the carriage. I quite forgot to look +inside the carriage and barely caught a glimpse of the King. And that +glimpse made no impression upon me. That he was Christian VIII. I did +not know; he was only "the King." + +Then one day we heard that the King was dead, and that he was to lie in +state twice. These lyings in state were called by forced, unnatural +names, _Lit de Parade_ and _Castrum doloris_; I heard them so +often that I learnt them and did not forget them. On the _Lit de +Parade_ the body of the King himself lay outstretched; that was too +sad for a little boy. But _Castrum doloris_ was sheer delight, and +it really was splendid. First you picked your way for a long time along +narrow corridors, then high up in the black-draped hall appeared the +coffin covered with black velvet, strewn with shining, twinkling stars. +And a crowd of candles all round. It was the most magnificent sight I +had ever beheld. + + +VII. + +I was a town child, it is true, but that did not prevent me enjoying +open-air life, with plants and animals. The country was not so far from +town then as it is now. My paternal grandfather had a country-house a +little way beyond the North gate, with fine trees and an orchard; it was +the property of an old man who went about in high Wellington boots and +had a regular collection of wax apples and pears--such a marvellous +imitation that the first time you saw them you couldn't help taking a +bite out of one. Driving out to the country-house in the Summer, the +carriage would begin to lumber and rumble as soon as you passed through +the North gate, and when you came back you had to be careful to come in +before the gate was closed. + +We lived in the country ourselves, for that matter, out in the western +suburb, near the Black Horse (as later during the cholera Summer), or +along the old King's Road, where there were beautiful large gardens. In +one such a huge garden I stood one Summer day by my mother's side in +front of a large oblong bed with many kinds of flowers. "This bed shall +be yours," said Mother, and happy was I. I was to rake the paths round +it myself and tend and water the plants in it. I was particularly +interested to notice that a fresh set of flowers came out for every +season of the year. When the asters and dahlias sprang into bloom the +Summer was over. Still the garden was not the real country. The real +country was at Inger's, my dear old nurse's. She was called my nurse +because she had looked after me when I was small. But she had not fed +me, my mother had done that. + +Inger lived in a house with fields round it near High Taastrup. There +was no railway there then, and you drove out with a pair of horses. It +was only later that the wonderful railway was laid as far as Roskilde. +So it was an unparalleled event for the children, to go by train to +Valby and back. Their father took them. Many people thought that it was +too dangerous. But the children cared little for the danger. And it went +off all right and they returned alive. + +Inger had a husband whose name was Peer. He was nice, but had not much +to say. Inger talked far more and looked after everything. They had a +baby boy named Niels, but he was in the cradle and did not count. +Everything at Inger and Peer's house was different from the town. There +was a curious smell in the rooms, with their chests of drawers and +benches, not exactly disagreeable, but unforgettable. They had much +larger dishes of curds and porridge than you saw in Copenhagen. They did +not put the porridge or the curds on plates. Inger and Peer and their +little visitor sat round the milk bowl or the porridge dish and put +their spoons straight into it. But the guest had a spoon to himself. +They did not drink out of separate glasses, but he had a glass to +himself. + +It was jolly in the country. A cow and little pigs to play with and milk +warm from the cow. Inger used to churn, and there was buttermilk to +drink. It was great fun for a little Copenhagen boy to roll about in the +hay and lie on the hay-waggons when they were driven home. And every +time I came home from a visit to Inger Mother would laugh at me the +moment I opened my mouth, for, quite unconsciously, I talked just like +Inger and the other peasants. + + +VIII. + +In the wood attic, a little room divided from the main garret by wooden +bars, in which a quantity of split firewood and more finely chopped fir +sticks, smelling fresh and dry, are piled up in obliquely arranged +heaps, a little urchin with tightly closed mouth and obstinate +expression has, for more than two hours, been bearing his punishment of +being incarcerated there. + +Several times already his anxious mother has sent the housemaid to ask +whether he will beg pardon yet, and he has only shaken his head. He is +hungry; for he was brought up here immediately after school. But he will +not give in, for he is in the right. It is not his fault that the grown- +up people cannot understand him. They do not know that what he is +suffering now is nothing to what he has had to suffer. It is true that +he would not go with the nurse and his little brother into the King's +Gardens. But what do Father and Mother know of the ignominy of hearing +all day from the other schoolboys: "Oh! so you are fetched by the +nurse!" or "Here comes your nurse to fetch you!" He is overwhelmed with +shame at the thought of the other boys' scorn. She is not _his_ +nurse, she is his brother's. He could find his way home well enough, but +how can he explain to the other boys that his parents will not trust him +with the little one yet, and so send for them both at the same time! Now +there shall be an end to it; he will not go to the King's Gardens with +the nurse again. + +It is the housemaid, once more, come to ask if he will not beg pardon +now. In vain. Everything has been tried with him, scolding, and even a +box on the ear; but he has not been humbled. Now he stands here; he will +not give in. + +But this time his kind mother has not let the girl come empty-handed. +His meal is passed through the bars and he eats it. It is so much the +easier to hold out. And some hours later he is brought down and put to +bed without having apologised. + +Before I had so painfully become aware of the ignominy of going with the +maid to the King's Gardens, I had been exceedingly fond of the place. +What gardens they were for hide and seek, and puss in the corner! What +splendid alleys for playing Paradise, with Heaven and Hell! To say +nothing of playing at horses! A long piece of tape was passed over and +under the shoulders of two playfellows, and you drove them with a tight +rein and a whip in your hand. And if it were fun in the old days when I +only had tape for reins, it was ever so much greater fun now that I had +had a present from my father of splendid broad reins of striped wool, +with bells, that you could hear from far enough when the pair came +tearing down the wide avenues. + +I was fond of the gardens, which were large and at that time much larger +than they are now; and of the trees, which were many, at that time many +more than now. And every part of the park had its own attraction. The +Hercules pavilion was mysterious; Hercules with the lion, instructive +and powerful. A pity that it had become such a disgrace to go there! + +I had not known it before. One day, not so long ago, I had felt +particularly happy there. I had been able for a long time to read +correctly in my reading-book and write on my slate. But one day Mr. +Voltelen had said to me: "You ought to learn to read writing." And from +that moment forth my ambition was set upon reading _writing_, an +idea which had never occurred to me before. When my tutor first showed +me _writing_, it had looked to me much as cuneiform inscriptions +and hieroglyphics would do to ordinary grown-up people, but by degrees I +managed to recognize the letters I was accustomed to in this their +freer, more frivolous disguise, running into one another and with their +regularity broken up. In the first main avenue of the King's Gardens I +had paced up and down, in my hand the thin exercise-book, folded over in +the middle,--the first book of writing I had ever seen,--and had already +spelt out the title, "Little Red Riding-Hood." The story was certainly +not very long; still, it filled several of the narrow pages, and it was +exciting to spell out the subject, for it was new to me. In triumphant +delight at having conquered some difficulties and being on the verge of +conquering others, I kept stopping in front of a strange nurse-girl, +showed her the book, and asked: "Can you read writing?" + +Twenty-three years later I paced up and down the same avenue as a young +man, once more with a book of manuscript, that I was reading, in my +hand. I was fixing my first lecture in my mind, and I repeated it over +and over again to myself until I knew it almost by heart, only to +discover, to my disquiet, a few minutes later, that I had forgotten the +whole, and that was bad enough; for what I wished to say in my lecture +were things that I had very much at heart. + +The King's Garden continued to occupy its place in my life. Later on, +for so many years, when Spring and Summer passed by and I was tied to +the town, and pined for trees and the scent of flowers, I used to go to +the park, cross it obliquely to the beds near the beautiful copper +beeches, by the entrance from the ramparts, where there were always +flowers, well cared for and sweet scented. I caressed them with my eyes, +and inhaled their perfume leaning forward over the railings. + +But just now I preferred to be shut up in the wood-loft to being fetched +by the nurse from school to the Gardens. It was horrid, too, to be +obliged to walk so slowly with the girl, even though no longer obliged +to take hold of her skirt. How I envied the boys contemptuously called +street boys! They could run in and out of the courtyard, shout and make +as much noise as they liked, quarrel and fight out in the street, and +move about freely. I knew plenty of streets. If sent into the town on an +errand I should be able to find my way quite easily. + +And at last I obtained permission. Happy, happy day! I flew off like an +arrow. I could not possibly have walked. And I ran home again at full +galop. From that day forth I always ran when I had to go out alone. Yes, +and I could not understand how grown-up people and other boys could +walk. I tried a few steps to see, but impatience got the better of me +and off I flew. It was fine fun to run till you positively felt the +hurry you were in, because you hit your back with your heels at every +step. + +My father, though, could run very much faster. It was impossible to +compete with him on the grass. But it was astonishing how slow old +people were. Some of them could not run up a hill and called it trying +to climb stairs. + + +IX. + +On the whole, the world was friendly. It chiefly depended on whether one +were good or not. If not, Karoline was especially prone to complain and +Father and Mother were transformed into angry powers. Father was, of +course, a much more serious power than Mother, a more distant, more +hard-handed power. Neither of them, in an ordinary way, inspired any +terror. They were in the main protecting powers. + +The terrifying power at this first stage was supplied by the bogey-man. +He came rushing suddenly out of a corner with a towel in front of his +face and said: "Bo!" and you jumped. If the towel were taken away there +soon emerged a laughing face from behind it. That at once made the +bogey-man less terrible. And perhaps that was the reason Maren's threat: +"Now, if you are not good, the bogey-man will come and take you," +quickly lost its effect. And yet it was out of this same bogey-man, so +cold-bloodedly shaken off, that at a later stage a personality with whom +there was no jesting developed, one who was not to be thrust aside in +the same way, a personality for whom you felt both fear and trembling-- +the Devil himself. + +But it was only later that he revealed himself to my ken. It was not he +who succeeded first to the bogey-man. It was--the police. The police was +the strange and dreadful power from which there was no refuge for a +little boy. The police came and took him away from his parents, away +from the nursery and the drawing-room, and put him in prison. + +In the street the police wore a blue coat and had a large cane in his +hand. Woe to the one who made the acquaintance of that cane! + +My maternal grandfather was having his warehouse done up, a large +warehouse, three stories high. Through doors at the top, just under the +gable in the middle, there issued a crane, and from it hung down a +tremendously thick rope at the end of which was a strong iron hook. By +means of it the large barrels of sky-blue indigo, which were brought on +waggons, were hoisted. Inside the warehouse the ropes passed through +every storey, through holes in the floors. If you pulled from the inside +at the one or the other of the ropes, the rope outside with the iron +crook went up or down. + +In the warehouse you found Jens; he was a big, strong, taciturn, +majestic man with a red nose and a little pipe in his mouth, and his +fingers were always blue from the indigo. If you had made sure of Jens' +good-will, you could play in the warehouse for hours at a time, roll the +empty barrels about, and--which was the greatest treat of all--pull the +ropes. This last was a delight that kept all one's faculties at extreme +tension. The marvellous thing about it was that you yourself stood +inside the house and pulled, and yet at the same time you could watch +through the open doors in the wall how the rope outside went up or down. +How it came about was an enigma. But you had the refreshing +consciousness of having accomplished something--saw the results of your +efforts before your eyes. + +Nor could I resist the temptation of pulling the ropes when Jens was out +and the warehouse empty. My little brother had whooping cough, so I +could not live at home, but had to be at my grandfather's. One day Jens +surprised me and pretty angry he was. "A nice little boy you are! If you +pull the rope at a wrong time you will cut the expensive rope through, +and it cost 90 Rigsdaler! What do you think your grandfather will +say?" [Footnote: A Rigsdaler was worth about two shillings and +threepence, English money. It is a coin that has been out of use about +40 years.] + +It was, of course, very alarming to think that I might destroy such a +valuable thing. Not that I had any definite ideas of money and numbers. +I was well up in the multiplication table and was constantly wrestling +with large numbers, but they did not correspond to any actual conception +in my mind. When I reckoned up what one number of several digits came to +multiplied by another of much about the same value, I had not the least +idea whether Father or Grandfather had so many Rigsdaler, or less, or +more. There was only one of the uncles who took an interest in my gift +for multiplication, and that was my stout, rich uncle with the crooked +mouth, of whom it was said that he owned a million, and who was always +thinking of figures. He was hardly at the door of Mother's drawing-room +before he called out: "If you are a sharp boy and can tell me what +27,374 times 580,208 are, you shall have four skilling;" and quickly +slate and pencil appeared and the sum was finished in a moment and the +four skilling pocketed. [Footnote: Four skilling would be a sum equal to +1-1/2d. English money.] + +I was at home then in the world of figures, but not in that of values. +All the same, it would be a terrible thing to destroy such a value as 90 +Rigsdaler seemed to be. But might it not be that Jens only said so? He +surely could not see from the rope whether it had been pulled or not. + +So I did it again, and one day when Jens began questioning me sternly +could not deny my guilt. "I saw it," said Jens; "the rope is nearly cut +in two, and now you will catch it, now the policeman will come and fetch +you." + +For weeks after that I did not have one easy hour. Wherever I went, or +whatever I did, the fear of the police followed me. I dared not speak to +anyone of what I had done and of what was awaiting me. I was too much +ashamed, and I noticed, too, that my parents knew nothing. But if a door +opened suddenly I would look anxiously at the incomer. When I was +walking with the nurse and my little brother I looked all round on every +side, and frequently peeped behind me, to see whether the police were +after me. Even when I lay in my bed, shut in on all four sides by its +trellis-work, the dread of the police was upon me still. + +There was only one person to whom I dared mention it, and that was Jens. +When a few weeks had gone by I tried to get an answer out of him. Then I +perceived that Jens did not even know what I was talking about. Jens had +evidently forgotten all about it. Jens had been making fun of me. If my +relief was immense, my indignation was no less. So much torture for +nothing at all! Older people, who had noticed how the word "police" was +to me an epitome of all that was terrible, sometimes made use of it as +an explanation of things that they thought were above my comprehension. + +When I was six years old I heard the word "war" for the first time. I +did not know what it was, and asked. "It means," said one of my aunts, +"that the Germans have put police in Schleswig and forbidden the Danes +to go there, and that they will beat them if they stay there." That I +could understand, but afterwards I heard them talking about soldiers. +"Are there soldiers as well?" I asked. "Police and soldiers," was the +answer. But that confused me altogether, for the two things belonged in +my mind to wholly different categories. Soldiers were beautiful, gay- +coloured men with shakos, who kept guard and marched in step to the +sound of drums and fifes and music, till you longed to go with them. +That was why soldiers were copied in tin and you got them on your +birthday in boxes. But police went by themselves, without music, without +beautiful colours on their uniforms, looked stern and threatening, and +had a stick in their hands. Nobody dreamt of copying them in tin. I was +very much annoyed to find out, as I soon did, that I had been misled by +the explanation and that it was a question of soldiers only. + +Not a month had passed before I began to follow eagerly, when the grown- +up people read aloud from the farthing newspaper sheets about the +battles at Bov, Nybböl, etc. The Danes always won. At bottom, war was a +cheerful thing. + +Then one day an unexpected and overwhelming thing happened. Mother was +sitting with her work on the little raised platform in the drawing-room, +in front of the sewing-table with its many little compartments, in +which, under the loose mahogany lid, there lay so many beautiful and +wonderful things--rings and lovely earrings, with pearls in them--when +the door to the kitchen opened and the maid came in. "Has Madame heard? +The _Christian VIII_. has been blown up at Eckernförde and the +_Gefion_ is taken." + +"Can it be possible?" said Mother. And she leaned over the sewing-table +and burst into tears, positively sobbed. It impressed me as nothing had +ever done before. I had never seen Mother cry. Grown-up people did not +cry. I did not even know that they could. And now Mother was crying till +the tears streamed down her face. I did not know what either the +_Christian VIII_. or the _Gefion_ were, and it was only now +that the maid explained to me that they were ships. But I understood +that a great misfortune had happened, and soon, too, how people were +blown up with gunpowder, and what a good thing it was that one of our +acquaintances, an active young man who was liked by everyone and always +got on well, had escaped with a whole skin, and had reached Copenhagen +in civilian's dress. + + +X. + +About this time it dawned upon me in a measure what birth and death +were. Birth was something that came quite unexpectedly, and afterwards +there was one child more in the house. One day, when I was sitting on +the sofa between Grandmamma and Grandpapa at their dining-table in +Klareboderne, having dinner with a fairly large company, the door at the +back of the room just opposite to me opened. My father stood in the +doorway, and, without a good-morning, said: "You have got a little +brother"--and there really was a little one in a cradle when I went +home. + +Death I had hitherto been chiefly acquainted with from a large, handsome +painting on Grandfather's wall, the death of the King not having +affected me. The picture represented a garden in which Aunt Rosette sat +on a white-painted bench, while in front of her stood Uncle Edward with +curly hair and a blouse on, holding out a flower to her. But Uncle +Edward was dead, had died when he was a little boy, and as he had been +such a very good boy, everyone was very sorry that they were not going +to see him again. And now they were always talking about death. So and +so many dead, so and so many wounded! And all the trouble was caused by +the Enemy. + + +XI. + +There were other inimical forces, too, besides the police and the Enemy, +more uncanny and less palpable forces. When I dragged behind the +nursemaid who held my younger brother by the hand, sometimes I heard a +shout behind me, and if I turned round would see a grinning boy, making +faces and shaking his fist at me. For a long time I took no particular +notice, but as time went on I heard the shout oftener and asked the maid +what it meant. "Oh, nothing!" she replied. But on my repeatedly asking +she simply said: "It is a bad word." + +But one day, when I had heard the shout again, I made up my mind that I +would know, and when I came home asked my mother: "What does it mean?" +"Jew!" said Mother. "Jews are people." "Nasty people?" "Yes," said +Mother, smiling, "sometimes very ugly people, but not always." "Could I +see a Jew?" "Yes, very easily," said Mother, lifting me up quickly in +front of the large oval mirror above the sofa. + +I uttered a shriek, so that Mother hurriedly put me down again, and my +horror was such that she regretted not having prepared me. Later on she +occasionally spoke about it. + + +XII. + +Other inimical forces in the world cropped up by degrees. When you had +been put to bed early the maids often sat down at the nursery table, and +talked in an undertone until far on into the evening. And then they +would tell stories that were enough to make your hair stand on end. They +talked of ghosts that went about dressed in white, quite noiselessly, or +rattling their chains through the rooms of houses, appeared to people +lying in bed, frightened guilty persons; of figures that stepped out of +their picture-frames and moved across the floor; of the horror of +spending a night in the dark in a church--no one dared do that; of what +dreadful places churchyards were, how the dead in long grave-clothes +rose up from their graves at night and frightened the life out of +people, while the Devil himself ran about the churchyard in the shape of +a black cat. In fact, you could never be sure, when you saw a black cat +towards evening, that the Devil was not inside it. And as easily as +winking the Devil could transform himself into a man and come up behind +the person he had a grudge against. + +It was a terrifying excitement to lie awake and listen to all this. And +there was no doubt about it. Both Maren and Karoline had seen things of +the sort themselves and could produce witnesses by the score. It caused +a revolution in my consciousness. I learnt to know the realm of Darkness +and the Prince of Darkness. For a time I hardly ventured to pass through +a dark room. I dared not sit at my book with an open door behind me. Who +might not step noiselessly in! And if there were a mirror on the wall in +front of me I would tremble with fear lest I might see the Devil, +standing with gleaming eyes at the back of my chair. + +When at length the impression made upon me by all these ghost and devil +stories passed away, I retained a strong repugnance to all darkness +terror, and to all who take advantage of the defenceless fear of the +ignorant for the powers of darkness. + + +XIII. + +The world was widening out. It was not only home and the houses of my +different grandparents, and the clan of my uncles, aunts, and cousins; +it grew larger. + +I realized this at the homecoming of the troops. They came home twice. +The impression they produced the first time was certainly a great, +though not a deep one. It was purely external, and indistinctly merged +together: garlands on the houses and across the streets, the dense +throng of people, the flower-decked soldiers, marching in step to the +music under a constant shower of flowers from every window, and looking +up smiling. The second time, long afterwards, I took things in in much +greater detail. The wounded, who went in front and were greeted with a +sort of tenderness; the officers on horseback, saluting with their +swords, on which were piled wreath over wreath; the bearded soldiers, +with tiny wreaths round their bayonets, while big boys carried their +rifles for them. And all the time the music of _Den tapre +Landsoldat_, when not the turn of _Danmark dejligst_ or _Vift +stolt!_ [Footnote: Three favourite Danish tunes: "The Brave Soldier," +"Fairest Denmark," and "Proudly Wave." ] + +But the second time I was not wholly absorbed by the sight, for I was +tormented by remorse. My aunt had presented me the day before with three +little wreaths to throw at the soldiers; the one I was to keep myself, +and I was to give each of my two small brothers one of the others; I had +promised faithfully to do so. And I had kept them all three, intending +to throw them all myself. I knew it was wrong and deceitful; I was +suffering for it, but the delight of throwing all the wreaths myself was +too great. I flung them down. A soldier caught one on his bayonet; the +others fell to the ground. I was thoroughly ashamed of myself, and have +never forgotten my shame. + + +XIV. + +I knew that the theatre (where I had never been) was the place where +Mother and Father enjoyed themselves most. They often talked of it, and +were most delighted if the actors had "acted well," words which conveyed +no meaning to me. + +Children were not at that time debarred from the Royal Theatre, and I +had no more ardent wish than to get inside. I was still a very small +child when one day they took me with them in the carriage in which +Father and Mother and Aunt were driving to the theatre. I had my seat +with the others in the pit, and sat speechless with admiration when the +curtain went up. The play was called _Adventures on a Walking +Tour_. I could not understand anything. Men came on the stage and +talked together. One crept forward under a bush and sang. I could not +grasp the meaning of it, and when I asked I was only told to be quiet. +But my emotion was so great that I began to feel ill, and had to be +carried out. Out in the square I was sick and had to be taken home. +Unfortunately for me, that was precisely what happened the second time, +when, in response to my importunity, another try was made. My +excitement, my delight, my attention to the unintelligible were too +overwhelming. I nearly fainted, and at the close of the first act had to +leave the theatre. After that, it was a very long time before I was +regarded as old enough to stand the excitement. + +Once, though, I was allowed to go to see a comedy. Mr. Voltelen gave me +a ticket for some students' theatricals at the Court Theatre, in which +he himself was going to appear. The piece was called _A Spendthrift_, +and I saw it without suffering for it. There was a young, flighty man in +it who used to throw gold coins out of the window, and there was an ugly +old hag, and a young, beautiful girl as well. I sat and kept a sharp +lookout for when my master should come on, but I was disappointed; there +was no Mr. Voltelen to be seen. + +Next day, when I thanked him for the entertainment, I added: "But you +made game of me. You were not in it at all." "What? I was not in it? Did +you not see the old hag? That was I. Didn't you see the girl? That was +I." It was incomprehensible to me that anyone could disguise himself so. +Mr. Voltelen must most certainly have "acted well." But years +afterwards, I could still not understand how one judged of this. Since +plays affected me exactly like real life, I was, of course, not in a +position to single out the share the actors took. + + +XV. + +The war imbued my tin soldiers with quite a new interest. It was +impossible to have boxes enough of them. You could set them out in +companies and battalions; they opened their ranks to attack, stormed, +were wounded, and fell. Sometimes they lay down fatigued and slept on +the field of battle. But a new box that came one day made the old ones +lose all value for me. For the soldiers in the new box were proper +soldiers, with chests and backs, round to the touch, heavy to hold. In +comparison with them, the older ones, profile soldiers, so small that +you could only look at them sideways, sank into utter insignificance. A +step had been taken from the abstract to the concrete. It was no longer +any pleasure to me to play with the smaller soldiers. I said: "They +amused me last year, when I was little." There was a similar change, a +similar picture of historic progress, when the hobby-horse on which I +had spent so many happy hours, and on which I had ridden through rooms +and passages, was put in the corner in favour of the new rocking-horse +which, long coveted and desired, was carried in through the door, and +stood in the room, rocking slightly, as though ready for the boldest +ride, the moment its rider flung himself into the saddle. + +I mounted it and oh, happiness! I began to ride, and rode on with +passionate delight till I nearly went over the horse's head. "When I was +a little boy the hobby-horse amused me, but it does not now." Every time +I climbed a fresh rung of the ladder, no matter how low an one, the same +feeling possessed me, and the same train of thought. Mother often joked +about it, up to the time when I was a full grown man. If I quickly +outgrew my fancies, if I had quite done with anything or anybody that +had absorbed me a little while before, she would say, with a smile: +"Last year, when I was a little boy, the hobby-horse amused me." + +Still, progress was not always smooth. When I was small I had pretty +blouses, one especially, grey, with brown worsted lace upon it, that I +was fond of wearing; now I had plain, flat blouses with a leather belt +round the waist. Later on, I was ambitious to have a jacket, like big +boys, and when this wish had been gratified there awoke in me, as +happens in life, a more lofty ambition still, that to wear a frock coat. +In the fulness of time an old frock coat of my father's was altered to +fit me. I looked thin and lank in it, but the dress was honourable. Then +it occurred to me that everybody would see I was wearing a frock coat +for the first time. I did not dare to go out into the streets with it +on, but went out of my way round the ramparts for fear of meeting +anyone. + +When I was a little boy I did not, of course, trouble much about my +appearance. I did not remember that my portrait had been drawn several +times. But when I was nine years old, Aunt Sarah--at that time everybody +was either uncle or aunt--determined that we brothers should have our +portraits taken in daguerreotype for Father's birthday. The event made a +profound impression, because I had to stand perfectly still while the +picture was being taken, and because the daguerreotypist, a German, +whose name was Schätzig, rolled his _r_s and hissed his _s_s. +The whole affair was a great secret, which was not to be betrayed. The +present was to be a surprise, and I was compelled to promise perfect +silence. I kept my promise for one day. But next day, at the dinner- +table, I accidentally burst out: "Now! quite shtill! _as the man +said_." "What man?" "Ah! that was the secret!" + +The visit to Schätzig in itself I had reason to remember a long time. +Some one or another had said that I had a slender neck, and that it was +pretty. Just as we were going in, my aunt said: "You will catch cold +inside," and in spite of my protests tied a little silk handkerchief +round my neck. That handkerchief spoilt all my pleasure in being +immortalised. And it is round my neck on the old picture to this day. + + +XVI. + +The tin soldiers had called all my warlike instincts into being. After +the rocking-horse, more and more military appurtenances followed. A +shining helmet to buckle firmly under the chin, in which one looked +quite imposing; a cuirass of real metal like the Horseguards', and a +short rapier in a leather scabbard, which went by the foreign name of +Hirschfänger, and was a very awe-inspiring weapon in the eyes of one's +small brothers, when they were mercilessly massacred with it. Sitting on +the rocking-horse, arrayed in all this splendour, wild dreams of +military greatness filled the soul, dreams which grew wilder and more +ambitious from year to year until between the age of 8 and 9 they +received a fresh and unwholesome stimulus from Ingemann's novels. +[Footnote: B.S. Ingemann (1789-1862), a Danish writer celebrated chiefly +as the author of many historical novels, now only read by very young +children.] + +On horseback, at the head of a chosen band, fighting like the lost +against unnumbered odds! Rock goes the rocking-horse, violently up and +down. The enemy wavers, he begins to give way. The rocking-horse is +pulled up. A sign with the Hirschfänger to the herd of common troops. +The enemy is beaten and flies, the next thing is to pursue him. The +rocking-horse is set once more in furious motion. Complete victory. +Procession into the capital; shouts of jubilation and wreaths of +flowers, for the victor and his men. + + +XVII. + +Just about this time, when in imagination I was so great a warrior, I +had good use in real life for more strength, as I was no longer taken to +school by the nurse, but instead had myself to protect my brother, two +years my junior. The start from home was pleasant enough. Lunch boxes of +tin with the Danish greeting after meals in gold letters upon them, +stood open on the table. Mother, at one end of the table, spread each +child six pieces of bread and butter, which were then placed together, +two and two, white bread on brown bread, a mixture which, was uncommonly +nice. The box would take exactly so many. Then it was put in the school- +bag with the books. And with bag on back you went to school, always the +same way. But those were days when the journey was much impeded. Every +minute you met boys who called you names and tried to hit the little +one, and you had to fight at every street corner you turned. And those +were days when, even in the school itself, despite the humanity of the +age (not since attained to), terms of abuse, buffets and choice insults +were one's daily bread, and I can see myself now, as I sprang up one day +in a fight with a much bigger boy and bit him in the neck, till a master +was obliged to get me away from him, and the other had to have his neck +bathed under the pump. + +I admired in others the strength that I lacked myself. There was in the +class one big, stout, squarely built, inexpressibly good-natured boy, +for whom no one was a match in fighting. He was from Lolland, and his +name was Ludvig; he was not particularly bright, but robust and as +strong as a giant. Then one day there arrived at the school a West +Indian of the name of Muddie, dark of hue, with curly hair, as strong +and slim as a savage, and with all the finesse and feints which he had +at his command, irresistible, whether wrestling or when fighting with +his fists. He beat all the strongest boys in the school. Only Ludvig and +he had not challenged each other. But the boys were very anxious to see +a bout between the two, and a wrestling match between them was arranged +for a free quarter of an hour. For the boys, who were all judges, it was +a fine sight to see two such fighters wrestle, especially when the +Lollander flung himself down on the other and the West Indian struggled +vainly, writhing like a very snake to twist himself out of his grasp. + +One day two new boys came to school, two brothers; the elder, Adam, was +small and sallow, extraordinarily withered, looking like a cripple, +without, however, being one; the somewhat younger brother, Sofus, was +splendidly made and amazed us in the very first lesson in which the new +arrivals took part--a gymnastic class--by his unusual agility in +swarming and walking up the sloping bar. He seemed to be as strong as he +was dexterous, and in a little boy with a reverence for those who were +strong, he naturally aroused positive enthusiasm. This was even +augmented next day, when a big, malicious boy, who had scoffed at Adam +for being puny, was, in a trice, so well thrashed by Sofus that he lost +both his breath and his courage. + +Sofus, the new arrival, and I, who had achieved fighting exploits from +the rocking-horse only, were henceforth, for some time, inseparable +friends. It was one of the usual friendships between little boys, in +which the one admires and the other allows himself to be worshipped. The +admirer in this case could only feed his feelings by presenting the +other with the most cherished thing he possessed. This most cherished +thing happened to be some figures cut out in gold paper, from France, +representing every possible object and personage, from ships with masts +and sails, to knights and ladies. I had collected them for a long time +and preserved them, piece by piece, by gumming them into a book which +was the pride of my existence. I gave the book, without the slightest +hesitation, to Sofus, who accepted it without caring for it in the +least. + +And then by reason of the exaggerated admiration of which he was the +object, Sofus, who hitherto had been so straightforward, began to grow +capricious. It was a settled rule that he and I went home from school +together. But one day a difficulty cropped up; Sofus had promised +Valdemar, a horrid boy, who cheated at lessons, to go home with him. And +next day something else prevented him. But when, suddenly having learnt +to know all the pangs of neglect and despised affection, I met him the +third day, after having waited vainly for him, crossing Our Lady's +Square with Valdemar, in my anger I seized my quondam friend roughly by +the arm, my face distorted with rage, and burst out: "You are a rascal!" +then rushed off, and never addressed him again. It was a very ill- +advised thing to do, in fact, the very most foolish thing I could have +done. But I was too passionate to behave sensibly. Valdemar spread the +account of my conduct all through the class, and next day, in our +quarter of an hour's playtime, I heard on every side from the laughing +boys: "You are a rascal! You are a rascal!" + + +XVIII. + +The world was widening out. The instruction I received grew more varied. +There were a great many lessons out of school. From my drawing mistress, +a pleasant girl, who could draw Fingal in a helmet in charcoal, I learnt +to see how things looked in comparison with one another, how they hid +one another and revealed themselves, in perspective; from my music +mistress, my kind aunt, to recognise the notes and keys, and to play, +first short pieces, then sonatas, alone, then as duets. But alas! +Neither in the arts of sight nor hearing did I ever prove myself more +than mediocre. I never attained, either in drawing or piano-playing, to +more than a soulless accuracy. And I hardly showed much greater aptitude +when, on bright Sunday mornings, which invited not at all to the +delights of dancing, with many another tiny lad and lass I was +marshalled up to dance in the dancing saloon of Mr. Hoppe, the royal +dancer, and learnt to take up the first to the fifth positions and swing +the girls round in the polka mazurka. I became an ardent, but never a +specially good, dancer. + + +XIX. + +The world was widening out. Father brought from Paris a marvellous game, +called Fortuna, with bells over pockets in the wood, and balls which +were pushed with cues. Father had travelled from Paris with it five days +and six nights. It was inexpressibly fascinating; no one else in +Copenhagen had a game like it. And next year, when Father came home from +Paris again, he brought a large, flat, polished box, in which there were +a dozen different games, French games with balls, and battledores and +shuttlecocks, games which grown-up people liked playing, too; and there +were carriages which went round and round by clockwork, and a tumbler +who turned somersaults backwards down a flight of steps as soon as he +was placed on the top step. Those were things that the people in France +could do. + +The world was widening out more and more. Relations often came over from +Göteborg. They spoke Swedish, but if you paid great attention you could +understand quite well what they said. They spoke the language of +_Frithiof's Saga_, but pronounced it differently from Mr. Voltelen. +And there came a young French count whose relations my father's brother +had known; he had come as a sailor on a French man-o'-war, and he came +and stayed to dinner and sang the Marseillaise. It was from him that I +heard the song for the first time. He was only fifteen, and very good- +looking, and dressed like an ordinary sailor, although he was a count. + +And then there were my two uncles, Uncle Jacob and Uncle Julius--my +mother's brother Jacob and my father's brother Julius, who had both +become Frenchmen long ago and lived in Paris. Uncle Jacob often came for +a few weeks or more at a time. He was small and broad-shouldered and +good-looking. Everybody was fond of Uncle Jacob; all the ladies wanted +to be asked to the house when Uncle Jacob came. He had a wife and four +children in Paris. But I had pieced together from the conversation of +the grown-up people that Aunt Victorine was his wife and yet not his +wife. Grandmother would have nothing to do with her. And Uncle Jacob had +gone all the way to the Pope in Rome and asked for her to remain his +wife. But the Pope had said No. Why? Because Aunt Victorine had had +another husband before, who had been cruel to her and beaten her, and +the man came sometimes, when Uncle was away, and took her furniture away +from her. It was incomprehensible that he should be allowed to, and that +the Pope would do nothing to prevent it, for after all she was a Catholic. + +Uncle Jacob had a peculiar expression about his mouth when he smiled. +There was a certain charm about everything he said and did, but his +smile was sad. He had acted thoughtlessly, they said, and was not happy. +One morning, while he was visiting Father and Mother and was lying +asleep in the big room, there was a great commotion in the house; a +messenger was sent for the doctor and the word _morphia_ was +spoken. He was ill, but was very soon well again. When he asked his +sister next day: "What has become of my case of pistols?" she replied +with a grave face: "I have taken it and I shall keep it." + +I had not thought as a boy that I should ever see Uncle Jacob's wife and +children. And yet it so happened that I did. Many years afterwards, when +I was a young man and went to Paris, after my uncle's death, I sought +out Victorine and her children. I wished to bring her personally the +monthly allowance that her relatives used to send her from Denmark. I +found her prematurely old, humbled by poverty, worn out by privation. +How was it possible that she should be so badly off? Did she not receive +the help that was sent from Copenhagen every month to uncle's best +friend, M. Fontane, in the Rue Vivienne? Alas, no! M. Fontane gave her a +little assistance once in a while, and at other times sent her and her +children away with hard words. + +It turned out that M. Fontane had swindled her, and had himself kept the +money that had been sent for years to the widow of his best friend. He +was a tall, handsome man, with a large business. No one would have +believed that a scoundrel could have looked as he did. He was eventually +compelled to make the money good. And when the cousin from Denmark rang +after that at his French relatives' door, he was immediately hung round, +like a Christmas tree, with little boys and one small girl, who jumped +up and wound their arms round his neck, and would not let him go. + + + + + +BOYHOOD'S YEARS + +Our House--Its Inmates--My Paternal Grandfather--My Maternal +Grandfather--School and Home--Farum--My Instructors--A Foretaste of Life +--Contempt for the Masters--My Mother--The Mystery of Life--My First +Glimpse of Beauty--The Head Master--Religion--My Standing in School-- +Self-esteem--An Instinct for Literature--Private Reading--Heine's +_Buch der Lieder_--A Broken Friendship. + + +I. + +The house belonged to my father's father, and had been in his possession +some twenty years. My parents lived on the second floor. It was situated +in the busy part of the town, right in the heart of Copenhagen. On the +first floor lived a West Indian gentleman who spoke Danish with a +foreign accent; sometimes there came to see him a Danish man of French +descent, Mr. Lafontaine, who, it was said, was so strong that he could +take two rifles and bayonets and hold them out horizontally without +bending his arm. I never saw Mr. Lafontaine, much less his marvellous +feat of strength, but when I went down the stairs I used to stare hard at +the door behind which these wonderful doings went on. + +In the basement lived Niels, manservant to the family, who, besides his +domestic occupations, found time to develop a talent for business. In +all secrecy he carried on a commerce, very considerable under the +circumstances, in common watches and in mead, two kinds of wares that in +sooth had no connection with each other. The watches had no particular +attraction for a little boy, but the mead, which was kept in jars, on a +shelf, appealed to me doubly. It was the beverage the old Northmen had +loved so much that the dead drank it in Valhalla. It was astonishing +that it could still be had. How nice it must be! I was allowed to taste +it and it surpassed all my expectations. Sweeter than sugar! More +delicious than anything else on earth that I had tasted! But if you +drank more than a very small glass of it, you felt sick. + +And I profoundly admired the dead warriors for having been able to toss +off mead from large drinking-horns and eat fat pork with it. What a +choice! And they never had stomach-ache! + + +II. + +On the ground floor was the shop, which occupied the entire breadth and +nearly the entire depth of the house, a silk and cloth business, large, +according to the ideas of the time, which was managed by my father and +grandfather together until my eleventh year, when Father began to deal +wholesale on his own account. It was nice in the shop, because when you +went down the assistants would take you round the waist and lift you +over to the other side of the semi-circular counter which divided them +from the customers. The assistants were pleasant, dignified gentlemen, +of fine appearance and behaviour, friendly without wounding +condescension. + +Between my fifth and sixth years some alterations were done at the shop, +which was consequently closed to me for a long time. When it was once +more accessible I stood amazed at the change. A long, glass-covered +gallery had been added, in which the wares lay stored on new shelves. +The extension of the premises was by no means inconsiderable, and +simultaneously an extension had been made in the staff. Among the new +arrivals was an apprentice named Gerhard, who was as tall as a grown +man, but must have been very young, for he talked to me, a six-year-old +child, like a companion. He was very nice-looking, and knew it. "You +don't want harness when you have good hips," he would say, pointing to +his mightily projecting loins. This remark made a great impression upon +me, because it was the first time I had heard anyone praise his own +appearance. I knew that one ought not to praise one's self and that +self-praise was no recommendation. So I was astonished to find that +self-praise in Gerhard's mouth was not objectionable; in fact, it +actually suited him. Gerhard often talked of what a pleasure it was to +go out in the evenings and enjoy one's self--what the devil did it +matter what old people said?--and listen to women singing--amusements +which his hearer could not manage to picture very clearly to himself. + +It soon began to be said that Gerhard was not turning out well. The +manner in which he procured the money for his pleasures resulted, as I +learnt long afterwards, in his sudden dismissal. But he had made some +slight impression on my boyish fancy--given me a vague idea of a +heedless life of enjoyment, and of youthful defiance. + + +III. + +On the landing which led from the shop to the stockroom behind, my +grandfather took up his position. He looked very handsome up there, with +his curly white hair. Thence, like a general, he looked down on +everything--on the customers, the assistants, the apprentices, both +before and behind him. If some specially esteemed lady customer came +into the shop, he hurriedly left his exalted position to give advice. If +the shopman's explanations failed to satisfy her, he put things right. +He was at the zenith of his strength, vigour, and apparently of his +glory. + +The glory vanished, because from the start he had worked his way up +without capital. The Hamburg firm that financed the business lent money +at too high a rate of interest and on too hard conditions for it to +continue to support two families. + +But when later on my grandfather had his time at his own disposal, he +took up the intellectual interests which in his working years he had had +to repress. In his old age, for instance, he taught himself Italian, and +his visitors would find him, with Tasso's _Gerusalemme liberata_ in +front of him, looking out in a dictionary every word that presented any +difficulty to him, and of such there were many. + +The old man was an ardent Buonapartist, and, strangely enough, an even +more ardent admirer of the Third Napoleon than of the First, because he +regarded him as shrewder, and was convinced that he would bequeath the +Empire to his son. But he and I came into collision on this point from +the time I was fourteen years of age. For I was of course a Republican, +and detested Napoleon III. for his breach of the Constitution, and used +to write secretly in impossible French, and in a still more impossible +metre (which was intended to represent hexameters and pentameters) +verses against the tyrant. An ode to the French language began: + + "Ah! quelle langue magnifique, si belle, si riche, si sonore, + Langue qu'un despote cruel met aux liens et aux fers!" + +On the subject of Napoleon III. grandfather and grandson could not +possibly agree. But this was the only subject on which we ever had any +dispute. + + +IV. + +My maternal grandfather was quite different, entirely devoid of +impetuosity, even-tempered, amiable, very handsome. He too had worked +his way up from straightened circumstances; in fact, it was only when he +was getting on for twenty that he had taught himself to read and write, +well-informed though he was at the time I write of. He had once been +apprentice to the widow of Möller the dyer, when Oehlenschläger and the +Oersteds used to dine at the house. After the patriarchal fashion of the +day, he had sat daily at the same table as these great, much-admired +men, and he often told how he had clapped his hands till they almost +bled at Oehlenschläger's plays, in the years when, by reason of +Baggesen's attack, opinions about them at the theatre were divided. + +My great-grandfather, the father of my mother's stepmother, who wore +high boots with a little tassel in front, belonged to an even older +generation. He used to say: "If I could only live to see a Danish man- +o'-war close with an English ship and sink it, I should be happy; the +English are the most disgraceful pack of robbers in the world." He was +so old that he had still a vivid recollection of the battle in the +roadstead and of the bombardment of Copenhagen. + + +V. + +School and Home were two different worlds, and it often struck me that I +led a double life. Six hours a day I lived under school discipline in +active intercourse with people none of whom were known to those at home, +and the other hours of the twenty-four I spent at home, or with +relatives of the people at home, none of whom were known to anybody at +school. + +On Oct. 1st, 1849, I was taken to school, led in through the sober- +looking doorway, and up into a classroom, where I was received by a +kindly man, the arithmetic master, who made me feel at my ease. I +noticed at once that when the master asked a boy anything which another +knew, this other had a right to publish his knowledge by holding up a +finger--a right of which I myself made an excessive use in the first +lessons, until I perceived the sense of not trying, in season and out of +season, to attract attention to my knowledge or superiority, and kept my +hands on the table in front of me. + + +VI. + +Suddenly, with surprising vividness, a little incident of my childhood +rises up before me. I was ten years old. I had been ill in the Winter +and my parents had boarded me out in the country for the Summer +holidays; all the love of adventure in me surged up. At the Straw Market +a fat, greasy, grinning peasant promised to take me in his cart as far +as the little town of Farum, where I was to stay with the schoolmaster. +He charged two dalers, and got them. Any sum, of course, was the same to +me. I was allowed to drive the brown horses, that is to say, to hold the +reins, and I was in high glee. Where Farum was, I did not know and did +not care, but it was a new world. Until now I, who was a town child, had +seen nothing of the country except my nurse's house and land at +Glostrup,--but what lay in front of me was a village, a schoolhouse, a +large farm, in short an adventure in grand style. + +I had my shirts and blouses and stockings in a portmanteau, and amongst +them a magnificent garment, never yet worn, a blue cloth jacket, and a +white waistcoat belonging to it, with gold buttons, which my mother had +given me permission to wear on Sundays. For days, I always wore blouses, +so the jacket implied a great step forward. I was eager to wear it, and +regretted profoundly that it was still only Monday. + +Half-way there, the peasant pulled up. He explained to me that he could +not very well drive me any farther, so must put me down; he was not +going to Farum himself at all. But a peat cart was coming along the road +yonder, the driver of which was going to Farum, and he transferred me, +poor defenceless child as I was, to the other conveyance. He had had my +money; I had nothing to give the second man, and sadly I exchanged the +quick trot of the brown horses for the walking pace of the jades in the +peat-cart. + +My first experience of man's perfidy. + +At last I was there. On a high, wide hill--high and wide as it seemed to +me then--towered the huge schoolhouse, a miniature Christiansborg +Castle, with the schoolmaster's apartments on the right and the +schoolroom on the left. And the schoolmaster came out smiling, holding a +pipe which was a good deal taller than I, held out his hand, and asked +me to come in, gave me coffee at once, and expressed the profoundest +contempt for the peasant who had charged two rigsdaler for such a +trifle, and then left me in the road. I asked at once for pen and +paper, and wrote in cipher to a comrade, with whom I had concocted this +mysterious means of communication, asking him to tell my parents that I +had been most kindly received. I felt a kind of shyness at the +schoolmaster seeing what I wrote home from his house. I gave him the +sheet, and begged him to fold it up, as I could not do it myself. There +were no envelopes in those days. But what was my surprise to hear him, +without further ado, read aloud with a smile, from my manufactured +cipher: "I have been most kindly received," etc. I had never thought +such keen-wittedness possible. And my respect for him and his long pipe +rose. + +Just then there was a light knock at the door. In walked two girls, one +tall and one short, the former of whom positively bewildered me. She was +fair, her sister as dark as a negro. They were ten and eight years old +respectively, were named Henrietta and Nina K., came from Brazil, where +their home was, and were to spend a few years in Denmark; came as a rule +every day, but had now arrived specially to inspect the strange boy. +After gazing for two minutes at the lovely Henrietta's fair hair and +wonderful grey eyes, I disappeared from the room, and five minutes +afterwards reappeared again, clothed in the dark-blue jacket and the +white waistcoat with gold buttons, which I had been strictly forbidden +to wear except on Sundays. And from that time forth, sinner that I was, +I wore my Sunday clothes every blessed day,--but with what qualms of +conscience! + +I can still see lovely fields, rich in corn, along the sides of which we +played; we chased beautiful, gaudy butterflies, which we caught in our +hats and cruelly stuck on pins, and the little girls threw oats at my +new clothes, and if the oats stuck fast it meant something, sweethearts, +I believe. Sweethearts--and I! + +Then we were invited to the manor, a big, stately house, a veritable +castle. There lived an old, and exceedingly handsome, white-haired +Chamberlain, called the General, who frequently dined with Frederik VII, +and invariably brought us children goodies from dessert, lovely large +pieces of barley sugar in papers with gay pictures on the outside of +shepherd lovers, and crackers with long paper fringes. His youngest son, +who owned a collection of insects and many other fine things, became my +sworn friend, which means that I was his, for he did not care in the +least about me; but I did not notice that, and I was happy and proud of +his friendship and sailed with him and lots of other boys and girls on +the pretty Farum lake, and every day was more convinced that I was quite +a man. It was a century since I had worn blouses. + +Every morning I took all the newspapers to Dr. Dörr, the German tutor at +the castle, and every morning I accidentally met Henrietta, and after +that we were hardly separated all day. I had no name for the admiration +that attached me to her. I knew she was lovely, that was all. We were +anxious to read something together, and so read the whole of a +translation of _Don Quixote_, sitting cheek against cheek in the +summer-house. Of course, we did not understand one-half of it, and I +remember that we tried in vain to get an explanation of the frequently +recurring word "doxy"; but we laughed till we cried at what we did +understand. And after all, it is this first reading of _Don +Quixote_ which has dominated all my subsequent attempts to understand +the book. + +But Henrietta had ways that I did not understand in the least; she used +to amuse herself by little machinations, was inventive and intriguing. +One day she demanded that I should play the school children, small, +white-haired boys and girls, all of whom we had long learnt to know, a +downright trick. I was to write a real love-letter to a nine-year-old +little girl named Ingeborg, from an eleven or twelve-year-old boy called +Per, and then Henrietta would sew a fragrant little wreath of flowers +round it. The letter was completed and delivered. But the only result of +it was that next day, as I was walking along the high road with +Henrietta, Per separated himself from his companions, called me a dandy +from Copenhagen, and asked me if I would fight. There was, of course, no +question of drawing back, but I remember very plainly that I was a +little aghast, for he was much taller and broader than I, and I had, +into the bargain, a very bad cause to defend. But we had hardly +exchanged the first tentative blows before I felt overwhelmingly +superior. The poor cub! He had not the slightest notion how to fight. +From my everyday school life in Copenhagen, I knew hundreds of tricks +and feints that he had never learnt, and as soon as I perceived this I +flung him into the ditch like a glove. He sprang up again, but, with +lofty indifference, I threw him a second time, till his head buzzed. +That satisfied me that I had not been shamed before Henrietta, who, for +that matter, took my exploit very coolly and did not fling me so much as +a word for it. However, she asked me if I would meet her the same +evening under the old May-tree. When we met, she had two long straps +with her, and at once asked me, somewhat mockingly and dryly, whether I +had the courage to let myself be bound. Of course I said I had, +whereupon, very carefully and thoroughly, she fastened my hands together +with the one strap. Could I move my arms? No. Then, with eager haste, +she swung the other strap and let it fall on my back. Again and again. + +My first smart jacket was a well-thrashed one. She thoroughly enjoyed +exerting her strength. Naturally, my boyish ideas of honour would not +permit me to scream or complain; I merely stared at her with the +profoundest astonishment. She gave me no explanation, released my hands, +we each went our own way, and I avoided her the rest of my stay. + +This was my first experience of woman's perfidy. + +Still, I did not bear a grudge long, and the evening before I left we +met once again, at her request, and then she gave me the first and only +kiss, neither of us saying anything but the one word, "Good-bye." + +I have never seen her since. I heard that she died twenty years ago in +Brazil. But two years after this, when I was feeling my first schoolboy +affection for an eleven-year-old girl, she silenced me at a children's +ball with the scoffing remark: "Ah! it was you who let Henrietta K. +thrash you under the May-tree at Farum." Yes, it was I. So cruel had my +fair lady been that she had not even denied herself the pleasure of +telling her friends of the ignominious treatment to which she had +subjected a comrade who, from pure feeling of honour, had not struck +back. + +This was my first real experience of feminine nature. + + +VII. + +For nearly ten years I went to one and the same school. I came to know +the way there and back, to and from the three different places, all near +together, where my parents lived during the time, as I knew no other. In +that part of the town, all about the Round Tower, I knew, not only every +house, but every archway, every door, every window, every Paving-stone. +It all gradually imprinted itself so deeply upon me that in after years, +when gazing on foreign sights and foreign towns, even after I had been +living for a long time in the same place, I had a curious feeling that, +however beautiful and fascinating it all might be, or perhaps for that +very reason, it was dreamland, unreality, which would one day elude me +and vanish; reality was the Round Tower in Copenhagen and all that lay +about it. It was ugly, and altogether unattractive, but it was reality. +That you always found again. + +Similarly, though in a somewhat different sense, the wooded landscape in +the neighbourhood of Copenhagen, to be exact, the view over the +Hermitage Meadows down to the Sound, as it appears from the bench +opposite the Slesvig Stone, the first and dearest type of landscape +beauty with which I became acquainted, was endowed to me with an imprint +of actuality which no other landscape since, be it never so lovely or +never so imposing, has ever been able to acquire. + + +VIII. + +The instruction at school was out of date, inasmuch as, in every branch, +it lacked intelligibility. The masters were also necessarily, in some +instances, anything but perfect, even when not lacking in knowledge of +their subject. Nevertheless, the instruction as a whole, especially when +one bears in mind how cheap it was, must be termed good, careful and +comprehensive; as a rule it was given conscientiously. When as a grown +up man I have cast my thoughts back, what has surprised me most is the +variety of subjects that were instilled into a boy in ten years. There +certainly were teachers so lacking in understanding of the proper way to +communicate knowledge that the instruction they gave was altogether +wasted. For instance, I learnt geometry for four or five years without +grasping the simplest elements of the science. The principles of it +remained so foreign to me that I did not even recognise a right-angled +triangle, if the right angle were uppermost. It so happened that the +year before I had to sit for my examinations, a young University student +in his first year, who had been only one class in front of the rest of +us, offered us afternoon instruction in trigonometry and spherical +geometry gratis, and all who appreciated the help that was being offered +to them streamed to his lessons. This young student, later Pastor Jörgen +Lund, had a remarkable gift for mathematics, and gave his instruction +with a lucidity, a fire, and a swing that carried his hearers with him. +I, who had never before been able to understand a word of the subject, +became keenly interested in it, and before many lessons were over was +very well up in it. As Jörgen Lund taught mathematics, so all the other +subjects ought to have been taught. We were obliged to be content with +less. + +Lessons might have been a pleasure. They never were, or rather, only the +Danish ones. But in childhood's years, and during the first years of +boyhood they were fertilising. As a boy they hung over me like a dread +compulsion; yet the compulsion was beneficial. It was only when I was +almost fourteen that I began inwardly to rebel against the time which +was wasted, that the stupidest and laziest of the boys might be enabled +to keep up with the industrious and intelligent. There was too much +consideration shown towards those who would not work or could not +understand. And from the time I was sixteen, school was my despair. I +had done with it all, was beyond it all, was too matured to submit to +the routine of lessons; my intellectual pulses no longer beat within the +limits of school. What absorbed my interest was the endeavour to become +master of the Danish language in prose and verse, and musings over the +mystery of existence. In school I most often threw up the sponge +entirely, and laid my head on my arms that I might neither see nor hear +what was going on around me. + +There was another reason, besides my weariness of it all, which at this +latter period made my school-going a torture to me. I was by now +sufficiently schooled for my sensible mother to think it would be good +for me to make, if it were but a small beginning, towards earning my own +living. Or rather, she wanted me to earn enough to pay for my amusements +myself. So I tried, with success, to find pupils, and gave them lessons +chiefly on Sunday mornings; but in order to secure them I had called +myself _Studiosus_. Now it was an ever present terror with me lest +I should meet any of my pupils as I went to school in the morning, or +back at midday, with my books in a strap under my arm. Not to betray +myself, I used to stuff these books in the most extraordinary places, +inside the breast of my coat till it bulged, and in all my pockets till +they burst. + + +IX. + +School is a foretaste of life. A boy in a large Copenhagen school would +become acquainted, as it were in miniature, with Society in its entirety +and with every description of human character. I encountered among my +comrades the most varied human traits, from frankness to reserve, from +goodness, uprightness and kindness, to brutality and baseness. + +In our quarter of an hour's playtime it was easy to see how cowardice +and meanness met with their reward in the boy commonwealth. There was a +Jewish boy of repulsive appearance, very easy to cow, with a positively +slavish disposition. Every single playtime his schoolfellows would make +him stand up against a wall and jump about with his feet close together +till playtime was over, while the others stood in front of him and +laughed at him. He became later a highly respected Conservative +journalist. + +In lesson time it was easy to see that the equality under one +discipline, under the hierarchy of merit, which was expressed in the +boys' places on the forms, from highest to lowest, was not maintained +when opposed to the very different hierarchy of Society. On the lowest +form sat a boy whose gifts were exceedingly mediocre, and who was +ignorant, moreover, from sheer laziness; to him were permitted things +forbidden to all the others: he was the heir of a large feudal barony. +He always came late to school, and even at that rode in followed by a +groom on a second horse. He wore a silk hat and, when he came into the +schoolroom, did not hang it up on the peg that belonged to him, where he +was afraid it might be interfered with, but in the school cupboard, in +which only the master was supposed to keep his things; and the tall hat +crowning so noble a head impressed the masters to such an extent that +not one of them asked for it to be removed. And they acquiesced like +lambs in the young lord's departure half-way through the last lesson, if +the groom happened to be there with his horse to fetch him. + +It seemed impossible to drive knowledge of any sort into the head of +this young peer, and he was taken from school early. To what an extent +he must have worked later to make up for lost time was proved by +results. For he became nothing less than a Minister. + + +X. + +The reverence with which the boys, as youngsters, had looked up to the +masters, disappeared with striking rapidity. The few teachers in whose +lessons you could do what you liked were despised. The masters who knew +how to make themselves respected, only in exceptional cases inspired +affection. The love of mockery soon broke out. Children had not been at +school long before the only opinion they allowed scope to was that the +masters were the natural enemies of the boys. There was war between +them, and every stratagem was permissible. They were fooled, misled, and +plagued in every conceivable manner. Or they were feared and we +flattered them. + +A little boy with a natural inclination to reverence and respect and who +brought both industry and good-will to his work, felt confused by all +the derogatory things he was constantly hearing about the masters, and, +long before he was half grown up, formed as one result of it the fixed +determination that, whatever he might be when he grew up, there was one +thing he would never, under any circumstances be, and that was--master +in a school. + +From twelve years of age upwards, contempt for the masters was the +keynote of all conversation about them. The Latin master, a little, +insignificant-looking man, but a very good teacher, was said to be so +disgracefully enfeebled by debauchery that an active boy could throw him +without the least difficulty. The Natural History master, a clever, +outspoken young man, who would call out gaily: "Silence there, or you'll +get a dusting on the teapot that will make the spout fly off!" sank +deeply in our estimation when one of the boys told us that he spent his +evenings at music-halls. One morning there spread like wildfire through +the class the report that the reason the Natural History master had not +come that day was because he had got mixed up the night before in a +fight outside a music-pavilion. The contempt and the ridicule that were +heaped upon him in the conversation of the boys were immeasurable. When +he came next morning with a black, extravasated eye, which he bathed at +intervals with a rag, he was regarded by most of us as absolute scum. +The German master, a tall, good-looking man, was treated as utterly +incompetent because, when he asked a question in grammar or syntax, he +walked up and down with the book in front of him, and quite plainly +compared the answer with the book. We boys thought that anyone could be +a master, with a book in his hand. History and Geography were taught by +an old man, overflowing with good-humour, loquacious, but self- +confident, liked for his amiability, but despised for what was deemed +unmanliness in him. The boys pulled faces at him, and imitated his +expressions and mannerisms. + +The Danish master, Professor H.P. Holst, was not liked. He evidently +took no interest in his scholastic labours, and did not like the boys. +His coolness was returned. And yet, that which was the sole aim and +object of his instruction he understood to perfection, and drilled into +us well. The unfortunate part of it was that there was hardly more than +one boy in the class who enjoyed learning anything about just that +particular thing. Instruction in Danish was, for Holst, instruction in +the metrical art. He explained every metre and taught the boys to pick +out the feet of which the verses were composed. When we made fun of him +in our playtime, it was for remarks which we had invented and placed in +his mouth ourselves; for instance: "Scan my immortal poem, _The Dying +Gladiator_." The reason of this was simply that, in elucidation of +the composition of the antique distich, he made use of his own poem of +the above name, which he had included in a Danish reading-book edited by +himself. As soon as he took up his position in the desk, he began: + +"Hark ye the--storm of ap--plause from the--theatre's--echoing circle! +Go on, Möller!" + +How could he find it in his heart, his own poem! + + +XI. + +The French master knew how to command respect; there was never a sound +during his lessons. He was altogether absorbed in his subject, was +absolutely and wholly a Frenchman; he did not even talk Danish with the +same accentuation as others, and he had the impetuous French disposition +of which the boys had heard. If a boy made a mess of his pronunciation, +he would bawl, from the depths of his full brown beard, which he was +fond of stroking: "You speak French _comme un paysan d'Amac_." When +he swore, he swore like a true Frenchman: _"Sacrebleu-Mops-Carot-ten- +Rapée!"_ [Footnote: Needless to say, this is impossible French, +composed chiefly of distorted Danish words. (Trans.)] If he got angry, +and he very often did, he would unhesitatingly pick up the full glass of +water that always stood in front of him on the desk, and in Gallic +exasperation fling it on the floor, when the glass would be smashed to +atoms and the water run about, whereupon he would quietly, with his +_Grand seigneur_ air, take his purse out of his pocket and lay the +money for the glass on the desk. + +For a time I based my ideas of the French mind and manner upon this +master, although my uncle Jacob, who had lived almost all his life in +Paris, was a very different sort of Frenchman. It was only later that I +became acquainted with a word and an idea which it was well I did not +know, as far as the master's capacity for making an impression was +concerned--the word _affected_. + +At last, one fine day, a little event occurred which was not without its +effect on the master's prestige, and yet aroused my compassion almost as +much as my surprise. The parents of one of my best friends were +expecting a French business friend for the evening. As they knew +themselves to be very weak in the language, they gave their son a polite +note to the French master, asking him to do them the honour of spending +the next evening at their house, on the occasion of this visit, which +rendered conversational support desirable. The master took the note, +which we two boys had handed to him, grew--superior though he usually +was--rather red and embarrassed, and promised a written reply. To our +astonishment we learnt that this reply was to the effect that he must +unfortunately decline the honour, as he had never been in France, had +never heard anyone speak French, and was not proficient in the language. +Thus this tiger of a savage Frenchman suddenly cast his tiger's skin and +revealed himself in his native wool. + +Unfortunately, the instruction of this master left long and deep traces +upon me. When I was fifteen and my French uncle began to carry on his +conversations with me in French, the Parisian was appalled at my +abominable errors of pronunciation. The worst of them were weeded out in +those lessons. But there were enough left to bring a smile many a time +and oft to the lips of the refined young lady whom my friends procured +me as a teacher on my first visit to Paris. + + +XII. + +Among the delights of Summer were picnics to the woods. There would be +several during the course of the season. When the weather seemed to +inspire confidence, a few phaetons would be engaged for the family and +their relations and friends, and some Sunday morning the seat of each +carriage would be packed full of good things. We took tablecloth and +serviettes with us, bread, butter, eggs and salmon, sausages, cold meat +and coffee, as well as a few bottles of wine. Then we drove to some +keeper's house, where for money and fair words they scalded the tea for +us, and the day's meal was seasoned with the good appetite which the +outdoor air gave us. + +As a child I preserved an uncomfortable and instructive recollection of +one of these expeditions. The next day my mother said to me: "You +behaved very ridiculously yesterday, and made a laughing stock of +yourself." "How?" "You went on in front of the grown-up people all the +time, and sang at the top of your voice. In the first place, you ought +not to go in front, and in the next place, you should not disturb other +people by singing." These words made an indelible impression upon me, +for I was conscious that I had not in the least intended to push myself +forward or put on airs. I could only dimly recollect that I had been +singing, and I had done it for my own pleasure, not to draw attention to +myself. + +I learnt from this experience that it was possible, without being +naughty or conceited, to behave in an unpleasing manner, understood that +the others, whom I had not been thinking about, had looked on me with +disfavour, had thought me a nuisance and ridiculous, my mother in +particular; and I was deeply humiliated at the thought. + +It gradually dawned upon me that there was no one more difficult to +please than my mother. No one was more chary of praise than she, and she +had a horror of all sentimentality. She met me with superior +intelligence, corrected me, and brought me up by means of satire. It was +possible to impress my aunts, but not her. The profound dread she had of +betraying her feelings or talking about them, the shrewdness that dwelt +behind that forehead of hers, her consistently critical and clear- +sighted nature, the mocking spirit that was so conspicuous in her, +especially in her younger days, gave me, with regard to her, a +conviction that had a stimulating effect on my character--namely, that +not only had she a mother's affection for me, but that the two shrewd +and scrutinising eyes of a very clever head were looking down upon me. +Rational as she was through and through, she met my visionary +inclinations, both religious and philosophical, with unshaken common +sense, and if I were sometimes tempted, by lesser people's over- +estimating of my abilities, to over-estimate them myself, it was she +who, with inflexible firmness, urged her conviction of the limitations +of my nature. None of my weaknesses throve in my mother's neighbourhood. + +This was the reason why, during the transitional years between boyhood +and adolescence, the years in which a boy feels a greater need of +sympathy than of criticism and of indulgence than of superiority, I +looked for and found comprehension as much from a somewhat younger +sister of my mother's as from the latter herself. This aunt was all +heart. She had an ardent, enthusiastic brain, was full of tenderness and +goodness and the keenest feeling for everything deserving of sympathy, +not least for me, while she had not my mother's critical understanding. +Her judgment might be obscured by passion; she sometimes allowed herself +to be carried to imprudent extremes; she had neither Mother's +equilibrium nor her satirical qualities. She was thus admirably adapted +to be the confidant of a big boy whom she gave to understand that she +regarded as extraordinarily gifted. When these transitional years were +over, Mother resumed undisputed sway, and the relations between us +remained in all essentials the same, even after I had become much her +superior in knowledge and she in some things my pupil. So that it +affected me very much when, many years after, my younger brother said to +me somewhat sadly: "Has it struck you, too, that Mother is getting old?" +"No, not at all," I replied. "What do you think a sign of it?" "I think, +God help me, that she is beginning to admire us." + + +XIII. + +My mind, like that of all other children, had been exercised by the +great problem of the mystery of our coming into the world. I was no +longer satisfied with the explanation that children were brought by the +stork, or with that other, advanced with greater seriousness, that they +drifted up in boxes, which were taken up out of Peblinge Lake. As a +child I tormented my mother with questions as to how you could tell whom +every box was for. That the boxes were numbered, did not make things +much clearer. That they were provided with addresses, sounded very +strange. Who had written the addresses? I then had to be content with +the assurance that it was a thing that I was too small to understand; it +should be explained to me when I was older. + +My thoughts were not directed towards the other sex. I had no little +girl playfellows, and as I had no sister, knew very few. When I was +eight or nine years old, it is true, there was one rough and altogether +depraved boy whose talk touched upon the sexual question in expressions +that were coarse and in a spirit coarser still. I was scoffed at for not +knowing how animals propagated themselves, and that human beings +propagated themselves like animals. + +I replied: "My parents, at any rate, never behaved in any such manner." +Then, with the effrontery of childhood, my schoolfellows went on to the +most shameless revelations, not only about a morbid development of +natural instincts, but actual crimes against nature and against the +elementary laws of society. In other words, I was shown the most +repulsive, most agitating picture of everything touching the relations +of the sexes and the propagation of the species. + +It is probable that most boys in a big school have the great mystery of +Nature sullied for them in their tender years by coarseness and +depravity. Whereas, in ancient Greek times, the mystery was holy, and +with a pious mind men worshipped the Force of Nature without exaggerated +prudery and without shamelessness, such conditions are impossible in a +society where for a thousand years Nature herself has been depreciated +by Religion, associated with sin and the Devil, stamped as unmentionable +and in preference denied, in which, for that very reason, brutality +takes so much more terrible a satisfaction and revenge. As grown-up +people never spoke of the forces of Nature in a pure and simple manner, +it became to the children a concealed thing. Individual children, in +whom the sexual impulse had awakened early, were taught its nature by +bestial dispositions, and the knowledge was interpreted by them with +childish shamelessness. These children then filled the ears of their +comrades with filth. + +In my case, the nastiness hit, and rebounded, without making any +impression. I was only infected by the tone of the other scholars in so +far as I learnt from them that it was manly to use certain ugly words. +When I was twelve years old, my mother surprised me one day, when I was +standing alone on the stairs, shouting these words out. I was reproved +for it, and did not do it again. + + +XIV. + +I hardly ever met little girls except at children's balls, and in my +early childhood I did not think further of any of them. But when I was +twelve years old I caught my first strong glimpse of one of the +fundamental forces of existence, whose votary I was destined to be for +life--namely, Beauty. + +It was revealed to me for the first time in the person of a slender, +light-footed little girl, whose name and personality secretly haunted my +brain for many a year. + +One of my uncles was living that Summer in America Road, which at that +time was quite in the country, and there was a beautiful walk thence +across the fields to a spot called _The Signal_, where you could +watch the trains go by from Copenhagen's oldest railway station, which +was not situated on the western side of the town, where the present +stations are. Near here lived a family whose youngest daughter used to +run over almost every day to my uncle's country home, to play with the +children. + +She was ten years old, as brown as a gipsy, as agile as a roe, and from +her childish face, from all the brown of her hair, eyes, and skin, from +her smile and her speech, glowed, rang, and as it were, struck me, that +overwhelming and hitherto unknown force, Beauty. I was twelve, she was +ten. Our acquaintance consisted of playing touch, not even alone +together, but with other children; I can see her now rushing away from +me, her long plaits striking against her waist. But although this was +all that passed between us, we both had a feeling as of a mysterious +link connecting us. It was delightful to meet. She gave me a pink. She +cut a Queen of Hearts out of a pack of cards, and gave it to me; I +treasured it for the next five years like a sacred thing. + +That was all that passed between us and more there never was, even when +at twelve years of age, at a children's ball, she confessed to me that +she had kept everything I had given her--gifts of the same order as her +own. But the impression of her beauty filled my being. + +Some one had made me a present of some stuffed humming-birds, perched on +varnished twigs under a glass case. I always looked at them while I was +reading in the nursery; they stood on the bookshelves which were my +special property. These birds with their lovely, shining, gay-coloured +plumage, conveyed to me my first impression of foreign or tropical +vividness of colouring. All that I was destined to love for a long time +had something of that about it, something foreign and afar off. + +The girl was Danish as far as her speech was concerned, but not really +Danish by descent, either on her father or her mother's side; her name, +too, was un-Danish. She spoke English at home and was called Mary at my +uncle's, though her parents called her by another name. All this +combined to render her more distinctive. + +Once a year I met her at a children's ball; then she had a white dress +on, and was, in my eyes, essentially different from all the other little +girls. One morning, after one of these balls, when I was fourteen, I +felt in a most singular frame of mind, and with wonder and reverence at +what I was about to do, regarding myself as dominated by a higher, +incomprehensible force, I wrote the first poetry I ever composed. + +There were several strophes of this heavenly poetry. Just because I so +seldom met her, it was like a gentle earthquake in my life, when I did. +I had accustomed myself to such a worship of her name that, for me, she +hardly belonged to the world of reality at all. But when I was sixteen +and I met her again, once more at a young people's ball, the glamour +suddenly departed. Her appearance had altered and corresponded no longer +to my imaginary picture of her. When we met in the dance she pressed my +hand, which made me indignant, as though it were an immodest thing. She +was no longer a fairy. She had broad shoulders, a budding bust, warm +hands; there was youthful coquetry about her--something that, to me, +seemed like erotic experience. I soon lost sight of her. But I retained +a sentiment of gratitude towards her for what, as a ten-year-old child, +she had afforded me, this naturally supernatural impression, my first +revelation of Beauty. + + +XV. + +The person upon whom the schoolboys' attention centred was, of course, +the Headmaster. To the very young ones, the Headmaster was merely +powerful and paternal, up above everything. As soon as the critical +instinct awoke, its utterances were specially directed, by the evil- +disposed, at him, petty and malicious as they were, and were echoed +slavishly by the rest. + +As the Head was a powerful, stout, handsome, distinguished-looking man +with a certain stamp of joviality and innocent good-living about him, +these malicious tongues, who led the rest, declared that he only lived +for his stomach. In the next place, the old-fashioned punishment of +caning, administered by the Head himself in his private room, gave some +cause of offence. It was certainly only very lazy and obdurate boys who +were thus punished; for others such methods were never even dreamt of. +But when they were ordered to appear in his room after school-time, and +the Head took them between his knees, thrashed them well and then +afterwards caressed them, as though to console them, he created ill- +feeling, and his dignity suffered. If there were some little sense in +the disgust occasioned by this, there was certainly none at all in +certain other grievances urged against him. + +It was the ungraceful custom for the boys, on the first of the month, to +bring their own school fees. In the middle of one of the lessons the +Head would come into the schoolroom, take his seat at the desk, and +jauntily and quickly sweep five-daler bills [Footnote: Five daler, a +little over 11/--English money.] into his large, soft hat and thence +into his pockets. One objection to this arrangement was that the few +poor boys who went to school free were thus singled out to their +schoolfellows, bringing no money, which they felt as a humiliation. In +the next place, the sight of the supposed wealth that the Head thus +became possessed of roused ill-feeling and derision. It became the +fashion to call him boy-dealer, because the school, which in its palmy +days had 550 scholars, was so well attended. This extraordinary influx, +which in all common sense ought to have been regarded as a proof of the +high reputation of the school, was considered a proof of the Head's +avarice. + +It must be added that there was in his bearing, which was evidently and +with good reason, calculated to impress, something that might justly +appear unnatural to keen-sighted boys. He always arrived with blustering +suddenness; he always shouted in a stentorian voice, and, when he gave +the elder boys a Latin lesson, he always appeared, probably from +indolence, a good deal behind time, but to make up, and as though there +were not a second to waste, began to hurl his questions at them the +moment he arrived on the threshold. He liked the pathetic, and was +certainly a man with a naturally warm heart. On a closer acquaintance, +he would have won much affection, for he was a clever man and a gay, +optimistic figure. As the number of his scholars was so great, he +produced more effect at a distance. + + +XVI. + +Neither he nor any of the other masters reproduced the atmosphere of the +classical antiquity round which all the instruction of the Latin side +centred. The master who taught Greek the last few years did so, not only +with sternness, but with a distaste, in fact, a positive hatred for his +class, which was simply disgusting. + +The Head, who had the gift of oratory, communicated to us some idea of +the beauty of Latin poetry, but the rest of the instruction in the dead +languages was purely grammatical, competent and conscientious though the +men who gave it might have been. Madvig's [Translator's note: Johan +Nicolai Madvig (1804-1886), a very celebrated Danish philologist, for +fifty years professor at the University of Copenhagen. He is especially +noted for his editions of the ancient classics, with critical notes on +the text, and for his Latin Grammar.] spirit brooded over the school. +Still, there was no doubt in the Head's mind as to the greatness of +Virgil or Horace, so that a boy with perception of stylistic emphasis +and metre could not fail to be keenly interested in the poetry of these +two men. Being the boy in the class of whom the Head entertained the +greatest hopes, I began at once secretly to translate them. I made a +Danish version of the second and fourth books of the Aeneid Danicised a +good part of the Songs and Epistles of Horace in imperfect verse. + + +XVII. + +Nothing was ever said at home about any religious creed. Neither of my +parents was in any way associated with the Jewish religion, and neither +of them ever went to the Synagogue. As in my maternal grandmother's +house all the Jewish laws about eating and drinking were observed, and +they had different plates and dishes for meat and butter and a special +service for Easter, orthodox Judaism, to me, seemed to be a collection +of old, whimsical, superstitious prejudices, which specially applied to +food. The poetry of it was a sealed book to me. At school, where I was +present at the religious instruction classes as an auditor only, I +always heard Judaism alluded to as merely a preliminary stage of +Christianity, and the Jews as the remnant of a people who, as a +punishment for slaying the Saviour of the world, had been scattered all +over the earth. The present-day Israelites were represented as people +who, urged by a stiff-necked wilfulness and obstinacy and almost +incomprehensible callousness, clung to the obsolete religious ideal of +the stern God in opposition to the God of Love. + +When I attempted to think the matter out for myself, it annoyed me that +the Jews had not sided with Jesus, who yet so clearly betokened progress +within the religion that He widened and unintentionally overthrew. The +supernatural personality of Jesus did not seem credible to me. The +demand made by faith, namely, that reason should be fettered, awakened a +latent rebellious opposition, and this opposition was fostered by my +mother's steady rationalism, her unconditional rejection of every +miracle. When the time came for me to be confirmed, in accordance with +the law, I had advanced so far that I looked down on what lay before me +as a mere burdensome ceremony. The person of the Rabbi only inspired me +with distaste; his German pronunciation of Danish was repulsive and +ridiculous to me. The abominable Danish in which the lesson-book was +couched offended me, as I had naturally a fine ear for Danish. +Information about ancient Jewish customs and festivals was of no +interest to me, with my modern upbringing. The confirmation, according +to my mocking summary of the impression produced by it, consisted mainly +in the hiring of a tall silk hat from the hat-maker, and the sending of +it back next day, sanctified. The silly custom was at that time +prevalent for boys to wear silk hats for the occasion, idiotic though +they made them look. With these on their heads, they went, after +examination, up the steps to a balustrade where a priest awaited, +whispered a few affecting words in their ear about their parents or +grandparents, and laid his hand in blessing upon the tall hat. When +called upon to make my confession of faith with the others, I certainly +joined my first "yes," this touching a belief in a God, to theirs, but +remained silent at the question as to whether I believed that God had +revealed Himself to Moses and spoken by His prophets. I did not believe +it. + +I was, for that matter, in a wavering frame of mind unable to arrive at +any clear understanding. What confused me was the unveracious manner in +which historical instruction, which was wholly theological, was given. +The History masters, for instance, told us that when Julian the Apostate +wanted to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem, flames had shot out of the +earth, but they interpreted this as a miracle, expressing the Divine +will. If this were true--and I was unable to refute it then--God had +expressly taken part against Judaism and the Jews as a nation. The +nation, in that case, seemed to be really cursed by Him. Still, +Christianity fundamentally repelled me by its legends, its dogmatism, +and its church rites. The Virgin birth, the three persons in the +Trinity, and the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper in particular, seemed to +me to be remnants of the basest barbarism of antiquity. + +Under these circumstances, my young soul, feeling the need of something +it could worship, fled from Asia's to Europe's divinities, from +Palestine to Hellas, and clung with vivid enthusiasm to the Greek world +of beauty and the legends of its Gods. From all the learned education I +had had, I only extracted this one thing: an enthusiasm for ancient +Hellas and her Gods; they were my Gods, as they had been those of +Julian. Apollo and Artemis, Athene and Eros and Aphrodite grew to be +powers that I believed in and rejoiced over in a very different sense +from any God revealed on Sinai or in Emmaus. They were near to me. + +And under these circumstances the Antiquities Room at Charlottenburg, +where as a boy I had heard Höyen's lectures, grew to be a place that I +entered with reverence, and Thorwaldsen's Museum my Temple, imperfectly +though it reproduced the religious and heroic life and spirit of the +Greeks. But at that time I knew no other, better door to the world of +the Gods than the Museum offered, and Thorwaldsen and the Greeks, from +fourteen to fifteen, were in my mind merged in one. Thorwaldsen's Museum +was to me a brilliant illustration of Homer. There I found my Church, my +Gods, my soul's true native land. + + +XVIII. + +I had for several years been top of my class, when a boy was put in who +was quite three years older than I, and with whom it was impossible for +me to compete, so much greater were the newcomer's knowledge and +maturity. It very soon became a settled thing for the new boy always to +be top, and I invariably No. 2. However, this was not in the least +vexatious to me; I was too much wrapped up in Sebastian for that. The +admiration which as a child I had felt for boys who distinguished +themselves by muscular strength was manifested now for superiority in +knowledge or intelligence. Sebastian was tall, thin, somewhat disjointed +in build, with large blue eyes, expressive of kindness, and +intelligence; he was thoroughly well up in all the school subjects, and +with the ripeness of the older boy, could infer the right thing even +when he did not positively know it. The reason why he was placed at +lessons so late was doubtless to be found in the narrow circumstances of +his parents. They considered that they had not the means to allow him to +follow the path towards which his talents pointed. But the Head, as +could be seen on pay days, was now permitting him to come to school +free. He went about among his jacketed schoolfellows in a long frock +coat, the skirts of which flapped round his legs. + +No. 2 could not help admiring No. 1 for the confidence with which he +disported himself among the Greek aorists, in the labyrinths of which I +myself often went astray, and for the knack he had of solving +mathematical problems. He was, moreover, very widely read in belles +lettres, and had almost a grown-up man's taste with regard to books at a +time when I still continued to admire P.P.'s [Footnote: P.P. was a +writer whose real name was Rumohr. He wrote a number of historical +novels of a patriotic type, but which are only read by children up to +14.] novels, and was incapable of detecting the inartistic quality and +unreality of his popular descriptions of the exploits of sailor heroes. +As soon as my eyes were opened to the other's advanced acquirements, I +opened my heart to him, gave him my entire confidence, and found in my +friend a well of knowledge and superior development from which I felt a +daily need to draw. + +When at the end of the year the large number of newcomers made it +desirable for the class to be divided, it was a positive blow to me that +in the division, which was effected by separating the scholars according +to their numbers, odd or even, Sebastian and I found ourselves in +different classes. I even took the unusual step of appealing to the Head +to be put in the same class as Sebastian, but was refused. + +However, childhood so easily adapts itself to a fresh situation that +during the ensuing year, in which I myself advanced right gaily, not +only did I feel no lack, but I forgot my elder comrade. And at the +commencement of the next school year, when the two parallel classes, +through several boys leaving, were once more united, and I again found +myself No. 2 by the side of my one-time friend, the relations between us +were altogether altered, so thoroughly so, in fact, that our rôles were +reversed. If formerly the younger had hung upon the elder's words, now +it was the other way about. If formerly Sebastian had shown the interest +in me that the half-grown man feels for a child, now I was too absorbed +by my own interests to wish for anything but a listener in him when I +unfolded the supposed wealth of my ideas and my soaring plans for the +future, which betrayed a boundless ambition. I needed a friend at this +stage only in the same sense as the hero in French tragedies requires a +confidant, and if I attached myself as before, wholly and completely to +him, it was for this reason. It is true that the other was still a good +deal in front of me in actual knowledge, so that there was much I had to +consult him about; otherwise our friendship would hardly have lasted; +but the importance of this superiority was slight, inasmuch as Sebastian +henceforward voluntarily subordinated himself to me altogether; indeed, +by his ready recognition of my powers, contributed more than anyone else +to make me conscious of these powers and to foster a self-esteem which +gradually assumed extraordinary forms. + + +XIX. + +This self-esteem, in its immaturity, was of a twofold character. It was +not primarily a belief that I was endowed with unusual abilities, but a +childish belief that I was one set apart, with whom, for mysterious +reasons, everything must succeed. The belief in a personal God had +gradually faded away from me, and there were times when, with the +conviction of boyhood, I termed myself an atheist to my friend; my +attitude towards the Greek gods had never been anything more than a +personification of the ideal forces upon which I heaped my enthusiasm. +But I believed in my star. And I hypnotised my friend into the same +belief, infected him so that he talked as if he were consecrating his +life to my service, and really, as far as was possible for a schoolboy, +lived and breathed exclusively for me, I, for my part, being gratified +at having, as my unreserved admirer and believer, the one whom, of all +people I knew, I placed highest, the one whose horizon seemed to me the +widest, and whose store of knowledge was the greatest; for in many +subjects it surpassed even that of the masters in no mean degree. + +Under such conditions, when I was fifteen or sixteen, I was deeply +impressed by a book that one might think was infinitely beyond the +understanding of my years, Lermontof's _A Hero of Our Time_, in +Xavier Marmier's French translation. The subject of it would seem +utterly unsuited to a schoolboy who had never experienced anything in +the remotest degree resembling the experiences of a man of the world, at +any rate those which produced the sentiments pervading this novel. +Nevertheless, this book brought about a revolution in my ideas. For the +first time I encountered in a book a chief character who was not a +universal hero, a military or naval hero whom one had to admire and if +possible imitate, but one in whom, with extreme emotion, I fancied that +I recognised myself! + +I had certainly never acted as Petsjórin did, and never been placed in +such situations as Petsjórin. No woman had ever loved me, still less had +I ever let a woman pay with suffering the penalty of her affection for +me. Never had any old friend of mine come up to me, delighted to see me +again, and been painfully reminded, by my coolness and indifference, how +little he counted for in my life. Petsjórin had done with life; I had +not even begun to live. Petsjórin had drained the cup of enjoyment; I +had never tasted so much as a drop of it. Petsjórin was as blasé as a +splendid Russian Officer of the Guards could be; I, as full of +expectation as an insignificant Copenhagen schoolboy could be. +Nevertheless, I had the perplexing feeling of having, for the first time +in my life, seen my inmost nature, hitherto unknown even to myself, +understood, interpreted, reproduced, magnified, in this unharmonious +work of the Russian poet who was snatched away so young. + + +XX. + +The first element whence the imaginary figure which I fancied I +recognized again in Lermontof had its rise was doubtless to be found in +the relations between my older friend and myself (in the reversal of our +rôles, and my consequent new feeling of superiority over him). The +essential point, however, was not the comparatively accidental shape in +which I fancied I recognised myself, but that what was at that time +termed _reflection_ had awaked in me, introspection, self- +consciousness, which after all had to awake some day, as all other +impulses awake when their time comes. This introspection was not, +however, by any means a natural or permanent quality in me, but on the +contrary one which made me feel ill at ease and which I soon came to +detest. During these transitional years, as my pondering over myself +grew, I felt more and more unhappy and less and less sure of myself. The +pondering reached its height, as was inevitable, when there arose the +question of choosing a profession and of planning the future rather than +of following a vocation. But as long as this introspection lasted, I had +a torturing feeling that my own eye was watching me, as though I were a +stranger, a feeling of being the spectator of my own actions, the +auditor of my own words, a double personality who must nevertheless one +day become one, should I live long enough. After having, with a friend, +paid a visit to Kaalund, who was prison instructor at Vridslöselille at +the time and showed us young fellows the prison and the cells, I used to +picture my condition to myself as that of a prisoner enduring the +torture of seeing a watchful eye behind the peep-hole in the door. I had +noticed before, in the Malmö prison, how the prisoners tried to besmear +this glass, or scratch on it, with a sort of fury, so that it was often +impossible to see through it. My natural inclination was to act naïvely, +without premeditation, and to put myself wholly into what I was doing. +The cleavage that introspection implies, therefore, was a horror to me; +all bisection, all dualism, was fundamentally repellent to me; and it +was consequently no mere chance that my first appearance as a writer was +made in an attack on a division and duality in life's philosophy, and +that the very title of my first book was a branding and rejection of a +_Dualism_. So that it was only when my self-contemplation, and with +it the inward cleavage, had at length ceased, that I attained to +quietude of mind. + + +XXI. + +Thus violently absorbing though the mental condition here suggested was, +it was not permanent. It was childish and child-like by virtue of my +years; the riper expressions which I here make use of to describe it +always seem on the verge of distorting its character. My faith in my +lucky star barely persisted a few years unassailed. My childish idea had +been very much strengthened when, at fifteen years of age, in the first +part of my finishing examination, I received _Distinction_ in all +my subjects, and received a mighty blow when, at seventeen, I only had +_Very Good_ in five subjects, thus barely securing Distinction for +the whole. + +I ceased to preoccupy myself about my likeness to Petsjórin after having +recovered from a half, or quarter, falling in love, an unharmonious +affair, barren of results, which I had hashed up for myself through +fanciful and affected reverie, and which made me realise the fundamental +simplicity of my own nature,--and I then shook off the unnatural +physiognomy like a mask. Belief in my own unbounded superiority and the +absolutely unmeasured ambition in which this belief had vented itself, +collapsed suddenly when at the age of eighteen, feeling my way +independently for the first time, and mentally testing people, I learnt +to recognise the real mental superiority great writers possess. It was +chiefly my first reading of the principal works of Kierkegaard that +marked this epoch in my life. I felt, face to face with the first great +mind that, as it were, had personally confronted me, all my real +insignificance, understood all at once that I had as yet neither lived +nor suffered, felt nor thought, and that nothing was more uncertain than +whether I might one day evince talent. The one certain thing was that my +present status seemed to amount to nothing at all. + + +XXII. + +In those boyhood's years, however, I revelled in ideas of greatness to +come which had not so far received a shock. And I was in no doubt as to +the domain in which when grown up I should distinguish myself. All my +instincts drew me towards Literature. The Danish compositions which were +set at school absorbed all my thoughts from week to week; I took the +greatest pains with them, weighed the questions from as many sides as I +could and endeavoured to give good form and style to my compositions. +Unconsciously I tried to find expressions containing striking contrasts; +I sought after descriptive words and euphonious constructions. Although +not acquainted with the word style in any other sense than that it bears +in the expression "style-book," the Danish equivalent for what in +English is termed an "exercise-book," I tried to acquire a certain +style, and was very near falling into mannerism, from sheer +inexperience, when a sarcastic master, to my distress, reminded me one +day of Heiberg's words: "The unguent of expression, smeared thickly over +the thinness of thoughts." + + +XXIII. + +Together with a practical training in the use of the language, the +Danish lessons afforded a presentment of the history of our national +literature, given intelligently and in a very instructive manner by a +master named Driebein, who, though undoubtedly one of the many +Heibergians of the time, did not in any way deviate from what might be +termed the orthodoxy of literary history. Protestantism carried it +against Roman Catholicism, the young Oehlenschläger against Baggesen, +Romanticism against Rationalism; Oehlenschläger as the Northern poet of +human nature against a certain Björnson, who, it was said, claimed to be +more truly Norse than he. In Mr. Driebein's presentment, no recognised +great name was ever attacked. And in his course, as in Thortsen's +History of Literature, literature which might be regarded as historic +stopped with the year 1814. + +The order in which in my private reading I became acquainted with Danish +authors was as follows: Ingemann, Oehlenschläger, Grundtvig, Poul +Möller, many books by these authors having been given me at Christmas +and on birthdays. At my grandfather's, I eagerly devoured Heiberg's +vaudevilles as well. As a child, of course, I read uncritically, merely +accepting and enjoying. But when I heard at school of Baggesen's +treatment of Oehlenschläger, thus realising that there had been various +tendencies in literature at that time, and various opinions as to which +was preferable, I read with enthusiasm a volume of selected poems by +Baggesen, which I had had one Christmas, and the treatment of language +in it fascinated me exceedingly, with its gracefulness and light, +conversational tone. Then, when Hertz's [Footnote: Henrik Hertz, a +Danish poet (1797-1870), published "Ghost Letters" anonymously, and +called them thus because in language and spirit they were a kind of +continuation of the long-deceased Baggesen's rhymed contribution to a +literary dispute of his day. Hertz, like the much greater Baggesen, laid +great stress upon precise and elegant form.--[Translator's note.]] +_Ghost Letters_ fell into my hands one day, and the diction of them +appealed to me almost more, I felt myself, first secretly, afterwards +more consciously, drawn towards the school of form in Danish literature, +and rather enjoyed being a heretic on this point. For to entertain +kindly sentiments for the man who had dared to profane Oehlenschläger +was like siding with Loki against Thor. Poul Möller's Collected Works I +had received at my confirmation, and read again and again with such +enthusiasm that I almost wore the pages out, and did not skip a line, +even of the philosophical parts, which I did not understand at all. But +Hertz's Lyrical Poems, which I read in a borrowed copy, gave me as much +pleasure as Poul Möller's Verses had done. And for a few years, grace +and charm, and the perfect control of language and poetic form, were in +my estimation the supreme thing until, on entering upon my eighteenth +year, a violent reaction took place, and resonance, power and grandeur +alone seemed to have value. From Hertz my sympathies went over to +Christian Winther, from Baggesen to Homer, Aeschylus, the Bible, +Shakespeare, Goethe. One of the first things I did as a student was to +read the Bible through in Danish and the Odyssey in Greek. + + +XXIV. + +The years of approaching maturity were still distant, however, and my +inner life was personal, not real, so that an element of fermentation +was cast into my mind when a copy of Heine's _Buch der Lieder_ was +one day lent to me. What took my fancy in it was, firstly, the +combination of enthusiasm and wit, then its terse, pithy form, and after +that the parts describing how the poet and his lady love, unable to +overcome the shyness which binds their tongues, involuntarily play hide +and seek with one another and lose each other; for I felt that I should +be equally unable to find natural and simple expression for my feelings, +should things ever come to such a pass with me. Of Heine's personality, +of the poet's historic position, political tendencies or importance, I +knew nothing; in these love-poems I looked more especially for those +verses in which violent self-esteem and blasé superiority to every +situation find expression, because this fell in with the Petsjórin note, +which, since reading Lermontof's novel, was the dominant one in my mind. +As was my habit in those years, when it was still out of the question +for me to buy books that pleased me, I copied out of the _Buch der +Lieder_ all that I liked best, that I might read it again. + + +XXV. + +Of all this life of artistic desire and seeking, of external +impressions, welcomed with all the freshness and impulsiveness of a +boy's mind, but most of self-study and self-discovery, the elder of the +two comrades was a most attentive spectator, more than a spectator. He +made use of expressions and said things which rose to my head and made +me conceited. Sebastian would make such a remark as: "It is not for your +abilities that I appreciate you, it is for your enthusiasm. All other +people I know are machines without souls, at their best full of +affected, set phrases, such as one who has peeped behind the scenes +laughs at; but in you there is a fulness of ideality too great for you +ever to be happy." "Fulness of ideality" was the expression of the time +for the supremest quality of intellectual equipment. No wonder, then, +that I felt flattered. + +And my older comrade united a perception of my mental condition, which +unerringly perceived its immaturity, with a steadfast faith in a future +for me which in spite of my arrogance, I thirsted to find in the one of +all others who knew me best and was most plainly my superior in +knowledge. One day, when I had informed him that I felt "more mature and +clearer about myself," he replied, without a trace of indecision, that +this was undoubtedly a very good thing, if it were true, but that he +suspected I was laboring under a delusion. "I am none the less +convinced," he added, "that you will soon reach a crisis, will overcome +all obstacles and attain the nowadays almost giant's goal that you have +set before you." This goal, for that matter, was very indefinite, and +was to the general effect that I intended to make myself strongly felt, +and bring about great changes in the intellectual world; of what kind, +was uncertain. + +Meanwhile, as the time drew near for us to enter the University, and I +approached the years of manhood which the other, in spite of his modest +position as schoolboy, had already long attained, Sebastian grew utterly +miserable. He had, as he expressed it, made up his mind to be my +_Melanchthon_. But through an inward collapse which I could not +understand he now felt that the time in which he could be anything to me +had gone by; it seemed to him that he had neglected to acquire the +knowledge and the education necessary, and he reproached himself +bitterly. "I have not been in the least what I might have been to you," +he exclaimed one day, and without betraying it he endured torments of +jealousy, and thought with vexation and anxiety of the time when a +larger circle would be opened to me in the University, and he himself +would become superfluous. + +His fear was thus far unfounded, that, naïve in my selfishness, as in my +reliance on him, I still continued to tell him everything, and in return +constantly sought his help when philological or mathematical +difficulties which I could not solve alone presented themselves to me. + +But I had scarcely returned to Copenhagen, after my first journey abroad +(a very enjoyable four weeks' visit to Göteborg), I had scarcely been a +month a freshman, attending philosophical lectures and taking part in +student life than the dreaded separation between us two so differently +constituted friends came to pass. The provocation was trifling, in fact +paltry. One day I was standing in the lecture-room with a few fellow- +students before a lecture began, when a freshman hurried up to us and +asked: "Is it true, what Sebastian says, that he is the person you think +most of in the world?" My reply was: "Did he say that himself?" "Yes." +And, disgusted that the other should have made such a remark in order to +impress perfect strangers, though it might certainly very easily have +escaped him in confidence, I said hastily: "Oh! he's mad!" which +outburst, bearing in mind young people's use of the word "mad," was +decidedly not to be taken literally, but was, it is quite true, ill- +naturedly meant. + +The same evening I received a short note from Sebastian in which, though +in polite terms, he repudiated his allegiance and fidelity; the letter, +in which the polite form _you_ was used instead of the accustomed +_thou_, was signed: "Your 'mad' and 'foolish,' but respectful +Sebastian." + +The impression this produced upon me was exceedingly painful, but an +early developed mental habit of always accepting a decision, and a +vehement repugnance to renew any connection deliberately severed by +another party, resulted in my never even for a moment thinking of +shaking his resolution, and in my leaving the note unanswered. However, +the matter was not done with, and the next few months brought me many +insufferable moments, indeed hours, for Sebastian, whose existence had +for so long centred round mine that he was evidently incapable of doing +without me altogether, continually crossed my path, planted himself near +me on every possible occasion, and one evening, at a students' +gathering, even got a chair outside the row round the table, sat himself +down just opposite to me, and spent a great part of the evening in +staring fixedly into my face. As may be supposed, I felt exceedingly +irritated. + +Three months passed, when one day I received a letter from Sebastian, +and at intervals of weeks or months several others followed. They were +impressive letters, splendidly written, with a sort of grim humour about +them, expressing his passionate affection and venting his despair. This +was the first time that I had come in contact with passion, but it was a +passion that without having any unnatural or sensual element in it, +nevertheless, from a person of the same sex, excited a feeling of +displeasure, and even disgust, in me. + +Sebastian wrote: "I felt that it was cheating you to take so much +without being able to give you anything in return; I thought it mean to +associate with you; consequently, I believe that I did perfectly right +to break with you. Still, it is true that I hardly needed to do it. Time +and circumstances would have effected the breach." And feeling that our +ways were now divided, he continued: + + Hie locus est, partes ubi se via findit in ambas. + Dextera, quae Ditis magni sub moenia tendit + Hac iter Elysium nobis; at laeva malorum + Exercet poenas et ad impia Tartara mittit. + +"I cannot kill myself at present, but as soon as I feel able I shall do +so." + +Or he wrote: "Towards the end of the time when we were friends, I was +not quite myself when talking to you; I was unbalanced; for I was +convinced that you wasted your valuable time talking to me, and at the +same time was oppressed with grief at the thought that we must part. +Then I tried to make you angry by pretending to question your abilities, +by affecting indifference and scorn; but it was the dog baying at the +moon. I had to bring about the severance that I did. That I should be so +childish as to be vexed about a slight from you, you cannot yourself +believe. I cannot really regret it, for I could no longer be of use to +you; you doubtless think the same yourself; but I cannot do without you; +my affection for you is the only vital thing in me; your life throbbed +in mine." + +Sometimes the letters ended with an outburst of a sort of despairing +humour, such as: "Vale! (Fanfare! somersaults by Pagliaccio.)" But +whether Sebastian assumed a serious or a desperate tone, the renewal of +our old companionship was equally impossible to me. I could not ignore +what had happened, and I could not have a friend who was jealous if I +talked to others. Since my intellectual entity had awakened, all +jealousy had been an abomination to me, but jealousy in one man of +another man positively revolted me. I recognised Sebastian's great +merits, respected his character, admired his wide range of knowledge, +but I could not associate with him again, could not even so much as walk +down the street by his side. All his affectionate and beautiful letters +glanced off ineffectual from this repugnance. Something in me had +suddenly turned stony, like a plant plunged in petrifying water. + +Six years passed before we saw each other again. We met then with simple +and sincere affection. Sebastian's old passion had evaporated without +leaving a trace; he himself could no longer understand it. And, though +far apart, and with nothing to connect us closely, we continued to think +kindly of one another and to exchange reflections, until, after a few +years, Death carried him away, ere he had reached the years of real +manhood, or fulfilled any of the promises of his gifted and industrious +youth. + + + + +TRANSITIONAL YEARS + +Schoolboy Fancies--Religion--Early Friends--_Daemonic_ Theory--A +West Indian Friend--My Acquaintance Widens--Politics--The Reactionary +Party--The David Family--A Student Society--An Excursion to Slesvig-- +Temperament--The Law--Hegel--Spinoza--Love for Humanity--A Religious +Crisis--Doubt--Personal Immortality--Renunciation. + + +I. + +My second schoolboy fancy dated from my last few months at school. It +was a natural enough outcome of the attraction towards the other sex +which, never yet encouraged, was lurking in my mind; but it was not +otherwise remarkable for its naturalness. It had its origin partly in my +love of adventure, partly in my propensity for trying my powers, but, as +love, was without root, inasmuch as it was rooted neither in my heart +nor in my senses. + +The object of it was again a girl from another country. Her name and +person had been well known to me since I was twelve years old. We had +even exchanged compliments, been curious about one another, gone so far +as to wish for a lock of each other's hair. There was consequently a +romantic background to our first meeting. When I heard that she was +coming to Denmark I was, as by chance, on the quay, and saw her arrive. + +She was exactly the same age as I, and, without real beauty, was very +good-looking and had unusually lovely eyes. I endeavoured to make her +acquaintance through relatives of hers whom I knew, and had no +difficulty in getting into touch with her. An offer to show her the +museums and picture galleries in Copenhagen was accepted. Although I had +very little time, just before my matriculation examination, my new +acquaintance filled my thoughts to such an extent that I did not care +how much of this valuable time I sacrificed to her. In the Summer, when +the girl went out near Charlottenlund, whereas my parents were staying +much nearer to the town, I went backwards and forwards to the woods +nearly every day, in the uncertain but seldom disappointed hope of +seeing her. Sometimes I rowed her about in the Sound. + +Simple and straightforward though the attraction I felt might seem, the +immature romance I built up on it was anything but simple. + +It was, as stated, not my senses that drew me on. Split and divided up +as I was just then, a merely intellectual love seemed to me quite +natural; one might feel an attraction of the senses for an altogether +different woman. I did not wish for a kiss, much less an embrace; in +fact, was too much a child to think of anything of the sort. + +But neither was it my heart that drew me on; I felt no tenderness, +hardly any real affection, for this young girl whom I was so anxious to +win. She only busied my brain. + +In the condition of boyish self-inquisition in which I then found +myself, this acquaintance was a fresh element of fermentation, and the +strongest to which my self-examination had hitherto been subjected. I +instinctively desired to engage her fancy; but my attitude was from +myself through her to myself. I wanted less to please than to dominate +her, and as it was only my head that was filled with her image, I wholly +lacked the voluntary and cheerful self-humiliation which is an element +of real love. I certainly wished with all my heart to fascinate her; but +what I more particularly wanted was to hold my own, to avoid submission, +and retain my independence. My boyish pride demanded it. + +The young foreigner, whose knowledge of the world was hardly greater +than my own, had certainly never, during her short life, come in contact +with so extraordinary a phenomenon; it afforded matter for reflection. +She certainly felt attracted, but, woman-like, was on her guard. She was +of a quiet, amiable disposition, innocently coquettish, naturally +adapted for the advances of sound common sense and affectionate good- +will, not for the volts of passion; she was, moreover, femininely +practical. + +She saw at a glance that this grown-up schoolboy, who almost staggered +her with his eloquence, his knowledge, his wild plans for the future, +was no wooer, and that his advances were not to be taken too seriously. +Next, with a woman's unfailing intuition, she discovered his empty love +of power. And first involuntarily, and then consciously, she placed +herself in an attitude of defence. She did not lack intelligence. She +showed a keen interest in me, but met me with the self-control of a +little woman of the world, now and then with coolness, on one occasion +with well-aimed shafts of mockery. + +Our mutual attitude might have developed into a regular war between the +sexes, had we not both been half-children. Just as I, in the midst of a +carefully planned assault on her emotions, occasionally forgot myself +altogether and betrayed the craving to be near her which drove me almost +every day to her door, she also would at times lose the equilibrium she +had struggled for, and feverishly reveal her agitated state of mind. But +immediately afterwards I was again at the assault, she once more on the +alert, and after the lapse of four months our ways separated, without a +kiss, or one simple, affectionate word, ever having passed between us. + +In my morbid self-duplication, I had been busy all this time fixing in +my memory and writing down in a book all that I had said to her or she +to me, weighing and probing the scope and effect of the words that had +been uttered, laying plans for future methods of advance, noting actual +victories and defeats, pondering over this inanity, bending over all +this abnormality, like a strategist who, bending over the map, marks +with his nail the movements of troops, the carrying or surrender of a +fortified position. + +This early, unsatisfactory and not strictly speaking erotic experience +had the remarkable effect of rendering me for the next seven years +impervious to the tender passion, so that, undisturbed by women or +erotic emotions, I was able to absorb myself in the world of varied +research that was now opening up to me. + + +II. + +A school-friend who was keenly interested in astronomy and had directed +my nightly contemplations of the heavens, drew me, just about this time, +a very good map of the stars, by the help of which I found those stars I +knew and extended my knowledge further. + +The same school-friend sometimes took me to the Observatory, to see old +Professor d'Arrest--a refined and sapient man--and there, for the first +time, I saw the stellar heavens through a telescope. I had learnt +astronomy at school, but had lacked talent to attain any real insight +into the subject. Now the constellations and certain of the stars began +to creep into my affections; they became the nightly witnesses of my +joys and sorrows, all through my life; the sight of them sometimes +comforted me when I felt lonely and forsaken in a foreign land. The +Lyre, the Swan, the Eagle, the Crown and Boötes, Auriga, the Hyades and +the Pleiades, and among the Winter constellations, Orion; all these +twinkling groups, that human eyes have sought for thousands of years, +became distant friends of mine, too. And the thoughts which the sight of +the countless globes involuntarily and inevitably evokes, were born in +me, too,--thoughts of the littleness of the earth in our Solar System, +and of our Solar System in the Universe, of immeasurable distances--so +great that the stars whose rays, with the rapidity of light's +travelling, are striking against our eyes now, may have gone out in our +childhood; of immeasurable periods of time, in which a human life, or +even the lifetime of a whole people, disappears like a drop in the +ocean. And whereas at school I had only studied astronomy as a subject, +from its mathematical aspect, I now learnt the results of spectroscopic +analysis, which showed me how the human genius of Bunsen and Kirchhoff +had annihilated the distance between the Earth and the Sun; and at the +same time I perceived the inherent improbability of the culture of our +Earth ever being transmitted to other worlds, even as the Earth had +never yet received communications from the civilisation of any of the +stars. + +This circumstance, combined with the certainty of the gradual cooling +and eventual death of the Earth, gave me a conclusive impression of the +finality of all earthly existence and of the merely temporary character +of all progress. + +Feeling that all religions built up on a belief in a God were +collapsing, Europe had long inclined towards the religion of Progress as +the last tenable. Now I perceived as I raised my eyes to the starry +expanse and rejoiced in my favourite stars, Sirius in the Great Dog, and +Vega in the Lyre or Altair in the Eagle, that it, too, was tottering, +this last religion of all. + + +III. + +At school, I had known a score of boys of my own age, and naturally +found few amongst them who could be anything to me. Among the advantages +that the freedom of student life afforded was that of coming in contact +all at once with hundreds of similarly educated young men of one's own +age. Young men made each other's acquaintance at lectures and banquets, +were drawn to one another, or felt themselves repulsed, and elective +affinity or accident associated them in pairs or groups for a longer or +shorter period. + +A young fellow whose main passion was a desire for intellectual +enrichment was necessarily obliged to associate with many of the other +young men of his own age, in order to learn to know them, in order, +externally and internally, to gain as much experience as possible and +thereby develop himself. + +In the case of many of them, a few conversations were enough to prove +that any fruitful intimacy was out of the question. I came into fleeting +contact with a number of suave, or cold, or too ordinary young students, +without their natures affecting mine or mine theirs. But there were +others who, for some months, engaged my attention to a considerable +extent. + +The first of these was a type of the student of the time. Vilsing was +from Jutland, tall, dark, neither handsome nor plain, remarkable for his +unparalleled facility in speaking. He owed his universal popularity to +the fact that at students' Parties he could at any time stand up and +rattle off at a furious rate an apparently unprepared speech, a sort of +stump speech in which humorous perversions, distortions, lyric remarks, +clever back-handed blows to right and left, astonishing incursions and +rapid sorties, were woven into a whole so good that it was an +entertaining challenge to common sense. + +The starting point, for instance, might be some travesty of Sibbern's +whimsical definition of life, which at that time we all had to learn by +heart for the examination. It ran: + +"Life altogether is an activity and active process, preceding from an +inner source and working itself out according to an inner impulse, +producing and by an eternal change of matter, reproducing, organising +and individualising, and, since it by a certain material or substratum +constitutes itself a certain exterior, within which it reveals itself, +it simultaneously constitutes itself as the subsisting activity and +endeavour in this, its exterior, of which it may further be inquired how +far a soul can be said to live and subsist in it, as a living entity-- +appearing in such a life." + +It is not difficult to conceive what delightful nonsense this barbaric +elucidation might suggest, if a carouse, or love, woman or drunkenness +were defined in this vein; and he would weave in amusing attacks on +earlier, less intrepid speakers, who, as Vilsing put it, reminded one of +the bashful forget-me-not, inasmuch as you could read in the play of +their features: "Forget me not! I, too, was an orator." + +Vilsing, who had been studying for some years already, paid a freshman a +compliment by desiring his acquaintance and seeking his society. He +frequented the Students' Union, was on terms of friendship with those +who led the fashion, and was a favourite speaker. It was a species of +condescension on his part to seek out a young fellow just escaped from +school, a fellow who would have sunk into the earth if he had had to +make a speech, and who had no connection with the circle of older +students. + +Vilsing was a young man of moods, who, like many at that time, like +Albrecht, the chief character in Schandorph's [Footnote: Sophus +Schandorph, b. 1820, d. 1901; a prominent Danish novelist, who commenced +his literary activity in the sixties.--[Translator's note.]] _Without +a Centre_, would exhibit all the colours of the rainbow in one +morning. He would give himself, and take himself back, show himself +affectionate, cordial, intimate, confidential, full of affectionate +anxiety for me his young friend, and at the next meeting be as cursory +and cool as if he scarcely remembered having seen me before; for he +would in the meantime have been attacked by vexation at his too great +friendliness, and wish to assert himself, as knowing his own value. + +He impressed me, his junior, by revealing himself, not precisely as a +man of the world, but as a much sought after society man. He told me how +much he was asked out, and how he went from one party and one ball to +another, which, to me, with my hankering after experiences, seemed to be +an enviable thing. But I was more struck by what Vilsing told me of the +favour he enjoyed with the other sex. One girl--a charming girl!--he was +engaged to, another loved him and he her; but those were the least of +his erotic triumphs; wherever he showed himself, he conquered. And +proofs were to hand. For one day, when he had dragged me up to his room +with him, he bewildered me by shaking out before my eyes a profusion of +embroidered sofa-cushions, fancy pillows, cigar-cases, match-holders, +crocheted purses, worked waistcoats, etc.; presents from every +description of person of the feminine gender. In every drawer he pulled +out there were presents of the sort; they hung over chairs and on pegs. + +I was young enough to feel a certain respect for a man so sought after +by the fair sex, although I thought his frankness too great. What first +began to undermine this feeling was not doubt of the truth of his tales, +or the genuineness of the gifts, but the fact that one after another of +my comrades, when the first cool stages of acquaintance were passed, +invariably found a favourable opportunity of confidentially informing +me--he could not explain why it was himself, but it was a fact--that +wherever he showed himself women were singularly fascinated by the sight +of him; there must be something about him which vanquished them in spite +of him. When at last one evening the most round-backed of all of them, a +swain whose blond mustache, of irregular growth, resembled an old, worn- +out toothbrush more than anything else, also confided in me that he did +not know how it was, or what could really be the cause of it, but there +must be something about him, etc.,--then my belief in Vilsing's +singularity and my admiration for him broke down. It must not be +supposed that Vilsing regarded himself as a sensual fiend. He did not +pose as cold and impudent, but as heartfelt and instinct with feeling. +He was studying theology, and cherished no dearer wish than eventually +to become a priest. He constantly alternated between contrition and +self-satisfaction, arrogance and repentance, enjoyed the consciousness +of being exceptionally clever, an irresistible charmer, and a true +Christian. It seemed to him that, in the freshman whom he had singled +out from the crowd and given a place at his side, he had found an +intellectual equal, or even superior, and this attracted him; he met +with in me an inexperience and unworldliness so great that the +inferiority in ability which he declared he perceived was more than +counterbalanced by the superiority he himself had the advantage of, both +in social accomplishments and in dealing with women. + +It thus seemed as though many of the essential conditions of a tolerably +permanent union between us were present. But during the first +conversation in which he deigned to be interested in my views, there +occurred in our friendship a little rift which widened to a chasm. +Vilsing sprang back horrified when he heard how I, greenhorn though I +was, regarded life and men and what I considered right. "You are in the +clutches of Evil, and your desire is towards the Evil. I have not time +or inclination to unfold an entire Christology now, but what you reject +is the Ideal, and what you appraise is the Devil himself. God! God! How +distressed I am for you! I would give my life to save you. But enough +about it for the present; I have not time just now; I have to go out to +dinner." + +This was our last serious conversation. I was not saved. He did not give +his life. He went for a vacation tour the following Summer holidays, +avoided me on his return, and soon we saw no more of each other. + + +IV. + +The theory, the intimation of which roused Vilsing to such a degree, +bore in its form witness to such immaturity that it could only have made +an impression on a youth whose immaturity, in spite of his age, was +greater still. To present it with any degree of clearness is scarcely +possible; it was not sufficiently clear in itself for that. But this was +about what it amounted to: + +The introspection and energetic self-absorption to which I had given +myself up during my last few years at school became even more persistent +on my release from the restraint of school and my free admission to the +society of grown-up people. + +I took advantage of my spare time in Copenhagen, and on the restricted +travels that I was allowed to take, to slake my passionate thirst for +life; firstly, by pondering ever and anon over past sensations, and +secondly, by plunging into eager and careful reading of the light +literature of all different countries and periods that I had heard +about, but did not yet myself know at first hand. + +Through all that I experienced and read, observed and made my own, my +attitude towards myself was, that before all, I sought to become clear +as to what manner of man I really, in my inmost being, was. I asked +myself who I was. I endeavoured to discover the mysterious word that +would break the charm of the mists in which I found myself and would +answer my fundamental question, _What_ was I? And then at last, my +ponderings and my readings resulted in my finding the word that seemed +to fit, although nowadays one can hardly hear it without a smile, the +word _Daemonic_. + +I was daemonic in giving myself this reply it seemed to me that I had +solved the riddle of my nature. I meant thereby, as I then explained it +to myself, that the choice between good and evil did not present itself +to me, as to others, since evil did not interest me. For me, it was not +a question of a choice, but of an unfolding of my ego, which had its +justification in itself. + +That which I called the _daemonic_ I had encountered for the first +time outside my own mind in Lermontof's hero. Petsjórin was compelled to +act in pursuance of his natural bent, as though possessed by his own +being. I felt myself in a similar manner possessed. I had met with the +word _Daimon_ and _Daimones_ in Plato; Socrates urges that by +_daemons_ the Gods, or the children of the Gods, were meant. I felt +as though I, too, were one of the children of the Gods. In all the great +legendary figures of the middle ages I detected the feature of divine +possession, especially in the two who had completely fascinated the +poets of the nineteenth century, Don Juan and Faust. The first was the +symbol of magic power over women, the second of the thirst for knowledge +giving dominion over humanity and Nature. Among my comrades, in Vilsing, +even in the hunch-backed fellow with the unsuccessful moustache, I had +seen how the Don Juan type which had turned their heads still held sway +over the minds of young people; I myself could quite well understand the +magic which this beautiful ideal of elementary irresistibility must +have; but the Faust type appealed to me, with my thirst for knowledge, +very much more. Still, the main thing for me was that in the first great +and wholly modern poets that I made acquaintance with, Byron and his +intellectual successors, Lermontof and Heine, I recognised again the +very fundamental trait that I termed _daemonic_, the worship of +one's own originality, under the guise of an uncompromising love of +liberty. + +I was always brooding over this idea of the _daemonic_ with which +my mind was filled. I recorded my thoughts on the subject in my first +long essay (lost, for that matter), _On the Daemonic, as it Reveals +Itself in the Human Character_. + +When a shrewdly intelligent young fellow of my own age criticised my +work from the assumption that the _daemonic_ did not exist, I +thought him ridiculous. I little dreamt that twenty-five years later +Relling, in _The Wild Duck_, would show himself to be on my +friend's side in the emphatic words: "What the Devil does it mean to be +daemonic! It's sheer nonsense." + + +V. + +The "daemonic" was also responsible for the mingled attraction that was +exerted over me at this point by a young foreign student, and for the +intercourse which ensued between us. Kappers was born somewhere in the +West Indies, was the son of a well-to-do German manufacturer, and had +been brought up in a North German town. His father, for what reason I do +not know, wished him to study at Copenhagen University, and there take +his law examination. There was coloured blood in his veins, though much +diluted, maybe an eighth or so. He was tall and slender, somewhat loose +in his walk and bearing, pale-complexioned, with dark eyes and negro +hair. His face, though not handsome, looked exceedingly clever, and its +expression was not deceptive, for the young man had an astonishing +intellect. + +He was placed in the house of a highly respected family in Copenhagen, +that of a prominent scientist, a good-natured, unpractical savant, very +unsuited to be the mentor of such an unconventional young man. He was +conspicuous among the native Danish freshmen for his elegant dress and +cosmopolitan education, and was so quick at learning that before very +many weeks he spoke Danish almost without a mistake, though with a +marked foreign accent, which, however, lent a certain charm to what he +said. His extraordinary intelligence was not remarkable either for its +comprehensiveness or its depth, but it was a quicker intelligence than +any his Copenhagen fellow-student had ever known, and so keen that he +seemed born to be a lawyer. + +Kappers spent almost all his day idling about the streets, talking to +his companions; he was always ready for a walk; you never saw him work +or heard him talk about his work. Nevertheless, he, a foreigner, who had +barely mastered the language, presented himself after six months--before +he had attended all the lectures, that is,--for the examination in +philosophy and passed it with _Distinction_ in all three subjects; +indeed, Rasmus Nielsen, who examined him in Propaedeutics, was so +delighted at the foreigner's shrewd and ready answers that he gave him +_Specially excellent_, a mark which did not exist. + +His gifts in the juridical line appeared to be equally remarkable. When +he turned up in a morning with his Danish fellow-students at the coach's +house it might occasionally happen that he was somewhat tired and slack, +but more often he showed a natural grasp of the handling of legal +questions, and a consummate skill in bringing out every possible aspect +of each question, that were astonishing in a beginner. + +His gifts were of unusual power, but for the externalities of things +only, and he possessed just the gifts with which the sophists of old +time distinguished themselves. He himself was a young sophist, and at +the same time a true comedian, adapting his behaviour to whomsoever he +might happen to be addressing, winning over the person in question by +striking his particular note and showing that side of his character with +which he could best please him. Endowed with the capacity of mystifying +and dazzling those around him, exceedingly keen-sighted, adaptable but +in reality empty, he knew how to set people thinking and to fascinate +others by his lively, unprejudiced and often paradoxical, but +entertaining conversation. He was now colder, now more confidential; he +knew how to assume cordiality, and to flatter by appearing to admire. + +With a young student like myself who had just left school, was quite +inexperienced in all worldly matters, and particularly in the chapter of +women, but in whom he detected good abilities and a very strained +idealism, he affected ascetic habits. With other companions he showed +himself the intensely reckless and dissipated rich man's son he was; +indeed, he amused himself by introducing some of the most inoffensive +and foolish of them into the wretched dens of vice and letting them +indulge themselves at his expense. + +Intellectually interested as he was, he proposed, soon after our first +meeting, that we should start a "literary and scientific" society, +consisting of a very few freshmen, who, at the weekly meetings, should +read a paper one of them had composed, whereupon two members who had +previously read the paper should each submit it to a prepared criticism +and after that, general discussion of the question. All that concerned +the proposed society was carried out with a genuine Kappers-like +mystery, as if it were a conspiracy, and with forms and ceremonies +worthy of a diplomat's action. + +Laws were drafted for the society, although it eventually consisted only +of five members, and elaborate minutes were kept of the meetings. Among +the members was V. Topsöe, afterwards well known as an editor and +author, at that time a cautious and impudent freshman, whose motto was: +"It is protection that we people must live by." He read the society a +paper _On the Appearance_, dealing with how one ought to dress, +behave, speak, do one's hair, which revealed powers of observation and a +sarcastic tendency. Amongst those who eagerly sought for admission but +never secured it was a young student, handsome, and with no small love +of study, but stupid and pushing, for whom I, who continued to see +myself in Lermontof's Petsjórin, cherished a hearty contempt, for the +curious reason that he in every way reminded me of Petsjórin's fatuous +and conceited adversary, Gruchnitski. Vilsing was asked to take part in +the society's endeavours, but refused. "What I have against all these +societies," he said, "is the self-satisfaction they give rise to; the +only theme I should be inclined to treat is that of how the modern Don +Juan must be conceived; but that I cannot do, since I should be obliged +to touch on so many incidents of my own life." + +This was the society before which I read the treatise on _The +Daemonic_, and it was Kappers who, with his well-developed +intelligence, would not admit the existence of anything of the sort. + +The regular meetings went on for six months only, the machinery being +too large and heavy in comparison with the results attained. Kappers and +his intimate friends, however, saw none the less of each other. The +brilliant West Indian continued to pursue his legal studies and to carry +on his merry life in Copenhagen for some eighteen months. But his +studies gradually came to a standstill, while his gay life took up more +and more of his time. He was now living alone in a flat which, to begin +with, had been very elegantly furnished, but grew emptier and emptier by +degrees, as his furniture was sold, or went to the pawnbroker's. His +furniture was followed by his books, and when Schou's "_Orders in +Council_" had also been turned into money, his legal studies ceased +of themselves. When the bookshelves were empty it was the turn of the +wardrobe and the linen drawers, till one Autumn day in 1861, an emissary +of his father, who had been sent to Copenhagen to ascertain what the son +was really about, found him in his shirt, without coat or trousers, +wrapped up in his fur overcoat, sitting on the floor in his drawing- +room, where there was not so much as a chair left. Asked how it was that +things had come to such a pass with him, he replied: "It is the curse +that follows the coloured race." + +A suit of clothes was redeemed for Kappers junior, and he was hurried +away as quickly as possible to the German town where his father lived, +and where the son explained to everyone who would listen that he had +been obliged to leave Copenhagen suddenly "on account of a duel with a +gentleman in a very exalted position." + + +VI. + +My first experiences of academic friendship made me smile in after years +when I looked back on them. But my circle of acquaintances had gradually +grown so large that it was only natural new friendships should grow out +of it. + +One of the members of Kappers' "literary and scientific" society, and +the one whom the West Indian had genuinely cared most for, was a young +fellow whose father was very much respected, and to whom attention was +called for that reason; he was short, a little heavy on his feet, and a +trifle indolent, had beautiful eyes, was warm-hearted and well educated, +had good abilities without being specially original, and was somewhat +careless in his dress, as in other things. + +His father was C.N. David, well known in his younger days as a +University professor and a liberal politician, who later became the Head +of the Statistical Department and a Member of the Senate. He had been in +his youth a friend of Johan Ludvig Heiberg, [Footnote: J.L. Heiberg, to +whom such frequent allusion is made, was a well-known Danish author of +the last century (1791-1860). Among many other things, he wrote a series +of vaudevilles for the Royal Theatre at Copenhagen, Of which he was +manager. In every piece he wrote there was a special part for his wife, +Johanne Luise Heiberg, who was the greatest Danish actress of the 19th +century.] and had been dramatic contributor to the latter's paper. + +He was a very distinguished satirist and critic and his influence upon +the taste and critical opinion of his day can only be compared with that +of Holberg in the 18th century. + +Now, in concert with Bluhme and a few other of the elder politicians, he +had formed a Conservative Fronde, opposed to the policy of the National +Liberals. One day as we two young men were sitting in his son's room, +drafting the rules for the freshmen's society of five members, the old +gentleman came through and asked us what we were writing. "Rules for a +society; we want to get them done as quickly as we can." "That is right. +That kind of constitution may very well be written out expeditiously. +There has not been very much more trouble or forethought spent on the +one we have in this country." + +It was not, however, so much the internal policy of the National +Liberals that he objected to--it was only the Election Law that he was +dissatisfied with--as their attitude towards Germany. Whenever a step +was taken in the direction of the incorporation of Slesvig, he would +exclaim: "We are doing what we solemnly promised not to do. How can +anyone be so childish as to believe that it will turn out well!" + +The son, whose home impressions in politics had been Conservative, was a +happy young man with a somewhat embarrassed manner, who sometimes hid +his uncertainty under the cloak of a carelessness that was not +altogether assumed. Behind him stood his family, to whom he hospitably +introduced those of his companions whom he liked, and though the family +were not gentle of origin, they belonged, nevertheless, to the highest +circles in the country and exercised their attraction through the son. + +I, whom Ludvig David was now eagerly cultivating, had known him for many +years, as we had been school-fellows and even classmates, although David +was considerably older. I had never felt drawn to him as a boy, in fact, +had not liked him. Neither had David, in our school-days, ever made any +advances to me, having had other more intimate friends. Now, however, he +was very cordial to me, and expressed in strong terms his appreciation +of my industry and abilities; he himself was often teased at home for +his lack of application. + +C.N. David was the first public personality with whom, as a student, I +became acquainted and into whose house I was introduced. For many years +I enjoyed unusual kindness and hospitality at the hands of the old +politician, afterwards Minister of Finance. + + +VII. + +I had hitherto been only mildly interested in politics. I had, of +course, as a boy, attentively followed the course of the Crimean war, +which my French uncle, on one of his visits, had called the fight for +civilisation against barbarism, although it was a fight for Turkey! now, +as a student, I followed with keen interest the Italian campaign and the +revolt against the Austrian Dukes and the Neapolitan Bourbons. But the +internal policy of Denmark had little attraction for me. As soon as I +entered the University I felt myself influenced by the spirit of such +men as Poul Möller, J.L. Heiberg, Sören Kierkegaard, and distinctly +removed from the belief in the power of the people which was being +preached everywhere at that time. This, however, was hardly more than a +frame of mind, which did not preclude my feeling myself in sympathy with +what at that time was called broad thought (i.e., Liberalism). Although +I was often indignant at the National Liberal and Scandinavian terrorism +which obtained a hearing at both convivial and serious meetings in the +Students' Union, my feelings in the matter of Denmark's foreign policy +with regard to Sweden and Norway, as well as to Germany, were the same +as those held by all the other students. I felt no intellectual debt to +either Sweden or Norway, but I was drawn by affection towards the Swedes +and the Norsemen, and in Christian Richardt's lovely song at the +Northern Celebration in 1860, _For Sweden and Norway_, I found the +expression of the fraternal feelings that I cherished in my breast for +our two Northern neighbours. On the other hand, small as my store of +knowledge still was, I had already acquired some considerable impression +of German culture. Nevertheless, the increasingly inimical attitude of +the German people towards Denmark, and the threatenings of war with +Germany, together with my childish recollections of the War of 1848-50, +had for their effect that in the Germany of that day I only saw an +enemy's country. A violent affection that I felt at sixteen for a +charming little German girl made no difference to this view. + + +VIII. + +The old men, who advocated the greatest caution in dealing with the +impossible demands of the German Federation, and were profoundly +distrustful as to the help that might be expected from Europe, were +vituperated in the press. As _Whole-State Men_, they were regarded +as unpatriotic, and as so-called _Reactionaries_, accused of being +enemies to freedom. When I was introduced into the house of one of these +politically ill-famed leaders, in spite of my ignorance, I knew enough +of politics, as of other subjects, to draw a sharp distinction between +that which I could in a measure grasp, and that which I did not +understand; I was sufficiently educated to place Danish constitutional +questions in the latter category, and consequently I crossed, devoid of +prejudice, the threshold of a house whence proceeded, according to the +opinion of the politically orthodox, a pernicious, though fortunately +powerless, political heterodoxy. + +It must not be supposed that I came into close touch with anything of +the sort. The old Minister never opened his mouth on political matters +in the bosom of his family. But the impression of superior intelligence +and knowledge of men that he conveyed was enough to place him in a +different light from that in which he was depicted in _The +Fatherland_, the paper whose opinions were swallowed blindly by the +student body. And my faith in the infallibility of the paper was shaken +even more one day, when I saw the Leader of the Reactionary Party +himself, Privy Councillor Bluhme, at the house, and sat unnoticed in a +corner, listening to his conversation. He talked a great deal, although, +like the master of the house, he did not allude to his public work. Like +a statesman of the old school, he expressed himself with exquisite +politeness and a certain ceremony. But of the affectation of which +_The Fatherland_ accused him, there was not a trace. What +profoundly impressed me was the Danish the old gentleman spoke, the most +perfect Danish. He told of his travels in India--once upon a time he had +been Governor of Trankebar--and you saw before you the banks of the +Ganges and the white troops of women, streaming down to bathe in the +river, as their religion prescribed. + +I never forgot the words with which Bluhme rose to go: "May I borrow the +English blue-books for a few days? There might be something or other +that the newspapers have not thought fit to tell us." I started at the +words. It dawned upon me for the first time, though merely as a remote +possibility, that the Press might purposely and with intent to mislead +keep silence about facts that had a claim upon the attention of the +public. + + +IX. + +Young David had once asked me to read Ovid's Elegiacs with him, and this +was the beginning of our closer acquaintance. In town, in the Winter, we +two younger ones were only rarely with the rest of the family, but in +Summer it was different. The Minister had built a house at Rungsted, on +a piece of land belonging to his brother, who was a farmer and the owner +of Rungstedgaard, Rungstedlund and Folehavegaard, a shrewd and practical +man. To this villa, which was in a beautiful situation, overlooking the +sea, I was often invited by my friend to spend a few days in the Summer, +sometimes even a month at a time. At first, of course, I was nothing to +the rest of the family; they received me for the son's sake; but by +degrees I won a footing with them, too. The handsome, clever and +sprightly mistress of the house took a motherly interest in me, and the +young daughters showed me kindness for which I was very grateful. + +The master of the house sometimes related an anecdote, as, for instance, +about Heiberg's mad pranks as a young man. When he went off into the +woods and got hungry, he used to take provisions from the stores in the +lockers of the phaetons that put up at Klampenborg, while the people +were walking about in the park, and the coachmen inside the public- +house. One day, with Möhl and David, he got hold of a huge layer-cake. +The young fellows had devoured a good half of it and replaced it under +the seat of the carriage, when the family came back, caught sight of +Heiberg, whom they knew, and invited the young men to have a piece of +cake and a glass of wine. When they made the horrifying discovery of the +havoc that had been wrought, they themselves would not touch it, and the +robbers, who were stuffed already, were obliged to consume the remainder +of the cake between them. + +There was often music at the Villa; sometimes I was asked to read aloud, +and then I did my best, choosing good pieces not well known, and reading +carefully. The pleasant outdoor life gave me a few glimpses of that rare +and ardently desired thing, still contentment. It was more particularly +alone with Nature that I felt myself at home. + +A loose page from my diary of those days will serve to indicate the +untried forces that I felt stirring within me: + + On the way down, the sky was dappled with large and many-coloured + clouds. I wandered about in the woods to-day, among the oaks and + beeches, and saw the sun gilding the leaves and the tree-trunks, lay + down under a tree with my Greek Homer and read the first and second + books of the Odyssey. Went backwards and forwards in the clover field, + revelled in the clover, smelt it, and sucked the juice of the flowers. I + have the same splendid view as of old from my window. The sea, in all + its flat expanse, moved in towards me to greet me, when I arrived. It + was roaring and foaming mildly. Hveen could be seen quite clearly. Now + the wind is busy outside my window, the sea is stormy, the dark heavens + show streaks of moonlight.... + + East wind and rain. Went as far as Valloröd in a furious wind. The sky + kept clear; a dark red patch of colour showed the position of the Sun on + the horizon. The Moon has got up hurriedly, has turned from red to + yellow, and looks lovely. I am drunk with the beauties of Nature. Go to + Folehave and feel, like the gods in Homer, without a care.... + + I can never get sleepy out in the open country on a windy night. Rested + a little, got up at four o'clock, went at full speed along soaked roads + to Humlebaek, to Gurre Ruins and lake, through the woods to Fredensborg + park, back to Humlebaek, and came home to Rungsted by steamer. Then went + up on the hill. Quiet beauty of the landscape. Feeling that Nature + raises even the fallen into purer, loftier regions. Took the Odyssey and + went along the field-path to the stone table; cool, fresh air, harmony + and splendour over Nature. "Wildly soars the hawk." Went up into the + sunlit wood at Hörsholm, gazed at the melancholy expression in the faces + of the horses and sheep. + + I made ducks and drakes and asked the others riddles. A woman came and + begged for help to bury her husband; he had had such an easy death. (She + is said to have killed him with a blow from a wooden shoe.) Sat under a + giant beech in Rungsted Wood; then had a splendid drive after the heavy + rain up to Folehave and thence to Hörsholm. Everything was as fresh and + lovely as in an enchanted land. What a freshness! The church and the + trees mirrored themselves in the lake. The device on my shield shall be + three lucky peas. [Footnote: There seems to be some such legendary + virtue attached in Denmark to a pea-pod containing _three_ or + _nine_ peas, as with us to a four-leaved clover.--[Translator's + note.]] To Vedbaek and back. We were going for a row. My hostess agreed, + but as we had a large, heavy and clumsy boat, they were all nervous. + Then Ludvig's rowlock snapped and he caught a crab. It was no wonder, as + he was rowing too deep. So I took both sculls myself. It was tiring to + pull the heavy boat with so many, but the sea was inexpressibly lovely, + the evening dead calm. Silver sheen on the water, visible to the + observant and initiated Nature-lover. Ripple from the west wind (GREEK: + phrhix). + + Grubbed in the shingle, and went to Folehave. Gathered flowers and + strawberries. My fingers still smell of strawberries. + + Went out at night. Pictures of my fancy rose around me. A Summer's + night, but as cold as Winter, the clouds banked up on the horizon. + Suppose in the wind and cold and dark I were to meet one I know! Over + the corn the wind whispered or whistled a name. The waves dashed in a + short little beat against the shore. It is only the sea that is as + Nature made it; the land in a thousand ways is robbed of its virginity + by human hands, but the sea now is as it was thousands of years ago. A + thick fog rose up. The birches bent their heads and went to sleep. But I + can hear the grass grow and the stars sing. + +Gradually my association with Ludvig David grew more and more intimate, +and the latter proved himself a constant friend. A few years after our +friendship had begun, when things were looking rather black for me, my +father having suffered great business losses, and no longer being able +to give me the same help as before, Ludvig David invited me to go and +live altogether at his father's house, and be like a son there--an offer +which I of course refused, but which affected me deeply, especially when +I learnt that it had only been made after the whole family had been +consulted. + + +X. + +In November, 1859, at exactly the same time as Kappers' "literary and +scientific" society was started, a fellow-student named Grönbeck, from +Falster, who knew the family of Caspar Paludan-Müller, the historian, +proposed my joining another little society of young students, of whom +Grönbeck thought very highly on account of their altogether unusual +knowledge of books and men. + +In the old Students' Union in Boldhusgade, the only meeting-place at +that time for students, which was always regarded in a poetic light, I +had not found what I wanted. There was no life in it, and at the +convivial meetings on Saturday night the punch was bad, the speeches +were generally bad, and the songs were good only once in a way. + +I had just joined one new society, but I never rejected any prospect of +acquaintances from whom I could learn anything, and nothing was too much +for me. So I willingly agreed, and one evening late in November I was +introduced to the society so extolled by Grönbeck, which called itself +neither "literary" nor "scientific," had no other object than +sociability, and met at Ehlers' College, in the rooms of a young +philological student, Frederik Nutzhorn. + +Expecting as I did something out of the ordinary, I was very much +disappointed. The society proved to be quite vague and indefinite. Those +present, the host, a certain Jens Paludan-Müller, son of the historian, +a certain Julius Lange, son of the Professor of Pedagogy, and a few +others, received me as though they had been waiting for me to put the +society on its legs; they talked as if I were going to do everything to +entertain them, and as if they themselves cared to do nothing; they +seemed to be indolent, almost sluggish. First we read aloud in turns +from Björnson's _Arne_, which was then new; a lagging conversation +followed. Nutzhorn talked nonsense, Paludan-Müller snuffled, Julius +Lange alone occasionally let fall a humorous remark. The contrast +between Nutzhorn's band, who took sociability calmly and quietly, and +Kappers' circle, which met to work and discuss things to its utmost +capacity, was striking. The band seemed exceedingly phlegmatic in +comparison. + +This first impression was modified at subsequent meetings. As I talked +to these young men I discovered, first and foremost, how ignorant I was +of political history and the history of art; in the next place, I +seemed, in comparison with them, to be old in my opinions and my habits. +They called themselves Republicans, for instance, whereas Republicanism +in Denmark had in my eyes hitherto been mere youthful folly. Then again, +they were very unconventional in their habits. After a party near +Christmas time, which was distinguished by a pretty song by Julius +Lange, they proposed--at twelve o'clock at night!--that we should go to +Frederiksborg. And extravagances of this kind were not infrequent. + +Still it was only towards midsummer 1860 that I became properly merged +into the new circle and felt myself at home in it. It had been increased +by two or three first-rate fellows, Harald Paulsen, at the present time +Lord Chief Justice, a courageous young fellow, who was not afraid of +tackling any ruffian who interfered with him in a defile; Troels Lund, +then studying theology, later on the esteemed historian, who was always +refined, self-controlled, thoughtful, and on occasion caustic, great at +feints in the fencing class; and Emil Petersen, then studying law (died +in 1890, as Departmental Head of Railways), gentle, dreamy, exceedingly +conscientious, with a marked lyric tendency. + +One evening, shortly before Midsummer's eve, when we had gone out to +Vedbaek, fetched Emil Petersen from Tryggeröd and thoroughly enjoyed the +beautiful scenery, we had a wrestling match out in the water off +Skodsborg and a supper party afterwards at which, under the influence of +the company, the gaiety rose to a wild pitch and eventually passed all +bounds. We made speeches, sang, shouted our witticisms at each other all +at once, seized each other round the waist and danced, till we had to +stop for sheer tiredness. Then we all drank pledges of eternal +friendship, and trooped into the town together, and hammered at the +doors of the coffee-houses after midnight to try to get in somewhere +where we could have coffee. We had learnt all at once to know and +appreciate each other to the full; we were united by a feeling of +brotherhood and remained friends for life. The life allotted to several +of the little band was, it is true, but short; Jens Paludan-Müller fell +at Sankelmark three and a half years later; Nutzhorn had only five years +and a half to live. Of the others, Emil Petersen and Julius Lange are +dead. But, whether our lives were long or short, our meetings frequent +or rare, we continued to be cordially attached to one another, and no +misunderstanding or ill-feeling ever cropped up between us. + + +XI. + +Among my Danish excursions was one to Slesvig in July, 1860. The +Copenhagen students had been asked to attend a festival to be held at +Angel at the end of July for the strengthening of the sparse Danish +element in that German-minded region. There were not many who wished to +go, but several of those who did had beautiful voices, and sang +feelingly the national songs with which it was hoped the hearts of the +Angel people, and especially of the ladies, might be touched. Several +gentlemen still living, at that time among the recognised leaders of the +students, went with us. + +We sailed from Korsör to Flensborg one exquisite Summer night; we gave +up the berths we had secured and stayed all night on deck with a bowl of +punch. It was a starlight night, the ship cut rapidly through the calm +waters, beautiful songs were sung and high-flown speeches made. One +speech was held in a whisper, the one in honour of General de Meza, who +was still a universal favourite, and who was sitting in his stateroom, +waked up out of his sleep, with his white gloves and gaufred lace cuffs +on and a red and white night-cap on his head. We young ones only thought +of him as the man who, during the battle of Fredericia, had never moved +a muscle of his face, and when it was over had said quietly: "The result +is very satisfactory." + +Unfriendly and sneering looks from the windows at Flensborg very soon +showed the travellers that Danish students' caps were not a welcome +sight there. The Angel peasants, however, were very pleasant. The +festival, which lasted all day and concluded with dancing and fireworks, +was a great success, and a young man who had been carousing all night, +travelling all day, and had danced all the evening with pretty girls +till his senses were in a whirl, could not help regarding the scene of +the festival in a romantic light, as he stood there alone, late at +night, surrounded by flaring torches, the fireworks sputtering and +glittering about him. Some few of the students sat in the fields round +flaming rings of pitch, an old Angel peasant keeping the fires alight +and singing Danish songs. Absolutely enraptured, and with tears in his +eyes, he went about shaking hands with the young men and thanking them +for coming. It was peculiarly solemn and beautiful. + +Next day, when I got out at Egebaek station on my way from Flensborg, +intending to go to Idsted, it seemed that three other young men had had +the same idea, so we all four walked together. They were young men of a +type I had not met with before. The way they felt and spoke was new to +me. They all talked in a very affectionate manner, betrayed at once that +they worshipped one another, and seemed to have strong, open natures, +much resembling each other. They were Ernst Trier, Nörregaard, and +Baagöe, later the three well-known High School men. + +The little band arrived at a quick pace on Idsted's beautiful heath, all +tufts of ling, the red blossoms of which looked lovely in the light of +the setting sun. We sat ourselves down on the hill where Baudissin and +his staff had stood. Then Baagöe read aloud Hammerich's description of +the battle of Idsted, while each of us in his mind's eye saw the +seething masses of troops advance and fall upon one another, as they had +done just ten years before. + +Our time was short, if we wanted to get under a roof that night. At 9 +o'clock we were still eight miles from Slesvig. We did the first four at +a pace that was novel to me. Three-parts of the way we covered in forty- +five minutes, the last two miles took us twenty. When we arrived at the +hotel, there stood Madam Esselbach, of war renown, in the doorway, with +her hands on her hips, as in her portrait; she summed up the arrivals +with shrewd, sharp eyes, and exclaimed: "_Das ist ja das junge +Dänemark_." Inside, officers were sitting, playing cards. Major +Sommer promised us young men to show us Gottorp at 6 o'clock next +morning; we should then get a view of the whole of the town from +Hersterberg beforehand. + +The Major, who was attacked in the newspapers after the war, and whose +expression "my maiden sword," was made great fun of, showed us younger +ones the magnificent church, and afterwards the castle, which, as a +barracks, was quite spoilt. He acted as the father of the regiment, and, +like Poul Möller's artist, encouraged the efficient, and said hard words +to the slighty, praising or blaming unceasingly, chatted Danish to the +soldiers, Low German to the cook, High German to the little housekeeper +at the castle, and called the attention of his guests to the perfect +order and cleanliness of the stables. He complained bitterly that a +certain senior lieutenant he pointed out to us, who in 1848 had flung +his cockade in the gutter and gone over to the Germans, had been +reinstated in the regiment, and placed over the heads of brave second- +lieutenants who had won their crosses in the war. + +Here I parted with my Grundtvigian friends. When I spoke of them to +Julius Lange on my return, he remarked: "They are a good sort, who wear +their hearts in their buttonholes as decorations." + +The society I fell in with for the rest of my journey was very droll. +This consisted of Borup, later Mayor of Finance, and a journalist named +Falkman (really Petersen), even at that time on the staff of _The +Dally Paper_. I little guessed then that my somewhat vulgar +travelling companion would develop into the Cato who wished Ibsen's +_Ghosts_ "might be thrust into the slime-pit, where such things +belong," and would write articles by the hundred against me. Neither had +I any suspicion, during my acquaintance with Topsöe, that the latter +would one day be one of my most determined persecutors. Without exactly +being strikingly youthful, the large, broad-shouldered Borup was still a +young man. Falkman wrote good-humouredly long reports to Bille about +Slesvig, which I corrected for him. Borup and Falkman generally +exclaimed the moment I opened my mouth: "Not seraphic, now!" + +We travelled together to Glücksborg, saw the camp there, and, as we had +had nothing since our morning coffee at 5 o'clock, ate between the three +of us a piece of roast meat six pounds weight. We spent the night at +Flensborg and drove next day to Graasten along a lovely road with wooded +banks on either side. It was pouring with rain, and we sat in dead +silence, trying to roll ourselves up in horse-cloths. When in an hour's +time the rain stopped, and we put up at an inn, our enforced silence +gave place to the wildest merriment. We three young fellows--the future +Finance Minister as well--danced into the parlour, hopped about like +wild men, spilt milk over ourselves, the sofa, and the waitress; then +sprang, waltzing and laughing, out through the door again and up into +the carriage, after having heaped the girl with small copper coins. + +From Graasten we proceeded to Sönderborg. The older men lay down and +slept after the meal. I went up to Dybbölmölle. On the way back, I found +on a hill looking out over Als a bench from which there was a beautiful +view across to Slesvig. I lay down on the seat and gazed up at the sky +and across the perfect country. The light fields, with their tall, dark +hedges, which give the Slesvig scenery its peculiar stamp, from this +high-lying position looked absolutely lovely. + + +XII. + +I was not given to looking at life in a rosy light. My nature, one +uninterrupted endeavour, was too tense for that. Although I occasionally +felt the spontaneous enjoyments of breathing the fresh air, seeing the +sun shine, and listening to the whistling of the wind, and always +delighted in the fact that I was in the heyday of my youth, there was +yet a considerable element of melancholy in my temperament, and I was so +loth to abandon myself to any illusion that when I looked into my own +heart and summed up my own life it seemed to me that I had never been +happy for a day. I did not know what it was to be happy for a whole day +at a time, scarcely for an hour. I had only known a moment's rapture in +the companionship of my comrades at a merry-making, in intercourse with +a friend, under the influence of the beauties of Nature, or the charm of +women, or in delight at gaining intellectual riches--during the reading +of a poem, the sight of a play, or when absorbed in a work of art. + +Any feeling that I was enriching my mind from those surrounding me was +unfortunately rare with me. Almost always, when talking to strangers, I +felt the exact opposite, which annoyed me exceedingly, namely, that I +was being intellectually sucked, squeezed like a lemon, and whereas I +was never bored when alone, in the society of other people I suffered +overwhelmingly from boredom. In fact, I was so bored by the visits +heaped upon me by my comrades and acquaintances, who inconsiderately +wasted my time, in order to kill a few hours, that I was almost driven +to despair; I was too young obstinately to refuse to see them. + +By degrees, the thought of the boredom that I suffered at almost all +social functions dominated my mind to such an extent that I wrote a +little fairy tale about boredom, by no means bad (but unfortunately +lost), round an idea which I saw several years later treated in another +way in Sibbern's well-known book of the year 2135. This fairy tale was +read aloud to Nutzhorn's band and met with its approval. + +But although I could thus by no means be called of a happy disposition, +I was, by reason of my overflowing youth, in a constant state of +elation, which, as soon as the company of others brought me out of my +usual balance, acted like exuberant mirth and made me burst out +laughing. + +I was noted, among my comrades, and not always to my advantage, for my +absolutely ungovernable risibility. I had an exceedingly keen eye for +the ridiculous, and easily influenced as I still was, I could not +content myself with a smile. Not infrequently, when walking about the +town, I used to laugh the whole length of a street. There were times +when I was quite incapable of controlling my laughter; I laughed like a +child, and it was incomprehensible to me that people could go so soberly +and solemnly about. If a person stared straight at me, it made me laugh. +If a girl flirted a little with me, I laughed in her face. One day I +went out and saw two drunken labourers, in a cab, each with a wreath on +his knee; I was obliged to laugh; I met an old dandy whom I knew, with +two coats on, one of which hung down below the other; I had to laugh at +that, too. Sometimes, walking or standing, absorbed in thoughts, I was +outwardly abstracted, and answered mechanically, or spoke in a manner +unsuited to my words; if I noticed this myself, I could not refrain from +laughing aloud at my own absent-mindedness. It occasionally happened +that at an evening party, where I had been introduced by the son of the +house to a stiff family to whom I was a stranger, and where the +conversation at table was being carried on in laboured monosyllables, I +would begin to laugh so unrestrainedly that every one stared at me in +anger or amazement. And it occasionally happened that when some sad +event, concerning people present, was being discussed, the recollection +of something comical I had seen or heard the same day would crop up in +my mind to the exclusion of all else, and I would be overtaken by fits +of laughter that were both incomprehensible and wounding to those round +me, but which it was impossible to me to repress. At funeral ceremonies, +I was in such dread of bursting out laughing that my attention would +involuntarily fix itself on everything it ought to avoid. This habit of +mine was particularly trying when my laughter had a ruffling effect on +others in a thing that I myself was anxious to carry through. Thus I +spoilt the first rehearsals of Sophocles' Greek play _Philoctetes_, +which a little group of students were preparing to act at the request of +Julius Lange. Some of them pronounced the Greek in an unusual manner, +others had forgotten their parts or acted badly--and that was quite +enough to set me off in a fit of laughter which I had difficulty in +stopping. Thus I often laughed, when I was tormented at being compelled +to laugh, in reality feeling melancholy, and mentally worried; I used to +think of Oechlenschläger's Oervarodd, who does not laugh when he is +happy, but breaks into a guffaw when he is deeply affected. + +These fits of laughter were in reality the outcome of sheer +youthfulness; with all my musings and reflection, I was still in many +ways a child; I laughed as boys and girls laugh, without being able to +stop, and especially when they ought not. But this painful trait in +myself directed my thoughts to the nature proper of laughter; I tried to +sum up to myself why I laughed, and why people in general laughed, +pondered, as well as I was capable of doing the question of what the +comical consisted of, and then recorded the fruits of my reflections in +my second long treatise, _On Laughter_, which has been lost. + +As I approached my twentieth year, these fits of laughter stopped. "I +have," wrote I at the time, "seen into that Realm of Sighs, on the +threshold of which I--like Parmeniscus after consulting the Oracle of +Trophonius--have suddenly forgotten how to laugh." + + +XIII. + +Meanwhile I had completed my eighteenth year and had to make my choice +of a profession. But what was I fitted for? My parents, and those other +of my relations whose opinions I valued, wished me to take up the law; +they thought that I might make a good barrister; but I myself held back, +and during my first year of study did not attend a single law lecture. +In July, 1860, after I had passed my philosophical examination (with +_Distinction_ in every subject), the question became urgent. +Whether I was likely to exhibit any considerable talent as a writer, it +was impossible for me to determine. There was only one thing that I felt +clear about, and that was that I should never be contented with a +subordinate position in the literary world; better a hundred times be a +judge in a provincial town. I felt an inward conviction that I should +make my way as a writer. It seemed to me that a deathlike stillness +reigned for the time being over European literature, but that there were +mighty forces working in the silence. I believed that a revival was +imminent. In August, 1860, I wrote in my private papers: "We Danes, with +our national culture and our knowledge of the literatures of other +countries, will stand well equipped when the literary horn of the Gods +resounds again through the world, calling fiery youth to battle. I am +firmly convinced that that time will come and that I shall be, if not +the one who evokes it in the North, at any rate one who will contribute +greatly towards it." + +One of the first books I had read as a student was Goethe's _Dichtung +und Wahrheit_, and this career had extraordinarily impressed me. In +my childlike enthusiasm I determined to read all the books that Goethe +says that he read as a boy, and thus commenced and finished +Winckelmann's collected works, Lessing's _Laocoon_ and other books +of artistic and archaeological research; in other words, studied the +history and philosophy of Art in the first instance under aspects which, +from the point of view of subsequent research, were altogether +antiquated, though in themselves, and in their day, valuable enough. + +Goethe's life fascinated me for a time to such an extent that I found +duplicates of the characters in the book everywhere. An old language +master, to whom I went early in the morning, in order to acquire from +him the knowledge of English which had not been taught me at school, +reminded me vividly, for instance, of the old dancing master in Goethe, +and my impression was borne out when I discovered that he, too, had two +pretty daughters. A more important point was that the book awoke in me a +restless thirst for knowledge, at the same time that I conceived a +mental picture of Goethe's monumental personality and began to be +influenced by the universality of his genius. + +Meanwhile, circumstances at home forced me, without further vacillation, +to take up some special branch of study. The prospects literature +presented were too remote. For Physics I had no talent; the logical bent +of my abilities seemed to point in the direction of the Law; so +Jurisprudentia was selected and my studies commenced. + +The University lectures, as given by Professors Aagesen and Gram, were +appalling; they consisted of a slow, sleepy dictation. A death-like +dreariness brooded always over the lecture halls. Aagesen was especially +unendurable; there was no trace of anything human or living about his +dictation. Gram had a kind, well-intentioned personality, but had barely +reached his desk than it seemed as though he, too, were saying: "I am a +human being, everything human is alien to me." + +We consequently had to pursue our studies with the help of a coach, and +the one whom I, together with Kappers, Ludvig David and a few others, +had chosen, Otto Algreen-Ussing, was both a capable and a pleasant +guide. Five years were yet to elapse before this man and his even more +gifted brother, Frederik, on the formation of the Loyal and Conservative +Society of August, were persecuted and ridiculed as reactionaries, by +the editors of the ascendant Press, who, only a few years later, proved +themselves to be ten times more reactionary themselves. Otto was +positively enthusiastic over Law; he used to declare that a barrister +"was the finest thing a man could be." + +However, he did not succeed in infecting me with his enthusiasm. I took +pains, but there was little in the subject that aroused my interest. +Christian the Fifth's _Danish Law_ attracted me exclusively on +account of its language and the perspicuity and pithiness of the +expressions occasionally made use of. + +With this exception what impressed me most of all that I heard in the +lessons was Anders Sandöe Oersted's _Interpretation of the Law_. +When I had read and re-read a passage of law which seemed to me to be +easily intelligible, and only capable of being understood in one way, +how could I do other than marvel and be seized with admiration, when the +coach read out Oersted's Interpretation, proving that the Law was +miserably couched, and could be expounded in three or four different +ways, all contradicting one another! But this Oersted very often did +prove in an irrefutable manner. + +In my lack of receptivity for legal details, and my want of interest in +Positive Law, I flung myself with all the greater fervour into the study +of what in olden times was called Natural Law, and plunged again and +again into the study of Legal Philosophy. + + +XIV. + +About the same time as my legal studies were thus beginning, I planned +out a study of Philosophy and Aesthetics on a large scale as well. My +day was systematically filled up from early morning till late at night, +and there was time for everything, for ancient and modern languages, for +law lessons with the coach, for the lectures in philosophy which +Professors H. Bröchner and R. Nielsen were holding for more advanced +students, and for independent reading of a literary, scientific and +historic description. + +One of the masters who had taught me at school, a very erudite +philologian, now Dr. Oscar Siesbye, offered me gratuitous instruction, +and with his help several of the tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides, +various things of Plato's, and comedies by Plautus and Terence were +carefully studied. + +Frederik Nutzhorn read the _Edda_ and the _Niebelungenlied_ +with me in the originals; with Jens Paludan-Müller I went through the +New Testament in Greek, and with Julius Lange, Aeschylus, Sophocles, +Pindar, Horace and Ovid, and a little of Aristotle and Theocritus. +Catullus, Martial and Caesar I read for myself. + +But I did not find any positive inspiration in my studies until I +approached my nineteenth year. In philosophy I had hitherto mastered +only a few books by Sören Kierkegaard. But now I began a conscientious +study of Heiberg's philosophical writings and honestly endeavoured to +make myself familiar with his speculative logic. As Heiberg's _Prose +Writings_ came out, in the 1861 edition, they were studied with +extreme care. Heiberg's death in 1860 was a great grief to me; as a +thinker I had loved and revered him. The clearness of form and the +internal obscurity of his adaptation of Hegel's Teachings, gave one a +certain artistic satisfaction, at the same time that it provoked an +effort really to understand. + +But in the nature of things, Heiberg's philosophical life-work could not +to a student be other than an admission into Hegel's train of thought, +and an introduction to the master's own works. I was not aware that by +1860 Europe had long passed his works by in favour of more modern +thinking. With a passionate desire to reach a comprehension of the +truth, I grappled with the System, began with the Encyclopaedia, read +the three volumes of Aesthetics, The Philosophy of Law, the Philosophy +of History, the Phenomenology of the Mind, then the Philosophy of Law +again, and finally the Logic, the Natural Philosophy and the Philosophy +of the Mind in a veritable intoxication of comprehension and delight. +One day, when a young girl towards whom I felt attracted had asked me to +go and say good-bye to her before her departure, I forgot the time, her +journey, and my promise to her, over my Hegel. As I walked up and down +my room I chanced to pull my watch out of my pocket, and realised that I +had missed my appointment and that the girl must have started long ago. + +Hegel's Philosophy of Law had a charm for me as a legal student, partly +on account of the superiority with which the substantial quality of +Hegel's mind is there presented, and partly on account of the challenge +in the attitude of the book to accepted opinions and expressions, +"morality" here being almost the only thing Hegel objects to. + +But it was the book on Aesthetics that charmed me most of all. It was +easy to understand, and yet weighty, superabundantly rich. + +Again and again while reading Hegel's works I felt carried away with +delight at the new world of thought opening out before me. And when +anything that for a long time had been incomprehensible to me, at last +after tenacious reflection became clear, I felt what I myself called "an +unspeakable bliss." Hegel's system of thought, anticipatory of +experience, his German style, overburdened with arbitrarily constructed +technical words from the year 1810, which one might think would daunt a +young student of another country and another age, only meant to me +difficulties which it was a pleasure to overcome. Sometimes it was not +Hegelianism itself that seemed the main thing. The main thing was that I +was learning to know a world-embracing mind; I was being initiated into +an attempt to comprehend the universe which was half wisdom and half +poetry; I was obtaining an insight into a method which, if +scientifically unsatisfying, and on that ground already abandoned by +investigators, was fruitful and based upon a clever, ingenuous, highly +intellectual conception of the essence of truth; I felt myself put to +school to a great intellectual leader, and in this school I learnt to +think. + +I might, it is true, have received my initiation in a school built up on +more modern foundations; it is true that I should have saved much time, +been spared many detours, and have reached my goal more directly had I +been introduced to an empirical philosophy, or if Fate had placed me in +a school in which historical sources were examined more critically, but +not less intelligently, and in which respect for individuality was +greater. But such as the school was, I derived from it all the benefit +it could afford to my _ego_, and I perceived with delight that my +intellectual progress was being much accelerated. Consequently it did +not specially take from my feeling of having attained a measure of +scientific insight, when I learnt--what I had not known at first--that +my teachers, Hans Bröchner, as well as Rasmus Nielsen, were agreed not +to remain satisfied with the conclusions of the German philosopher, had +"got beyond Hegel." At the altitude to which the study of philosophy had +now lifted me, I saw that the questions with which I had approached +Science were incorrectly formulated, and they fell away of themselves, +even without being answered. Words that had filled men's minds for +thousands of years, God, Infinity, Thought, Nature and Mind, Freedom and +Purpose, all these words acquired another and a deeper meaning, were +stamped with a new character, acquired a new value, and the depurated +ideas which they now expressed opposed each other, and combined with +each other, until the universe was seen pierced by a plexus of thoughts, +and resting calmly within it. + +Viewed from these heights, the petty and the every-day matters which +occupied the human herd seemed so contemptible. Of what account, for +instance, was the wrangling in the Senate and the Parliament of a little +country like Denmark compared with Hegel's vision of the mighty march, +inevitable and determined by spiritual laws, of the idea of Freedom, +through the world's History! And of what account was the daily gossip of +the newspapers, compared with the possibility now thrown open of a life +of eternal ideals, lived in and for them! + + +XV. + +I had an even deeper perception of my initiation when I went back from +Hegel to Spinoza and, filled with awe and enthusiasm, read the +_Ethica_ for the first time. Here I stood at the source of modern +pantheistic Philosophy. Here Philosophy was even more distinctly +Religion, since it took Religion's place. Though the method applied was +very artificial, purely mathematical, at least Philosophy had here the +attraction of a more original type of mind, the effect being much the +same as that produced by primitive painting, compared with a more +developed stage. His very expression, _God or Nature_, had a +fascinating mysticism about it. The chapter in the book which is devoted +to the Natural History of passions, surprised and enriched one by its +simple, but profound, explanation of the conditions of the human soul. +And although his fight against Superstition's views of life is conducted +with a keenness that scouts discussion, whereas in modern Philosophy the +contention is merely implied, it seemed as though his thoughts travelled +along less stormy paths. + +In Hegel, it had been exclusively the comprehensiveness of the thoughts +and the mode of the thought's procedure that held my attention. With +Spinoza it was different. It was his personality that attracted, the +great man in him, one of the greatest that History has known. With him a +new type had made its entrance into the world's History; he was the calm +thinker, looking down from above on this earthly life, reminding one, by +the purity and strength of his character, of Jesus, but a contrast to +Jesus, inasmuch as he was a worshipper of Nature and Necessity, and a +Pantheist. His teaching was the basis of the faith of the new age. He +was a Saint and a Heathen, seditious and pious, at the same time. + + +XVI. + +Still, while I was in this way making a purely mental endeavour to +penetrate into as many intellectual domains as I could, and to become +master of one subject after another, I was very far from being at peace +with regard to my intellectual acquisitions, or from feeling myself in +incontestable possession of them. While I was satisfying my desire for +insight or knowledge and, by glimpses, felt my supremest happiness in +the delight of comprehension, an ever more violent struggle was going on +in my emotions. + +As my being grew and developed within me and I slowly emerged from the +double state of which I had been conscious, in other words, the more I +became one and individual and strove to be honest and true, the less I +felt myself to be a mere individual, the more I realised that I was +bound up with humanity, one link in the chain, one organ belonging to +the Universe. The philosophical Pantheism I was absorbed by, itself +worked counter to the idea of individualism inherent in me, taught me +and presented to me the union of all beings in Nature the All-Divine. +But it was not from Pantheism that the crisis of my spiritual life +proceeded; it was from the fountains of emotion which now shot up and +filled my soul with their steady flow. A love for humanity came over me, +and watered and fertilised the fields of my inner world which had been +lying fallow, and this love of humanity vented itself in a vast +compassion. + +This gradually absorbed me till I could hardly bear the thought of the +suffering, the poor, the oppressed, the victims of Injustice. I always +saw them in my mind's eye, and it seemed to be my duty to work for them, +and to be disgraceful of me to enjoy the good things of life while so +many were being starved and tortured. Often as I walked along the +streets at night I brooded over these ideas till I knew nothing of what +was passing around me, but only felt how all the forces of my brain drew +me towards those who suffered. + +There were warm-hearted and benevolent men among my near relatives. The +man whom my mother's younger sister had married had his heart in the +right place, so much indeed that he no sooner saw or heard of distress +than his hand was in his pocket, although he had little from which to +give. My father's brother was a genuinely philanthropic man, who founded +one beneficent institution or society after the other, had an unusual +power of inducing his well-to-do fellow-townsmen to carry his schemes +through, and in the elaboration of them showed a perception and +practical sense that almost amounted to genius; this was the more +surprising since his intelligence was not otherwise remarkable for its +keenness and his reasoning methods were confused. But what I felt was +quite different. My feelings were not so easily roused as those of the +first-mentioned; I was not so good-natured or so quick to act as he. +Neither did they resemble those of my other uncle, who merely +represented compassion for those unfortunately situated, but was without +the least vestige of rebellious feeling against the conditions or the +people responsible for the misery; my uncle was always content with life +as it was, saw the hand of a loving Providence everywhere and was fully +and firmly convinced that he himself was led and helped by this same +Providence, which specially watched over the launching of his projects +for the welfare of mankind. No, my feeling was of quite another kind. +Nothing was farther removed from me than this sometimes quite childish +optimism. It was not enough for me to advertise the sufferings of a few +individuals and, when possible, alleviate them; I sought the causes of +them in brutality and injustice. Neither could I recognise the finger of +a Universal Ruler in a confusion of coincidences, conversations, +newspaper articles, and advice by prudent men, the outcome of all which +was the founding of a society for seamstresses or the erection of a +hospital to counteract the misery that the Controlling Power had Itself +occasioned. I was a child no longer, and in that sense never had been +childish. But my heart bled none the less with sympathy for society's +unfortunates. I did not as yet perceive the necessity of that +selfishness which is self-assertion, and I felt oppressed and tormented +by all that I, in my comparatively advantageous position as a non- +proletarian, enjoyed, while many others did not. + +Then another mood, with other promptings, asserted itself. I felt an +impulse to step forward as a preacher to the world around me, to the +thoughtless and the hardhearted. Under the influence of strong emotion I +wrote an edifying discourse, _The Profitable Fear_. I began to +regard it as my duty, so soon as I was fitted for it, to go out into the +town and preach at every street-corner, regardless of whether a lay +preacher, like myself, should encounter indifference or harvest scorn. + +This course attracted me because it presented itself to me under the +guise of the most difficult thing, and, with the perversity of youth, I +thought difficulty the only criterion of duty. I only needed to hit upon +something that seemed to me to be the right thing and then say to +myself: "You dare not do it!" for all the youthful strength and daring +that was in me, all my deeper feelings of honour and of pride, all my +love of grappling with the apparently insurmountable to unite, and in +face of this _You dare not_, satisfy myself that I did dare. + +As provisionally, self-abnegation, humility, and asceticism seemed to me +to be the most difficult things, for a time my whole spiritual life was +concentrated into an endeavour to attain them. Just at this time--I was +nineteen--my family was in a rather difficult pecuniary position, and I, +quite a poor student, was cast upon my own resources. I had consequently +not much of this world's goods to renounce. From a comfortable residence +in Crown Prince's Street, my parents had moved to a more modest flat in +the exceedingly unaristocratic Salmon Street, where I had an attic of +limited dimensions with outlook over roofs by day and a view of the +stars by night. Quiet the nights were not, inasmuch as the neighbouring +houses re-echoed with screams and shrieks from poor women, whom their +late-returning husbands or lovers thrashed in their cups. But never had +I felt myself so raised, so exhilarated, so blissfully happy, as in that +room. My days slipped by in ecstasy; I felt myself consecrated a +combatant in the service of the Highest. I used to test my body, in +order to get it wholly under my control, ate as little as possible, +slept as little as possible, lay many a night outside my bed on the bare +floor, gradually to make myself as hardy as I required to be. I tried to +crush the youthful sensuality that was awakening in me, and by degrees +acquired complete mastery over myself, so that I could be what I wished +to be, a strong and willing instrument in the fight for the victory of +Truth. And I plunged afresh into study with a passion and a delight that +prevented my perceiving any lack, but month after month carried me +along, increasing in knowledge and in mental power, growing from day to +day. + + +XVII. + +This frame of mind, however, was crossed by another. The religious +transformation in my mind could not remain clear and unmuddied, placed +as I was in a society furrowed through and through by different +religious currents, issued as I was from the European races that for +thousands of years had been ploughed by religious ideas. All the +atavism, all the spectral repetition of the thoughts and ideas of the +past that can lie dormant in the mind of the individual, leaped to the +reinforcement of the harrowing religious impressions which came to me +from without. + +It was not the attitude of my friends that impressed me. All my more +intimate friends were orthodox Christians, but the attempts which +various ones, amongst them Julius Lange, and Jens Paludan-Müller, had +made to convert me had glanced off from my much more advanced thought +without making any impression. I was made of much harder metal than +they, and their attempts to alter my way of thinking did not penetrate +beyond my hide. To set my mind in vibration, there was needed a brain +that I felt superior to my own; and I did not find it in them. I found +it in the philosophical and religious writings of Sören Kierkegaard, in +such works, for instance, as _Sickness unto Death_. + +The struggle within me began, faintly, as I approached my nineteenth +year. My point of departure was this: one thing seemed to me requisite, +to live in and for _The Idea_, as the expression for the highest at +that time was. All that rose up inimical to _The Idea_ or Ideal +merited to be lashed with scorn or felled with indignation. And one day +I penned this outburst: "Heine wept over _Don Quixote_. Yes, he was +right. I could weep tears of blood when I think of the book." But the +first thing needed was to acquire a clear conception of what must be +understood by the Ideal. Heiberg had regarded the uneducated as those +devoid of ideals. But I was quite sure myself that education afforded no +criterion. And I could find no other criterion of devotion to the Ideal +than a willingness to make sacrifices. If, I said, I prove myself less +self-sacrificing than any one of the wretches I am fighting, I shall +myself incur well-merited scorn. But if self-sacrifice were the +criterion, then Jesus, according to the teachings of tradition, was the +Ideal, for who as self-sacrificing as He? + +This was an inclined plane leading to the Christian spiritual life, and +a year later, when I was nearly twenty, I had proceeded so far on this +plane that I felt myself in all essentials in agreement with the +Christian mode of feeling, inasmuch as my life was ascetic, and my +searching, striving, incessantly working mind, not only found repose, +but rapture, in prayer, and was elated and fired at the idea of being +protected and helped by "God." + +But just as I was about to complete my twentieth year, the storm broke +out over again, and during the whole of the ensuing six months raged +with unintermittent violence. Was I, at this stage of my development, a +Christian or not? And if not, was it my duty to become a Christian? + +The first thought that arose was this: It is a great effort, a constant +effort, sometimes a minutely recurring effort, to attain moral mastery +over one's self, and though this certainly need not bring with it a +feeling of self-satisfaction, much less _ought_ to do so, it does +bring with it a recognition of the value of this self-mastery. How +strange, then, that Christianity, which commands its attainment, at the +same time declares it to be a matter of indifference to the revealed God +whether a man has lived morally or not, since Faith or lack of Faith is +the one condition upon which so-called Salvation depends! + +The next thought was this: It is only in the writings of Kierkegaard, in +his teachings concerning paradox, that Christianity appears so definite +that it cannot be confused with any other spiritual trend whatever. But +when one has to make one's choice between Pantheism and Christianity, +then the question arises, Are Kierkegaard's teachings really historic +Christianity, and not rather a rational adaptation? And this question +must be answered in the negative, since it is possible to assimilate it +without touching upon the question of the revelation of the Holy Ghost +in the shape of a dove, to the Voice from the clouds, and the whole +string of miracles and dogmas. + +The next thought again was this: Pantheism does not place any one +unconditional goal in front of man. The unbeliever passes his life +interested in the many aims that man, as man, has. The Pantheist will +therefore have difficulty in living a perfect ethical life. There are +many cases in which, by deviating from the strictly ethic code, you do +not harm anyone, you only injure your own soul. The Non-Believer will in +this case only hardly, for the sake of impersonal Truth, make up his +mind to the step which the God-fearing man will take actuated by his +passionate fear of offending God. + +Thus was I tossed backwards and forwards in my reflections. + + +XVIII. + +What I dreaded most was that if I reached a recognition of the truth, a +lack of courage would prevent me decisively making it my own. Courage +was needed, as much to undertake the burdens entailed by being a +Christian as to undertake those entailed by being a Pantheist. When +thinking of Christianity, I drew a sharp distinction between the +cowardice that shrunk from renunciation and the doubt that placed under +discussion the very question as to whether renunciation were duty. And +it was clear to me that, on the road which led to Christianity, doubt +must be overcome before cowardice--not the contrary, as Kierkegaard +maintains in his _For Self-Examination_, where he says that none of +the martyrs doubted. + +But my doubt would not be overcome. Kierkegaard had declared that it was +only to the consciousness of sin that Christianity was not horror or +madness. For me it was sometimes both. I concluded therefrom that I had +no consciousness of sin, and found this idea confirmed when I looked +into my own heart. For however violently at this period I reproached +myself and condemned my failings, they were always in my eyes weaknesses +that ought to be combatted, or defects that could be remedied, never +sins that necessitated forgiveness, and for the obtaining of this +forgiveness, a Saviour. That God had died for me as my Saviour,--I could +not understand what it meant; it was an idea that conveyed nothing to +me. + +And I wondered whether the inhabitants of another planet would be able +to understand how on the Earth that which was contrary to all reason was +considered the highest truth. + + +XIX. + +With Pantheism likewise I was on my guard against its being lack of +courage, rather than a conviction of its untruth, which held me back +from embracing it. I thought it a true postulate that everything seemed +permeated and sustained by a Reason that had not human aims in front of +it and did not work by human means, a Divine Reason. Nature could only +be understood from its highest forms; the Ideal, which revealed itself +to the world of men at their highest development, was present, in +possibility and intent, in the first germ, in the mist of primeval +creation, before it divided itself into organic and inorganic elements. +The whole of Nature was in its essence Divine, and I felt myself at +heart a worshipper of Nature. + +But this same Nature was indifferent to the weal or woe of humans. It +obeyed its own laws regardless of whether men were lost thereby; it +seemed cruel in its callousness; it took care that the species should be +preserved, but the individual was nothing to it. + +Now, like all other European children, I had been brought up in the +theory of personal immortality, a theory which, amongst other things, is +one way of expressing the immense importance, the eternal importance, +which is attributed to each individual. The stronger the feeling of his +own _ego_ that the individual has, the more eagerly he necessarily +clings to the belief that he cannot be annihilated. But to none could +the belief be more precious than to a youth who felt his life pulsate +within, as if he had twenty lives in himself and twenty more to live. It +was impossible to me to realise that I could die, and one evening, about +a year later, I astonished my master, Professor Bröchner, by confessing +as much. "Indeed," said Bröchner, "are you speaking seriously? You +cannot realise that you will have to die one day? How young! You are +very different from me, who always have death before my eyes." + +But although my vitality was so strong that I could not imagine my own +death, I knew well enough that my terrestrial life, like all other +men's, would come to an end. But I felt all the more strongly that it +was impossible everything could be at an end then; death could not be a +termination; it could only, as the religions preached and as eighteenth- +century Deism taught, be a moment of transition to a new and fuller +existence. In reward and punishment after death I could not believe; +those were mediaeval conceptions that I had long outgrown. But the dream +of immortality I could not let go. And I endeavoured to hold it fast by +virtue of the doctrine of the impossibility of anything disappearing. +The quantity of matter always remained the same; energy survived every +transformation. + +Still, I realised that this could not satisfy one, as far as the form +which we term individuality was concerned. What satisfaction was it to +Alexander that his dust should stop a bung-hole? or to Shakespeare that +Romeo and Juliet were acted in Chicago? So I took refuge in parallels +and images. Who could tell whether the soul, which on earth had been +blind to the nature of the other life, did not, in death, undergo the +operation which opened its eyes? Who could tell whether death were not, +as Sibbern had suggested, to be compared with a birth? Just as the +unborn life in its mother's womb would, if it were conscious, believe +that the revolution of birth meant annihilation, whereas it was for the +first time awakening to a new and infinitely richer life, so it was +perhaps for the soul in the dreaded moment of death.... + +But when I placed before my master these comparisons and the hopes I +built upon them, they were swept away as meaningless; he pointed out +simply that nothing went to prove a continuation of personality after +death, while on the contrary everything argued against it,--and to this +I could not refuse my assent. + +Then I understood that in what I called Pantheism, the immortality of +the individual had no place. And a slow, internal struggle commenced for +renunciation of the importance and value of the individual. I had many a +conversation on this point with my teacher, a man tired of life and +thoroughly resigned. + +He always maintained that the desire of the individual for a +continuation of personality was nothing but the outcome of vanity. He +would very often put the question in a comical light. He related the +following anecdote: In summer evenings he used to go for a walk along +the Philosopher's Avenue (now West Rampart Street). Here he had +frequently met, sitting on their benches, four or five old gentlemen who +took their evening ramble at the same time; by degrees they made each +other's acquaintance and got into conversation with one another. It +turned out that the old gentlemen were candle-makers who had retired +from business and now had considerable difficulty in passing their time +away. In reality they were always bored, and they yawned incessantly. +These men had one theme only, to which they always recurred with +enthusiasm--their hope in personal immortality for all eternity. And it +amused Bröchner that they, who in this life did not know how to kill so +much as one Sunday evening, should be so passionately anxious to have a +whole eternity to fill up. His pupil then caught a glimpse himself of +the grotesqueness of wishing to endure for millions of centuries, which +time even then was nothing in comparison with eternity. + + +XX. + +But in spite of it all, it was a hard saying, that in the pantheistic +view of life the absorption of the individual into the great whole took +the place of the continued personal existence which was desired by the +_ego_. But what frightened me even more was that the divine All was +not to be moved or diverted by prayer. But pray I had to. From my +earliest childhood I had been accustomed, in anxiety or necessity, to +turn my thoughts towards a Higher Power, first forming my needs and +wishes into words, and then later, without words, concentrating myself +in worship. It was a need inherited from many hundreds of generations of +forefathers, this need of invoking help and comfort. Nomads of the +plains, Bedouins of the desert, ironclad warriors, pious priests, roving +sailors, travelling merchants, the citizen of the town and the peasant +in the country, all had prayed for centuries, and from the very dawn of +time; the women, the hundreds and hundreds of women from whom I was +descended, had centred all their being in prayer. It was terrible, never +to be able to pray again.... Never to be able to fold one's hands, never +to raise one's eyes above, but to live, shut in overhead, alone in the +universe! + +If there were no eye in Heaven that watched over the individual, no ear +that understood his plaint, no hand that protected him in danger, then +he was placed, as it were, on a desolate steppe where the wolves were +howling. + +And in alarm I tried once more the path towards religious quietude that +I had recently deemed impracticable,--until the fight within me calmed +again, and in renunciation I forced my emotion to bow to what my reason +had acknowledged as the Truth. + + + + +ADOLESCENCE + +Julius Lange--A New Master--Inadaption to the Law--The University Prize +Competition--An Interview with the Judges--Meeting of Scandinavian +Students--The Paludan-Müllers--Björnstjerne Björnson--Magdalene +Thoresen--The Gold Medal--The Death of King Frederik VII--The Political +Situation--My Master of Arts Examination--War--_Admissus cum laude +praecipua_--Academical Attention--Lecturing--Music--Nature--A Walking +Tour--In Print--Philosophical Life in Denmark--Death of Ludwig David-- +Stockholm. + + +I. + +Among my many good comrades, there was one, Julius Lange, with whom +comradeship had developed into friendship, and this friendship again +assumed a passionate character. We were the two, who, of them all, were +most exactly suited to one another, completed one another. Fundamentally +different though we were, we could always teach each other something. We +grew indispensable to one another; for years there seldom a day went by +that we did not meet. The association with his junior cannot possibly +have given Julius Lange a delight corresponding to that which his +society gave me. Intellectually equal, we were of temperaments +diametrically opposed. Having the same love of Art and the same +enthusiasm for Art,--save that the one cared more for its pictorial and +the other for its literary expression,--we were of mutual assistance to +one another in the interchange of thoughts and information. Entirely at +variance in our attitude towards religious tradition, in our frequent +collisions we were both perpetually being challenged to a critical +inspection of our intellectual furniture. But I was the one who did the +worshipping. + +When Julius Lange, on December 17, 1861, after having twice been to see +me and found me out, the third time met with me and informed me: "I have +received an invitation to go to Italy on Saturday and be away five +months," was, though surprised, exceedingly glad for my friend's sake, +but at the same time I felt as if I had received a blow in the face. +What would become of me, not only during the interval, but afterwards? +Who could say whether Lange would ever come back, or whether he would +not come back changed? How should I be able to endure my life! I should +have to work tremendously hard, to be able to bear the loss of him. I +could hardly understand how I should be able to exist when I could no +longer, evening after evening, slip up to my friend's little room to sit +there in calm, quiet contentment, seeing pictures and exchanging +thoughts! It was as though a nerve had been cut. I only then realised +that I had never loved any man so much. I had had four eyes; now I had +only two again; I had had two brains; now I had only one; in my heart I +had felt the happiness of two human beings; now only the melancholy of +one was left behind. + +There was not a painting, a drawing, a statue or a bas-relief in the +galleries and museums of Copenhagen that we had not studied together and +compared our impressions of. We had been to Thorwaldsen's Museum +together, we went together to Bissen's studio, where in November, 1861, +I met for the first time my subsequent friends, Vilhelm Bissen and +Walter Runeberg. The memory of Julius Lange was associated in my mind +with every picture of Hobbema, Dubbels or Ruysdael, Rembrandt or Rubens, +every reproduction of Italian Renaissance art, every photograph of +church or castle. And I myself loved pictures even more ardently than +poetry. I was fond of comparing my relations with literature to +affection for a being of the same sex; my passion for pictures to the +stormy passion of a youth for a woman. It is true that I knew much less +about Art than about Poetry, but that made no difference. I worshipped +my favourite artists with a more impetuous enthusiasm than any of my +favourite authors. And this affection for pictures and statuary was a +link between my friend and myself. When we were sitting in my room +together, and another visitor happened to be there, I positively +suffered over the sacrifice of an hour's enjoyment and when Lange got up +to go, I felt as though a window had been slammed to, and the fresh air +shut out. + + +II. + +I had for a long time pursued my non-juridic studies as well as I could +without the assistance of a teacher. But I had felt the want of one. And +when a newly appointed docent at the University, Professor H. Bröchner, +offered instruction in the study of Philosophy to any who cared to +present themselves at his house at certain hours, I had felt strongly +tempted to take advantage of his offer. I hesitated for some time, for I +was unwilling to give up the least portion of my precious freedom; I +enjoyed my retirement, the mystery of my modest life of study, but on +the other hand I could not grapple with Plato and Aristotle without the +hints of a competent guide as to the why and wherefore. + +I was greatly excited. I had heard Professor Bröchner speak on +Psychology, but his diction was handled with such painful care, was so +monotonous and sounded so strange, that it could not fail to alarm. It +was only the professor's distinguished and handsome face that attracted +me, and in particular his large, sorrowful eyes, with their beautiful +expression, in which one read a life of deep research--and tears. Now, I +determined to venture up to Bröchner. But I had not the courage to +mention it to my mother beforehand, for fear speaking of it should +frighten me from my resolution, so uneasy did I feel about the step I +was taking. When the day which I had fixed upon for the attempt arrived +--it was the 2nd of September, 1861,--I walked up and down in front of +the house several times before I could make up my mind to go upstairs; I +tried to calculate beforehand what the professor would say, and what it +would be best for me to reply, interminably. + +The tall, handsome man with the appearance of a Spanish knight, opened +the door himself and received the young fellow who was soon to become +his most intimate pupil, very kindly. To my amazement, as soon as he +heard my name, he knew which school I had come from and also that I had +recently become a student. He vigorously dissuaded me from going through +a course of Plato and Aristotle, saying it would be too great a strain-- +said, or implied, that I should be spared the difficult path he had +himself traversed, and sketched out a plan of study of more modern +Philosophy and Aesthetics. His manner inspired confidence and left +behind it the main impression that he wished to save the beginner all +useless exertion. All the same, with my youthful energy, I felt, as I +went home, a shade disappointed that I was not to begin the History of +Philosophy from the beginning. + +My visit was soon repeated, and a most affectionate intimacy quickly +sprang up between master and pupil, revealed on the side of the elder, +in an attitude of fatherly goodwill to which the younger had hitherto +been a stranger, the teacher, while instructing his pupil and giving him +practical guidance, constantly keeping in view all that could further +his well-being and assist his future; my attitude was one of reverence +and affection, and of profound gratitude for the care of which I was the +object. + +I certainly, sometimes, in face of my master's great thoroughness and +his skill in wrestling with the most difficult thoughts, felt a painful +distrust of my own capacity and of my own intellectual powers, compared +with his. I was also not infrequently vexed by a discordant note, as it +were, being struck in our intercourse, when Bröchner, despite the doubts +and objections I brought forward, always took it for granted that I +shared his pantheistic opinions, without perceiving that I was still +tossed about by doubts, and fumbling after a firm foothold. But the +confidential terms upon which I was with the maturer man had an +attraction for me which my intimacy with undecided and youthfully +prejudiced comrades necessarily lacked; he had the experience of a +lifetime behind him, he looked down from superior heights on the +sympathies and antipathies of a young man. + +To me, for instance, Ploug's _The Fatherland_ was at that time +Denmark's most intellectual organ, whereas Bille's _Daily Paper_ +disgusted me, more particularly on account of the superficiality and the +tone of finality which distinguished its literary criticisms. Bröchner, +who, with not unmixed benevolence, and without making any special +distinction between the two, looked down on both these papers of the +educated mediocrity, saw in his young pupil's bitterness against the +trivial but useful little daily, only an indication of the quality of +his mind. Bröchner's mere manner, as he remarked one day with a smile, +"You do not read _The Daily Paper_ on principle," made me perceive +in a flash the comicality of my indignation over such articles as it +contained. My horizon was still sufficiently circumscribed for me to +suppose that the state of affairs in Copenhagen was, in and of itself, +of importance. I myself regarded my horizon as wide. One day, when +making a mental valuation of myself, I wrote, with the naïveté of +nineteen, "My good qualities, those which will constitute my +personality, if I ever become of any account, are a mighty and ardent +enthusiasm, a thorough authority in the service of Truth, _a wide +horizon_ and philosophically trained thinking powers. These must make +up for my lack of humour and facility." + +It was only several years after the beginning of our acquaintance that I +felt myself in essential agreement with Hans Bröchner. I had been +enraptured by a study of Ludwig Feuerbach's books, for Feuerbach was the +first thinker in whose writings I found the origin of the idea of God in +the human mind satisfactorily explained. In Feuerbach, too, I found a +presentment of ideas without circumlocution and without the usual heavy +formulas of German philosophy, a conquering clarity, which had a very +salutary effect on my own way of thinking and gave me a feeling of +security. If for many years I had been feeling myself more conservative +than my friend and master, there now came a time when in many ways I +felt myself to be more liberal than he, with his mysterious life in the +eternal realm of mind of which he felt himself to be a link. + + +III. + +I had not been studying Jurisprudence much more than a year before it +began to weigh very heavily upon me. The mere sight of the long rows of +_Schou's Ordinances_, which filled the whole of the back of my +writing-table, were a daily source of vexation. I often felt that I +should not be happy until the Ordinances were swept from my table. And +the lectures were always so dreary that they positively made me think of +suicide--and I so thirsty of life!--as a final means of escape from the +torment of them. I felt myself so little adapted to the Law that I +wasted my time with Hamlet-like cogitations as to how I could give up +the study without provoking my parents' displeasure, and without +stripping myself of all prospects for the future. And for quite a year +these broodings grew, till they became a perfect nightmare to me. + +I had taken a great deal of work upon myself; I gave lessons every day, +that I might have a little money coming in, took lessons myself in +several subjects, and not infrequently plunged into philosophical works +of the past, that were too difficult for me, such as the principal works +of Kant. Consequently when I was nineteen, I begun to feel my strength +going. I felt unwell, grew nervous, had a feeling that I could not draw +a deep breath, and when I was twenty my physical condition was a violent +protest against overwork. One day, while reading Kant's _Kritik der +Urteilskraft_, I felt so weak that I was obliged to go to the doctor. +The latter recommended physical exercises and cold shower-baths. + +The baths did me good, and I grew so accustomed to them that I went on +taking them and have done so ever since. I did my gymnastic exercises +with a Swede named Nycander, who had opened an establishment for Swedish +gymnastics in Copenhagen. + +There I met, amongst others, the well-known Icelandic poet and +diplomatist, Grimur Thomsen, who bore the title of Counsellor of +Legation. His compatriots were very proud of him. Icelandic students +declared that Grimur possessed twelve dress shirts, three pairs of +patent leather boots, and had embraced a marchioness in Paris. At +gymnastics, Grimur Thomsen showed himself audacious and not seldom +coarse in what he said and hinted. It is true that by reason of my youth +I was very susceptible and took offence at things that an older man +would have heard without annoyance. + + +IV. + +I continued to be physically far from strong. Mentally, I worked +indefatigably. The means of deciding the study question that, after long +reflection, seemed to me most expedient, was this: I would compete for +one of the University prizes, either the aesthetic or the philosophical, +and then, if I won the gold medal, my parents and others would see that +if I broke with the Law it was not from idleness, but because I really +had talents in another direction. + +As early as 1860 I had cast longing eyes at the prize questions that had +been set, and which hung up in the Entrance Hall of the University. But +none of them were suited to me. In 1861 I made up my mind to attempt a +reply, even if the questions in themselves should not be attractive. + +There was amongst them one on the proper correlation between poetic +fiction and history in the historical romances. The theme in itself did +not particularly fascinate me; but I was not ignorant of the subject, +and it was one that allowed of being looked at in a wide connection, +i.e., the claims of the subject as opposed to the imagination of the +artist, in general. I was of opinion that just as in sculpture the human +figure should not be represented with wings, but the conception of its +species be observed, so the essential nature of a past age should be +unassailed in historic fiction. Throughout numerous carefully elaborated +abstractions, extending over 120 folio pages, and in which I aimed at +scientific perspicuity, I endeavoured to give a soundly supported theory +of the limits of inventive freedom in Historical Romance. The +substructure was so painstaking that it absorbed more than half of the +treatise. Quite apart from the other defects of this tyro handiwork, it +lauded and extolled an aesthetic direction opposed to that of both the +men who were to adjudicate upon it. Hegel was mentioned in it as "The +supreme exponent of Aesthetics, a man whose imposing greatness it is +good to bow before." I likewise held with his emancipated pupil, Fr. Th. +Vischer, and vindicated him. Of Danish thinkers, J.L. Heiberg and S. +Kierkegaard were almost the only ones discussed. + +Heiberg was certainly incessantly criticised, but was treated with +profound reverence and as a man whose slightest utterance was of +importance. Sibbern's artistic and philosophical researches, on the +other hand, were quite overlooked, indeed sometimes Vischer was praised +as being the first originator of psychological developments, which +Sibbern had suggested many years before him. I had, for that matter, +made a very far from sufficient study of Sibbern's researches, which +were, partly, not systematic enough for me, and partly had repelled me +by the peculiar language in which they were couched. + +Neither was it likely that this worship of Heiberg, which undeniably +peeped out through all the proofs of imperfections and self- +contradictions in him, would appeal to Hauch. + +When I add that the work was youthfully doctrinaire, in language not +fresh, and that in its skeleton-like thinness it positively tottered +under the weight of its definitions, it is no wonder that it did not win +the prize. The verdict passed upon it was to the effect that the +treatise was thorough in its way, and that it would have been awarded +the prize had the question asked been that of determining the +correlation between History and Fiction in general, but that under the +circumstances it dwelt too cursorily on Romance and was only deemed +deserving of "a very honourable mention." + +Favourable as this result was, it was nevertheless a blow to me, who had +made my plans for the following years dependent on whether I won the +prize or not. Julius Lange, who knocked at my door one evening to tell +me the result, was the witness of my disappointment. "I can understand," +he said, "that you should exclaim: _'Oleum et operam perdidi!'_, +but you must not give up hope for so little. It is a good thing that you +prohibited the opening of the paper giving your name in the event of the +paper not winning the prize, for no one will trouble their heads about +the flattering criticism and an honourable mention would only harm you +in People's eyes; it would stamp you with the mark of mediocrity." + + +V. + +The anonymous recipient of the honourable mention nevertheless +determined to call upon his judges, make their acquaintance, and let +them know who he was. + +I went first to Hauch, who resided at that time at Frederiksberg Castle, +in light and lofty rooms. Hauch appeared exaggeratedly obliging, the old +man of seventy and over paying me, young man as I was, one compliment +after the other. The treatise was "extraordinarily good," they had been +very sorry not to give me the prize; but I was not to bear them any ill- +will for that; they had acted as their consciences dictated. In eighteen +months I should be ready to take my Magister examination; the old poet +thought he might venture to prophesy that I should do well. He was +surprised at his visitor's youth, could hardly understand how at my age +I could have read and thought so much, and gave me advice as to the +continuation of my studies. + +Sibbern was as cordial as Hauch had been polite and cautious. It was +very funny that, whereas Hauch remarked that he himself had wished to +give me the prize with an _although_ in the criticism, but that +Sibbern had been against it, Sibbern declared exactly the reverse; in +spite of all its faults he had wanted to award the medal, but Hauch had +expressed himself adverse. Apparently they had misunderstood one +another; but in any case the result was just, so there was nothing to +complain of. + +Sibbern went into the details of the treatise, and was stricter than +Hauch. He regretted that the main section of the argument was deficient; +the premises were too prolix. He advised a more historic, less +philosophical study of Literature and Art. He was pleased to hear of the +intimate terms I was on with Bröchner, whereas Hauch would have +preferred my being associated with Rasmus Nielsen, whom he jestingly +designated "a regular brown-bread nature." When the treatise was given +back to me, I found it full of apt and instructive marginal notes from +Sibbern's hand. + +Little as I had gained by my unsuccessful attempt to win this prize, and +unequivocally as my conversation with the practical Sibbern had proved +to me that a post as master in my mother tongue at a Grammar-school was +all that the Magister degree in Aesthetics was likely to bring me, +whereas from my childhood I had made up my mind that I would never be a +master in a school, this conversation nevertheless ripened my +determination to give up my law studies, but of course only when by +successfully competing for the prize the next year I had satisfactorily +proved my still questionable ability. + + +VI. + +The Meeting of Scandinavian students at Copenhagen in June, 1862, taught +me what it meant to be a Scandinavian. Like all the other +undergraduates, I was Scandinavian at heart, and the arrangements of the +Meeting were well calculated to stir the emotions of youth. Although, an +insignificant Danish student, I did not take part in the expedition to +North Zealand specially arranged for our guests, consequently neither +was present at the luncheon given by Frederik VII to the students at +Fredensborg (which was interrupted by a heavy shower), I was +nevertheless deeply impressed by the Meeting. + +It was a fine sight to behold the students from the three other +Scandinavian Universities come sailing across the Sound from Malmö to +Copenhagen. The Norwegians were especially striking, tall and straight, +with narrow faces under tasseled caps, like a wood of young fir trees; +the national type was so marked that at first I could hardly see any +difference between them. + +For me, there were three perfect moments during the festivities. The +first was at the meeting of all the students in the Square of Our Lady, +after the arrival of the visitors, when the scholars of the Metropolitan +School, crowding the windows of the building, greeted them with a shout +of delight. There was such a freshness, such a childish enthusiasm about +it, that some of us had wet eyes. It was as though the still distant +future were acclaiming the young ones now advancing to the assault, and +promising them sympathy and conquest. + +The second was when the four new flags embroidered by Danish ladies for +the students were consecrated and handed over. Clausen's speech was full +of grandeur, and addressed, not to the recipients, but to the flags as +living beings: "Thou wilt cross the Baltic to the sanctuary at Upsala. +Thou wilt cross the Cattegat to the land of rocks...." and the address +to each of the flags concluded: "Fortune and Honour attend thee!" The +evening after the consecration of the flags, there was a special +performance at the Royal Theatre for the members of the Meeting, at +which Heiberg, radiant as she always was, and saluted with well-merited +enthusiasm, played _Sophie_ in the vaudeville "_No_," with a +rosette of the Scandinavian colours at her waist. Then it was that +Paludan-Müller's prologue, recited by our idolised actor, Michael Wiehe, +caused me the third thrilling moment. Listening to the words of the poet +from a bad place in the gallery, I was hardly the only one who felt +strangely stirred, as Wiehe, letting his eyes roam round the theatre, +said: + + Oh! that the young of the North might one day worthily play + Their part! Oh that each one might do his best + For the party he has chosen! That never there be lack + Of industry, fidelity, strength and talents! + And may he firm step forth, the mighty genius + (_Mayhap, known only to the secret power within him, + Seated amongst us now_), the mighty genius, + Who, as Fate hath willed it, is to play + The mighty part and do the mighty things. + +Involuntarily we looked round, seeking for the one to whom the poet's +summons referred. + +The general spirit of this Meeting has been called flat in comparison +with that pervading former meetings. It did not strike the younger +participants so. A breath of Scandinavianism swept over every heart; one +felt borne along on a historic stream. It seemed like a bad dream that +the peoples of the North had for so many centuries demolished and laid +waste each other, tapped one another for blood and gold, rendered it +impossible for the North to assert herself and spread her influence in +Europe. + +One could feel at the Meeting, though very faintly, that the Swedes and +Norwegians took more actual pleasure in each other, and regarded +themselves as to a greater extent united than either of them looked upon +themselves as united with the Danes, who were outside the political +Union. I was perhaps the only Dane present who fancied I detected this, +but when I mentioned what I thought I observed to a gifted young +Norwegian, so far was he from contradicting me that he merely replied: +"Have you noticed that, too?" + +Notwithstanding, during the whole of the Meeting, one constantly heard +expressed on every hand the conviction that if Germany were shortly to +declare war against Denmark--which no one doubted--the Swedes and +Norwegians would most decidedly not leave the Danes in the lurch. The +promise was given oftener than it was asked. Only, of course, it was +childish on the part of those present at the Meeting to regard such +promises, given by the leaders of the students, and by the students +themselves in festive mood, as binding on the nations and their +statesmen. + +I did not make any intellectually inspiring acquaintances through the +Meeting, although I was host to two Upsala students; neither of them, +however, interested me. I got upon a friendly footing through mutual +intellectual interests with Carl von Bergen, later so well known as an +author, he, like myself, worshipping philosophy and hoping to contribute +to intellectual progress. Carl von Bergen was a self-confident, +ceremonious Swede, who had read a great many books. At that time he was +a new Rationalist, which seemed to promise one point of interest in +common; but he was a follower of the Boström philosophy, and as such an +ardent Theist. At this point we came into collision, my researches and +reflections constantly tending to remove me farther from a belief in any +God outside the world, so that after the Meeting Carl von Bergen and I +exchanged letters on Theism and Pantheism, which assumed the width and +thickness of treatises. For very many years the Swedish essayist and I +kept up a friendly, though intermittent intercourse. Meanwhile von +Bergen, whose good qualities included neither character nor originality, +inclined, as years went on, more and more towards Conservatism, and at +forty years old he had attained to a worship of what he had detested, +and a detestation of what he had worshipped. His vanity simultaneously +assumed extraordinary proportions. In a popular Encyclopaedia, which he +took over when the letter B was to be dealt with, and, curiously enough, +disposed of shortly afterwards, _von Bergen_ was treated no less in +detail than _Buonaparte_. He did battle with some of the best men +and women in Sweden, such as Ellen Key and Knut Wicksell, who did not +fail to reply to him. When in 1889 his old friend from the Students' +Meeting gave some lectures on Goethe in Stockholm, he immediately +afterwards directed some poor opposition lectures against him, which +neither deserved nor received any reply. It had indeed become a +specialty of his to give "opposition lectures." When he died, some few +years later, what he had written was promptly forgotten. + +There was another young Swedish student whom I caught a glimpse of for +the first time at the Students' Meeting, towards whom I felt more and +more attracted, and who eventually became my friend. This was the +darling of the gods, Carl Snoilsky. At a fête in Rosenborg Park, amongst +the songs was one which, with my critical scent, I made a note of. It +was by the then quite unknown young Count Snoilsky, and it was far from +possessing the rare qualities, both of pith and form, that later +distinguished his poetry; but it was a poet's handiwork, a troubadour +song to the Danish woman, meltingly sweet, and the writer of it was a +youth of aristocratic bearing, regular, handsome features, and smooth +brown hair, a regular Adonis. The following year he came again, drawn by +strong cords to Christian Winther's home, loving the old poet like a +son, as Swinburne loved Victor Hugo, sitting at Mistress Julie Winther's +feet in affectionate admiration and semi-adoration, although she was +half a century old and treated him as a mother does a favourite child. + +It was several years, however, before there was any actual friendship +between the Swedish poet and myself. He called upon me one day in my +room in Copenhagen, looking exceedingly handsome in a tight-fitting +waistcoat of blue quilted silk. In the absence of the Swedo-Norwegian +Ambassador, he was Chargé d'Affaires in Copenhagen, after, in his +capacity as diplomatic attaché, having been stationed in various parts +of the world and, amongst others, for some time in Paris. He could have +no warmer admirer of his first songs than myself, and we very frequently +spent our evenings together in Bauer's wine room--talking over +everything in Scandinavian, English, or French literature which both of +us had enthusiastically and critically read. On many points our verdicts +were agreed. + +There came a pause in Snoilsky's productive activity; he was depressed. +It was generally said, although it sounded improbable, that he had had +to promise his wife's relations to give up publishing verse, they +regarding it as unfitting the dignity of a noble. In any case, he was at +that time suffering under a marriage that meant to him the deprivation +of the freedom without which it was impossible to write. Still, he never +mentioned these strictly personal matters. But one evening that we were +together, Snoilsky was so overcome by the thought of his lack of freedom +that tears suddenly began to run down his cheeks. He was almost +incapable of controlling himself again, and when we went home together +late at night, poured out a stream of melancholy, half-despairing +remarks. + +A good eighteen months later we met again in Stockholm; Snoilsky was +dignified and collected. But when, a few years later, so-called public +opinion in Sweden began to rave against the poet for the passion for his +second wife which so long made him an exile from his country, I often +thought of that evening. + +As years passed by, his outward bearing became more and more reserved +and a trifle stiff, but he was the same at heart, and no one who had +known him in the heyday of his youth could cease to love him. + + +VII. + +A month after the Students' Meeting, at the invitation of my friend Jens +Paludan-Müller, I spent a few weeks at his home at Nykjöbing, in the +island of Falster, where his father, Caspar Paludan-Müller, the +historian, was at the time head master of the Grammar-school. Those were +rich and beautiful weeks, which I always remembered later with +gratitude. + +The stern old father with his leonine head and huge eyebrows impressed +one by his earnestness and perspicacity, somewhat shut off from the +world as he was by hereditary deafness. The dignified mistress of the +house likewise belonged to a family that had made its name known in +Danish literature. She was a Rosenstand-Göiske. Jens was a cordial and +attentive host, the daughters were all of them women out of the +ordinary, and bore the impress of belonging to a family of the highest +culture in the country; the eldest was womanly and refined, the second, +with her Roman type of beauty and bronze-coloured head, lovely in a +manner peculiarly her own; the youngest, as yet, was merely an amiable +young girl. The girls would have liked to get away from the monotony of +provincial life, and their release came when their father was appointed +to a professorship at Copenhagen University. There was an ease of manner +and a tone of mental distinction pervading the whole family. Two young, +handsome Counts Reventlow were being brought up in the house, still only +half-grown boys at that time, but who were destined later to win +honourable renown. One of them, the editor of his ancestress's papers, +kept up his acquaintance with the guest he had met in the Paludan-Müller +home for over forty years. + +There often came to the house a young Dane from Caracas in Venezuela, of +unusual, almost feminine beauty, with eyes to haunt one's dreams. He +played uncommonly well, was irresistibly gentle and emotional. After a +stay of a few years in Denmark he returned to his native place. The +previously mentioned Grönbeck, with his pretty sister, and other young +people from the town, were frequent guests during the holidays, and the +days passed in games, music, wanderings about the garden, and delightful +excursions to the woods. + +On every side I encountered beauty of some description. I said to Jens +one day: "One kind of beauty is the glow which the sun of Youth casts +over the figure, and it vanishes as soon as the sun sets. Another is +stamped into shape from within; it is Mind's expression, and will remain +as long as the mind remains vigorous. But the supremest beauty of all is +in the unison of the two harmonies, which are contending for existence. +In the bridal night of this supremest beauty, Mind and Nature melt into +one." + +A few years later the old historian was called upon to publish the +little book on Gulland, with its short biography prefixed, as a memorial +to his only son, fallen at Sankelmark, and again, a few years later, to +edit Frederik Nutzhorn's translation of Apuleius in memory of his son's +friend, his elder daughter's fiancé. During the preparation of these two +little books, our relations became more intimate, and our friendship +continued unbroken until in the month of February, 1872, a remark in one +of my defensive articles caused him to take up his pen against me. My +remark was to the effect that there were men of the same opinions as +myself even among the priests of the established church. Caspar Paludan- +Müller declared it my public duty to mention of whom I was thinking at +the time, since such a traitor was not to be tolerated in the lap of the +Church. As I very naturally did not wish to play the part of informer, I +incurred, by my silence, the suspicion of having spoken without +foundation. The Danish man whom I had in my thoughts, and who had +confided his opinions to me, was still alive at the time. This was the +late Dean Ussing, at one time priest at Mariager, a man of an +extraordinarily refined and amiable disposition, secretly a convinced +adherent of Ernest Renan. A Norwegian priest, who holds the same +opinions, is still living. + + +VIII. + +In August, 1863, on a walking tour through North Sjaelland, Julius Lange +introduced me to his other celebrated uncle, Frederik Paludan-Müller, +whose Summer residence was at Fredensborg. In appearance he was of a +very different type from his brother Caspar. The distinguishing mark of +the one was power, of the other, nobility. For Frederik Paludan-Müller +as a poet I cherished the profoundest admiration. He belonged to the +really great figures of Danish literature, and his works had so fed and +formed my inmost nature that I should scarcely be the same had I not +read them. It was unalloyed happiness to have access to his house and be +allowed to enjoy his company. It was a distinction to be one of the few +he vouchsafed to take notice of and one of the fewer still in whose +future he interested himself. Do the young men of Denmark to-day, I +wonder, admire creative intellects as they were admired by some few of +us then? It is in so far hardly possible, since there is not at the +present time any Northern artist with such a hall-mark of refined +delicacy as Frederik Paludan-Müller possessed. + +The young people who came to his house might have wished him a younger, +handsomer wife, and thought his choice, Mistress Charite, as, curiously +enough, she was called, not quite worthy of the poet. Unjustly so, since +he himself was perfectly satisfied with her, and was apparently wholly +absorbed by a union which had had its share in isolating him from the +world. His wife was even more theologically inclined than himself, and +appeared anonymously--without anyone having a suspicion of the fact--as +a religious authoress. Still, she was exceedingly kind to anyone, +regardless of their private opinions, who had found favour in the poet's +eyes. + +The dry little old lady was the only one of her sex with whom Paludan- +Müller was intimate. He regarded all other women, however young and +beautiful, as mere works of art. But his delight in them was charming in +him, just because of its freedom from sense. One evening that he was +giving a little banquet in honour of a Swedish lady painter, named +Ribbing, a woman of rare beauty, he asked her to stand by the side of +the bust of the Venus of Milo, that the resemblance, which really +existed between them, might be apparent. His innocent, enthusiastic +delight in the likeness was most winning. + + +IX. + +Two other celebrated personages whom I met for the first time a little +later were Björnstjerne Björnson and Magdalene Thoresen. + +I became acquainted with Björnstjerne Björnson at the Nutzhorns, their +son, Ditlev, being a passionate admirer of his. His _King Sverre_ +of 1861 had been a disappointment, but _Sigurd Slembe_ of the +following year was new and great poetry, and fascinated young people's +minds. Björnson, socially, as in literature, was a strong figure, self- +confident, loud-voiced, outspoken, unique in all that he said, and in +the weight which he knew how to impart to all his utterances. His manner +jarred a little on the more subdued Copenhagen style; the impression he +produced was that of a great, broad-shouldered, and very much spoilt +child. In the press, all that he wrote and did was blazoned abroad by +the leading critics of the day, who had a peculiar, challenging way of +praising Björnson, although his ability was not seriously disputed by +anyone. The National Liberal Leaders, Alfred Hage, Carl Ploug, etc., had +opened their hearts and houses to him. It is said that at one time +Heiberg had held back; the well-bred old man, a little shocked by the +somewhat noisy ways of the young genius, is said to have expressed to +his friend Krieger some scruples at inviting him to his house. To +Krieger's jesting remark: "What does it matter! He is a young man; let +him rub off his corners!" Heiberg is credited with having replied: "Very +true! Let him! but not in my drawing-room! That is not a place where +people may rub anything off." Heiberg's wife, on the other hand, admired +him exceedingly, and was undoubtedly very much fascinated by him. + +In a circle of younger people, Björnson was a better talker than +conversationalist. Sometimes he came out with decidedly rash expressions +of opinion, conclusively dismissing a question, for instance, with +severe verdicts over Danish music, Heyse's excepted, judgments which +were not supported by sufficient knowledge of the subject at issue. But +much of what he said revealed the intellectual ruler, whose self- +confidence might now and again irritate, but at bottom was justified. He +narrated exceptionally well, with picturesque adjectives, long +remembered in correct Copenhagen, spoke of the _yellow_ howl of +wolves, and the like. Take it all in all, his attitude was that of a +conqueror. + +He upheld poetry that was actual and palpable, consequently had little +appreciation for poetry, that, like Paludan-Müller's, was the perfection +of thought and form, and boldly disapproved of my admiration for it. + + +X. + +It was likewise through Frederik Nutzhorn that I, when a young beginner +in the difficult art of life, became acquainted with Madame Magdalene +Thoresen. Our first conversation took place in the open air one Summer +day, at the Klampenborg bathing establishment. Although Magdalene +Thoresen was at that time at least forty-six years old, her warm, +brownish complexion could well stand inspection in the strongest light. +Her head, with its heavy dark hair, was Southern in its beauty, her +mouth as fresh as a young girl's; she had brilliant and very striking +eyes. Her figure was inclined to be corpulent, her walk a trifle heavy, +her bearing and movements full of youth and life. + +She was remarkably communicative, open and warmhearted, with a +propensity towards considerable extravagance of speech. Originally +incited thereto by Björnson's peasant stories, she had then published +her first tales, _The Student and Signe's Story_, which belonged, +half to Norwegian, half to Danish literature, and had been well +received. She was the daughter of a fisherman at Fredericia, and after +having known both the buffets and the smiles of Fortune, had come to be +on terms of friendship with many men and women of importance, now +belonging to the recognised personalities of the day. She was also very +well received and much appreciated in the Heiberg circle. + +In comparison with her, a woman, I might have been called erudite and +well-informed. Her own knowledge was very desultory. She was interested +in me on account of my youth, and her warm interest attached me to her +for the next five years,--as long, that is, as she remained in Denmark. +She very soon began to confide in me, and although she scarcely did so +unreservedly, still, no woman, at least no mature and gifted woman, had +told me so much about herself before. She was a woman who had felt +strongly and thought much; she had lived a rich, and eventful life; but +all that had befallen her she romanticised. Her poetic tendency was +towards the sublime. She was absolutely veracious, and did not really +mean to adorn her tales, but partly from pride, partly from +whimsicality, she saw everything, from greatest to least, through +beautifully coloured magnifying-glasses, so that a translation of her +communications into every-day language became a very difficult matter, +and when an every-day occurrence was suspected through the narrative, +the same could not be reproduced in an every-day light, and according to +an every-day standard, without wounding the narrator to the quick. For +these reasons I never ventured to include among my Collected Essays a +little biographical sketch of her (written just as she herself had +idealised its events to me), one of the first articles I had printed. + +She saw strong natures, rich and deep natures, in lives that were meagre +or unsuccessful. Again, from lack of perspicacity, she sometimes saw +nothing but inefficiency in people with wide intellectual gifts; thus, +she considered that her son-in-law, Henrik Ibsen, who at that time had +not become either known or celebrated, had very imperfect poetic gifts. +"What he writes is as flat as a drawing," she would say. Or she would +remark: "He ought to be more than a collaborator of Kierkegaard." It was +only much later that she discovered his genius. Björnson, on the other +hand, she worshipped with an enthusiastic love; it was a trouble to her +that just about this time he had become very cool to her. + +Vague feelings did not repel her, but all keen and pointed intelligence +did. She was wholly and entirely romantic. Gallicism she objected to; +the clarity of the French seemed to her superficial; she saw depth in +the reserved and taciturn Northern, particularly the Norwegian, nature. +She had groped her way forward for a long time without realising what +her gifts really were. Her husband, who had done all he could to assist +her education, had even for a time imagined, and perhaps persuaded her, +that her gifts lay in the direction of Baggesen's. Now, however, she had +found her vocation and her path in literature. + +On all questions of thought, pure and simple, she was extremely vague. +She was a Christian and a Heathen with equal sincerity, a Christian with +her overflowing warm-heartedness, with her honest inclination to +believe, a Heathen in her averseness to any negation of either life or +Nature. She used to say that she loved Christ and Eros equally, or +rather, that to her, they both meant the same. To her, Christianity was +the new, the modern, in contrast to the rationalism of a past age, so +that Christianity and modern views of life in general merged in her eyes +into one unity. + +Hers was a deeply feminine nature, and a productive nature. Her fertile +character was free from all taint of over-estimation of herself. She +only revealed a healthy and pleasing self-satisfaction when she imagined +that some person wished to set up himself or herself over her and +misjudge acts or events in her life with respect to which she considered +herself the only person qualified to judge. At such times she would +declare in strong terms that by her own unassisted strength she had +raised herself from a mean and unprotected position to the level of the +best men and women of her day. Herself overflowing with emotion, and of +a noble disposition, she craved affection and goodwill, and gave back a +hundredfold what she received. If she felt herself the object of cold +and piercing observation, she would be silent and unhappy, but if she +herself were at ease and encountered no coolness, she was all geniality +and enthusiasm, though not to such an extent that her enthusiasm ceased +to be critical. + +She could over-value and under-value people, but was at the same time a +keen, in fact a marvellous psychologist, and sometimes astonished one by +the pertinent things she said, surprising one by her accurate estimate +of difficult psychological cases. For instance, she understood as few +others did the great artist, the clever coquette, and the old maid in +Heiberg's wife, the actress. + +She had no moral prejudices, and had written _Signe's Story_ as a +protest against conventional morality; but she was none the less +thoroughly permeated by Christian and humane ideas of morality, and +there was no element of rebellion in her disposition. + +On the whole, she was more a woman than an authoress. Her nature was +tropical in comparison with Mrs. Charite Paludan-Müller's North Pole +nature. She lived, not in a world of ideas remote from reality, but in a +world of feeling and passion, full of affection and admiration, jealousy +and dislike. Being a woman, she was happy at every expression of +pleasure over one of her books that she heard or read of, and liked to +fancy that the solitary young man who sent her an enthusiastic letter of +thanks was only one of hundreds who thought as he did. Like a woman, +also, she was hurt by indifference, which, however, her warm heart +rarely encountered. + +This richly endowed woman made me appear quite new to myself, inasmuch +as, in conversations with my almost maternal friend, I began to think I +was of a somewhat cold nature, a nature which in comparison with hers +seemed rather dry, unproductive and unimaginative, a creature with +thoughts ground keen. + +Magdalene Thoresen compared me one day to an unlighted glass candelabra, +hanging amid several others all lighted up, which had the gleam of the +fire on the countless facets of its crystals, but was itself nothing but +cold, smooth, polished, prisms. + +Thus during my association with Magdalene Thoresen I came to regard +myself in a new light, when I saw myself with her eyes, and I was struck +more than ever by how different the verdicts over me would be were my +various friends and acquaintances each to describe me is I appeared to +them. To Magdalene Thoresen I was all mind, to others all passion, to +others again all will. At the Nutzhorns' I went by the name of the +modest B., elsewhere I was deemed conceitedly ambitious, some people +thought me of a mild temper, others saw in me a quarrelsome unbeliever. + +All this was a challenge to me to come to a clear understanding about my +real nature. The fruits of my work must show me what sort of man I was. + + +XI. + +I continued my legal studies with patient persistence, and gradually, +after having made myself master of Civil Proceedings, I worked my way +through the whole of the juridic system, Roman Law excluded. But the +industry devoted to this was purely mechanical. I pursued my other +studies, on the contrary, with delight, even tried to produce something +myself, and during the last months of 1862 elaborated a very long paper +on _Romeo and Juliet_, chiefly concerning itself with the +fundamental problems of the tragedy, as interpreted in the Aesthetics of +the day; it has been lost, like so much else that I wrote during those +years. I sent it to Professor Bröchner and asked his opinion of it. + +Simultaneously I began to work upon a paper on the Idea of Fate in Greek +Tragedy, a response to the Prize question of the year 1862-1863, and on +December 31, 1862, had finished the Introduction, which was published +for the first time about six years later, under the title _The Idea of +Tragic Fate_. Appended to this was a laborious piece of work dealing +with the conceptions of Fate recorded in all the Greek tragedies that +have come down to us. This occupied the greater part of the next six +months. + +The published Introduction gives a true picture of the stage of my +development then, partly because it shows the manner in which I had +worked together external influences, the Kierkegaardian thoughts and the +Hegelian method, partly because with no little definiteness it reveals a +fundamental characteristic of my nature and a fundamental tendency of my +mind, since it is, throughout, a protest against the ethical conception +of poetry and is a proof of how moral ideas, when they become part of an +artistic whole, lose their peculiar stamp and assume another aspect. + +In November, 1862, I joined a very large recently started +undergraduates' society, which met once a fortnight at Borch's College +to hear lectures and afterwards discuss them together. It numbered full +fifty members, amongst them most of the men of that generation who +afterwards distinguished themselves in Denmark. The later known +politician, Octavius Hansen, was Speaker of the Meetings, and even then +seemed made for the post. His parliamentary bearing was unrivalled. It +was not for nothing he was English on the mother's side. He looked +uncommonly handsome on the platform, with his unmoved face, his +beautiful eyes, and his brown beard, curled like that of Pericles in the +Greek busts. He was good-humoured, just, and well-informed. Of the +numerous members, Wilhelm Thomsen the philologist was certainly the most +prominent, and the only one whom I later on came to value, that is, for +purely personal reasons; in daily association it was only once in a way +that Thomsen could contribute anything from his special store of +knowledge. One day, when we had been discussing the study of cuneiform +inscriptions, the young philologist had said, half in jest, half in +earnest: "If a stone were to fall down from the Sun with an inscription +in unknown signs, in an unknown language, upon it, we should be able to +make it out,"--a remark which I called to mind many years later when +Thomsen deciphered the Ancient Turkish inscriptions in the Mountains of +Siberia. + +A great many political lectures were given. I gave one on Heiberg's +Aesthetics. + +On January 1, 1863, I received a New Year's letter from Bröchner, in +which he wrote that the essay on Romeo and Juliet had so impressed him +that, in his opinion, no one could dispute my fitness to fill the Chair +of Aesthetics, which in the nature of things would soon be vacant, since +Hauch, at his advanced age, could hardly continue to occupy it very +long. + +Thus it was that my eager patron first introduced what became a +wearisome tangle, lasting a whole generation, concerning my claims to a +certain post, which gradually became in my life what the French call +_une scie_, an irritating puzzle, in which I myself took no part, +but which attached itself to my name. + +That letter agitated me very much; not because at so young an age the +prospect of an honourable position in society was held out to me by a +man who was in a position to judge of my fitness for it, but because +this smiling prospect of an official post was in my eyes a snare which +might hold me so firmly that I should not be able to pursue the path of +renunciation that alone seemed to me to lead to my life's goal. I felt +myself an apostle, but an apostle and a professor were, very far apart. +I certainly remembered that the Apostle Paul had been a tent-maker. But +I feared that, once appointed, I should lose my ideal standard of life +and sink down into insipid mediocrity. If I once deviated from my path, +I might not so easily find it again. It was more difficult to resign a +professorship than never to accept it. And, once a professor, a man soon +got married and settled down as a citizen of the state, not in a +position to dare anything. To dispose of my life at Bröchner's request +would be like selling my soul to the Devil. + +So I replied briefly that I was too much attached to Hauch to be able or +willing to speculate on his death. But to this Bröchner very logically +replied: "I am not speculating on his death, but on his life, for the +longer he lives, the better you will be prepared to be his successor." + +By the middle of June, 1863, the prize paper was copied out. In +September the verdict was announced; the gold medal was awarded to me +with a laudatory criticism. The gold medal was also won by my friend +Jens Paludan-Müller for a historic paper, and in October, at the annual +Ceremony at the University, we were presented with the thin medal +bearing the figure of Athene, which, for my part, being in need of a +Winter overcoat, I sold next day. Clausen, the Rector, a little man with +regular features, reserved face and smooth white hair, said to us that +he hoped this might prove the first fruits of a far-reaching activity in +the field of Danish literature. But what gave me much greater pleasure +was that I was shaken hands with by Monrad, who was present as Minister +for Education. Although Clausen was well known, both as a theologian and +an important National Liberal, I cared nothing for him. But I was a +little proud of Monrad's hand-pressure, for his political liberality, +and especially his tremendous capacity for work, compelled respect, +while from his handsome face with its thoughtful, commanding forehead, +there shone the evidence of transcendent ability. + + +XII. + +On the morning of November 15th, 1863, Julius Lange and I went together +to offer our congratulations to Frederik Nutzhorn, whose birthday it +was. His sisters received me with their usual cheerfulness, but their +father, the old doctor, remarked as I entered: "You come with grave +thoughts in your mind, too," for the general uneasiness occasioned by +Frederik VII's state of health was reflected in my face. There was good +reason for anxiety concerning all the future events of which an +unfavourable turn of his illness might be the signal. + +I went home with Julius Lange, who read a few wild fragments of his +"System" to me. This turned upon the contrasting ideas of +_Contemplation_ and _Sympathy_, corresponding to the inhaling +and exhaling of the breath; the resting-point of the breathing was the +moment of actual consciousness, etc.; altogether very young, curious, +and confused. + +In the afternoon came the news of the King's death. In the evening, at +the Students' Union, there was great commotion and much anxiety. There +were rumours of a change of Ministry, of a Bluhme-David-Ussing Ministry, +and of whether the new King would be willing to sign the Constitution +from which people childishly expected the final incorporation of Slesvig +into Denmark. That evening I made the acquaintance of the poet Christian +Richardt, who told me that he had noticed my face before he knew my +name. Julius Lange was exceedingly exasperated and out of spirits. Ploug +went down the stairs looking like a man whose hopes had been shattered, +and whom the blow had found unprepared. His paper had persistently sown +distrust of the Prince of Denmark. + +The Proclamation was to take place in front of Christiansborg Castle on +December 16th, at 11 o'clock. I was fetched to it by a student of the +same age, the present Bishop Frederik Nielsen. The latter had made my +acquaintance when a Free-thinker, but fortunately he recognised his +errors only a very few years later, and afterwards the valiant +theologian wrote articles and pamphlets against the heretic he had +originally cultivated for holding the same opinions as himself. There is +hardly anyone in Denmark who persists in error; people recognise their +mistakes in time, before they have taken harm to their souls; sometimes, +indeed, so much betimes that they are not even a hindrance to their +worldly career. + +The space in front of the Castle was black with people, most of whom +were in a state of no little excitement. Hall, who was then Prime +Minister, stepped out on the balcony of the castle, grave and upright, +and said, first standing with his back to the Castle, then looking to +the right and the left, these words: "King Frederik VII is dead. Long +live King Christian IX!" + +Then the King came forward. There were loud shouts, doubtless some cries +of "Long live the King," but still more and louder shouts of: "The +Constitution forever!" which were by no means loyally intended. At a +distance, from the Castle balcony, the different shouts could, of +course, not be distinguished. As the King took them all to be shouts of +acclamation, he bowed politely several times, and as the shouts +continued kissed his hand to right and left. The effect was not what he +had intended. His action was not understood as a simple-hearted +expression of pure good-will. People were used to a very different +bearing on the part of their King. With all his faults and foibles, +Frederik VII was always in manner the Father of his people; always the +graceful superior; head up and shoulders well back, patronisingly and +affectionately waving his hand: "Thank you, my children, thank you! And +now go home and say 'Good-morning' to your wives and children from the +King!" One could not imagine Frederik VII bowing to the people, much +less kissing his hand to them. + +There was a stormy meeting of the Students' Union that evening. Vilhelm +Rode made the principal speech and caustically emphasised that it took +more than a "Kiss of the hand and a parade bow" to win the hearts of the +Danish people. The new dynasty, the head of which had been abused for +years by the National Liberal press, especially in _The Fatherland_, +who had thrown suspicion of German sympathies on the heir-presumptive, was +still so weak that none of the students thought it necessary to take much +notice of the change of sovereigns that had taken place. This was partly +because since Frederik VII's time people had been accustomed to +indiscriminate free speech concerning the King's person--it was the +fashion and meant nothing, as he was beloved by the body of the people +--partly because what had happened was not regarded as irrevocable. All +depended on whether the King signed the Constitution, and even the coolest +and most conservative, who considered that his signing it would be a fatal +misfortune, thought it possible that Christian IX. would be dethroned if +he did not. So it is not difficult to form some idea of how the Hotspurs +talked. The whole town was in a fever, and it was said that Prince Oscar +was in Scania, ready at the first sign to cross the Sound and allow +himself to be proclaimed King on behalf of Charles XV. Men with +Scandinavian sympathies hoped for this solution, by means of which the +three kingdoms would have been united without a blow being struck. + +In the middle of the meeting, there arrived a message from Crone, the +Head of Police, which was delivered verbally in this incredibly +irregular form--that the Head of Police was as good a Scandinavian as +anyone, but he begged the students for their own sakes to refrain from +any kind of street disturbance that would oblige him to interfere. + +I, who had stood on the open space in front of the Castle, lost in the +crowd, and in the evening at the meeting of the students was auditor to +the passionate utterances let fall there, felt my mood violently swayed, +but was altogether undecided with regard to the political question, the +compass of which I could not fully perceive. I felt anxious as to the +attitude of foreign powers would be in the event of the signing of the +Constitution. Old C.N. David had said in his own home that if the matter +should depend on him, which, however, he hoped it would not, he would +not permit the signing of the Constitution, were he the only man in +Denmark of that way of thinking, since by so doing we should lose our +guarantee of existence, and get two enemies instead of one, Russia as +well as Germany. + +The same evening I wrote down: "It is under such circumstances as these +that one realises how difficult it is to lead a really ethical +existence. I am not far-sighted enough to perceive what would be the +results of that which to me seems desirable, and one cannot +conscientiously mix one's self up in what one does not understand. +Nevertheless, as I stood in the square in front of the Castle, I was so +excited that I even detected in myself an inclination to come forward as +a political speaker, greenhorn though I be." + + +XIII. + +On the 18th of November, the fever in the town was at its height. From +early in the morning the space in front of the Castle was crowded with +people. Orla Lehmann, a Minister at the time, came out of the Castle, +made his way through the crowd, and shouted again and again, first to +one side, then to the other: + +"He has signed! He has signed!" + +He did not say: "The King." + +The people now endured seven weeks of uninterrupted change and +kaleidoscopic alteration of the political situation. Relations with all +foreign powers, and even with Sweden and Norway, presented a different +aspect to the Danish public every week. Sweden's withdrawal created a +very bitter impression; the public had been induced to believe that an +alliance was concluded. Then followed the "pressure" in Copenhagen by +the emissaries of all the Powers, to induce the Government to recall the +November Constitution, then the Czar's letter to the Duke of +Augustenborg, finally the occupation of Holstein by German troops, with +all the censure and disgrace that the Danish army had to endure, for +Holstein was evacuated without a blow being struck, and the Duke, to the +accompanyment of scorn and derision heaped on the Danes, was proclaimed +in all the towns of Holstein. + +On Christmas Eve came tidings of the convocation of the Senate, +simultaneously with a change of Ministry which placed Monrad at the head +of the country, and in connection with this a rumour that all young men +of twenty-one were to be called out at once. This last proved to be +incorrect, and the minds of the young men alternated between composure +at the prospect of war and an enthusiastic desire for war, and a belief +that there would be no war at all. The first few days in January, +building on the rumour that the last note from England had promised help +in the event of the Eider being passed, people began to hope that the +war might be avoided, and pinned their faith to Monrad's dictatorship. + +Frederik Nutzhorn, who did not believe there would be a war, started on +a visit to Rome; Jens Paludan-Müller, who had been called out, was +quartered at Rendsborg until the German troops marched in; Julius Lange, +who, as he had just become engaged, did not wish to see his work +interrupted and his future prospects delayed by the war, had gone to +Islingen, where he had originally made the acquaintance of his fiancée. +Under these circumstances, as a twenty-one-year-old student who had +completed his university studies, I was anxious to get my examination +over as quickly as possible. At the end of 1863 I wrote to my teacher, +Professor Bröchner, who had promised me a short philosophical summary as +a preparation for the University test: "I shall sit under a conjunction +of all the most unfavourable circumstances possible, since for more than +a month my head has been so full of the events of the day that I have +been able neither to read nor think, while the time of the examination +itself promises to be still more disquiet. Still, I dare not draw back, +as I should then risk--which may possibly happen in any case--being +hindered from my examination by being called out by the conscription and +perhaps come to lie in my grave as _Studiosus_ instead of +_candidatus magisterii_, which latter looks infinitely more +impressive and is more satisfying to a man as greedy of honour as Your +respectful and heartily affectionate, etc." + + +XIV. + +Shortly before, I had paid my first visit to Professor Rasmus Nielsen. +He was exceedingly agreeable, recognised me, whom perhaps he remembered +examining, and accorded me a whole hour's conversation. He was, as +always, alert and fiery, not in the least blasé, but with a slight +suggestion of charlatanism about him. His conversation was as lively and +disconnected as his lectures; there was a charm in the clear glance of +his green eyes, a look of genius about his face. He talked for a long +time about Herbart, whose Aesthetics, for that matter, he betrayed +little knowledge of, then of Hegel, Heiberg, and Kierkegaard. To my +intense surprise, he opened up a prospect, conflicting with the opinions +he had publicly advocated, that Science, "when analyses had been carried +far enough," might come to prove the possibility of miracles. This was +an offence against my most sacred convictions. + +Nielsen had recently, from the cathedra, announced his renunciation of +the Kierkegaard standpoint he had so long maintained, in the phrase: +"The Kierkegaard theory is impracticable"; he had, perhaps influenced +somewhat by the Queen Dowager, who about that time frequently invited +him to meet Grundtvig, drawn nearer to Grundtvigian ways of thinking,-- +as Bröchner sarcastically remarked about him: "The farther from +Kierkegaard, the nearer to the Queen Dowager." + +In the midst of my final preparations for the examination, I wrestled, +as was my wont, with my attempts to come to a clear understanding over +Duty and Life, and was startled by the indescribable irony in the word +by which I was accustomed to interpret my ethically religious +endeavours,--_Himmelspraet_. [Footnote: Word implying one who +attempts to spring up to Heaven, and of course falls miserably to earth +again. The word, in ordinary conversation, is applied to anyone tossed +in a blanket.] + +I handed in, then, my request to be allowed to sit for my Master of Arts +examination; the indefatigable Bröchner had already mentioned the matter +to the Dean of the University, who understood the examinee's reasons for +haste. But the University moved so slowly that it was some weeks before +I received the special paper set me, which, to my horror, ran as +follows: "Determine the correlation between the pathetic and the +symbolic in general, in order by that means to elucidate the contrast +between Shakespeare's tragedies and Dante's _Divina Commedia_, +together with the possible errors into which one might fall through a +one-sided preponderance of either of these two elements." + +This paper, which had been set by R. Nielsen, is characteristic of the +purely speculative manner, indifferent to all study of history, in which +Aesthetics were at that time pursued in Copenhagen. It was, moreover, +worded with unpardonable carelessness; it was impossible to tell from it +what was to be understood by the correlation on which it was based, and +which was assumed to be a given conclusion. Even so speculative a +thinker as Frederik Paludan-Müller called the question absolutely +meaningless. It looked as though its author had imagined Shakespeare's +dramas and Dante's epic were produced by a kind of artistic commingling +of pathetic with symbolic elements, and as though he wished to call +attention to the danger of reversing the correct proportions, for +instance, by the symbolic obtaining the preponderance in tragedy, or +pathos in the epopee, or to the danger of exaggerating these +proportions, until there was too much tragic pathos, or too much epic +symbolism. But a scientific definition of the expressions used was +altogether lacking, and I had to devote a whole chapter to the +examination of the meaning of the problem proposed to me. + +The essay, for the writing of which I was allowed six weeks, was handed +in, 188 folio pages long, at the right time. By reason of the sheer +foolishness of the question, it was never published. + +In a postscript, I wrote: "I beg my honoured examiners to remember the +time during which this treatise was written, a time more eventful than +any other young men can have been through, and during which I, for my +part, have for days at a time been unable to work, and should have been +ashamed if I could have done so." + +In explanation of this statement, the following jottings, written down +at the time on a sheet of paper: + +_Sunday, Jan. 17th_. Received letter telling me I may fetch my +leading question to-morrow at 5 o'clock. + +_Monday, Feb. 1st_. Heard to-day that the Germans have passed the +Eider and that the first shots have been exchanged. + +_Saturday, Feb. 6th_. Received to-day the terrible, +incomprehensible, but only too certain news that the Danevirke has been +abandoned without a blow being struck. This is indescribable, +overwhelming. + +_Thursday, Feb. 28th_. We may, unfortunately, assume it as certain +that my dear friend Jens Paludan-Müller fell at Oversö on Feb. 5th. + +_Feb. 28th_. Heard definitely to-day.--At half-past one this night +finished my essay. + + +XV. + +I thought about this time of nothing but my desire to become a competent +soldier of my country. There was nothing I wanted more, but I felt +physically very weak. When the first news of the battles of Midsunde and +Bustrup arrived, I was very strongly inclined to follow Julius Lange to +the Reserve Officers' School. When tidings came of the abandonment of +the Danevirke my enthusiasm cooled; it was as though I foresaw how +little prospect of success there was. Still, I was less melancholy than +Lange at the thought of going to the war. I was single, and delighted at +the thought of going straight from the examination-table into a camp +life, and from a book-mad student to become a lieutenant. I was +influenced most by the prospect of seeing Lange every day at the +Officers' School, and on the field. But my comrades explained to me that +even if Lange and I came out of the School at the same time, it did not +follow that we should be in the same division, and that the thing, +moreover, that was wanted in an officer, was entire self-dependence. +They also pointed out to me the improbability of my being able to do the +least good, or having the slightest likelihood in front of me of doing +anything but quickly find myself in hospital. I did not really think +myself that I should be able to stand the fatigue, as the pupils of the +military academy went over to the army with an equipment that I could +scarcely have carried. I could not possibly suppose that the +conscription would select me as a private, on account of my fragile +build; but like all the rest, I was expecting every day a general +ordering out of the fit men of my age. + +All this time I worked with might and main at the development of my +physical strength and accomplishments. I went every day to fencing +practice, likewise to cavalry sword practice; I took lessons in the use +of the bayonet, and I took part every afternoon in the shooting +practices conducted by the officers--with the old muzzle-loaders which +were the army weapons at the time. I was very delighted one day when Mr. +Hagemeister, the fencing-master, one of the many splendid old Holstein +non-commissioned officers holding the rank of lieutenant, said I was "A +smart fencer." + + +XVI. + +Meanwhile, the examination was taking its course. As real curiosities, I +here reproduce the questions set me. The three to be replied to in +writing were: + +1. To what extent can poetry be called the ideal History? + +2. In what manner may the philosophical ideas of Spinoza and Fichte lead +to a want of appreciation of the idea of beauty? + +3. In what relation does the comic stand to its limitations and its +various contrasts? + +The three questions which were to be replied to in lectures before the +University ran as follows: + +1. Show, through poems in our literature, to what extent poetry may +venture to set itself the task of presenting the Idea in a form +coinciding with the philosophical understanding of it? + +2. Point out the special contributions to a philosophical definition of +the Idea made by Aesthetics in particular. + +3. What are the merits and defects of Schiller's tragedies? + +These questions, in conjunction with the main question, may well be +designated a piece of contemporary history; they depict exactly both the +Science of the time and the peculiar philosophical language it adopted. +Hardly more than one, or at most two, of them could one imagine set to- +day. + +After the final (and best) lecture, on Schiller, which was given at six +hours' notice on April 25th, the judges, Hauch, Nielsen and Bröchner, +deliberated for about ten minutes, then called in the auditors and R. +Nielsen read aloud the following verdict: "The candidate, in his long +essay, in the shorter written tests, and in his oral lectures, has +manifested such knowledge of his subject, such intellectual maturity, +and such originality in the treatment of his themes, that we have on +that account unanimously awarded him the mark: _admissus cum laude +praecipua_." + + +XVII. + +The unusually favourable result of this examination attracted the +attention of academical and other circles towards me. The mark +_admissus cum praecipua laude_ had only very rarely been given +before. Hauch expressed his satisfaction at home in no measured terms. +His wife stopped my grandfather in the street and informed him that his +grandson was the cleverest and best-read young man that her husband had +come across during his University experience. When I went to the old +poet after the examination to thank him, he said to me (these were his +very words): "I am an old man and must die soon; you must be my +successor at the University; I shall say so unreservedly; indeed, I will +even say it on my death-bed." Strangely enough, he did say it and record +it on his death-bed seven years later, exactly as he had promised to do. + +In Bröchner's house, too, there was a great deal said about my becoming +a professor. I myself was despondent about it; I thought only of the +war, only wished to be fit for a soldier. Hauch was pleased at my +wanting to be a soldier. "It is fine of you, if you can only stand it." +When Hauch heard for certain that I was only 22 years old (he himself +was 73), he started up in his chair and said: + +"Why, it is incredible that at your age you can have got so far." Rasmus +Nielsen was the only one of the professors who did not entertain me with +the discussion of my future academic prospects; but he it was who gave +me the highest praise: + +"According to our unanimous opinions," said he, "you are the foremost of +all the young men." + +I was only the more determined not to let myself be buried alive in the +flower of my youth by accepting professorship before I had been able to +live and breathe freely.--I might have spared myself any anxiety. + + +XVIII. + +A few days later, on May both, a month's armistice was proclaimed, which +was generally construed as a preliminary to peace, if this could be +attained under possible conditions. It was said, and soon confirmed, +that at the Conference of London, Denmark had been offered North +Slesvig. Most unfortunately, Denmark refused the offer. On June 26th, +the war broke out again; two days later Alsen was lost. When the young +men were called up to the officers' board for conscription, "being too +slight of build," I was deferred till next year. Were the guerilla war +which was talked about to break out, I was determined all the same to +take my part in it. + +But the Bluhme-David Ministry succeeded to Monrad's, and concluded the +oppressive peace. + +I was very far from regarding this peace as final; for that, I was too +inexperienced. I correctly foresaw that before very long the state of +affairs in Europe would give rise to other wars, but I incorrectly +concluded therefrom that another fight for Slesvig, or in any case, its +restoration to Denmark, would result from them. + +In the meantime peace, discouraging, disheartening though it was, opened +up possibilities of further undisturbed study, fresh absorption in +scientific occupations. + +When, after the termination of my University studies, I had to think of +earning my own living, I not only, as before, gave private lessons, but +I gave lectures, first to a circle before whom I lectured on Northern +and Greek mythology, then to another, in David's house, to whom I +unfolded the inner history of modern literature to interested listeners, +amongst them several beautiful young girls. I finally engaged myself to +my old Arithmetic master as teacher of Danish in his course for National +school-mistresses. I found the work horribly dull, but there was one +racy thing about it, namely, that I, the master, was three years younger +than the youngest of my pupils; these latter were obliged to be at least +25, and consequently even at their youngest were quite old in my eyes. + +But there were many much older women amongst them, one even, a priest or +schoolmaster's widow, of over fifty, a poor thing who had to begin--at +her age!--from the very beginning, though she was anything but gifted. +It was not quite easy for a master without a single hair on his face to +make himself respected. But I succeeded, my pupils being so well- +behaved. + +It was an exciting moment when these pupils of mine went up for their +teacher's examination, I being present as auditor. + +I continued to teach this course until the Autumn of 1868. When I left, +I was gratified by one of the ladies rising and, in a little speech, +thanking me for the good instruction I had given. + + +XIX. + +Meanwhile, I pursued my studies with ardour and enjoyment, read a very +great deal of _belles-lettres_, and continued to work at German +philosophy, inasmuch as I now, though without special profit, plunged +into a study of Trendelenburg. My thoughts were very much more +stimulated by Gabriel Sibbern, on account of his consistent scepticism. +It was just about this time that I made his acquaintance. Old before his +time, bald at forty, tormented with gout, although he had always lived a +most abstemious life, Gabriel Sibbern, with his serene face, clever eyes +and independent thoughts, was an emancipating phenomenon. He had +divested himself of all Danish prejudices. "There is still a great deal +of phlogiston in our philosophy," he used to say sometimes. + +I had long been anxious to come to a clear scientific understanding of +the musical elements in speech. I had busied myself a great deal with +metrical art. Brücke's _Inquiries_ were not yet in existence, but I +was fascinated by Apel's attempt to make use of notes (crotchets, +quavers, dotted quavers, and semi-quavers) as metrical signs, and by +J.L. Heiberg's attempt to apply this system to Danish verse. But the +system was too arbitrary for anything to be built up upon it. And I then +made up my mind, in order better to understand the nature of verse, to +begin at once to familiarise myself with the theory of music, which +seemed to promise the opening out of fresh horizons in the +interpretation of the harmonies of language. + +With the assistance of a young musician, later the well-known composer +and Concert Director, Victor Bendix, I plunged into the mysteries of +thorough-bass, and went so far as to write out the entire theory of +harmonics. I learnt to express myself in the barbaric language of music, +to speak of minor scales in fifths, to understand what was meant by +enharmonic ambiguity. I studied voice modulation, permissible and non- +permissible octaves; but I did not find what I hoped. I composed a few +short tunes, which I myself thought very pretty, but which my young +master made great fun of, and with good reason. One evening, when he was +in very high spirits, he parodied one of them at the piano in front of a +large party of people. It was a disconcerting moment for the composer of +the tune. + +A connection between metrical art and thorough-bass was not +discoverable. Neither were there any unbreakable laws governing +thorough-bass. The unversed person believes that in harmonics he will +find quite definite rules which must not be transgressed. But again and +again he discovers that what is, as a general rule, forbidden, is +nevertheless, under certain circumstances, quite permissible. + +Thus he learns that in music there is no rule binding on genius. And +perhaps he asks himself whether, in other domains, there are rules which +are binding on genius. + + +XX. + +I had lived so little with Nature. The Spring of 1865, the first Spring +I had spent in the country--although quite near to Copenhagen--meant to +me rich impressions of nature that I never forgot, a long chain of the +most exquisite Spring memories. I understood as I had never done before +the inborn affection felt by every human being for the virgin, the +fresh, the untouched, the not quite full-blown, just as it is about to +pass over into its maturity. It was in the latter half of May. I was +looking for anemones and violets, which had not yet gone to seed. The +budding beech foliage, the silver poplar with its shining leaves, the +maple with its blossoms, stirred me, filled me with Spring rapture. I +could lie long in the woods with my gaze fastened on a light-green +branch with the sun shining through it, and, as if stirred by the wind, +lighted up from different sides, and floating and flashing as if coated +with silver. I saw the empty husks fall by the hundred before the wind. +I followed up the streams in the wood to their sources. For a while a +rivulet oozed slowly along. Then came a little fall, and it began to +speak, to gurgle and murmur; but only at this one place, and here it +seemed to me to be like a young man or woman of twenty. Now that I, who +in my boyhood's days had gone for botanical excursions with my master +and school-fellows, absorbed myself in every plant, from greatest to +least, without wishing to arrange or classify any, it seemed as though +an infinite wisdom in Nature were being revealed to me for the first +time. + +As near to Copenhagen as Söndermarken, stood the beech, with its curly +leaves and black velvet buds in their silk jackets. In the gardens of +Frederiksberg Avenue, the elder exhaled its fragrance, but was soon +over; the hawthorn sprang out in all its splendour. I was struck by the +loveliness of the chestnut blooms. When the blossom on the cherry-trees +had withered, the lilac was out, and the apple and pear-trees paraded +their gala dress. + +It interested me to notice how the colour sometimes indicated the shape, +sometimes produced designs quite independently of it. I loitered in +gardens to feast my eyes on the charming grouping of the rhubarb leaves +no less than on the exuberance of their flowers, and the leaves of the +scorzonera attracted my attention, because they all grew in one plane, +but swung about like lances. + +And as my habit was, I philosophised over what I saw and had made my +own, and I strove to understand in what beauty consisted. I considered +the relations between beauty and life; why was it that artificial +flowers and the imitation of a nightingale's song were so far behind +their originals in beauty? What was the difference between the beauty of +the real, the artificial and the painted flower? Might not Herbart's +Aesthetics be wrong, in their theory of form? The form itself might be +the same in Nature and the imitation, in the rose made of velvet and the +rose growing in the garden. And I reflected on the connection between +the beauty of the species and that of the individual. Whether a lily be +a beautiful flower, I can say without ever having seen lilies before, +but whether it be a beautiful lily, I cannot. The individual can only be +termed beautiful when more like than unlike to the ideal of the species. +And I mused over the translation of the idea of beauty into actions and +intellectual conditions. Was not the death of Socrates more beautiful +than his preservation of Alcibiades' life in battle?--though this was +none the less a beautiful act. + + +XXI. + +In the month of July I started on a walking tour through Jutland, with +the scenery of which province I had not hitherto been acquainted; +travelled also occasionally by the old stage-coaches, found myself at +Skanderborg, which, for me, was surrounded by the halo of mediaeval +romance; wandered to Silkeborg, entering into conversation with no end +of people, peasants, peasant boys, and pretty little peasant girls, +whose speech was not always easy to understand. I studied their Juttish, +and laughed heartily at their keen wit. The country inns were often +over-full, so that I was obliged to sleep on the floor; my wanderings +were often somewhat exhausting, as there were constant showers, and the +night rain had soaked the roads. I drove in a peasant's cart to Mariager +to visit my friend Emil Petersen, who was in the office of the district +judge of that place, making his home with his brother-in-law and his +very pretty sister, and I stayed for a few days with him. Here I became +acquainted with a little out-of-the-world Danish town. The priest and +his wife were an interesting and extraordinary couple. The priest, the +before-mentioned Pastor Ussing, a little, nervous, intelligent and +unworldly man, was a pious dreamer, whose religion was entirely +rationalistic. Renan's recently published _Life of Jesus_ was so +far from shocking him that the book seemed to him in all essentials to +be on the right track. He had lived in the Danish West Indies, and there +he had become acquainted with his wife, a lady with social triumphs +behind her, whose charms he never wearied of admiring. The mere way in +which she placed her hat upon her head, or threw a shawl round her +shoulders, could make him fall into ecstasies, even though he only +expressed his delight in her in half-facetious terms. This couple showed +me the most cordial kindness; to their unpractised, provincial eyes, I +seemed to be a typical young man of the world, and they amazed me with +the way in which they took it for granted that I led the dances at every +ball, was a lion in society, etc. I was reminded of the student's words +in Hostrup's vaudeville: "Goodness! How innocent they must be to think +_me_ a dandy!" and vainly assured them that I lived an exceedingly +unnoticed life in Copenhagen, and had never opened a ball in my life. + +The priest asked us two young men to go and hear his Sunday sermon, and +promised that we should be pleased with it. We went to church somewhat +expectant, and the sermon was certainly a most unusual one. It was +delivered with great rapture, after the priest had bent his head in his +hands for a time in silent reflection. With great earnestness he +addressed himself to his congregation and demanded, after having put +before them some of the cures in the New Testament, generally extolled +as miracles, whether they dared maintain that these so-called miracles +could not have taken place according to Nature's laws. And when he +impressively called out: "Darest thou, with thy limited human +intelligence, say, 'This cannot happen naturally?'" it was in the same +tone and style in which another priest would have shouted out: "Darest +thou, with thy limited human intelligence, deny the miracle?" The +peasants, who, no doubt, understood his words quite in this latter +sense, did not understand in the least the difference and the contrast, +but judged much the same as a dog to whom one might talk angrily with +caressing words or caressingly with abusive words, simply from the +speaker's tone; and both his tone and facial expression were ecstatic. +They perceived no heresy and felt themselves no less edified by the +address than did the two young Copenhagen graduates. + + +XXII. + +My first newspaper articles were printed in _The Fatherland_ and +the _Illustrated Times_; the very first was a notice of Paludan- +Müller's _Fountain of Youth_, in which I had compressed matter for +three or four lectures; a commissioned article on Dante was about the +next, but this was of no value. But it was a great event to see one's +name printed in a newspaper for the first time, and my mother saw it not +without emotion. + +About this time Henrik Ibsen's first books fell into my hands and +attracted my attention towards this rising poet, who, among the leading +Danish critics, encountered a reservation of appreciation that scarcely +concealed ill-will. From Norway I procured Ibsen's oldest dramas, which +had appeared there. + +Frederik Algreen-Ussing asked me to contribute to a large biographical +dictionary, which he had for a long time been planning and preparing, +and which he had just concluded a contract for with the largest Danish +publishing firm of the time. A young man who hated the August +Association and all its deeds could not fail to feel scruples about +engaging in any collaboration with its founder. But Algreen-Ussing knew +how to vanquish all such scruples, inasmuch as he waived all rights of +censorship, and left it to each author to write as he liked upon his own +responsibility. And he was perfectly loyal to his promise. Moreover, the +question here was one of literature only, and not politics. + +As the Danish authors were to be dealt with in alphabetical order, the +article that had to be set about at once was an account of the only +Danish poet whose name began with _Aa_. Thus it was that Emil +Aarestrup came to be the first Danish poet of the past of whom I chanced +to write. I heard of the existence of a collection of unprinted letters +from Aarestrup to his friend Petersen, the grocer, which were of very +great advantage to my essay. A visit that I paid to the widow of the +poet, on the other hand, led to no result whatever. It was strange to +meet the lady so enthusiastically sung by Aarestrup in his young days, +as a sulky and suspicious old woman without a trace of former beauty, +who declared that she had no letters from her husband, and could not +give me any information about him. It was only a generation later that +his letters to her came into my hands. + +In September, 1865, the article on Aarestrup was finished. It was +intended to be quickly followed up by others on the remaining Danish +authors in A. But it was the only one that was written, for Algreen- +Ussing's apparently so well planned undertaking was suddenly brought to +a standstill. The proprietors of the National Liberal papers declared, +as soon as they heard of the plan, that they would not on any account +agree to its being carried out by a man who took up such a "reactionary" +position in Danish politics as Ussing, and in face of their threat to +annihilate the undertaking, the publishers, who were altogether +dependent on the attitude of these papers, did not dare to defy them. +They explained to Algreen-Ussing that they felt obliged to break their +contract with him, but were willing to pay him the compensation agreed +upon beforehand for failure to carry it out. He fought long to get his +project carried through, but his efforts proving fruitless, he refused, +from pride, to accept any indemnity, and was thus compelled to see with +bitterness many years' work and an infinite amount of trouble completely +wasted. Shortly afterwards he succumbed to an attack of illness. + + +XXIII. + +A young man who plunged into philosophical study at the beginning of the +sixties in Denmark, and was specially engrossed by the boundary +relations between Philosophy and Religion, could not but come to the +conclusion that philosophical life would never flourish in Danish soil +until a great intellectual battle had been set on foot, in the course of +which conflicting opinions which had never yet been advanced in express +terms should be made manifest and wrestle with one another, until it +became clear which standpoints were untenable and which could be +maintained. Although he cherished warm feelings of affection for both R. +Nielsen and Bröchner the two professors of Philosophy, he could not help +hoping for a discussion between them of the fundamental questions which +were engaging his mind. As Bröchner's pupil, I said a little of what was +in my mind to him, but could not induce him to begin. Then I begged +Gabriel Sibbern to furnish a thorough criticism of Nielsen's books, but +he declined. I began to doubt whether I should be able to persuade the +elder men to speak. + +A review in The _Fatherland_ of the first part of Nielsen's +_Logic of Fundamental Ideas_ roused my indignation. It was in +diametric opposition to what I considered irrefutably true, and was +written in the style, and with the metaphors, which the paper's literary +criticisms had brought into fashion, a style that was repugnant to me +with its sham poetical, or meaninglessly flat expressions ("Matter is +the hammer-stroke that the Ideal requires"--"Spontaneity is like food +that has once been eaten"). + +In an eleven-page letter to Bröchner I condensed all that I had thought +about the philosophical study at the University during these first years +of my youth, and proved to him, in the keenest terms I could think of, +that it was his duty to the ideas whose spokesman he was, to come +forward, and that it would be foolish, in fact wrong, to leave the +matter alone. I knew well enough that I was jeopardising my precious +friendship with Bröchner by my action, but I was willing to take the +risk. I did not expect any immediate result of my letter, but thought to +myself that it should ferment, and some time in the future might bear +fruit. The outcome of it far exceeded my expectations, inasmuch as +Bröchner was moved by my letter, and not only thanked me warmly for my +daring words, but went without delay to Nielsen and told him that he +intended to write a book on his entire philosophical activity and +significance. Nielsen took his announcement with a good grace. + +However, as Bröchner immediately afterwards lost his young wife, and was +attacked by the insidious consumption which ravaged him for ten years, +the putting of this resolution into practice was for several years +deferred. + +At that I felt that I myself must venture, and, as a beginning, Julius +Lange and I, in collaboration, wrote a humorous article on Schmidt's +review of _The Logic of Fundamental Ideas_, which Lange was to get +into _The Daily Paper_, to which he had access. Three days after +the article was finished Lange came to me and told me that to his dismay +it was--gone. It was so exactly like him that I was just as delighted as +if he had informed me that the article was printed. For some time we +hoped that it might be on Lange's table, for, the day before, he had +said: + +"I am not of a curious disposition, but I should like to know what there +really is on that table!" + +However, it had irrevocably disappeared. + +I then came forward myself with a number of shorter articles which I +succeeded in getting accepted by the _Fatherland_. When I entered +for the first time Ploug's tiny little office high up at the top of a +house behind Höjbro Place, the gruff man was not unfriendly. Surprised +at the youthful appearance of the person who walked in, he merely burst +out: "How old are you?" And to the reply: "Twenty-three and a half," he +said smilingly, "Don't forget the half." + +The first article was not printed for months; the next ones appeared +without such long delay. But Ploug was somewhat uneasy about the +contents of them, and cautiously remarked that there was "not to be any +fun made of Religion," which it could not truthfully be said I had done. +But I had touched upon dogmatic Belief and that was enough. + +Later on, Ploug had a notion that, as he once wrote, he had excluded me +from the paper as soon as he perceived my mischievous tendency. This was +a failure of memory on his part; the reason I left the paper was a +different one, and I left of my own accord. + +Bold and surly, virile and reliable as Ploug seemed, in things +journalistic you could place slight dependence on his word. His dearest +friend admitted as much; he gave his consent, and then forgot it, or +withdrew it. Nothing is more general, but it made an overweening +impression on a beginner like myself, inexperienced in the ways of life. + +When Ibsen's _Brand_ came out, creating an unusual sensation, I +asked Ploug if I might review the book and received a definite "Yes" +from him. I then wrote my article, to which I devoted no little pains, +but when I took it in it was met by him, to my astonishment, with the +remark that the paper had now received another notice from their regular +reviewer, whom he "could not very well kick aside." Ploug's promise had +apparently been meaningless! I went my way with my article, firmly +resolved never to go there again. + +From 1866 to 1870 I sought and found acceptance for my newspaper +articles (not very numerous) in Bille's _Daily Paper_, which in its +turn closed its columns to me after my first series of lectures at the +University of Copenhagen. Bille as an editor was pleasant, a little +patronising, it is true, but polite and invariably good-tempered. He +usually received his contributors reclining at full length on his sofa, +his head, with its beautifully cut features, resting against a cushion +and his comfortable little stomach protruding. He was scarcely of medium +height, quick in everything he did, very clear, a little flat; very +eloquent, but taking somewhat external views; pleased at the great +favour he enjoyed among the Copenhagen bourgeoisie. If he entered +Tivoli's Concert Hall in an evening all the waiter's ran about at once +like cockroaches. They hurried to know what he might please to want, and +fetched chairs for him and his party. Gay, adaptable, and practised, he +was the principal speaker at every social gathering. In his editorial +capacity he was courteous, decided, and a man of his word; he did not +allow himself to be alarmed by trifles. When Björnson attacked me (I was +at the time his youngest contributor), he raised my scale of pay, +unsolicited. The first hitch in our relations occurred when in 1869 I +published a translation of Mill's Subjection of Women. This book roused +Bille's exasperation and displeasure. He forbade it to be reviewed in +his paper, refused me permission to defend it in the paper, and would +not even allow the book in his house, so that his family had to read it +clandestinely, as a dangerous and pernicious work. + + +XXIV. + +In the beginning of the year 1866 Ludvig David died suddenly in Rome, of +typhoid fever. His sorrowing parents founded in memory of him an +exhibition for law-students which bears and perpetuates his name. The +first executors of the fund were, in addition to his most intimate +friend, two young lawyers named Emil Petersen and Emil Bruun, who had +both been friends of his. The latter, who has not previously been +mentioned in these pages, was a strikingly handsome and clever young +man, remarkable for his calm and superior humour, and exceedingly self- +confident and virile. His attitude towards Ludvig David in his early +youth had been somewhat that of a protector. Unfortunately he was +seriously wounded during the first storming of the Dybböl redoubts by +the Germans; a bullet crushed one of the spinal vertebrae; gradually the +wound brought on consumption of the lungs and he died young. + +Ludvig David's death was a great loss to his friends. It was not only +that he took such an affectionate interest in their welfare and +happiness, but he had a considerable gift for Mathematics and History, +and, from his home training, an understanding of affairs of state which +was considerably above that of most people. Peculiarly his own was a +combination of keen, disintegrating intelligence, and a tendency towards +comprehensive, rounded off, summarising. He had strong public +antipathies. In his opinion the years of peace that had followed the +first war in Slesvig had had an enervating effect; public speakers and +journalists had taken the places of brave men; many a solution of a +difficulty, announced at first with enthusiasm, had in course of time +petrified into a mere set phrase. He thought many of the leading men +among the Liberals superficial and devoid of character, and accused +them, with the pitilessness of youth, of mere verbiage. Influenced as he +was by Kierkegaard, such a man as Bille was naturally his aversion. He +considered--not altogether justly--that Bille cloaked himself in false +earnestness. + +He himself was profoundly and actively philanthropic, with an impulse-- +by no means universal--to relieve and help. Society life he hated; to +him it was waste of time and a torture to be obliged to figure in a +ballroom; he cared very little for his appearance, and was by no means +elegant in his dress. He was happy, however, in the unconstrained +society of the comrades he cared about, enjoyed a merry chat or a +frolicsome party, and in intimate conversation he would reveal his +inmost nature with modest unpretension, with good-natured wit, directed +against himself as much as against others, and with an understanding and +sympathetic eye for his surroundings. His warmest outburst had generally +a little touch of mockery or teasing about it, as though he were +repeating, half roguishly, the feelings of another, rather than +unreservedly expressing his own. But a heartfelt, steadfast look would +often come into his beautiful dark eyes. + + +XXV. + +His death left a great void in his home. His old father said to me one +day: + +"Strange how one ends as one begins! I have written no verses since my +early youth, and now I have written a poem on my grief for Ludvig. I +will read it to you." + +There was an Art and Industrial Exhibition in Stockholm, that Summer, +which C.N. David was anxious to see. As he did not care to go alone, he +took me in his son's place. It was my first journey to a foreign +capital, and as such both enjoyable and profitable. I no longer, it is +true, had the same intense boyish impressionability as when I was in +Sweden for the first time, seven years before. The most trifling thing +then had been an experience. In Göteborg I had stayed with a friend of +my mother's, whose twelve-year-old daughter, Bluma Alida, a wondrously +charming little maiden, had jokingly been destined by the two mothers +for my bride from the child's very birth. And at that time I had +assimilated every impression of people or scenery with a voracious +appetite which rendered these impressions ineffaceable all my life long. +That Summer month, my fancy had transformed every meeting with a young +girl into an adventure and fixed every landscape on my mental retina +with an affection such as the landscape painter generally only feels for +a place where he is specially at home. Then I had shared for a whole +month Göteborg family and social life. Now I was merely travelling as a +tourist, and as the companion of a highly respected old man. + +I was less entranced at Stockholm by the Industrial Exhibition than by +the National Museum and the Royal Theatre, where the lovely Hyasser +captivated me by her beauty and the keen energy of her acting. I became +exceedingly fond of Stockholm, this most beautifully situated of the +Northern capitals, and saw, with reverence, the places associated with +the name of Bellman. I also accompanied my old friend to Ulriksdal, +where the Swedish Queen Dowager expected him in audience. More than an +hour before we reached the Castle he threw away his cigar. + +"I am an old courtier," he remarked. He had always been intimately +associated with the Danish Royal family; for a long time the Crown +Prince used to go regularly to his flat in Queen's Crossway Street, to +be instructed by him in political economy. He was consequently used to +Court ceremonial. + +Beautiful were those Summer days, lovely the light nights in Stockholm. + +One recollection from these weeks is associated with a night when the +sky was overcast. I had wandered round the town, before retiring to +rest, and somewhere, in a large square, slipping my hand in my pocket, +and feeling it full of bits of paper, could not remember how they got +there, and threw them away. When I was nearly back at the hotel it +flashed upon me that it had been small Swedish notes--all the money that +I had changed for my stay in Stockholm--that I had been carrying loose +in my pocket and had so thoughtlessly thrown away. With a great deal of +trouble, I found the square again, but of course not a sign of the +riches that in unpardonable forgetfulness I had scattered to the winds. +I was obliged to borrow six Rigsdaler (a sum of a little over thirteen +shillings) from my old protector. That my requirements were modest is +proved by the fact that this sum sufficed. + +The Danish Ambassador was absent from Stockholm just at this time, and +the Chargé d'Affaires at the Legation had to receive the Danish ex- +Minister in his stead. He was very attentive to us, and took the +travellers everywhere where C.N. David wished his arrival to be made +known. He himself, however, was a most unfortunate specimen of Danish +diplomacy, a man disintegrated by hideous debauchery, of coarse +conversation, and disposition so brutal that he kicked little children +aside with his foot when they got in front of him in the street. +Abnormities of too great irregularity brought about, not long +afterwards, his dismissal and his banishment to a little Danish island. + +This man gave a large dinner-party in honour of the Danish ex-Minister, +to which, amongst others, all the Swedish and Norwegian Ministers in +Stockholm were invited. It was held at Hasselbakken, [Footnote: a +favourite outdoor pleasure resort at Stockholm.] and the arrangements +were magnificent. But what highly astonished me, and was in reality most +out of keeping in such a circle, was the tone that the conversation at +table gradually assumed, and especially the obscenity of the subjects of +conversation. It was not, however, the Ministers and Diplomats present, +but a Danish roué, a professor of Physics, who gave this turn to the +talk. He related anecdotes that would have made a sailor blush. Neither +Count Manderström, nor any of the other Ministers, neither Malmgren, nor +the dignified and handsome Norwegian Minister Bretteville, seemed to be +offended. Manderström's expression, however, changed very noticeably +when the professor ventured to make some pointed insinuations regarding +the Swedish attitude, and his personal attitude in particular, previous +to the Dano-German war and during its course. He suddenly pretended not +to understand, and changed the subject of conversation. + +It produced an extremely painful impression upon me that not only the +Danish Chargé d'Affaires, but apparently several of these fine +gentlemen, had determined on the additional amusement of making me +drunk. Everybody at table vied one with the other to drink my health, +and they informed me that etiquette demanded I should each time empty my +glass to the bottom; the contrary would be a breach of good form. As I +very quickly saw through their intention, I escaped from the difficulty +by asking the waiter to bring me a very small glass. By emptying this I +could, without my manners being affected, hold my own against them all. + +But,--almost for the first time in my life,--when the company rose from +table I felt that I had been in exceedingly bad company, and a disgust +for the nominally highest circles, who were so little capable of acting +in accordance with the reputation they enjoyed, and the polish imputed +to them, remained with me for many years to come. + + + + +FIRST LONG SOJOURN ABROAD + +My Wish to See Paris--_Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_--A +Journey--Impressions of Paris--Lessons in French--Mademoiselle Mathilde +--Taine. + + +I. + +I had wished for years to see Paris, the city that roused my most devout +feelings. As a youth I had felt a kind of reverent awe for the French +Revolution, which represented to me the beginning of human conditions +for all those who were not of the favoured among men,--and Paris was the +city of the Revolution. Moreover, it was the city of Napoleon, the only +ruler since Caesar who had seriously fascinated me, though my feelings +for him changed so much that now admiration, now aversion, got the upper +hand. And Paris was the city, too, of the old culture, the city of +Julian the Apostate, the city of the middle ages, that Victor Hugo had +portrayed in _Notre Dame de Paris_--the first book I had read in +French, difficult though it was with its many peculiar expressions for +Gothic arches and buttresses--and it was the city where Alfred de Musset +had written his poems and where Delacroix had painted. The Louvre and +the Luxembourg, the Théâtre Français and the Gymnase were immense +treasuries that tempted me. In the Autumn of 1866, when Gabriel Sibbern +started to Paris, somewhat before I myself could get away, my last words +to him: "Till we meet again in the Holy City!" were by no means a jest. + + +II. + +Before I could start, I had to finish the pamphlet which, with Sibbern's +help, I had written against Nielsen's adjustment of the split between +Protestant orthodoxy and the scientific view of the universe, and which +I had called _Dualism in our Modern Philosophy_. I was not troubled +with any misgivings as to how I should get the book published. As long +ago as 1864 a polite, smiling, kindly man, who introduced himself to me +as Frederik Hegel, the bookseller, had knocked at the door of my little +room and asked me to let him print the essay which I had written for my +Master of Arts examination, and if possible he would also like the paper +which had won the University gold medal; and in fact, anything else I +might wish published. To my amazed reply that those essays were not +worth publishing, and that in general I did not consider what I wrote +sufficiently mature for publication, Hegel had first suggested that I +should leave that question to the publisher, and then, when he saw that +my refusal was honestly meant, had simply asked me to take my work to +him when I myself considered that the moment had arrived. On this +occasion, as on many others, the acute and daring publisher gave proof +of the _flair_ which made him the greatest in the North. He +accepted the little book without raising any difficulties, merely +remarking that it would have to be spread out a little in the printing, +that it might not look too thin. Even before the pamphlet was mentioned +in the Press, its author was on his way to foreign parts. + + +III. + +On one of the first days of November, I journeyed, in a tremendous +storm, to Lübeck, the characteristic buildings of which (the Church of +Mary, the Exchange, the Town-hall), together with the remains of the old +fortifications, aroused my keen interest. In this Hanse town, with its +strongly individual stamp, I found myself carried back three hundred +years. + +I was amazed at the slave-like dress of the workmen, the pointed hats of +the girls, and the wood pavements, which were new to me. + +I travelled through Germany with a Portuguese, a little doctor from the +University of Coimbra, in whose queer French fifteen was _kouss_ +and Goethe _Shett_. A practical American, wrapped up in a +waterproof, took up three places to lie down in one evening, pretended +to sleep, and never stirred all night, forcing his inexperienced fellow- +travellers to crowd up into the corners of the carriage, and when the +day broke, chatted with them as pleasantly as if they and he were the +best friends in the world. + +At Cologne, where I had stood, reverential, in the noble forest of +pillars in the Cathedral, then afterwards, in my simplicity, allowed +someone to foist a whole case of Eau de Cologne upon me, I shortened my +stay, in my haste to see Paris. But, having by mistake taken a train +which would necessitate my waiting several hours at Liège, I decided +rather to continue my journey to Brussels and see that city too. The run +through Belgium seemed to me heavenly, as for a time I happened to be +quite alone in my compartment and I walked up and down, intoxicated with +the joy of travelling. + +Brussels was the first large French town I saw; it was a foretaste of +Paris, and delighted me. + +Never having been out in the world on my own account before, I was still +as inexperienced and awkward as a child. It was not enough that I had +got into the wrong train; I discovered, to my shame, that I had mislaid +the key of my box, which made me think anxiously of the customs +officials in Paris, and I was also so stupid as to ask the boots in the +Brussels hotel for "a little room," so that they gave me a miserable +little sleeping-place under the roof. + +But at night, after I had rambled about the streets of Brussels, as I +sat on a bench somewhere on a broad boulevard, an overwhelming, +terrifying, transporting sense of my solitariness came over me. It +seemed to me as though now, alone in a foreign land, at night time, in +this human swarm, where no one knew me and I knew no one, where no one +would look for me if anything were to happen to me, I was for the first +time thrown entirely on my own resources, and I recognised in the +heavens, with a feeling of reassurance, old friends among the stars. + +With a guide, whom in my ignorance I thought necessary, I saw the sights +of the town, and afterwards, for the first time, saw a French play. So +little experience of the world had I, that, during the interval, I left +my overcoat, which I had not given up to the attendant, lying on the +seat in the pit, and my neighbour had to explain to me that such great +confidence in my fellow-men was out of place. + +Everything was new to me, everything fascinated me. I, who only knew +"indulgence" from my history lessons at school, saw with keen interest +the priest in a Brussels church dispense "_indulgence plénière_," +or, in Flemish, _vollen aflaet_. I was interested in the curious +names of the ecclesiastical orders posted up in the churches, marvelled, +for instance, at a brotherhood that was called "St. Andrew Avellin, +patron saint against apoplexy, epilepsy and sudden death." + +In the carriage from Brussels I had for travelling companion a pretty +young Belgian girl named Marie Choteau, who was travelling with her +father, but talked all the time to her foreign fellow-traveller, and in +the course of conversation showed me a Belgian history and a Belgian +geography, from which it appeared that Belgium was the centre of the +globe, the world's most densely built over, most religious, and at the +same time most enlightened country, the one which, in proportion to its +size, had the most and largest industries. I gave her some of my +bountiful supply of Eau de Cologne. + + +IV. + +The tiring night-journey, with its full four hours' wait at Liège, was +all pure enjoyment to me, and in a mood of mild ecstasy, at last, at +half-past ten on the morning of November 11th 1866, I made my entry into +Paris, and was received cordially by the proprietors of a modest but +clean little hotel which is still standing, No. 20 Rue Notre Dame des +Victoires, by the proprietors, two simple Lorrainers, François and +Müller, to whom Gabriel Sibbern, who was staying there, had announced my +arrival. The same morning Sibbern guided my first steps to one of +Pasdeloup's great classical popular concerts. + +In the evening, in spite of my fatigue after travelling all night, I +went to the Théâtre Français for the first time, and there, lost in +admiration of the masterly ensemble and the natural yet passionate +acting, with which I had hitherto seen nothing to compare, I saw +Girardin's _Le supplice d'une femme_, and Beaumarchais' _Le +mariage de Figaro_, in one evening making the acquaintance of such +stars as Régnier, Madame Favart, Coquelin and the Sisters Brohan. + +Régnier especially, in his simple dignity, was an unforgettable figure, +being surrounded, moreover, in my eyes by the glory which the well-known +little poem of Alfred de Musset, written to comfort the father's heart, +had shed upon him. Of the two celebrated sisters, Augustine was all wit, +Madeleine pure beauty and arch, melting grace. + +These first days were rich days to me, and as they did not leave me any +time for thinking over what I had seen, my impressions overwhelmed me at +night, till sometimes I could not sleep for sheer happiness. This, to +me, was happiness, an uninterrupted garnering of intellectual wealth in +association with objects that all appealed to my sympathies, and I wrote +home: "To be here, young, healthy, with alert senses, keen eyes and good +ears, with all the curiosity, eagerness to know, love of learning, and +susceptibility to every impression, that is youth's own prerogative, and +to have no worries about home, all that is so great a happiness that I +am sometimes tempted, like Polycrates, to fling the handsome ring I had +from Christian Richardt in the gutter." + +For the rest, I was too fond of characteristic architecture to feel +attracted by the building art displayed in the long, regular streets of +Napoleon III, and too permeated with national prejudices to be able at +once to appreciate French sculpture. I was justified in feeling repelled +by many empty allegorical pieces on public monuments, but during the +first weeks I lacked perception for such good sculpture as is to be +found in the _foyer_ of the Théâtre Français. "You reel at every +step," I wrote immediately after my arrival, "that France has never had a +Thorwaldsen, and that Denmark possesses an indescribable treasure in +him. We are and remain, in three or four directions, the first nation in +Europe. This is pure and simple truth." + +To my youthful ignorance it was the truth, but it hardly remained such +after the first month. + +Being anxious to see as much as possible and not let anything of +interest escape me, I went late to bed, and yet got up early, and tried +to regulate my time, as one does a blanket that is too short. + +I was immensely interested in the art treasures from all over the world +collected in the Louvre. Every single morning, after eating my modest +breakfast at a _crêmerie_ near the château, I paid my vows in the +_Salon carré_ and then absorbed myself in the other halls. The +gallery of the Louvre was the one to which I owe my initiation. Before, +I had seen hardly any Italian art in the original, and no French at all. +In Copenhagen I had been able to worship all the Dutch masters. Leonardo +and the Venetians spoke to me here for the first time. French painting +and sculpture, Puget and Houdon, Clouet and Delacroix, and the French +art that was modern then, I learnt for the first time to love and +appreciate at the Luxembourg. + +I relished these works of art, and the old-time art of the Greeks and +Egyptians which the Museum of the Louvre contained, in a mild +intoxication of delight. + +And I inbreathed Paris into my soul. When on the broad, handsome Place +de la Concorde, I saw at the same time, with my bodily eyes, the +beautifully impressive obelisk, and in my mind's eye the scaffold on +which the royal pair met with their death in the Revolution; when in the +Latin quarter I went upstairs to the house in which Charlotte Corday +murdered Marat, or when, in the highest storey of the Louvre, I gazed at +the little gray coat from Marengo and the three-cornered hat, or from +the Arc de Triomphe let my glance roam over the city, the life that +pulsated through my veins seemed stimulated tenfold by sight and +visions. + +Yet it was not only the city of Paris, its appearance, its art gems, +that I eagerly made my own, and with them much that intellectually +belonged to Italy or the Netherlands; it was French culture, the best +that the French nature contains, the fragrance of her choicest flowers, +that I inhaled. + +And while thus for the first time learning to know French people, and +French intellectual life, I was unexpectedly admitted to constant +association with men and women of the other leading Romance races, +Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, Brazilians. + +Bröchner had given me a letter of introduction to Costanza Testa, a +friend of his youth, now married to Count Oreste Blanchetti and living +in Paris, with her somewhat older sister Virginia, a kind-hearted and +amiable woman of the world. The latter had married in Brazil, as her +second husband, the Italian banker Pagella, and to their house came, not +only Italians and other European Southerners, but members of the South +American colony. + +So warm a reception as I met with from the two sisters and their +husbands I had never had anywhere before. After I had known the two +families one hour, these people treated me as though I were their +intimate friend; Costanza's younger brother, they called me. I had a +seat in their carriage every day, when the ladies drove out in the Bois +de Boulogne; they never had a box at the Italian opera, where Adelina +Patti's first notes were delighting her countrymen, without sending me a +seat. They expected me every evening, however late it often might be +when I came from the theatre, in their drawing-room, where, according to +the custom of their country, they always received the same circle of +friends. + +I was sincerely attached to the two sisters, and felt myself at ease in +their house, although the conversation there was chiefly carried on in a +language of which I understood but little, since French was spoken only +on my account. The only shadow over my pleasure at spending my evenings +in the Rue Valois du Roule was the fact that this necessitated my +missing some acts at the Théâtre Français, for which the Danish +Minister, through the Embassy, had procured me a free pass. Certainly no +Dane was ever made so happy by the favour. They were enraptured hours +that I spent evening after evening in the French national theatre, where +I became thoroughly acquainted with the modern, as well as the +classical, dramatic repertoire,--an acquaintance which was further +fortified during my long stay in Paris in 1870. + +I enjoyed the moderation of the best actors, their restraint, and +subordination of self to the rôle and the general effect. It is true +that the word genius could only be applied to a very few of the actors, +and at that time I saw none who, in my opinion, could be compared with +the great representatives of the Danish stage, such as Michael Wiehe, +Johanne Luise Heiberg, or Phister. But I perceived at once that the +mannerisms of these latter would not be tolerated here for a moment; +here, under the influence of this artistic whole-harmony, they would +never have been able to give free vent to individuality and peculiarity +as they did at home. + +I saw many hundred performances in these first years of my youth at the +Théâtre Français, which was then at its zenith. There, if anywhere, I +felt the silent march of the French muses through Time and Space. + + +V. + +A capable journalist named Grégoire, a sickly, prematurely aged, limping +fellow, with alert wits, an Alsatian, who knew Danish and regularly read +Bille's _Daily Paper_, had in many ways taken me up almost from the +first day of my sojourn on French soil. This man recommended me, on my +expressing a wish to meet with a competent teacher, to take instruction +in the language from a young girl, a friend of his sister, who was an +orphan and lived with her aunt. She was of good family, the daughter of +a colonel and the granddaughter of an admiral, but her own and her +aunt's circumstances were narrow, and she was anxious to give lessons. + +When I objected that such lessons could hardly be really instructive, I +was told that she was not only in every way a nice but a very gifted and +painstaking young girl. + +The first time I entered the house, as a future pupil, I found the young +lady, dressed in a plain black silk dress, surrounded by a circle of +toddlers of both sexes, for whom she had a sort of school, and whom on +my arrival she sent away. She had a pretty figure, a face that was +attractive without being beautiful, a large mouth with good teeth, and +dark brown hair. Her features were a little indefinite, her face rather +broad than oval, her eyes brown and affectionate. She had at any rate +the beauty that twenty years lends. We arranged for four lessons a week, +to begin with. + +The first dragged considerably. My teacher was to correct any mistakes +in pronunciation and grammar that I made in conversation. But we could +not get up any proper conversation. She was evidently bored by the +lessons, which she had only undertaken for the sake of the fees. If I +began to tell her anything, she only half listened, and yawned with all +her might very often and very loudly, although she politely put her hand +in front of her large mouth. There only came a little animation into her +expression when I either pronounced as badly as I had been taught by my +French master at school, or made some particularly ludicrous mistake, +such as _c'est tout égal_ for _bien égal_. At other times she +was distracted, sleepy, her thoughts elsewhere. + +After having tried vainly for a few times to interest the young lady by +my communications, I grew tired of the lessons. Moreover, they were of +very little advantage to me, for the simple reason that my youthful +teacher had not the very slightest scientific or even grammatical +knowledge of her own tongue, and consequently could never answer my +questions as to _why_ you had to pronounce in such and such a way, +or by virtue of what _rule_ you expressed yourself in such and such +a manner. I began to neglect my lessons, sometimes made an excuse, but +oftener remained away without offering any explanation. + +On my arrival one afternoon, after having repeatedly stayed away, the +young lady met me with some temper, and asked the reason of my failures +to come, plainly enough irritated and alarmed at my indifference, which +after all was only the reflection of her own. I promised politely to be +more regular in future. To insure this, she involuntarily became more +attentive. + +She yawned no more. I did not stay away again. + +She began to take an interest herself in this eldest pupil of hers, who +at 24 years of age looked 20 and who was acquainted with all sorts of +things about conditions, countries, and people of which she knew +nothing. + +She had been so strictly brought up that nearly all secular reading was +forbidden to her, and she had never been to any theatre, not even the +Théâtre Français. She had not read Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Musset, +had not even dared to read _Paul et Virginie_, only knew expurgated +editions of Corneille, Racine and Molière. She was sincerely clerical, +had early been somewhat influenced by her cousin, later the well-known +Roman Catholic author, Ernest Hello, and in our conversations was always +ready to take the part of the Jesuits against Pascal; what the latter +had attacked were some antiquated and long-abandoned doctrinal books; +even if there were defects in the teaching of certain Catholic +ecclesiastics, their lives at any rate were exemplary, whereas the +contrary was the case with the free-thinking men of science; their +teaching was sometimes unassailable, but the lives they led could not be +taken seriously. + +When we two young people got into a dispute, we gradually drew nearer to +one another. Our remarks contradicted each other, but an understanding +came about between our eyes. One day, as I was about to leave, she +called me back from the staircase, and, very timidly, offered me an +orange. The next time she blushed slightly when I came in. She +frequently sent me cards of admission to the Athénée, a recently started +institution, in which lectures were given by good speakers. She began to +look pleased at my coming and to express regret at the thought of my +departure. + +On New Year's day, as a duty gift, I had sent her a bouquet of white +flowers, and the next day she had tears in her eyes as she thanked me: +"I ask you to believe that I highly appreciate your attention." From +that time forth she spoke more and more often of how empty it would be +for her when I was gone. I was not in love with her, but was too young +for her feelings, so unreservedly expressed, to leave me unaffected, and +likewise young enough to imagine that she expected me before long to ask +for her hand. So I soon informed her that I did not feel so warmly +towards her as she did towards me, and that I was not thinking of +binding myself for the present. + +"Do you think me so poor an observer?" she replied, amazed. "I have +never made any claims upon you, even in my thoughts. But I owe you the +happiest month of my life." + + +VI. + +This was about the state of affairs between Mademoiselle Louise and me, +when one evening, at Pagella's, where there were Southerners of various +races present, I was introduced to a young lady, Mademoiselle Mathilde +M., who at first sight made a powerful impression upon me. + +She was a young Spanish Brazilian, tall of stature, a proud and dazzling +racial beauty. The contours of her head were so impeccably perfect that +one scarcely understood how Nature could have made such a being +inadvertently, without design. The rosy hue of her complexion made the +carnation even of a beautiful woman's face look chalky or crimson by the +side of hers. At the same time there was a something in the colour of +her skin that made me understand better the womanish appearance of +Zurbaran and Ribera, a warm glow which I had never seen in Nature +before. Her heavy, bluish-black hair hung down, after the fashion of the +day, in little curls over her forehead and fell in thick ringlets upon +her shoulders. Her eyebrows were exquisitely pencilled, arched and +almost met over her delicate nose, her eyes were burning and a deep +brown; they conquered, and smiled; her mouth was a little too small, +with white teeth that were a little too large, her bust slender and +full. Her manner was distinguished, her voice rich; but most marvellous +of all was her hand, such a hand as Parmeggianino might have painted, +all soul, branching off into five delightful fingers. + +Mentally I unhesitatingly dubbed her the most marvelous feminine +creature I had ever seen, and that less on account of her loveliness +than the blending of the magnificence of her bearing with the ardour, +and often the frolicsomeness, of her mode of expression. + +She was always vigorous and sometimes daring in her statements, cared +only for the unusual, loved only "the impossible," but nevertheless +carefully observed every established custom of society. To my very first +remark to her, to the effect that the weakness of women was mostly only +an habitual phrase; they were not weak except when they wished to be, +she replied: "Young as you are, you know women very well!" In that she +was quite wrong. + +Besides Spanish and Portuguese, she spoke French perfectly and English +not badly, sang in a melodious contralto voice, drew well for an +amateur, carved alabaster vases, and had all kinds of talents. She did +not care to sing ballads, only cared for grand pathos. + +She was just twenty years of age, and had come into the world at Rio, +where her father represented the Spanish government. The family were +descended from Cervantes. As she had early been left motherless, her +father had sent her over in her fifteenth year to her aunt in Paris. +This latter was married to an old monstrosity of a Spaniard, religious +to the verge of insanity, who would seem to have committed some crime in +his youth and now spent his whole day in the church, which was next door +to his house, imploring forgiveness for his sins. He was only at home at +mealtimes, when he ate an alarming amount, and he associated only with +priests. The aunt herself, however, in spite of her age, was a pleasure- +seeking woman, rarely allowed her niece to stay at home and occupy +herself as she liked, but dragged her everywhere about with her to +parties and balls. In her aunt's company she sometimes felt depressed, +but alone she was cheerful and without a care. At the Pagellas' she was +like a child of the house. She had the Spanish love of ceremony and +magnificence, the ready repartee of the Parisian, and, like a well- +brought-up girl, knew how to preserve the balance between friendliness +and mirth. She was not in the least prudish, and she understood +everything; but there was a certain sublimity in her manner. + +While Mademoiselle Louise, the little Parisian, had been brought up in a +convent, kept from all free, intelligent, mundane conversation, and all +free artistic impressions, the young Spaniard, at the same age, had the +education and the style of a woman of the world in her manner. + +We two young frequenters of the Pagella salon, felt powerfully drawn to +one another. We understood one another at once. Of course, it was only I +who was fascinated. When, in an evening, I drove across Paris in the +expectation of seeing her, I sometimes murmured to myself Henrik Hertz's +verse: + + "My beloved is like the dazzling day, + Brazilia's Summer!" + +My feelings, however, were much more admiration than love or desire. I +did not really want to possess her. I never felt myself quite on a level +with her even when she made decided advances to me. I rejoiced over her +as over something perfect, and there was the rich, foreign colouring +about her that there had been about the birds of paradise in my nursery. +She seldom disturbed my peace of mind, but I said to myself that if I +were to go away then, I should in all probability never see her again, +as her father would be taking her the next year to Brazil or Madrid, and +I sometimes felt as though I should be going away from my happiness +forever. She often asked me to stay with such expressions and with such +an expression that I was quite bewildered. And then she monopolised my +thoughts altogether, like the queenly being she was. + +A Danish poet had once called the beautiful women of the South "Large, +showy flowers without fragrance." Was she a large, showy flower? Forget- +me-nots were certainly by no means showy, but they were none the more +odorous for that. + +Now that I was seeing the radiant Mathilde almost every day, my position +with regard to Louise seemed to me a false one. I did not yet know how +exceedingly rare an undivided feeling is, did not understand that my +feelings towards Mathilde were just as incomplete as those I cherished +for Louise. I looked on Mademoiselle Mathilde as on a work of art, but I +came more humanly close to Mademoiselle Louise. She did not evoke my +enthusiastic admiration; that was quite true, but Mademoiselle Mathilde +evoked my enthusiastic admiration only. If there were a great deal of +compassion mingled with my feelings for the Parisian, there was likewise +a slight erotic element. + +The young Frenchwoman, in her passion, found expressions for affection +and tenderness, in which she forgot all pride. She lived in a +commingling, very painful for me, of happiness at my still being in +Paris, and of horror at my approaching departure, which I was now about +to accelerate, merely to escape from the extraordinary situation in +which I found myself, and which I was too young to carry. Although +Mathilde, whom I had never seen alone, was always the same, quite the +great lady, perfectly self-controlled, it was the thought of saying +good-bye to her that was the more painful to me. Every other day, on the +other hand, Louise was trembling and ill, and I dreaded the moment of +separation. + + +VII. + +I had not left off my daily work in Paris, but had read industriously at +the Imperial Library. I had also attended many lectures, some +occasionally, others regularly, such as those of Janet, Caro, Lévêque +and Taine. + +Of all contemporary French writers, I was fondest of Taine. I had begun +studying this historian and thinker in Copenhagen. The first book of his +that I read was _The French Philosophers of the Nineteenth +Century_, in a copy that had been lent to me by Gabriel Sibbern. The +book entranced me, and I determined to read every word that I could get +hold of by the same author. In the Imperial Library in Paris I read +first of all _The History of English Literature_, of which I had +hitherto only been acquainted with a few fragments, which had appeared +in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. Taine was to me an antidote to +German abstraction and German pedantry. Through him I found the way to +my own inmost nature, which my Dano-German University education had +covered over. + +Shortly after my arrival in Paris, therefore, I had written to Taine and +begged for an interview. By a singular piece of ill-luck his reply to me +was lost, and it was only at the very end of my stay that I received a +second invitation to go to him. Although this one conversation could not +be of any vast importance to me, it was nevertheless the first personal +link between me and the man who was and remained my greatly loved master +and deliverer, even though I mistrusted his essential teachings. I was +afraid that I had created a bad impression, as I had wasted the time +raising objections; but Taine knew human nature well enough to perceive +the personality behind the clumsy form and the admiration behind the +criticism. In reality, I was filled with passionate gratitude towards +Taine, and this feeling remained unaltered until his latest hour. + +During this my first stay in Paris I added the impression of Taine's +personality to the wealth of impressions that I took back with me from +Paris to Copenhagen. + + + + +EARLY MANHOOD + +Feud in Danish Literature--Riding--Youthful Longings--On the Rack--My +First Living Erotic Reality--An Impression of the Miseries of Modern +Coercive Marriage--Researches on the Comic--Dramatic Criticism--A Trip +to Germany--Johanne Louise Heiberg--Magdalene Thoresen--Rudolph Bergh-- +The Sisters Spang--A Foreign Element--The Woman Subject--Orla Lehmann-- +M. Goldschmidt--Public Opposition--A Letter from Björnstjerne Björnson-- +Hard Work. + + +I. + +After my return from France to Denmark, in 1867, my thoughts were taken +up once more by the feud that had broken out in Danish literature +between Science and so-called Revelation (in the language of the time, +Faith and Knowledge). More and more had by degrees entered the lists, +and I, who centred my greatest intellectual interest in the battle, took +part in it with a dual front, against the orthodox theologians, and more +especially against R. Nielsen, the assailant of the theologians, whom I +regarded as no less theologically inclined than his opponents. + +I thereby myself became the object of a series of violent attacks from +various quarters. These did not have any appreciable effect on my +spirits, but they forced me for years into a somewhat irritating +attitude of self-defence. Still I was now arrived at that period of my +youth when philosophy and art were unable to keep temperament in check. + + +II. + +This manifested itself first in a fresh need for physical exercise. +During the first two years after the decision of 1864, while things were +leading up to war between Prussia and Austria, and while the young blood +of Denmark imagined that their country would be drawn into this war, I +had taken part, as a member of the Academic Shooting Society, in drill +and shooting practice. After the battle of Königgratz these occupations +lost much of their attraction. + +I was now going in for an exercise that was new to me and which I had +long wished to become proficient in. This was riding. + +Up to that time I had never been able to afford to ride. But just then a +captain of the dragoons offered to teach me for a very low fee, and in +the Queen's Riding-School I was initiated during the Spring months into +the elementary stages of the art, in order that in Summer I might be +able to ride out. These riding-lessons were the keenest possible delight +to me. I, who so seldom felt happy, and still more seldom jubilant, was +positively exultant as I rode out in the morning along the Strand Road. +Even if I had had an almost sleepless night I felt fresh on horseback. + +It was no pleasure to me to ride the same horse often, if I knew its +disposition. I liked to change as often as possible, and preferred +rather difficult horses to mares too well broken in. I felt the arrogant +pride of youth seethe in my veins as I galloped briskly along. + +I was still far from an accomplished horseman when an examination of my +finances warned me that I must give up my riding lessons. + +When I informed my instructor that I could no longer allow myself the +pleasure of his lessons, and in reply to his "Why?" had mentioned the +reason, the captain answered that it would be very easy to settle that +matter: he had a sister, an elderly maiden lady, who was passionately +fond of literature and literary history. Lessons in that subject could +to our mutual satisfaction balance the riding lessons, which could thus +go on indefinitely. It is unnecessary to say how welcome the proposition +was to me. It was such a relief! + +The captain was a pleasant, good-natured man, quite uneducated in +literary matters, who confidingly communicated his bachelor experiences +to his pupil. These were summed up in the reflection that when womenkind +fall in love, they dread neither fire nor water; the captain himself, +who yet, in his own opinion, only looked well on horseback, had once had +an affair with a married lady who bombarded him with letters, and who, +in her ardour, began writing one day without noticing that her husband, +who was standing behind her chair, was looking over her shoulder. Since +then the captain had not felt the need of women, so to speak, preferred +to be without them, and found his greatest pleasure in his horses and +his skill as an equestrian. + +The sister was a maiden lady of forty, by no means devoid of +intellectual ability, with talent for observation and an appreciation of +good books, but whose development had been altogether neglected. She now +cherished an ambition to write. She wrote in secret little tales that +were not really stupid but had not the slightest pretensions to style or +literary talent. She was very plain and exceedingly stout, which +produced a comical effect, especially as she was inclined to +exaggeration both of speech and gesture. + +There was a disproportion between the ages of the master and the pupil; +in my eyes she was quite an old person, in her eyes, being her +intellectual equal, I was likewise her equal in age. In the natural +order of things she felt more personal sympathy for me than I for her. +Consequently, I involuntarily put a dash of teasing into my instruction, +and occasionally made fun of her sentimentality, and when the large +lady, half angry, half distressed, rose to seize hold of me and give me +a shaking, I would run round the table, pursued by her, or shoot out a +chair between her and myself,--which indubitably did not add to the +dignity of our lessons. + +There was no question of thorough or connected instruction. What the +lady wanted more particularly was that I should go through her literary +attempts and correct them, but corrections could not transform them into +art. And so it came about that after no very long time I gave up these +arduous lessons, although obliged to give up my precious riding lessons +at the same time. + +Consequently I never became a really expert rider, although during the +next few years I had a ride now and then. But after a severe attack of +phlebitis following upon typhoid fever, in 1870-71, I was compelled to +give up all the physical exercises that I loved best. + + +III. + +My temperament expressed itself in a profusion of youthful longings, as +well as in my love of athletics. + +During my University studies, in my real budding manhood, I had +voluntarily cut myself away from the usual erotic diversions of youth. +Precocious though I was in purely intellectual development, I was very +backward in erotic experience. In that respect I was many years younger +than my age. + +On my return, my Paris experiences at first exercised me greatly. +Between the young French lady and myself an active correspondence had +sprung up, while the young Spaniard's radiant figure continued to retain +the same place in my thoughts. + +Then my surroundings claimed their rights, and it was not without +emotion that I realised how charming the girls at home were. For I was +only then entering upon the Cherubino stage of my existence, when the +sight of feminine grace or beauty immediately transports a youth into a +mild state of love intoxication. + +It was incredible how rich the world was in bewitching creatures, and +the world of Copenhagen especially. If you walked down Crown Princess +Street, at a window on the ground floor you saw a dark girl with a +Grecian-shaped head and two brown eyes, exquisitely set, beneath a high +and noble forehead. She united the chaste purity of Pallas Athene with a +stern, attractive grace. + +If you went out towards the north side of the town, there was a house +there on the first floor of which you were very welcome, where a +handsome and well-bred couple once a week received young men for the +sake of the lady's young niece. The master of the house was a lean and +silent man, who always looked handsome, and was always dignified; he had +honourably filled an exalted official post. His wife had been very +attractive in her youth, had grown white while still quite young, and +was now a handsome woman with snow-white curls clustering round her +fresh-coloured face. To me she bore, as it were, an invisible mark upon +her forehead, for when quite a young girl she had been loved by a great +man. She was sincerely kind and genuinely pleasant, but the advantage of +knowing her was not great; for that she was too restless a hostess. When +it was her At Home she never remained long enough with one group of +talkers properly to understand what was being discussed. After about a +minute she hurried off to the opposite corner of the drawing-room, said +a few words there, and then passed on to look after the tea. + +It was neither to see her nor her husband that many of the young people +congregated at the house. It was for the sake of the eighteen-year-old +fairy maiden, her niece, whose face was one to haunt a man's dreams. It +was not from her features that the witchery emanated, although in shape +her face was a faultless oval, her narrow forehead high and well-shaped, +her chin powerful. Neither was it from the personality one obtained a +glimpse of through her features. The girl's character and mental quality +seemed much the same as that of other girls; she was generally silent, +or communicative about trifles, and displayed no other coquetry than the +very innocent delight in pleasing which Nature itself would demand. + +But all the same there was a fascination about her, as about a fairy +maiden. There was a yellow shimmer about her light hair; azure flames +flashed from her blue eyes. These flames drew a magic circle about her, +and the dozen young men who had strayed inside the circle flocked round +her aunt the evening in the week that the family were "at home" and sat +there, vying with each other for a glance from those wondrous eyes, +hating each other with all their hearts, and suffering from the +ridiculousness of yet meeting like brothers, week after week, as guests +in the same house. The young girl's male relatives, who had outgrown +their enthusiasm for her, declared that her character was not good and +reliable--poor child! had she to be all that, too? Others who did not +ask so much were content to enjoy the sound of her voice. + +She was not a Copenhagen girl, only spent a few Winters in the town, +then disappeared again. + +Some years after, it was rumoured, to everybody's astonishment, that she +had married a widower in a provincial town--she who belonged to the +realms of Poesy! + +Then there was another young girl, nineteen. Whereas the fairy maiden +did not put herself out to pretend she troubled her head about the young +men whom she fascinated with the rhythm of her movements or the +radiation of her loveliness, was rather inclined to be short in her +manner, a little staccato in her observations, too accustomed to +admiration to attract worshippers to herself by courting them, too +undeveloped and impersonal to consciously assert herself--this other +girl was of quite another sort. She had no innate irresistibility, but +was a shrewd and adaptable human girl. Her face did not attract by its +beauty, though she was very much more beautiful than ugly, with a +delicately hooked nose, a mouth full of promise, an expression of +thoughtfulness and determination. When she appeared at a ball, men's +eyes lingered on her neck, and even more on her white back, with its +firm, smooth skin, and fine play of the muscles; for if she did not +allow very much of her young bust to be seen, her dress at the back was +cut down nearly to her belt. Her voice was a deep contralto, and she +knew how to assume an expression of profound gravity and reflection. But +she captivated most by her attentiveness. When a young man whom she +wished to attract commenced a conversation with her, she never took her +eyes from his, or rather she gazed into his, and showed such a rapt +attention to his words, such an interest in his thoughts and his +occupations, that after meeting her once he never forgot her again. Her +coquetry did not consist of languishing glances, but of a pretended +sympathy, that flattered and delighted its object. + + +IV. + +These Danish girls were likely to appeal to a young man just returned +from travels abroad, during which his emotions had been doubly stirred, +for the first time, by feminine affection and by enthusiasm for a woman. +They influenced me the more strongly because they were Danish, and +because I, who loved everything Danish, from the language to the +monuments, had, since the war, felt something lacking in everyone, man +or woman, who was foreign to Denmark. + +But in the midst of all these visitations of calf-love, and their +vibrations among undefined sensations, I was pulled back with a jerk, as +it were, to my earlier and deepest impression, that of the loveliness +and exalted person of the young Spaniard. Letters from Paris furrowed my +mind like steamers the waters of a lake, made it foam, and the waves run +high, left long streaks across its wake. Not that Mlle. Mathilde sent +letters to me herself, but her Italian lady and gentlemen friends wrote +for her, apparently in her name, loudly lamenting my unreasonable +departure, wishing and demanding my return, telling me how she missed +me, sometimes how angry she was. + +I was too poor to be able to return at once. I did what I could to +procure money, wrote to those of my friends whom I thought could best +afford it and on whom I relied most, but met with refusals, which made +me think of the messages Timon of Athens received in response to similar +requests. Then I staked in the lottery and did not win. + +Urged from France to return, and under the high pressure of my own +romantic imagination, it seemed clear to me all at once that I ought to +unite my lot for good to that of this rare and beautiful woman, whom, it +is true, I had never spoken to one minute alone, who, moreover, had +scarcely anything in common with me, but who, just by the dissimilarity +of her having been born of Spanish parents in Rio, and I of a Danish +father and mother in Copenhagen, seemed destined by Fate for me, as I +for her. The Palm and the Fir-tree had dreamed of one another, and could +never meet; but men and women could, however far apart they might have +been born. In the middle of the Summer of 1867 I was as though possessed +by the thought that she and I ought to be united. + +The simplest objection of all, namely, that I, who was scarcely able to +support myself, could not possibly support a wife, seemed to me +altogether subordinate. My motives were purely chivalric; I could not +leave her in the lurch, as the miserable hero of Andersen's _Only a +Player_ did Noomi. And a vision of her compelling loveliness hovered +before my eyes. + +The whole of the month of July and part of the month of August I was on +the rack, now passionately desiring a successful issue of my plans, now +hoping just as ardently that they would be stranded through the +opposition of the foreign family; for I was compelled to admit to myself +that the beautiful Spaniard would be very unsuited to Copenhagen, would +freeze there, mentally as well as literally. And I said to myself every +day that supposing the war expected in Denmark were to break out again, +and the young men were summoned to arms, the most insignificant little +Danish girl would make me a better Valkyrie; all my feelings would be +foreign to her, and possibly she would not even be able to learn Danish. +Any other woman would understand more of my mind than she. And yet! Yet +she was the only one for me. + +Thus I was swayed by opposing wishes the whole of the long time during +which the matter was pending and uncertain. I was so exhausted by +suspense that I only kept up by taking cold baths twice a day and by +brisk rides. The mere sight of a postman made my heart beat fast. The +scorn heaped upon me in the Danish newspapers had a curious effect upon +me under these circumstances; it seemed to me to be strangely far away, +like blows at a person who is somewhere else. + +I pondered all day on the painful dilemma in which I was placed; I +dreamt of my Dulcinea every night, and began to look as exhausted as I +felt. One day that I went to Fredensborg, in response to an invitation +from Frederik Paludan-Müller, the poet said to me: "Have you been ill +lately? You look so pale and shaken." I pretended not to care; whatever +I said or did in company was incessant acting. + +I experienced revulsions of feeling similar to those that troubled Don +Quixote. Now I saw in my distant Spanish maiden the epitome of +perfection, now the picture melted away altogether; even my affection +for her then seemed small, artificial, whimsical, half-forgotten. And +then again she represented supreme happiness. + +When the decision came, when,--as everyone with the least experience of +the world could have foretold,--all the beautiful dreams and audacious +plans collapsed suddenly, I felt as though this long crisis had thrown +me back indescribably; my intellectual development had been at a +standstill for months. It was such a feeling as when the death of some +loved person puts an end to the long, tormenting anxiety of the +foregoing illness. I, who had centred everything round one thought, must +now start joylessly along new paths. My outburst,--which astonished +myself,--was: + +"How I wanted a heart!" + + +V. + +I could not at once feel it a relief that my fancies had all been +dissipated into thin air. Physically I was much broken down, but, with +my natural elasticity, quickly recovered. Yet in my relations towards +the other sex I was torn as I had never been before. My soul, or more +exactly, that part of my psychical life bordering on the other sex, was +like a deep, unploughed field, waiting for seed. + +It was not much more than a month before the field was sown. Amongst my +Danish acquaintances there was only one, a young and very beautiful +widow, upon whom, placed as I was with regard to Mile. Mathilde, I had +definitely counted. I should have taken the young Spaniard to her; she +alone would have understood her--they would have been friends. + +There had for a long time been warm feelings of sympathy between her and +me. It so chanced that she drew much closer to me immediately after the +decisive word had been spoken. She became, consequently, the only one to +whom I touched upon the wild fancies to which I had given myself up, and +confided the dreams with which I had wasted my time. She listened to me +sympathetically, no little amazed at my being so devoid of practical +common sense. She stood with both feet on the earth; but she had one +capacity that I had not met with before in any young woman--the capacity +for enthusiasm. She had dark eyes, with something melancholy in their +depths; but when she spoke of anything that roused her enthusiasm, her +eyes shone like stars. + +She pointed out how preposterous it was in me to wish to seek so far +away a happiness that perhaps was very close to me, and how even more +preposterous to neglect, as I had done, my studies and intellectual aims +for a fantastic love. And for the first time in my life, a young woman +spoke to me of my abilities and of the impression she had received of +them, partly through the reading of the trifles that I had had printed, +partly, and more particularly, through her long talks with me. Neither +the little French girl nor the young Spanish lady had ever spoken to me +of myself, my talents, or my future; this Danish woman declared that she +knew me through and through. And the new thing about it all, the thing +hitherto unparalleled in my experience, was that she believed in me. +More than that: she had the highest possible conception of my abilities, +asserted in contradiction to my own opinion, that I was already a man of +unusual mark, and was ardently ambitious for me. + +Just at this moment, when so profoundly disheartened, and when in idle +hopes and plans I had lost sight of my higher goal, by her firm belief +in me she imparted to me augmented self-respect. Her confidence in me +gave me increasing confidence in myself, and a vehement gratitude awoke +in me for the good she thus did me. + +Then it happened that one day, without preamble, she admitted that the +interest she felt in me was not merely an intellectual one; things had +now gone so far that she could think of nothing but me. + +My whole nature was shaken to its foundations. Up to this time I had +only regarded her as my friend and comforter, had neither felt nor +fought against any personal attraction. But she had scarcely spoken, +before she was transformed in my eyes. The affection I had thirsted for +was offered to me here. The heart I had felt the need of was this heart. +And it was not only a heart that was offered me, but a passion that +scorned scruples. + +In my austere youth hitherto, I had not really had erotic experiences +whatever. I had led the chaste life of the intellectual worker. My +thoughts had been the thoughts of a man; they had ascended high and had +delved deep, but my love affairs had been the enthusiasms and fancies of +a half-grown boy, chimeras and dreams. This young woman was my first +living erotic reality. + +And suddenly, floodgates seemed to open within me. Streams of lava, +streams of molten fire, rushed out over my soul. I loved for the first +time like a man. + +The next few days I went about as if lifted above the earth; in the +theatre, in the evening, I could not follow the performance, but sat in +the pit with my face in my hands, full of my new destiny, as though my +heart would burst. + +And yet it was more a physical state, an almost mechanical outcome of +what to me was overwhelmingly new, association with a woman. It was not +because it was just this particular woman. For my emotional nature was +so composite that even in the first moment of my bliss I did not regard +this bliss as unmixed. From the very first hour, I felt a gnawing regret +that it was not I who had desired her, but she who had chosen me, so +that my love in my heart of hearts was only a reflection of hers. + + +VI. + +About this time it so happened that another woman began to engage my +thoughts, but in an altogether different manner. Circumstances resulted +in my being taken into the secret of unhappy and disturbing domestic +relations in a well-to-do house to which I was frequently invited, and +where to all outward seeming all the necessary conditions of domestic +happiness were present. + +The master of the house had in his younger days been a very handsome +man, lazy, not clever, and of an exceedingly passionate temper. He was +the son of a man rich, worthy and able, but of a very weak character, +and of a kept woman who had been the mistress of a royal personage. +Through no fault of his own, he had inherited his mother's professional +vices, persistent untruthfulness, a comedian's manner, prodigality, a +love of finery and display. He was quite without intellectual interests, +but had a distinguished bearing, a winning manner, and no gross vices. + +His wife, who, for family reasons, had been married to him much too +young, had never loved him, and never been suited to him. As an +innocent, ignorant girl, she had been placed in the arms of a man who +was much the worse for a reckless life, and suffering from an illness +that necessitated nursing, and made him repulsive to her. Every day that +passed she suffered more from being bound to a man whose slightest +movement was objectionable to her and whose every remark a torture. In +the second decade of her marriage the keenest marital repulsion had +developed in her; this was so strong that she sometimes had to pull +herself together in order, despite her maternal feelings, not to +transfer her dislike to the children, who were likewise his, and in whom +she dreaded to encounter his characteristics. + +Towards her, the man was despotic and cunning, but not unkind, and in so +far excusable that, let him have done what he might, she could not have +got rid of the hatred that plagued him and consumed her. So dissimilar +were their two natures. + +Her whole aim and aspiration was to get the bond that united them +dissolved. But this he would not hear of, for many reasons, and more +especially from dislike of scandal. He regarded himself, and according +to the usual conception of the words, justly so, as a good husband and +father. He asked for no impossible sacrifice from his wife, and he was +affectionate to his children. He could not help her detesting him, and +indeed, did not fully realise that she did. And yet, it was difficult +for him to misunderstand. For his wife scarcely restrained her aversion +even when there were guests in the house. If he told an untruth, she +kept silence with her lips, but scarcely with her expression. And she +would sometimes talk of the faults and vices that she most abhorred, and +then name his. + +The incessant agitation in which she lived had made her nervous and +restless to excess. As the feminine craving to be able, in marriage, to +look up to the man, had never been satisfied, she only enacted the more +vehemently veracity, firmness and intellect in men. But undeveloped as +she was, and in despair over the dissatisfaction, the drowsiness, and +the darkness in which her days glided away, whatever invaded the +stagnation and lighted up the darkness: sparkle, liveliness, brilliance +and wit, were estimated by her more highly than they deserved to be. + +At first when, in the desolation of her life, she made advances to me, +this repelled me somewhat. The equestrian performer in Heiberg's Madame +Voltisubito cannot sing unless she hears the crack of a whip. Thus it +seemed to me that her nature could not sing, save to the accompaniment +of all the cart, carriage and riding whips of the mind. But I saw how +unhappy she was, and that the intense strain of her manner was only an +expression of it. + +She could not know the beauty of inward peace, and in spite of her +Protestant upbringing she had retained all the unaffectedness and +sincerity of the natural human being, all the obstinate love of freedom, +unmoved in the least by what men call discipline, ethics, Christianity, +convention. She did not believe in it all, she had seen what it resulted +in, and what it covered up, and she passed her life in unmitigated +despair, which was ordinarily calm to all appearance, but in reality +rebellious: what she was enduring was the attempted murder of her soul. + +To all that she suffered purely mentally from her life with her husband +in the home that was no home at all, there had of late been added +circumstances which likewise from a practical point of view made +interference and alteration necessary. Her lord and master had always +been a bad manager, in fact worse than that; in important matters, +thoroughly incapable and fatuous. That had not mattered much hitherto, +since others had looked after his affairs; but now the control of them +had fallen entirely into his own hands, and he managed them in such a +way that expenses increased at a terrific rate, while his income +diminished with equal rapidity, and the question of total ruin only +seemed a matter of time. + +His wife had no outside support. She was an orphan and friendless. Her +husband's relations did not like her and did not understand her. And yet +just at this time she required as a friend a man who understood her and +could help her to save her own and the children's fortunes from the +shipwreck, before it was too late. She felt great confidence in me, whom +she had met, at intervals, from my boyhood, and she now opened her heart +to me in conversation more and more. She confided in me fully, gave me a +complete insight into the torture of her life, and implored me to help +her to acquire her freedom. + +Thus it was that while still quite a young man a powerful, never-to-be- +effaced impression of the miseries of modern coercive marriage was +produced upon me. The impression was not merely powerful, but it waked, +like a cry of distress, both my thinking powers and my energy. As +through a chink in the smooth surface of society, I looked down into the +depths of horror. Behind the unhappiness of one, I suspected that of a +hundred thousand, knew that of a hundred thousand. And I felt myself +vehemently called upon, not only to name the horror by its name, but to +step in, as far as I was able, and prevent the thing spreading unheeded. + +Scales had fallen from my eyes. Under the semblance of affection and +peace, couples were lacerating one another by the thousand, swallowed up +by hatred and mutual aversion. The glitter of happiness among those +higher placed dazzled the thoughtless and the credulous. He who had eyes +to see, observed how the wretchedness due to the arrangement of society, +wound itself right up to its pinnacles. + +The vices and paltrinesses of the individual could not be directly +remedied; inherited maladies and those brought upon one's self, +stupidity and folly, brutality and malice, undeniably existed. But the +institutions of society ought to be so planned as to render these +destructive forces inoperative, or at least diminish their harmfulness, +not so as to give them free scope and augment their terrors by securing +them victims. + +In marriage, the position of the one bound against his or her will was +undignified, often desperate, but worst in the case of a woman. As a +mother she could be wounded in her most vulnerable spot, and what was +most outrageous of all, she could be made a mother against her will. One +single unhappy marriage had shown me, like a sudden revelation, what +marriage in countless cases is, and how far from free the position of +woman still was. + +But that woman should be oppressed in modern society, that the one-half +of the human race could be legally deprived of their rights, revealed +that justice in society, as it at present stood, was in a sorry state. +In the relations between the strong and the weak, the rich and the poor, +the same legalised disproportion would necessarily prevail as between +man and woman. + +My thought pierced down into the state of society that obtained and was +praised so highly, and with ever less surprise and ever greater +disquiet, found hollowness everywhere. And this called my will to +battle, armed it for the fight. + + +VII. + +From this time forth I began to ponder quite as much over Life as over +Art, and to submit to criticism the conditions of existence in the same +way as I had formerly done with Faith and Law. + +In matters concerning Life, as in things concerning Art, I was not a +predetermined Radical. There was a great deal of piety in my nature and +I was of a collecting, retentive disposition. Only gradually, and step +by step, was I led by my impressions, the incidents I encountered, and +my development, to break with many a tradition to which I had clung to +the last extremity. + +It was in the spirit of the Aesthetics of the time, that, after having +been engaged upon the Tragic Idea, I plunged into researches on the +Comic, and by degrees, as the material ordered itself for me, I tried to +write a doctor's thesis upon it, Abstract researches were regarded as +much more valuable than historic investigation. In comic literature +Aristophanes in particular delighted me, and I was thinking of letting +my general definitions merge into a description of the greatness of the +Greek comedian; but as the thread broke for me, I did not get farther +than the theory of the Comic in general. It was not, like my previous +treatise on the Tragic, treated under three headings, according to the +Hegelian model, but written straight ahead, without any subdivision into +sections. + +Whilst working at this paper I was, of course, obliged constantly to +consult the national comedies and lighter plays, till I knew them from +cover to cover. Consequently, when Gotfred Rode, the poet, who was +connected with a well-known educational establishment for girls, asked +me whether I would care to give a course of public lectures for ladies, +I chose as my subject _The Danish Comedy_. The lectures were +attended in force. The subject was supremely innocent, and it was +treated in quite a conservative manner. At that time I cherished a +sincere admiration, with only slight reservations, for Heiberg, Hertz, +Hostrup and many others as comic playwriters, and was not far short of +attributing to their works an importance equal to those of Holberg. And +yet I was unable to avoid giving offence. I had, it appears, about +Heiberg's _Klister and Malle_, an inseparable betrothed couple, +used what was, for that matter, an undoubtedly Kierkegaardian +expression, viz., _to beslobber a relation_. This expression was +repeated indignantly to the Headmistress, and the thoughtless lecturer +was requested to call upon the Principal of the college. When, after a +long wait, and little suspecting what was going to be said to me, I was +received in audience, it appeared that I had been summoned to receive a +polite but decided admonition against wounding the susceptibilities of +my listeners by expressions which were not "good form," and when I, +unconscious of wrongdoing, asked which expression she alluded to, the +unfortunate word "beslobber" was alleged; my young hearers were not +"'Arriets" for whom such expressions might be fitting. + +I was not asked again to give lectures for young ladies. + + +VIII. + +Hitherto, when I had appeared before the reading public, it had only +been as the author of shorter or longer contributions to the +philosophical discussion of the relations between Science and Faith; +when these had been accepted by a daily paper it had been as its +heaviest ballast. I had never yet written anything that the ordinary +reader could follow with pleasure, and I had likewise been obliged to +make use of a large number of abstruse philosophical words. + +The proprietors of the _Illustrated Times_ offered me the reviewing +of the performances at the Royal Theatre in their paper, which had not +hitherto printed dramatic criticisms. I accepted the offer, because it +afforded me a wished-for opportunity of further shaking off the dust of +the schools. I could thus have practice with my pen, and get into touch +with a section of the reading public who, without caring for philosophy, +nevertheless had intellectual interests; and these articles were in +reality a vent for what I had at heart about this time touching matters +human and artistic. They were written in a more colloquial style than +anything I had written before, or than it was usual to write in Denmark +at that time, and they alternated sometimes with longer essays, such as +those on Andersen and Goldschmidt. + +Regarded merely as dramatic criticisms, they were of little value. The +Royal Theatre, the period of whose zenith was nearly at an end, I cared +little for, and I was personally acquainted with next to none of the +actors, only meeting, at most, Phister and Adolf Rosenkilde and of +ladies, Södring in society. + +I found it altogether impossible to brandish my cane over the individual +actor in his individual part. But the form of it was merely a pretext. I +wanted to show myself as I was, speak out about dramatic and other +literature, reveal how I felt, show what I thought about all the +conditions of life represented or touched upon on the stage. + +My articles were read with so much interest that the editors of the +_Illustrated Times_ raised the writer's scale of remuneration to 10 +Kr. a column (about 11_s_. 3_d_.), which at that time was very +respectable pay. Unfortunately, however, I soon saw that even at that, +if I wrote in the paper all the year round, I could not bring up my +yearly income from this source to more than 320 kroner of our money, +about I7_l_. 12_s_. 6_d_. in English money; so that, without a +University bursary, I should have come badly off, and even with it +was not rolling in riches. + +The first collection of my articles, which I published in 1868 under the +title of _Studies in Aesthetics_, augmented my income a little, it +is true, but for that, as for the next collection, _Criticisms and +Portraits_, I only received 20 kroner (22_s_. 6_d_.) per +sheet of sixteen pages. Very careful management was necessary. + + +IX. + +With the first money I received for my books, I went in the middle of +the Summer of 1868 for a trip to Germany. I acquired some idea of +Berlin, which was then still only the capital of Prussia, and in +population corresponded to the Copenhagen of our day; I spent a few +weeks in Dresden, where I felt very much at home, delighted in the +exquisite art collection and derived no small pleasure from the theatre, +at that time an excellent one. I saw Prague for the first time, +worshipped Rubens in Munich, and, with him specially in my mind, tried +to realise how the greatest painters had regarded Life. Switzerland +added to my store of impressions with grand natural spectacles. I saw +the Alps, and a thunderstorm in the Alps, passed starlit nights on the +Swiss lakes, traced the courses of foaming mountain streams such as the +Tamina at Pfäffers, ascended the Rigi at a silly forced march, and from +the Kulm saw a procession of clouds that gripped my fancy like the +procession of the Vanir in Northern mythology. Many years afterwards I +described it in the Fourth volume of _Main Currents_. From +Interlaken I gazed on the whiteness of the Jungfrau, but scarcely with +greater emotion than once upon a time when I had gazed at the white +cliffs of Möen. On my homeward journey I saw Heidelberg's lovely ruins, +to which Charles V.'s castle, near the Al-hambra, makes a marvellous +pendant, Strassburg's grave Cathedral, and Goethe's house at Frankfurt. + +My travels were not long, but were extraordinarily instructive. I made +acquaintance with people from the most widely different countries, with +youthful frankness engaged in conversation with Germans and Frenchmen, +Englishmen and Americans, Poles and Russians, Dutchmen, Belgians and +Swiss, met them as travelling companions, and listened attentively to +what they narrated. They were, moreover, marvellously frank towards the +young man who, with the curiosity of his age, plied them with questions. + +Young Dutchmen, studying music in Dresden, gave me some idea of the ill- +will felt in their country towards the Prussians, an ill-will not +unmingled with contempt. On the other hand, I was astonished, during a +half day's excursion on foot with a few Leipzig students, to learn how +strong was the feeling of the unity of Germany and of the necessity of +the supremacy of Prussia, even in the states which in the 1866 war had +been on the side of Austria. The students felt no grief over having been +defeated, the victors were Germans too; everything was all right so long +as the German Empire became one. These and similar conversations, which +finally brought me to the conclusion that the whole of the bourgeoisie +was satisfied with the dominance of Prussia, had for result that in 1870 +I did not for a moment share the opinion of the Danes and the French, +that the defeated German states would enter into an alliance with France +against Prussia. + +English undergraduates told me what philosophical and historical works +were being most read in the universities of Great Britain; Bohemian +students explained to me that in the German philosophical world Kant had +quite outshone Hegel and put him in the background. + +The lady members of an American family from Boston treated me quite +maternally; the wife suggested almost at once, in the railway-carriage, +that I should give her when we reached the hotel whatever linen or +clothes I had that wanted repairs; she would be very pleased to mend +them for me. The husband, who was very pious and good-natured, had all +his pockets full of little hymn-books and in his memorandum book a +quantity of newspaper cuttings of devotional verse, which he now and +then read aloud enthusiastically. + +But I also met with Americans of quite a different cast. A young student +from Harvard University, who, for that matter, was not in love with the +Germans and declared that the United States could with difficulty absorb +and digest those who were settled there, surprised me with his view that +in the future Bismarck would come to be regarded as no less a figure +than Cavour. The admiration of contemporary educated thought was then +centred around Cavour, whereas Bismarck had hitherto only encountered +passionate aversion outside Germany, and even in Germany was the object +of much hatred. This student roused me into thinking about Bismarck for +myself. + +Having lain down, all bathed in perspiration, during the ascent without +a guide of a mountain in Switzerland, I was accosted by a woman, who +feared I had come to some harm. I walked on up with her. She turned out +to be a young peasant woman from Normandy, who lived half-way up the +mountain. She had accompanied her husband to Switzerland, but cursed her +lot, and was always longing to be back in France. When I remarked that +it must be some consolation to live in so lovely a place, she +interrupted me with the most violent protests. A beautiful place! This! +The steep mountain, the bristly fir-trees and pine-trees, the snow on +the top and the lake deep down below--anything uglier it would be hard +to conceive. No fields, no pasture-land, no apple-trees! No indeed! If +she had to mention a country that really was beautiful, it was Normandy. +There was plenty of food for all there, you did not need to go either up +or down hill; there, thank God, it was flat. Did I think stones +beautiful, perhaps? She had not been down in the valley for five months, +and higher than her house she had never been and would never go; no, +thank you, not she! She let her husband fetch what they required for the +house; she herself sat and fretted all through the Winter; life then was +almost more than she could bear. + +On one of the steamers on the Lake of Lucerne, I caught, for the first +time, a glimpse of Berthold Auerbach, who was very much admired by my +comrades in Copenhagen and by myself. + +At the hotel table at Lucerne I made the acquaintance of a Dutch captain +from Batavia, an acquaintance productive of much pleasure to me. Before +the soup was brought round I had pulled out a letter I had just +received, opened it and begun to read it. A voice by my side said in +French: + +"Happy man! You are reading a letter in a woman's writing!" With that +our acquaintance was made. + +The captain was a man of forty, who in the course of an active life had +had many and varied experiences and met with prosperity, but was +suffering from a feeling of great void. His society was exceedingly +attractive to me, and he related to me the main events of his life; but +after one day's association only, we were obliged to part. All through +my trip I had a curious feeling of every farewell on the journey being +in all human probability a farewell for life, but had not realised it +painfully before. But when next day the brave captain, whose home was +far away in another quarter of the globe, held his hand out to say good- +bye, I was much affected. "Till we meet again" said the captain. + +"And where?" + +"Till we meet again all and everywhere, for we live an eternal life; +till we meet again in time and space, or outside time and space!" + +I reflected sadly that I should never again see this man, who, the last +twenty-four hours had shown me, was in extraordinary sympathy and +agreement with me. + +Separated from those dearest to me, the whole of the journey, for that +matter, was a sort of self-torment to me, even though a profitable one. +Like every other traveller, I had many a lonely hour, and plenty of time +to ponder over my position and vocation in life. I summed up my +impressions in the sentence: "The Powers have designated me the champion +of great ideas against great talents, unfortunately greater than I." + + +X. + +There was only one distinguished person outside my circle of +acquaintance to whom I wished to bring my first descriptive book, as a +mark of homage, Johanne Louise Heiberg, the actress. I had admired her +on the stage, even if not to the same extent as Michael Wiehe; but to me +she was the representative of the great time that would soon sink into +the grave. In addition, I ventured to hope that she, being a friend of +Frederik Paludan-Müller, Magdalene Thoresen and others who wished me +well, would be at any rate somewhat friendly inclined towards me. A few +years before, it had been rumoured in Copenhagen after the publication +of my little polemical pamphlet against Nielsen, that at a dinner at the +Heiberg's there had been a good deal of talk about me; even Bishop +Martensen had expressed himself favourably, and it also attracted +attention that a short time afterwards, in a note to his book _On +Knowledge and Faith_, he mentioned me not unapprovingly, and +contented himself with a reminder to me not to feel myself too soon +beyond being surprised. When the Bishop of Zealand, one of the actress's +most faithful adherents, had publicly spoken thus mildly of the youthful +heretic, there was some hope that the lady herself would be free from +prejudice. My friends also eagerly encouraged me to venture upon a visit +to her home. + +I was admitted and asked to wait in a room through the glass doors of +which I was attentively observed for some time by the lady's adopted +children. Then she came in, in indoor dress, with a stocking in her +hand, at which she uninterruptedly continued to knit during the +following conversation: She said: "Well! So you have collected your +articles." I was simple enough to reply--as if that made any difference +to the lady--that the greater part of the book had not been printed +before. She turned the conversation upon Björnson's _Fisher Girl_, +which had just been published, and which had been reviewed by _The +Fatherland_ the evening before, declaring that she disagreed +altogether with the reviewer, who had admired in the _Fisher Girl_ +a psychological study of a scenic genius. "It is altogether a mistake," +said Mrs. Heiberg, absorbed in counting her stitches, "altogether a +mistake that genius is marked by restlessness, refractoriness, an +irregular life, or the like. That is all antiquated superstition. True +genius has no connection whatever with excesses and caprices, in fact, +is impossible without the strict fulfilment of one's duty. (Knitting +furiously.) Genius is simple, straightforward, domesticated, +industrious." + +When we began to speak of mutual acquaintances, amongst others, +Magdalene Thoresen, feeling very uncomfortable in the presence of the +lady, I blurted out most tactlessly that I was sure that lady was much +interested in me. It was a mere nothing, but at the moment sounded like +conceit and boasting. I realised it the moment the words were out of my +mouth, and instinctively felt that I had definitely displeased her. But +the conversational material was used up and I withdrew. I never saw +Johanne Louise Heiberg again; henceforth she thought anything but well +of me. + + +XI. + +Magdalene Thoresen was spending that year in Copenhagen, and our +connection, which had been kept up by correspondence, brought with it a +lively mutual interchange of thoughts and impressions. Our natures, it +is true, were as much unlike as it was possible for them to be; but +Magdalene Thoresen's wealth of moods and the overflowing warmth of her +heart, the vivacity of her disposition, the tenderness that filled her +soul, and the incessant artistic exertion, which her exhausted body +could not stand, all this roused in me a sympathy that the mistiness of +her reasoning, and the over-excitement of her intellectual life, could +not diminish. Besides which, especially when she was away from +Copenhagen, but when she was there, too, she needed a literary assistant +who could look through her MSS. and negotiate over them with the +publishers of anthologies, year-books, and weekly papers, and for this +purpose she not infrequently seized upon me, innocently convinced, like +everybody else for that matter, that she was the only person who made a +similar demand upon me. + +Still, it was rather trying that, when my verdict on her work did not +happen to be what she wished, she saw in what I said an unkindness, for +which she alleged reasons that had nothing whatever to do with Art. + +Magdalene Thoresen could not be otherwise than fond of Rasmus Nielsen; +they were both lively, easily enraptured souls, who breathed most freely +in the fog. That, however, did not come between her and me, whom she +often thought in the right. With regard to my newspaper activity, she +merely urged the stereotyped but pertinent opinion, that I ought not to +write so many small things; my nature could not stand this wasting, drop +by drop. + +I had myself felt for a long time that I ought to concentrate my forces +on larger undertakings. + + +XII. + +There were not many of the upper middle class houses in Copenhagen at +that time, the hospitality of which a young man with intellectual +interests derived any advantage from accepting. One of these houses, +which was opened to me, and with which I was henceforward associated, +was that of Chief Physician Rudolph Bergh. His was the home of +intellectual freedom. + +The master of the house was not only a prominent scientist and savant, +but, at a time when all kinds of prejudices ruled unassailed, a man who +had retained the uncompromising radicalism of the first half of the +century. The spirit of Knowledge was the Holy Spirit to him; the +profession of doctor had placed him in the service of humanity, and to +firmness of character he united pure philanthropy. The most despised +outcasts of society met with the same consideration and the same +kindness from him as its favoured ones. + +His wife was well calculated, by her charm of manner, to be the centre +of the numerous circle of talented men who, both from Denmark and +abroad, frequented the house. There one met all the foreign natural +scientists who came to Copenhagen, all the esteemed personalities +Denmark had at the time, who might be considered as belonging to the +freer trend of thought, and many neutrals. Actors such as Höedt and +Phister went there, favourite narrators such as Bergsöe, painters like +Kröyer, distinguished scientists like J.C. Schiödte, the entomologist. +This last was an independent and intellectual man, somewhat touchy, and +domineering in his manner, a master of his subject, a man of learning, +besides, ceremonious, often cordial, ready to listen to anything worth +hearing that was said. He had weaknesses, never would admit that he had +made a mistake, and was even very unwilling to own he had not read a +book that was being spoken of. Besides which, he had spent too great a +part of his life in virulent polemics to be devoid of the narrowing of +the horizon which is the concomitant of always watching and being ready +to attack the same opponent. But he was in the grand style, which is +rare in Denmark, as elsewhere. + + +XIII. + +The house of the sisters Spang was a pleasant one to go to; they were +two unmarried ladies who kept an excellent girls' school, at which +Julius Lange taught drawing. Benny Spang, not a beautiful, but a +brilliant girl, with exceptional brains, daughter of the well-known +Pastor Spang, a friend of Sören Kierkegaard, adopted a tone of good- +fellowship towards me that completely won my affection. She was +cheerful, witty, sincere and considerate. Not long after we became +acquainted she married a somewhat older man than herself, the gentle and +refined landscape painter, Gotfred Rump. The latter made a very good +sketch of me. + +The poet Paludan-Müller and the Lange family visited at the house; so +did the two young and marvellously beautiful girls, Alma Trepka and +Clara Rothe, the former of whom was married later to Carl Bloch the +painter, the other to her uncle, Mr. Falbe, the Danish Minister in +London. + +It was hard to say which of the two was the more beautiful. Both were +unusually lovely. Alma Trepka was queenly, her movements sedate, her +disposition calm and unclouded--Carl Bloch could paint a Madonna, or +even a Christ, from her face without making any essential alteration in +the oval of its contours. Clara Rothe's beauty was that of the white +hart in the legend; her eyes like a deer's, large and shy, timid, and +unself-conscious, her movements rapid, but so graceful that one was +fascinated by the harmony of them. + + +XIV. + +Just about this time a foreign element entered the circle of Copenhagen +students to which I belonged. One day there came into my room a youth +with a nut-brown face, short and compactly built, who after only a few +weeks' stay in Copenhagen could speak Danish quite tolerably. He was a +young Armenian, who had seen a great deal of the world and was of very +mixed race. His father had married, at Ispahan, a lady of Dutch-German +origin. Up to his seventh year he had lived in Batavia. When the family +afterwards moved to Europe, he was placed at school in Geneva. He had +there been brought up, in French, to trade, but as he revealed an +extraordinary talent for languages, was sent, for a year or eighteen +months at a time, to the four German universities of Halle, Erlangen, +Göttingen and Leipzig. Now, at the age of 22, he had come to Copenhagen +to copy Palahvi and Sanscrit manuscripts that Rask and Westergaard had +brought to Europe. He knew a great many languages, and was moreover very +many-sided in his acquirements, sang German student songs charmingly, +was introduced and invited everywhere, and with his foreign appearance +and quick intelligence was a great success. He introduced new points of +view, was full of information, and brought with him a breath from the +great world outside. Industrious though he had been before, Copenhagen +social life tempted him to idleness. His means came to an end; he said +that the annual income he was in the habit of receiving by ship from +India had this year, for some inexplicable reason, failed to arrive, +dragged out a miserable existence for some time under great +difficulties, starved, borrowed small sums, and disappeared as suddenly +as he had come. + + +XV. + +Knowing this Armenian made me realise how restricted my own learning +was, and what a very general field of knowledge I had chosen. + +I wrote my newspaper articles and my essays, and I worked at my doctor's +thesis on French Aesthetics, which cost me no little pains; it was my +first attempt to construct a consecutive book, and it was only by a +vigorous effort that I completed it at the end of 1869. But I had then +been casting over in my mind for some years thoughts to which I never +was able to give a final form, thoughts about the position of women in +society, which would not let me rest. + +A woman whose thought fired mine even further just about this time, a +large-minded woman, who studied society with an uncompromising +directness that was scarcely to be met with in any man of the time in +Denmark, was the wife of the poet Carsten Hauch. When she spoke of +Danish women, the stage of their development and their position in law, +their apathy and the contemptibleness of the men, whether these latter +were despots, pedants, or self-sufficient Christians, she made me a +sharer of her point of view; our hearts glowed with the same flame. + +Rinna Hauch was not, like certain old ladies of her circle, a "woman's +movement" woman before the name was invented. She taught no doctrine, +but she glowed with ardour for the cause of freedom and justice. She saw +through the weak, petty men and women of her acquaintance and despised +them. She too passionately desired a thorough revolution in modern +society to be able to feel satisfied merely by an amelioration of the +circumstances of women of the middle classes; and yet it was the +condition of women, especially in the classes she knew well, that she +thought most about. + +She began to place some credence in me and cherished a hope that I +should do my utmost to stir up the stagnation at home, and during the +long conversations we had together, when, in the course of these +Summers, I now and again spent a week at a time with the Hauchs at +Hellebaek, she enflamed me with her ardour. + +In September, 1868, after wandering with my old friend up and down the +shore, under the pure, starlit heaven, and at last finding myself late +at night in my room, I was unable to go to rest. All that had been +talked of and discussed in the course of the day made my head hot and +urged me to reflection and action. Often I seized a piece of paper and +scribbled off, disconnectedly, in pencil, remarks corresponding to the +internal agitation of my mind, jottings like the following, for example: + + S.R., that restive fanatic, has a wife who cannot believe, and wishes + for nothing but to be left in peace on religious matters. He _forces + her_ to go to Communion, though he knows the words of Scripture, that + he who partakes unworthily eats and drinks to his own damnation. + + There is not one sound, healthy sentiment in the whole of our religious + state of being. You frequently hear it said: "Everyone can't be a + hypocrite." True enough. But begin, in the middle classes, to deduct + hypocrisy, and gross affectation and cowardly dread of Hell, and see + what is left! + + If we have young people worthy the name, I will tell them the truth; but + this band of backboneless creatures blocks up the view. + + Women whom Life has enlightened and whom it has disappointed! You I can + help. + + I see two lovers hand in hand, kissing the tears away from each other's + eyes. + + I can only rouse the wakeful. Nothing can be done with those who are + incapable of feeling noble indignation. + + I have known two women prefer death to the infamy of conjugal life. + + Open the newspapers!--hardly a line that is not a lie. + + And poets and speakers flatter a people like that. + + Christianity and Humanity have long wished for divorce. Now this is an + accomplished fact. + + And the priests are honoured. They plume themselves on not having + certain vices, for which they are too weak. + + I know that I shall be stoned, that every boy has his balderdash ready + against that to which the reflection of years and sleepless nights has + given birth. But do you think I am afraid of anyone? + + Stupidity was always the bodyguard of Lies. + + A people who have put up with the Oldenborgs for four hundred years and + made loyalty to them into a virtue! + + They do not even understand that here there is no Antichrist but Common + Sense. + + Abandoned by all, except Unhappiness and me. + + When did God become Man? When Nature reached the point in its + development at which the first man made his appearance; when Nature + became man, then God did. + + Women say of the beloved one: "A bouquet he brings smells better than + one another brings." + + You are weak, dear one, God help you! And you help! and I help! + + These thoughts have wrought a man of me, have finally wrought me to a + man. + +I procured all that was accessible to me in modern French and English +literature on the woman subject. + +In the year 1869 my thoughts on the subordinate position of women in +society began to assume shape, and I attempted a connected record of +them. I adopted as my starting point Sören Kierkegaard's altogether +antiquated conception of woman and contested it at every point. But all +that I had planned and drawn up was cast aside when in 1869 John Stuart +Mill's book on the subject fell into my hands. I felt Mill's superiority +to be so immense and regarded his book as so epoch-making that I +necessarily had to reject my own draft and restrict myself to the +translation and introduction of what he had said. In November, 1869, I +published Mill's book in Danish and in this manner introduced the modern +woman's movement into Denmark. + +The translation was of this advantage to me that it brought me first +into epistolary communication, and later into personal contact with one +of the greatest men of the time. + + +XVI. + +There was one of the political figures of the time whom I often met +during these years. This was the man most beloved of the previous +generation, whose star had certainly declined since the war, but whose +name was still one to conjure with, Orla Lehmann. + +I had made his acquaintance when I was little more than a boy, in a very +curious way. + +In the year 1865 I had given a few lectures in C.N. David's house, on +Runeberg, whom I had glorified exceedingly, and as the David and Lehmann +houses, despite the political differences between them, were closely +related one to the other, and intimately connected, Orla Lehmann had +heard these lectures very warmly spoken of. At that time he had just +founded a People's Society as a counterpoise to the supremely +conservative Society of August, and, looking out for lecturers for it, +hit upon the twenty-three-year-old speaker as upon a possibility. + +I was then living in a little cupboard of a room on the third floor in +Crystal Street, and over my room was one, in the attic, inhabited by my +seventeen-year-old brother, who had not yet matriculated. + +Orla Lehmann, who had been told that the person he was seeking lived +high up, rapidly mounted the four storeys, and knocked, a little out of +breath, at the schoolboy's door. When the door opened, he walked in, and +said, still standing: + +"You are Brandes? I am Lehmann." Without heeding the surprise he read in +the young fellow's face, he went on: + +"I have come to ask you to give a lecture to the People's Society in the +Casino's big room." + +As the addressee looked about to speak, he continued, drowning every +objection, "I know what you are going to say. That you are too young. +Youth is written in your face. But there is no question of seniority +here. I am accustomed to accomplish what I determine upon, and I shall +take no notice of objections. I know that you are able to give lectures, +you have recently given proof of it." + +At last there was a minute's pause, permitting the younger one to +interpose: + +"But you are making a mistake, it is not I you mean. It must be my elder +brother." + +"Oh! very likely. Where does your brother live?" + +"Just underneath." + +A minute later there was a knock at the third-storey door beneath; it +was opened, and without even stopping to sit down, the visitor began: + +"You are Brandes? I am Lehmann. You recently gave some lectures on +Runeberg. Will you kindly repeat one of them before the People's Society +in the Casino's big room?" + +"Won't you sit down? I thank you for your offer. But my lecture was not +good enough to be repeated before so large a gathering. I do not know +enough about Runeberg's life, and my voice, moreover, will not carry. I +should not dare, at my age, to speak in so large a room." + +"I expected you to reply that you are too young. Your youth is written +in your face. But there is no question of seniority about it. I am +accustomed to carry through anything that I have determined upon, and I +take no notice of objections. What you do not know about Runeberg's +life, you can read up in a literary history. And if you can give a +successful lecture to a private audience, you can give one in a theatre +hall. I am interested in you, I am depending on you, I take your promise +with me. Good-bye!" + +This so-called promise became a regular nightmare to me, young and +absolutely untried as I was. It did not even occur to me to work up and +improve my lecture on Runeberg, for the very thought of appearing before +a large audience alarmed me and was utterly intolerable to me. During +the whole of my first stay in Paris I was so tormented by the consent +that Orla Lehmann had extorted from me, that it was a shadow over my +pleasure. I would go happy to bed and wake up in the middle of the night +with the terror of a debtor over something far off, but surely +threatening, upon me, seek in my memory for what it was that was +troubling me, and find that this far-off, threatening thing was my +promise to Lehmann. It was only after my return home that I summoned up +courage to write to him, pleading my youth and unfitness, and begging to +be released from the honourable but distasteful duty. Orla Lehmann, in +the meantime, had in all probability not bestowed a thought on the whole +matter and long since forgotten all about it. + +In any case he never referred to the subject again in after years, when +we frequently met. + +Among Bröchner's private pupils was a young student. Kristian Möller, by +name, who devoted himself exclusively to philosophy, and of whom +Bröchner was particularly fond. He had an unusually keen intelligence, +inclined to critical and disintegrating research. His abilities were +very promising, inasmuch as it seemed that he might be able to establish +destructive verdicts upon much that was confused, or self- +contradicting, but nevertheless respected; in other respects he had a +strangely infertile brain. He had no sudden inspirations, no +imagination. It could not be expected that he would ever bring forward +any specially new thoughts, only that he would penetrate confusion, +think out errors to the bottom, and, with the years, carry out a process +of thorough cleansing. + +But before he had accomplished any independent work his lungs became +affected. It was not at once perceived how serious the affection was, +and Orla Lehmann, who, with the large-mindedness and open-handedness of +a patriot, had taken him up, as well as sundry other young men who +promised well or were merely poor, not only invited him to his weekly +dinner-parties at Frederiksberg, but sent him to Upsala, that he might +study Swedish philosophy there. Möller himself was much inclined to +study Boströmianism and write a criticism of this philosophy, which was +at that time predominant in Sweden. + +He ought to have been sent South, or rather to a sanatorium; Orla +Lehmann's Scandinavian sympathies, however, determined his stay in the +North, which proved fatal to his health. + +In 1868 he returned to Copenhagen, pale, with hollow cheeks, and a +stern, grave face, that of a marked man, his health thoroughly +undermined. His friends soon learnt, and doubtless he understood +himself, that his condition was hopeless. The quite extraordinary +strength of character with which he submitted, good-temperedly and +without a murmur, to his fate, had for effect that all who knew him vied +with each other in trying to lessen the bitterness of his lot and at any +rate show him how much they cared for him. As he could not go out, and +as he soon grew incapable of connected work, his room became an +afternoon and evening meeting-place for many of his comrades, who went +there to distract him with whatever they could think of to narrate, or +discuss. If you found him alone, it was rarely long before a second and +a third visitor came, and the room filled up. + +Orla Lehmann, his patron, was also one of Kristian Möller's frequent +visitors. But whenever he arrived, generally late and the last, the +result was always the same. The students and graduates, who had been +sitting in the room in lively converse, were struck dumb, awed by the +presence of the great man; after the lapse of a few minutes, one would +get up and say good-bye; immediately afterwards the next would remember +that he was engaged elsewhere just at that particular time; a moment +later the third would slip noiselessly out of the room, and it would be +empty. + +There was one, however, who, under such circumstances, found it simply +impossible to go. I stayed, even if I had just been thinking of taking +my leave. + +Under the autocracy, Orla Lehmann had been the lyrical figure of +Politics; he had voiced the popular hopes and the beauty of the people's +will, much more than the political poets did. They wrote poetry; his +nature was living poetry. The swing of his eloquence, which so soon grew +out of date, was the very swing of youth in men's souls then. At the +time I first knew him, he had long left the period of his greatness +behind him, but he was still a handsome, well set-up man, and, at 58 +years of age, had lost nothing of his intellectual vivacity. He had lost +his teeth and spoke indistinctly, but he was fond of telling tales and +told them well, and his enemies declared that as soon as a witty thought +struck him, he took a cab and drove round from house to house to relate +it. + +Passionately patriotic though Orla Lehmann was, he was very far from +falling into the then usual error of overestimating Denmark's historical +exploits and present importance. He related one day that when he was in +Paris, as a young man, speaking under an impression very frequent among +his travelled compatriots, he had, in a conversation with Sainte-Beuve, +reproached the French with knowing so shamefully little of the Danes. +The great critic, as was his habit, laid his head a little on one side, +and with roguish impertinence replied: "_Eh! bien, faites quelque +chose! on parlera de vous_." He approved of the reply. We younger +ones looked upon him as belonging to another period and living in +another plane of ideas, although, being a liberal-minded man, he was not +far removed from us. He was supposed to be a freethinker, and it was +told of him that when his old housekeeper repeatedly, and with +increasing impatience, requested him to come to table, he would reply, +in the presence of students--a rallying allusion to the lady's Christian +disposition: + +"Get help from Religion, little Bech, get help from Religion!"--a remark +that in those days would be regarded as wantonly irreligious! + +People felt sorry for Lehmann because his politics had so wholly +miscarried, and somewhat sore against him because he wanted to lay all +the blame on the old despotism and the unfavourable circumstances of the +time. Take him altogether, to those who were not intimately associated +with him, and did not share the strong dislike felt against him in +certain circles, he was chiefly a handsome and attractive antiquity. + +Kristian Möller died in 1869, and his death was deeply lamented. He was +one of the few comrades admired by the younger ones alike for his gifts +and his stoicism. With his death my opportunities of frequently meeting +Orla Lehmann ceased. But that the latter had not quite lost sight of me, +he proved by appearing, at the end of February, 1870, at my examination +upon my doctor's thesis at the University. As on this occasion Lehmann +arrived a little late, he was placed on a chair in front of all the +other auditors, and very imposing he looked, in a mighty fur coat which +showed off his stately figure. He listened very attentively to +everything, and several times during the discussion showed by a short +laugh that some parrying reply had amused him. + +Six months afterwards he was no more. + + +XVII. + +During those years I came into very curious relations with another +celebrity of the time. This was M. Goldschmidt, the author, whose great +talent I had considerable difficulty in properly appreciating, so +repelled was I by his uncertain and calculating personality. + +I saw Goldschmidt for the first time, when I was a young man, at a large +ball at a club in Copenhagen. + +A man who had emigrated to England as a poor boy returned to Copenhagen +in the sixties at the age of fifty, after having acquired a considerable +fortune. He was uneducated, kind, impeccably honourable, and was anxious +to secure acquaintances and associates for his adopted daughter, a +delicate young girl, who was strange to Copenhagen. With this object in +view, he invited a large number of young people to a ball in the rooms +of the King's Club, provided good music and luxurious refreshments. This +man was a cousin of Goldschmidt's, and as he himself was unable to make +more of a speech than a short welcome to table, he begged "his cousin, +the poet," to be his spokesman on this occasion. + +One would have thought that so polished a writer, such a master of +language, as Goldschmidt, would be able, with the greatest ease, to make +an after-dinner speech, especially when he had had plenty of time to +prepare himself; but the gift of speaking is, as everyone knows, a gift +in itself. And a more unfortunate speaker than Goldschmidt could not be. +He had not even the art of compelling silence while he spoke. + +That evening he began rather tactlessly by telling the company that +their host, who was a rich man, had earned his money in a strictly +honourable manner; it was always a good thing to know "that one had +clear ground to dance upon"; then he dwelt on the Jewish origin of the +giver of the feast, and, starting from the assumption that the greater +number of the invited guests were young Jews and Jewesses, he formulated +his toast in praise of "the Jewish woman, who lights the Sabbath +candles." The young Jewesses called out all at once: "The Danish woman I +The Danish woman! We are Danish!" They were irritated at the dead +Romanticism into which Goldschmidt was trying to push them back. They +lighted no Sabbath candles! they did not feel themselves Jewish either +by religion or nationality. The day of Antisemitism had not arrived. +Consequently there was still no Zionist Movement. They had also often +felt vexed at the descriptions that Goldschmidt in his novels frequently +gave of modern Jews, whose manners and mode of expression he screwed +back fifty years. + +These cries, which really had nothing offensive about them, made +Goldschmidt lose his temper to such an extent that he shouted, in great +exasperation: "Will you keep silence while I speak! What manners are +these! I will teach you to keep silence!" and so forth,--which evoked a +storm of laughter. He continued for some time to rebuke their exuberant +mirth in severe terms, but was so unsuccessful that he broke off his +speech and, very much out of humour, sat down. + +Not long afterwards, perhaps in the year 1865, I came into contact with +Goldschmidt once only, when walking one evening with Magdalene Thoresen. +On meeting this lady, whom he knew, he turned round, walking with her as +far as her house on the shores of the Lakes, after which his way led +towards the town, as did mine. As long as Mrs. Thoresen was present, he +naturally addressed his conversation to her and expressed himself, as +his habit was, without much ceremony. For instance, he said: "I don't as +a rule care for women writers, not even for those we have; but I will +concede that, of all the ladies who write, you are the freshest." When +Mrs. Thoresen brought the conversation round to her favourite subject, +love, he said, banteringly: "My heart is like the flags of the Zouave +Regiments, so pierced with holes that it is almost impossible to tell +what the material originally looked like." + +On the whole, he was animated and polite, but his glance was somewhat +stinging. + +Goldschmidt had greater difficulty in hitting on the right manner to +adopt towards a much younger man. He used expressions which showed that +he was standing on his dignity, and was all the time conscious of his +own superiority. "People have spoken about you to me," he said, "and I +know you by name." The word here rendered _people_ had a strangely +foreign sound, as though translated, or affected. + +"Have you read Taine's History of English Literature?" he asked. + +"No, I don't know it." + +"Ah, perhaps you are one of those who regard it as superfluous to learn +about anything foreign. We have enough of our own, is it not so? It is a +very widespread opinion, but it is a mistake." + +"You judge too hastily; that is not my opinion." + +"Oh,--ah. Yes. Good-bye." + +And our ways parted. + +I did not like Goldschmidt. He had dared to profane the great Sören +Kierkegaard, had pilloried him for the benefit of a second-rate public. +I disliked him on Kierkegaard's account. But I disliked him much more +actively on my master, Professor Bröchner's account. + +Bröchner had an intense contempt for Goldschmidt; intellectually he +thought him of no weight, as a man he thought him conceited, and +consequently ridiculous. He had not the slightest perception of the +literary artist in him. The valuable and unusual qualities of his +descriptive talent he overlooked. But the ignorance Goldschmidt had +sometimes shown about philosophy, and the incapacity he had displayed +with regard to art, his change of political opinion, his sentimentality +as a wit, all the weaknesses that one Danish critic had mercilessly +dragged into the light, had inspired Bröchner with the strongest +aversion to Goldschmidt. Add to this the personal collisions between the +two men. At some public meeting Bröchner had gazed at Goldschmidt with +such an ironic smile that the latter had passionately called him to +account. + +"Don't make a scene now!" replied Bröchner. + +"I am ready to make a scene anywhere," the answer is reported to have +been. + +"That I can believe; but keep calm now!" + +Shortly afterwards, in _North and South_, Goldschmidt, on the +occasion of Bröchner's candidature for parliament, had written that the +well-known atheist, H. Bröchner, naturally, as contributor to _The +Fatherland_, was supported by the "Party." Now, there was nothing +that annoyed Bröchner so much as when anyone called him an atheist, and +tried to make him hated for that reason,--the word, it is true, had a +hundred times a worse sound then than now,--he always maintaining that +he and other so-called atheists were far more religious than their +assailants. And although Goldschmidt's sins against Bröchner were in +truth but small, although the latter, moreover--possibly unjustifiably-- +had challenged him to the attack, Bröchner nevertheless imbued me with +such a dislike of Goldschmidt that I could not regard him with quite +unprejudiced eyes. + +Goldschmidt tried to make personal advances to me during my first stay +in Paris in 1866. + +Besides the maternal uncle settled in France, of whom I have already +spoken, I had still another uncle, my father's brother, who had gone to +France as a boy, had become naturalised, and had settled in Paris. He +was a little older than my father, a somewhat restless and fantastic +character, whom Goldschmidt frequently met at the houses of mutual +friends. He let me know through this man that he would like to make my +acquaintance, gave him his address and mentioned his receiving hours. As +I held back, he repeated the invitation, but in vain. Bröchner's +influence was too strong. A few years later, in some dramatic articles, +I had expressed myself in a somewhat satirical, offhand manner about +Goldschmidt, when one day an attempt was made to bring the poet and +myself into exceedingly close connection. + +One Spring morning in 1869, a little man with blue spectacles came into +my room and introduced himself as Goldschmidt's publisher, Bookseller +Steen. He had come on a confidential errand from Goldschmidt, regarding +which he begged me to observe strict silence, whatever the outcome of +the matter might be. + +Goldschmidt knew that, as a critic, I was not in sympathy with him, but +being very difficultly placed, he appealed to my chivalry. For reasons +which he did not wish to enter into, he would be obliged, that same +year, to sever his connection with Denmark and settle down permanently +in England. For the future he should write in English. But before he +left he wished to terminate his literary activity in his native country +by an edition of his collected works, or at any rate a very exhaustive +selection from them. He would not and could not direct so great an +undertaking himself, from another country; he only knew one man who was +capable of doing so, and him he requested to undertake the matter. He +had drawn up a plan of the edition, a sketch of the order in which the +writings were to come out, and what the volume was to contain, and he +placed it before me for approval or criticism. The edition was to be +preceded by an account of Goldschmidt as an author and of his artistic +development; if I would undertake to write this, I was asked to go to +see Goldschmidt, in order to hear what he himself regarded as the main +features and chief points of his literary career. + +The draft of what the projected edition was to include made quite a +little parcel of papers; besides these, Steen gave me to read the actual +request to me to undertake the task, which was cautiously worded as a +letter, not to me, but to Bookseller Steen, and which Steen had been +expressly enjoined to bring back with him. Although I did not at all +like this last-mentioned item, and although this evidence of distrust +was in very conspicuous variance with the excessive and unmerited +confidence that was at the same time being shown me, this same +confidence impressed me greatly. + +The information that Goldschmidt, undoubtedly the first prose writer in +the country, was about to break off his literary activity and +permanently leave Denmark, was in itself overwhelming and at once set my +imagination actively at work. What could the reason be? A crime? That +was out of the question. What else could there be but a love affair, and +that had my entire sympathy. It was well known that Goldschmidt admired +a very beautiful woman, who was watched the more jealously by her +husband, because the latter had for a great number of years been +paralysed. He would not allow her to go to the theatre to sit anywhere +but in the mirror box [Footnote: The mirror box was a box in the first +Royal Theatre, surrounded by mirrors and with a grating in front, where +the stage could be seen, reflected in the mirrors, but the occupants +were invisible. It was originally constructed to utilise a space whence +the performance could not otherwise be seen, and was generally occupied +by actresses, etc.], where she could not be seen by the public. The +husband met with no sympathy from the public; he had always been a +characterless and sterile writer, had published only two books, written +in a diametrically opposite spirit, flatly contradicting one another. As +long as he was able to go out he had dyed his red hair black. He was an +insignificant man in every way, and by his first marriage with an ugly +old maid had acquired the fortune which alone had enabled him to pay +court to the beautiful woman he subsequently won. + +It had leaked out that she was the original of the beautiful woman in +The Inheritance, and that some of the letters that occur in it were +really notes from Goldschmidt to her. + +What more likely than the assumption that the position of affairs had at +last become unbearable to Goldschmidt, and that he had determined on an +elopement to London? In a romantic purpose of the sort Goldschmidt could +count upon the sympathy of a hot-blooded young man. I consequently +declared myself quite willing to talk the matter over with the poet and +learn more particulars as to what was expected of me; meanwhile, I +thought I might promise my assistance. It was Easter week, I believe +Maunday Thursday; I promised to call upon Goldschmidt on one of the +holidays at a prearranged time. + +Good Friday and Easter Sunday I was prevented from going to him, and I +had already made up my mind to pay my visit on Easter Monday when on +Monday morning I received a letter from Bookseller Steen which made me +exceedingly indignant. The letter, which exhibited, as I considered, +(incorrectly, as it turned out), unmistakably signs of having been +dictated to him, bore witness to the utmost impatience. Steen wrote that +after undertaking to pay a visit to Goldschmidt I had now let two days +elapse without fulfilling my promise. There was "no sense in keeping a +man waiting" day after day, on such important business; in Steen's +"personal opinion," it had not been at all polite of me, as the younger +author, not to inform Goldschmidt which day I would go to see him. + +I was very much cooled by reading this letter. I saw that I had wounded +Goldschmidt's vanity deeply by not going to him immediately upon receipt +of his communication; but my chief impression was one of surprise that +Goldschmidt should reveal himself such a poor psychologist in my case. +How could he believe that I would allow myself to be terrified by rough +treatment or won by tactless reprimands? How could he think that I +regarded the task he wished to allot me as such an honour that for that +reason I had not refused it? Could not Goldschmidt understand that it +was solely the appeal to my better feelings from an opponent, struck by +an untoward fate, that had determined my attitude? + +Simultaneously, though at first very faintly, a suspicion crossed my +mind. Was it possible that the whole touching story which had been +confided to me was a hoax calculated to disarm my antagonism, arouse my +sympathy and secure Goldschmidt a trumpeting herald? Was it possible +that the mysterious information about the flight to London was only an +untruth, the sole purpose of which was to get me into Goldschmidt's +service? + +I dismissed the thought at once as too improbable, but it recurred, for +I had learnt from experience that even distinguished authors sometimes +did not shrink from very daring means of securing the services of a +critic. A critic is like the rich heiress, who is always afraid of not +being loved for herself alone. Even then, I was very loth to believe +that any recognised author, much less a writer whose position was a +vexed question, would make advances to me from pure benevolence, for the +sake of my beautiful eyes, as they say in French. + +At any rate, I had now made up my mind not to have anything whatever to +do with the matter. I replied emphatically: + +"Lessons in politeness I take from no one, consequently return you the +enclosed papers. Be kind enough to appeal to some one else." + +This reply was evidently not the one the letter had been intended to +evoke. Steen rushed up to me at once to apologise, but I did not see +him. Twice afterwards he came with humble messages from Goldschmidt +asking me to "do him the honour" of paying him a visit. But my pride was +touchy, and my determination unwavering. Undoubtedly Steen's letter was +sent at Goldschmidt's wish, but it is equally undoubted that its form +had not been approved by him. That the alliance so cleverly led up to +came to nothing was evidently as unexpected by the poet as unpalatable +to him. + +Not long afterwards, I accidentally had strong confirmation of my +suspicion that the story of a flight from Denmark was merely an +invention calculated to trap me, and after the lapse of some time I +could no longer harbour a doubt that Goldschmidt had merely wished to +disarm a critic and secure himself a public crier. + +This did not make me feel any the more tenderly disposed towards +Goldschmidt, and my feeling lent a sharper tone than it would otherwise +have had to an essay I wrote shortly afterwards about him on the +production of his play _Rabbi and Knight_ at the Royal Theatre. + +Three years passed before our paths crossed again and a short-lived +association came about between us. + + +XVIII. + +In my public capacity about this time, I had many against me and no one +wholly for me, except my old protector Bröchner, who, for one thing, was +very ill, and for another, by reason of his ponderous language, was +unknown to the reading world at large. Among my personal friends there +was not one who shared my fundamental views; if they were fond of me, it +was in spite of my views. That in itself was a sufficient reason why I +could not expect them, in the intellectual feud in which I was still +engaged, to enter the lists on my behalf. I did not need any long +experience to perceive that complete and unmixed sympathy with my +endeavours was a thing I should not find. Such a sympathy I only met +with in reality from one of my comrades, Emil Petersen, a young private +individual with no connection whatever with literature, and without +influence in other directions. + +Moreover, I had learnt long ago that, as a literary beginner in a +country on a Liliputian scale, I encountered prompt opposition at every +step, and that ill-will against me was always expressed much more +forcibly than good-will, was quickly, so to say, organised. + +I had against me at once every literary or artistic critic who already +held an assured position, from the influential men who wrote in _The +Fatherland_ or the _Berlin Times_ to the small fry who snapped +in the lesser papers, and if they mentioned me at all it was with the +utmost contempt, or in some specially disparaging manner. It was the +rival that they fought against. Thus it has continued to be all my life. +Certain "critics," such as Falkman in Denmark and Wirsen in Sweden, +hardly ever put pen to paper for some forty years without bestowing an +affectionate thought upon me. (Later, in Norway, I became Collin's +_idée fixe_.) + +Add to these all who feared and hated a train of thought which in their +opinion was dangerous to good old-fashioned faith and morality. + +Definite as were the limits of my articles and longer contributions to +the dispute concerning Faith and Science, and although, strictly +speaking, they only hinged upon an obscure point in Rasmus Nielsen's +philosophy, they alarmed and excited a large section of the +ecclesiastics of the country. I had carefully avoided saying anything +against faith or piety; I knew that Orthodoxy was all-powerful in +Denmark. However, I did not meet with refutations, only with the +indignation of fanaticism. As far back as 1867 Björnson had come forward +in print against me, had reproached the Daily Paper with giving my +contributions a place in their columns, and reported their contents to +the Editor, who was away travelling, on the supposition that they must +have been accepted against his wishes; and although the article did not +bear Björnson's name, this attack was not without weight. The innocent +remark that Sören Kierkegaard was the Tycho Brahe of our philosophy, as +great as Tycho Brahe, but, like him, failing to place the centre of our +solar system in its Sun, gave Björnson an opportunity for the +statement,--a very dangerous one for a young author of foreign origin to +make,--that the man who could write like that "had no views in common +with other Danes, no Danish mind." + +The year after I was astonished by inflammatory outbursts on the part of +the clergy. One day in 1868 the much-respected Pastor Hohlenberg walked +into my friend Benny Spang's house, reprimanded her severely for +receiving such an undoubted heretic and heathen under her roof, and +demanded that she should break off all association with me. As she +refused to do so and turned a deaf ear to his arguments, losing all +self-control, he flung his felt hat on the floor, continued to rage and +rail against me, and, no result coming of it, dashed at last, in a +towering passion, out through the door, which he slammed behind him. +There was a farcical ending to the scene, since he was obliged to ring +at the door again for his hat, which, in his exasperation, he had +forgotten. This was a kind of private prologue to the ecclesiastical +drama which from the year 1871 upwards was enacted in most of the +pulpits of the country. Only the parsons instead of flinging their hats +upon the floor, beat their hands against the pulpit. + +But what surprised me, a literary beginner, still more, was the gift I +discovered in myself of hypnotising, by my mere existence, an ever- +increasing number of my contemporaries till they became as though +possessed by a hatred which lasted, sometimes a number of years, +sometimes a whole life long, and was the essential determining factor in +their careers and actions. By degrees, in this negative manner, I +succeeded in engaging the attentions of more than a score of persons. +For the time being, I encountered the phenomenon in the person of one +solitary genius-mad individual. For a failure of a poet and philosopher, +with whom I had nothing to do, and who did not interest me in the least, +I became the one enemy it was his business to attack. + +Rudolf Schmidt, who was a passionate admirer of Rasmus Nielsen, in whose +examination lectures he coached freshmen, was enraged beyond measure by +the objections, perfectly respectful, for that matter, in form, which I +had raised against one of the main points in Nielsen's philosophy. In +1866 he published a pamphlet on the subject; in 1867 a second, which, so +possessed was he by his fury against his opponent, he signed with the +latter's own initials, Gb. And from this time forth, for at least a +generation, it became this wretch's task in life to persecute me under +every possible pseudonym, and when his own powers were not sufficient, +to get up conspiracies against me. In particular, he did all he could +against me in Germany. + +Meanwhile, he started a magazine in order to bring before the public +himself and the ideas he was more immediately serving, viz.: those of R. +Nielsen; and since this latter had of late drawn very much nearer to the +Grundtvigian way of thinking, partly also those of Grundtvig. The +magazine had three editors, amongst them R. Nielsen himself, and when +one of them, who was the critic of the _Fatherland_, suddenly left +the country, Björnstjerne Björnson took his place. The three names, R. +Nielsen, B. Björnson, and Rudolph Schmidt, formed a trinity whose +supremacy did not augur well for the success of a beginner in the paths +of literature, who had attacked the thinker among them for ideal +reasons, and who had been the object of violent attacks from the two +others. The magazine _Idea and Reality_, was, as might be expected, +sufficiently unfavourable to my cause. + +The sudden disappearance of the critic of _The Fatherland_ from the +literary arena was, under the conditions of the time, an event. He had +no little talent, attracted by ideas and fancies that were sometimes +very telling, repelled by mannerisms and a curious, far-fetched style, +laid chief emphasis, in the spirit of the most modern Danish philosophy, +on the will, and always defended ethical standpoints. From the time of +Björnson's first appearance he had attached himself so enthusiastically +and inviolably to him that by the general public he was almost regarded +as Björnson's herald. At every opportunity he emphatically laid down +Björnson's importance and as a set-off fell upon those who might be +supposed to be his rivals. Ibsen, in particular, received severe +handling. His departure was thus a very hard blow for Björnson, but for +that matter, was also felt as a painful loss by those he opposed. + + +XIX. + +Not long after this departure, and immediately after the publication of +my long article on Goldschmidt, I received one day, to my surprise, a +letter of eight closely written pages from Björnstjerne Björnson, dated +April 15th, 1869. + +What had called it forth was my remark, in that article, that Björnson, +like Goldschmidt, sometimes, when talent failed, pretended to have +attained the highest, pretended that obscurity was the equivalent of +profundity. When writing this, I was thinking of the obscure final +speech about God in Heaven in Björnson's _Mary Stuart_, which I +still regard as quite vague, pretentious though it be as it stands +there; however, it was an exaggeration to generalise the grievance, as I +had done, and Björnson was right to reply. He considered that I had +accused him of insincerity, though in this he was wrong; but for that +matter, with hot-tempered eloquence, he also denied my real contention. +His letter began: + + Although I seldom read your writings, so that possibly I risk speaking + of something you have elsewhere developed more clearly, and thus making + a mistake, I nevertheless wish to make a determined protest against its + being called a characteristic of mine, in contrast to Oehlenschläger + (and Hauch!!), to strain my powers to reach what I myself only perceive + unclearly, and then intentionally to state it as though it were clear. I + am quite sure that I resemble Oehlenschläger in one thing, namely, that + the defects of my book are open to all, and are not glossed over with + any sort or kind of lie; anything unclear must for the moment have + seemed clear to me, as in his case. My motto has always been: "Be + faithful in _small_ things, and God shall make you ruler over great + things." And never, no, never, have I snatched after great material in + order to seem great, or played with words in order to seem clever, or + been silent, in order to appear deep. Never. The examples around me have + been appalling to me, and I am sure that they have been so because I + have from the very beginning been on my guard against lies. There are + passages in every work which will not yield immediately what one + impatiently demands of them;--and then I have always waited, never + tried; the thing has had to come itself unforced, and it is possible + that what I have received has been a deception; but I have believed in + it; to me it has been no deception. Before I finally conclude, I always, + it is true, go over again what I have written (as in the case of + _Synnöve_, and _A Happy Boy, Between the Fights_, etc). I wish + to have the advantage of a better perception. Thus far, in what I have + gone through, I have seen weak places which I can no longer correct. + Lies I have never found. + + Unfortunately one is often exposed to the danger of being untrue; but it + is in moments of surprise and absolute passion, when something happens + to one's eye or one's tongue, that one feels is half mad, but when the + beast of prey within one, which shrinks at nothing, is the stronger. + Untrue in one's beautiful, poetic calm, one's confessional silence, at + one's work, I think very few are. + +This summing up, which does honour to Björnson and is not only a +striking self-verdict, but a valuable contribution to poetic psychology +in general, in its indication of the strength of the creative +imagination and its possibilities of error, was followed by a co- +ordinate attempt at a characterisation and appreciation of Goldschmidt: + + You are likewise unjust to Goldschmidt on this point, that I know with + certainty. Goldschmidt is of a naïve disposition, susceptible of every + noble emotion. It is true that he often stages these in a comic manner, + and what you say about that is true; he does the same in private life, + but you have not recognised the source of this. In the last instance, it + is not a question of what we think, but of what we do. Just as this, on + the whole, is an error that you fall persistently into, it is in + particular an error here, where, for instance, his two brothers, with + the same qualifications and with the same dual nature, have both + developed into characters, the one indeed into a remarkable personality. + But Goldschmidt began as a corsair captain at seventeen; his courage was + the courage behind a pen that he fancied was feared, his happiness that + of the flatterer, his dread that of being vapid; and there were many + other unfavourable circumstances, for that matter.... He is now striving + hard towards what he feels has, during his life, been wasted in his + ability, both moral and intellectual qualities, and for my part, I + respect this endeavour more than his decisive success within narrow + limits. + +In this passage the distinction and contrast between contemplative life +and actual existence was quite in the Rasmus Nielsen spirit; the use +that was made of it here was strange. One would suppose that the example +adduced established that similar natural qualifications, similar family +and other conditions, in other words, the actual essential conditions of +life, were of small importance compared with one's mode of thought, +since the brothers could be so different; Björnson wished to establish, +hereby, that the mode of life was more important than the mode of +thought, although the former must depend on the latter. For the rest, he +alluded to Goldschmidt's weak points, even if in somewhat too superior a +manner, and without laying stress upon his great artistic importance, +with leniency and good-will. + +But if, in other things he touched upon, he had an eye for essentials, +this failed him sadly when the letter proceeded to a characterisation of +the addressee, in which he mixed up true and false in inextricable +confusion. Amongst other things, he wrote: + + Here, I doubtless touch upon a point that is distinctive of your + criticism. It is an absolute beauty worship. With that you can quickly + traverse our little literature and benefit no one greatly; for the poet + is only benefited by the man who approaches him with affection and from + his own standpoint; the other he does not understand, and the public + will, likely enough, pass with you through this unravelling of the + thousand threads, and believe they are growing; but no man or woman who + is sound and good lays down a criticism of this nature without a feeling + of emptiness. + + I chanced to read one of your travel descriptions which really became a + pronouncement upon some of the greatest painters. It was their nature in + their works (not their history or their lives so much as their natural + dispositions) that you pointed out,--also the influence of their time + upon them, but this only in passing; and you compared these painters, + one with another. In itself, much of this mode of procedure is correct, + but the result is merely racy. A single one of them, seized largely and + affectionately, shown in such manner that the different paintings and + figures became a description of himself, but were simultaneously the + unfolding of a culture, would have been five times as understandable. A + contrast can be drawn in when opportunity arises, but that is not the + essential task. Yes, this is an illustration of the form of your + criticism. It is an everlasting, and often very painful, juxtaposition + of things appertaining and contrasting, but just as poetry itself is an + absorption in the one thing that it has extracted from the many, so + comprehension of it is dependent on the same conditions. The individual + work or the individual author whom you have treated of, you have in the + same way not brought together, but disintegrated, and the whole has + become merely a piquant piece of effectiveness. Hitherto one might have + said that it was at least good-natured; but of late there have + supervened flippant expressions, paradoxical sentences, crude + definitions, a definite contumacy and disgust, which is now and again + succeeded by an outburst of delight over the thing that is peculiarly + Danish, or peculiarly beautiful. I cannot help thinking of P.L. Möller, + as I knew him in Paris. + + There are a thousand things between Heaven and Earth that you understand + better than I. But for that very reason you can listen to me. It seems + to me now as if the one half of your powers were undoing what the other + half accomplishes. I, too, am a man with intellectual interests, but I + feel no cooperation. Might there not be other tasks that you were more + fitted for than that of criticism? I mean, that would be less of a + temptation to you, and would _build_ up on your personality, at the + same time as you yourself were building? It strikes me that even if you + do choose criticism, it should be more strongly in the direction of our + educating responsibilities and less as the arranger of technicalities, + the spyer out of small things, the dragger together of all and + everything which can be brought forward as a witness for or against the + author, which is all frightfully welcome in a contemporary critical + epidemic in Copenhagen, but, God help me, is nothing and accomplishes + nothing. + +This part of the letter irritated me intensely, partly by the mentor's +tone assumed in it, partly by a summing up of my critical methods which +was founded simply and solely on the reading of three or four articles, +more especially those on Rubens and Goldschmidt, and which quite missed +the point. I was far from feeling that I had been understood, and for +that reason warned against extremes; on the contrary, I saw myself only +caricatured, without even wit or humour, and could not forget that the +man who had sketched this picture of me had done his utmost to injure +me. And he compared me with P.L. Möller! + +The fact that the conclusion of the letter contained much that was +conciliatory and beautiful consequently did not help matters. Björnson +wrote: + + When you write about the Jews, although I am not in agreement with you, + _altogether_ in agreement, you yet seem to me to touch upon a + domain where you might have much to offer us, many beautiful prospects + to open to us. In the same way, when you interpret Shakespeare (not when + you make poetry by the side of him), when you tranquilly expound, I seem + to see the beginnings of greater works, in any case of powers which I + could imagine essentially contributing to the introduction into our + culture of greater breadth of view, greater moral responsibility, more + affection. + +When I now read these words, I am obliged to transport myself violently +back, into the feelings and to the intellectual standpoint that were +mine at the time, in order to understand how they could to such a pitch +incense me. It was not only that, like all young people of any account, +I was irritable, sensitive and proud, and unwilling to be treated as a +pupil; but more than that, as the way of youth is, I confused what I +knew myself capable of accomplishing with what I had already +accomplished; felt myself rich, exuberantly rich, already, and was +indignant at perceiving myself deemed still so small. + +But the last straw was a sentence which followed: + + I should often have liked to talk all this over with you, when last I + was in Copenhagen, but I noticed I was so pried after by gossips that I + gave it up. + +The last time Björnson was in Copenhagen he had written that article +against me. Besides, I had been told that some few times he had read my +first articles aloud in public in friends' houses, and made fun of their +forced and tyro-like wording. And now he wanted me to believe that he +had at that time been thinking of visiting me, in order to come to an +understanding with me. And worse still, the fear of gossip had +restrained him! This hero of will-power so afraid of a little gossip! He +might go on as he liked now, I had done with him. He did go on, both +cordially and gracefully, but condescendingly, quite incapable of seeing +how wounding the manner of his advances was. He wished to make advances +to me and yet maintain a humiliating attitude of condescension: + + There are not many of us in literature who are in earnest; the few who + are ought not to be daunted by the accidental separation that opposed + opinions can produce, when there is a large field for mutual + understanding and co-operation. I sometimes get violently irate for a + moment; if this in lesser men, in whom there really is something base, + brings about a lifelong separation, it does not greatly afflict me. But + I should be very sorry if it should influence the individuals in whom I + feel there are both ability and will. And as far as you are concerned, I + have such a strong feeling that you must be standing at a parting of the + ways, that, by continuing your path further, you will go astray, that I + want to talk to you, and consequently am speaking from my heart to you + now. If you do not understand, I am sorry; that is all I can say. + + In the Summer I am going to Finmark, and involuntarily, as I write this, + the thought occurs to me what a journey it would be for you; away from + everything petty and artificial to a scenery which in its magnificent + loneliness is without parallel in the world, and where the wealth of + birds above us and fish beneath us (whales, and shoals of herrings, cod + and capelans often so close together that you can take them up in your + hands, or they press against the sides of the boat) are marvel upon + marvel, in the light of a Sun that does not set, while human beings up + there live quiet and cowed by Nature. If you will come with me, and meet + me, say, at Trondhjem, I know that you would not regret it. And then I + should get conversation again; here there are not many who hit upon just + that which I should like them to. Think about it. + +A paragraph relating to Magdalene Thoresen followed. But what is here +cited is the essential part of the letter. Had its recipient known +Björnson better, he would in this have found a foundation to build upon. +But as things were, I altogether overlooked the honestly meant +friendliness in it and merely seized upon the no small portion of it +that could not do other than wound. My reply, icy, sharp and in the +deeper sense of the word, worthless, was a refusal. I did not believe in +Björnson, saw in the letter nothing but an attempt to use me as a +critic, now that he had lost his former advocate in the Press. The +prospect of the journey to the North did not tempt me; in Björnson's +eyes it would have been Thor's journey with Loki, and I neither was Loki +nor wished to be. + +But even had I been capable of rising to a more correct and a fuller +estimate of Björnson's character, there was too much dividing us at this +time for any real friendship to have been established. Björnson was then +still an Orthodox Protestant, and in many ways hampered by his youthful +impressions; I myself was still too brusque to be able to adapt myself +to so difficult and masterful a personality. + +Eight years elapsed before the much that separated me from Björnson +crumbled away. But then, when of his own accord he expressed his regret +on a public occasion at the rupture between us, and spoke of me with +unprejudiced comprehension and good-will, I seized with warmth and +gratitude the hand stretched out to me. A hearty friendship, bringing +with it an active and confidential correspondence, was established +between us and remained unshaken for the next ten years, when it broke +down, this time through no fault of mine, but through distrust on +Björnson's part, just as our intimacy had been hindered the first time +through distrust on mine. + +The year 1869 passed in steady hard work. Among the many smaller +articles I wrote, one with the title of _The Infinitely Small and the +Infinitely Great in Poetry_, starting with a representment of +Shakespeare's Harry Percy, contained a criticism of the hitherto +recognised tendency of Danish dramatic poetry and pointed out into the +future. The paper on H.C. Andersen, which came into being towards +midsummer, and was read aloud in a clover field to a solitary listener, +was representative of my critical abilities and aims at that date. I had +then known Andersen socially for a considerable time. My cordial +recognition of his genius drew us more closely together; he often came +to see me and was very ready to read his new works aloud to me. It is +hardly saying too much to declare that this paper secured me his +friendship. + +The fundamental principles of the essay were influenced by Taine, the +art philosopher I had studied most deeply, and upon whom I had written a +book that was to be my doctor's thesis. Lightly and rapidly though my +shorter articles came into being, this larger task was very long in +hand. Not that I had little heart for my work; on the contrary, no +question interested me more than those on which my book hinged; but +there were only certain of them with which, as yet, I was equal to +dealing. + +First and foremost came the question of the nature of the producing +mind, the possibility of showing a connection between its faculties and +deriving them from one solitary dominating faculty, which would thus +necessarily reveal itself in every aspect of the mind. It puzzled me, +for example, how I was to find the source whence Pascal's taste, both +for mathematics and religious philosophy, sprang. Next came the question +of the possibility of a universally applicable scientific method of +criticism, regarded as intellectual optics. If one were to define the +critic's task as that of understanding, through the discovery and +elucidation of the dependent and conditional contingencies that occur in +the intellectual world, then there was a danger that he might approve +everything, not only every form and tendency of art that had arisen +historically, but each separate work within each artistic section. If it +were no less the critic's task to distinguish between the genuine and +the spurious, he must at any rate possess a technical standard by which +to determine greater or lesser value, or he must be so specially and +extraordinarily gifted that his instinct and tact estimate infallibly. + +Further, there was the question of genius, the point on which Taine's +theory roused decisive opposition in me. He regarded genius as a summing +up, not as a new starting-point; according to him it was the assemblage +of the original aptitudes of a race and of the peculiarities of a period +in which these aptitudes were properly able to display themselves. He +overlooked the originality of the man of genius, which could not be +explained from his surroundings, the new element which, in genius, was +combined with the summarising of surrounding particles. Before, when +studying Hegel, I had been repelled by the suggestion that what spoke to +us through the artist was only the universally valid, the universal +mind, which, as it were, burnt out the originality of the individual. In +Taine's teaching, nation and period were the new (although more +concrete) abstractions in the place of the universally valid; but here, +too, the particularity of the individual was immaterial. The kernel of +my work was a protest against this theory. + +I was even more actively interested in the fundamental question raised +by a scientific view of history. For some years I had been eagerly +searching Comte and Littré, Buckle, Mill and Taine for their opinions on +the philosophy of History. Here, too, though in another form, the +question of the importance of the individual versus the masses presented +itself. Statistics had proved to what extent conscious actions were +subordinated to uniform laws. We could foresee from one year to another +how many murders would be committed and how many with each kind of +instrument. The differences between men and men neutralised each other, +if we took the average of a very large number. But this did not prove +that the individual was not of considerable importance. If the victory +of Salamis depended on Themistocles, then the entire civilisation of +Europe henceforth depended on him. + +Another aspect of the question was: Did the consistent determinism of +modern Science, the discovery of an unalterable interdependency in the +intellectual, as in the physical worlds, allow scope for actions +proceeding otherwise than merely illusorily from the free purpose or +determination of the individual? Very difficult the question was, and I +did not feel confident of solving it; but it was some consolation to +reflect that the doubt as to the possibility of demonstrating a full +application of the law in the domain in which chance has sway, and +Ethics its sphere, was comparatively infinitesimal in the case of those +domains in which men make themselves felt by virtue of genius or talent +as producers of literary and artistic works. Here, where natural gifts +and their necessary deployment were of such extraordinary weight, the +probability of a demonstration of natural laws was, of course, much +greater. + +The general fundamental question was: Given a literature, a philosophy, +an art, or a branch of art, what is the attitude of mind that produces +it? What are its sufficing and necessary conditions? What, for instance, +causes England in the sixteenth century to acquire a dramatic poetry of +the first rank, or Holland in the seventeenth century a painting art of +the first rank, without any of the other branches of art simultaneously +bearing equally fine fruit in the same country? + +My deliberations resulted, for the time being, in the conviction that +all profound historical research was psychical research. + +That old piece of work, revised, as it now is, has certainly none but +historic interest; but for a doctor's thesis, it is still a tolerably +readable book and may, at any rate, introduce a beginner to reflection +upon great problems. + +After the fundamental scientific questions that engaged my attention, I +was most interested in artistic style. There was, in modern Danish +prose, no author who unreservedly appealed to me; in German Heinrich +Kleist, and in French Mérimée, were the stylists whom I esteemed most. +The latter, in fact, it seemed to me was a stylist who, in unerring +sureness, terseness and plasticism, excelled all others. He had +certainly not much warmth or colour, but he had a sureness of line equal +to that of the greatest draughtsmen of Italian art. His aridity was +certainly not winning, and, in reading him, I frequently felt a lack of +breadth of view and horizon, but the compelling power of his line- +drawing captivated me. When my doctor's thesis was finished, towards the +middle of December, 1869, both it and the collection of articles bearing +the name _Criticisms and Portraits_ were placed in the printer's +hands. In the beginning of 1870 two hitherto unprinted pieces were +added, of which one was a paper written some time before on Kamma +Rahbek, which had been revised, the other, a new one on Mérimée, which +in general shows what at that time I admired in style. + +It had long been settled that as soon as I had replied to the critics of +my thesis I should start on prolonged travels, the real educational +travels of a young man's life. I had a little money lying ready, a small +bursary, and a promise of a travelling allowance from the State, which +promise, however, was not kept. This journey had for a long time been +haunting my fancy. I cherished an ardent wish to see France again, but +even more especially to go to Italy and countries still farther South. +My hope of catching a glimpse of Northern Africa was only fulfilled +thirty-five years later; but I got as far as Italy, which was the actual +goal of my desires. I knew enough of the country, its history from +ancient days until then, and was sufficiently acquainted with its Art +from Roman times upwards and during the Renaissance, to be regarded as +passed for intellectual consecration in the South. + +When the thesis was done with and the printing of the second book was +nearing completion, not anxiety to travel, but melancholy and heavy- +heartedness at the thought of my departure, gained the upper hand. It +had been decided that I was to remain away at least a year, and it was +less to myself than to others whom I must necessarily leave behind, that +the time seemed immeasurably long. Professor Schiödte advised me rather +to take several short journeys than one long one; but that was +impracticable. I wanted to get quite away from the home atmosphere. As, +however, there were some who thought of my journey with disquiet and +dread, and from whom it was difficult for me to tear myself, I put off +my departure as long as I could. At last the remnant of work that still +bound me to Copenhagen was finished, and then all the new and enriching +prospects my stay in foreign countries was to bring me shone in a golden +light. Full of undaunted hope, I set out on my travels at the beginning +of April, 1870. + + + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +Hamburg--My Second Fatherland--Ernest Hello--_Le Docteur Noir_-- +Taine--Renan--Marcelin--Gleyre--Taine's Friendship--Renan at Home-- +Philarète Chasles' Reminiscences--_Le Théâtre Français_--Coquelin +--Bernhardt--Beginnings of _Main Currents_--The Tuileries--John +Stuart Mill--London--Philosophical Studies--London and Paris Compared-- +Antonio Gallenga and His Wife--Don Juan Prim--Napoleon III--London +Theatres--Gladstone and Disraeli in Debate--Paris on the Eve of War-- +First Reverses--Flight from Paris--Geneva, Switzerland--Italy--Pasquale +Villari--Vinnie Ream's Friendship--Roman Fever--Henrik Ibsen's +Influence--Scandinavians in Rome. + + +I. + +The first thing that impressed me was Hamburg, and by that I mean the +European views prevalent there. At that time, doubtless mainly for +national reasons, Denmark hated Hamburg. Different Danish authors had +recently written about the town, and in as depreciatory a strain as they +could. The description of one amounted to an assertion that in Hamburg +people only talked of two things, money and women; that of another +commenced: "Of all the places I have ever seen in my life, Hamburg is +the most hideous." + +The situation of the town could not be compared with that of Copenhagen, +but the Alster quarter was attractive, the architecture and the street +life not uninteresting. What decided me, however, was not the externals +of the town, but the spirit I noticed pervading the conversation. The +idea underlying things was that a young man must first and foremost +learn to keep himself well and comfortably; if he could not do this in +Hamburg, then as soon as possible he must set off to some place across +the sea, to Rio, or New York, to the Argentine, or Cape Colony, and +there make his way and earn a fortune. The sons of the families I was +invited to visit, or heard talked about, had long been away; in the +houses I went to, the head of the family had seen other parts of the +world. The contrast with Copenhagen was obvious; there the young sons of +the middle classes were a burden on their families sometimes until they +were thirty, had no enterprise, no money of their own to dispose of, +were often glued, as it were, to the one town, where there was no +promotion to look forward to and no wide prospect of any sort. + +It was a long time since I had been so much struck by anything as by an +expression that a Hamburg lady, who had been to Copenhagen and had +stayed there some time, used about the young Danish men, namely, that +they had _l'apparence chétive_. I tried to persuade her that life +in Copenhagen had only accidentally appeared so wretched to her; but I +did not convince her in the least. She demonstrated to me, by numerous +examples, to what an extent enterprise was lacking in Denmark, and I was +obliged to restrict myself to explaining that the tremendous pressure of +political pettiness and weakness had brought a general slackness with +it, without people feeling or suspecting it, and had robbed nearly every +one of daring and success. The result of the conversation was that +Denmark was shown to me in a fresh light. + +A Hamburg merchant who had lived for a long time in Mexico invited me to +dinner, and at his house I had the same impression of apparent +happiness, comfort, enterprise and wide outlook, in contrast to the +cares and the narrowness at home, where only the few had travelled far +or collected material which might by comparison offer new points of view +and give one a comprehensive experience of life. My psychological +education in Danish literature, with its idolising of "thoroughness" had +imprinted on my mind that whoever thoroughly understood how to observe a +man, woman and child in a Copenhagen backyard had quite sufficient +material whence to brew a knowledge of human nature. It now dawned upon +me that comparative observation of a Mexican and a North German family, +together with their opinions and prejudices, might nevertheless +considerably advance one's knowledge of human nature, should such +comparisons constantly obtrude themselves upon one. + +The same man let fall an observation which set me thinking. When the +conversation turned upon the strained relations between France and +Prussia since the battle of Königgratz, and I expressed myself confident +that, in the event of a war, France would be victorious, as she +generally was victorious everywhere, he expressed well-supported doubts. +Prussia was a comparatively young state, extremely well organised and +carefully prepared for war; antiquated routine held great sway in the +French army; the Emperor himself, the esteem in which he was held, and +his management were on the down grade. These were words that I had never +heard in Denmark. The possibility of France being defeated in a war with +Prussia was not even entertained there. This merchant showed me an +original photograph of the execution of the Emperor Maximilian, taken on +the spot a moment before the word to fire was given, and a second taken +immediately afterwards. The calm bearing of the Emperor and the two +generals compelled admiration. This was the first time I had seen +photography taken into the service of history. + +In the Hamburg Zoological Gardens I was fascinated by the aquarium, with +its multitudes of aquatic animals and fish. There, for the first time in +my life, I saw an elephant, and did not tire of gazing at the mighty +beast. I was struck by the strange caprice with which the great Being we +call Nature goes to work, or, more correctly, by the contrast between +the human point of view and Nature's mode of operations. To us, the +elephant's trunk was burlesque, its walk risibly clumsy; the eagle and +the kite seemed to us, as they sat, to have a severe appearance and a +haughty glance; the apes, picking lice from one another and eating the +vermin, were, to our eyes, contemptible and ridiculous at the same time; +but Nature took everything equally seriously, neither sought nor avoided +beauty, and to her one being was not more central than another. That +must be deemed Nature's central point which is equidistant from the +lowest and from the highest being; it was not impossible, for instance, +that the _harefish_, a great, thick, odd-looking creature, was the +real centre of terrestrial existence, in the same way as our celestial +sphere has its centre, through which a line reaches the pole of the +zodiac in the constellation of the Dragon. And I smiled as I thought of +R. Nielsen and his pupils always speaking as if they stood on the most +intimate footing with the "central point" of existence, and pouring +contempt on others who, it was to be supposed, could not approach it. + +I was very unfavourably impressed in Hamburg by German drama and German +dramatic art. + +At the town theatre, Hebbel's _Judith_ was being performed, with +Clara Ziegler in the leading part. At that time this lady enjoyed a +considerable reputation in Germany, and was, too, a tall, splendid- +looking female, with a powerful voice, a good mimic, and all the rest of +it, but a mere word-machine. The acting showed up the want of taste in +the piece. Holofernes weltered knee-deep in gore and bragged +incessantly; Judith fell in love with his "virility," and when he had +made her "the guardian of his slumbers" murdered him, from a long +disremembered loyalty to the God of Israel. + +At the Thalia Theatre, Raupach's _The School of Life_ was being +produced, a lot of silly stuff, the theme of it, for that matter, allied +to the one dealt with later by Drachmann in _Once upon a Time_. A +Princess is hard-hearted and capricious. To punish her, the King, her +father, shuts a man into her bedroom, makes a feigned accusation against +her, and actually drives her out of the castle. She becomes a waiting- +maid, and passes through various stages of civil life. The King of +Navarra, whose suit she had haughtily rejected, disguised as a +goldsmith, marries her, then arrays himself in silks and velvets, to +tempt her to infidelity. When she refuses, he allows every possible +injustice to be heaped upon her, to try her, makes her believe that the +King, on a false accusation, has had her husband's eyes put out, and +then himself goes about with a bandage before his eyes, and lets her +beg. She believes everything and agrees to everything, until at last, +arrived at honour and glory, she learns that it has all been only play- +acting, trial, and education. + +This nonsense was exactly on a par with taste in Germany at the time, +which was undeniably considerably below the level of that in France and +Denmark, and it was acted by a group of actors, some very competent, at +the chief theatre of Hamburg. Slowly though business life pulsated in +Denmark, we were superior to Germany in artistic perception. + +The low stage of artistic development at which Hamburg had then arrived +could not, however, efface the impression its superiority over +Copenhagen in other respects had made upon me. Take it all together, my +few days in Hamburg were well spent. + + +II. + +And then I set foot once more in the country which I regarded as my +second fatherland, and the overflowing happiness of once more feeling +French ground under my feet returned undiminished and unchanged. I had +had all my letters sent to Mlle. Louise's address, so fetched them +shortly after my arrival and saw the girl again. Her family invited me +to dinner several times during the very first week, and I was associated +with French men and women immediately upon my arrival. + +They were well-brought-up, good-natured, hospitable bourgeois, very +narrow in their views. Not in the sense that they took no interest in +politics and literature, but in that questions for them were decided +once and for all in the clerical spirit. They did not regard this as a +party standpoint, did not look upon themselves as adherents of a party; +their way of thinking was the right one; those who did not agree with +them held opinions they ought to be ashamed of, and which they probably, +in private, were ashamed of holding and expressing. + +Mlle. Louise had a cousin whom she used to speak of as a warm-hearted +man with peculiar opinions, eager and impetuous, who would like to make +the acquaintance of her friend from the North. The aunts called him a +passionate Catholic, and an energetic writer in the service of the +Church Militant. Shortly after my arrival, I met him at dinner. He was a +middle-aged, pale, carelessly dressed man with ugly, irregular features, +and a very excitable manner. With him came his wife, who though pale and +enthusiastic like himself, yet looked quite terrestrial. He introduced +himself as Ernest Hello, contributor to Veuillot's then much talked of +Romish paper, _L'Univers_, which, edited with no small talent by a +noted stylist, adopted all sorts of abusive methods as weapons in every +feud in which the honour of the Church was involved. It was against +Veuillot that Augier had just aimed the introduction to his excellent +comedy, _Le Fils de Giboyer_, and he made no secret of the fact +that in the Déodat mentioned in the piece he had had this writer of holy +abuse in his mind. Hello was in everything Veuillot's vassal. + +He was one of the martial believers who despised and hated the best free +research men, and who knew himself in a position to confute them. He +possessed some elements of culture, and had early had thoroughly drilled +into him what, in comparison with the views of later times on History +and Religion, was narrow and antiquated in Voltaire's education, and for +this reason regarded, not only Voltaire's attack on the Church, but all +subsequent philosophy inimical to the Church, as belonging to a bygone +age. He was a fanatic, and there was a sacristy odour about all that he +said. But there was in his disposition an enthusiastic admiration for +weakness in fighting against external strength, and for courage that +expressed itself in sheer defiance of worldly prudence, that made him +feel kindly towards the young Dane. Denmark's taking up arms, with its +two million inhabitants, against a great power like Prussia, roused his +enthusiasm. "It is great, it is Spartan!" he exclaimed. It must +certainly be admitted that this human sympathy was not a prominent +characteristic, and he wearied me with his hateful verdicts over all +those whom I, and by degrees, all Europe, esteemed and admired in +France. + +As an instance of the paradoxicalness to which Huysmans many years later +became addicted, the latter tried to puff up Hello as being a man of +remarkable intellect; and an instance of the want of independence with +which the new Catholic movement was carried on in Denmark is to be found +in the fact that the organ of Young Denmark, _The Tower_, could +declare: "Hello is one of the few whom all men of the future are agreed +to bow before.... Hello was,--not only a Catholic burning with religious +ardour,--but a genius; these two things explain everything." + +When Hello invited me to his house, I regarded it as my duty to go, that +I might learn as much as possible, and although his circle was +exceedingly antipathetic to me, I did not regret it; the spectacle was +highly instructive. + +Next to Hello himself, who, despite his fanaticism and restlessness, +impressed one as very inoffensive at bottom, and not mischievous if one +steered clear of such names as Voltaire or Renan, the chief member of +his circle was the black doctor, (_le Docteur noir_,) so much +talked of in the last years of the Empire, and who is even alluded to in +Taine's _Graindorge_. His real name was Vries. He was a negro from +the Dutch West Indies, a veritable bull, with a huge body and a black, +bald physiognomy, made to stand outside a tent at a fair, and be his own +crier to the public. His conversation was one incessant brag, in +atrocious French. Although he had lived seventeen years in France, he +spoke almost unintelligibly. + +He persuaded himself, or at least others, that he had discovered +perpetual motion, vowed that he had made a machine which, "by a simple +mechanism," could replace steam power and had been declared practicable +by the first engineers in Paris; but of course he declined to speak +freely about it. Columbus and Fulton only were his equals; he knew all +the secrets of Nature. He had been persecuted--in 1859 he had been +imprisoned for eleven months, on a charge of quackery--because all great +men were persecuted; remember our Lord Jesus Christ! He himself was the +greatest man living. _Moi vous dire le plus grand homme d'universe_. +Hello and the ladies smiled admiringly at him, and never grew tired of +listening to him. This encouraged him to monopolise the conversation: +He, Vries, was a man possessed of courage and wisdom; he understood +Phrenology, Allopathy, Homoeopathy, Engineering Science, Metereology +--like Molière's doctors and Holberg's Oldfux. His greatest and most +special gift was that of curing cancer. Like writing-masters, who hang +out specimens of how people wrote when they came to them, and of their +caligraphy after they had benefited by their instruction, he had his +cancer patients photographed before and after his treatment, looking +ghastly the first time, and as fresh as a flower the second, and these +pictures hung on view in his house. No wonder, therefore, that Napoleon +III--so Vries said--had his portrait in an album containing, besides, +only portraits of European sovereigns. + +He pretended that he had made many important prophecies. This was a bond +between him and Hello, who claimed the same extraordinary power, and had +foretold all sorts of singular events. He performed miraculous cures; +this appealed to Hello, who was suspicious of all rational Science and +ready to believe any mortal thing. He could read everybody's characters +in their faces. This was a pretext for the most barefaced flattery of +Hello, his wife, and their friends of both sexes, and of course +everything was swallowed with alacrity. To me he said: "Monsieur is +gentle, very calm, very indulgent, and readily forgives an injury." + +Hideous though he was, his powerful brutality had a great effect on the +ladies of the circle. They literally hung upon his words. He seized them +by the wrists, and slid his black paws up their bare arms. The married +women whispered languishingly: "You have a marvellous power over women." +The husbands looked on smilingly. + +Now when Hello and he and their friends and the ladies began to talk +about religious matters and got steam up, it was a veritable witches' +Sabbath, and no mistake, every voice being raised in virulent cheap Jack +denunciation of freedom, and common sense. Satan himself had dictated +Voltaire's works; now Voltaire was burning in everlasting fire. +Unbelievers ought to be exterminated; it would serve them right. Renan +ought to be hanged on the first tree that would bear him; the Black +Doctor even maintained that in Manila he would have been shot long ago. +It was always the Doctor who started the subject of the persecution of +heretics. Hello himself persecuted heretics with patronising scorn, but +was already ready to drop into a hymn of praise to the Madonna. + +I had then read two of Hello's books, _Le Style_ and _M. Renan, +L'Allemagne et l'Athéisme au 19me Siècle_. Such productions are +called books, because there is no other name for them. As a matter of +fact, idle talk and galimatias of the sort are in no wise literature. +Hello never wrote anything but Roman Catholic sermons, full of +theological sophistries and abuse of thinking men. In those years his +books, with their odour of incense, made the small, flat inhabitants of +the sacristy wainscotting venture out of their chinks in the wall in +delight; but they obtained no applause elsewhere. + +It was only after his death that it could occur to a morbid seeker after +originality, with a bitter almond in place of a heart, like Huysmans, to +make his half-mad hero, Des Esseintes, who is terrified of the light, +find satisfaction in the challenges to common sense that Hello wrote. +Hello was a poor wretch who, in the insane conviction that he himself +was a genius, filled his writings with assertions concerning the +marvellous, incomprehensible nature of genius, and always took up the +cudgels on its behalf. During the Empire, his voice was drowned. It was +only a score of years later that the new Catholic reaction found it to +their advantage to take him at his word and see in him the genius that +he had given himself out to be. He was as much a genius as the madman in +the asylum is the Emperor. + + +III. + +A few days after my arrival, I called upon Taine and was cordially +received. He presented me with one of his books and promised me his +great work, _De l'Intelligence_, which was to come out in a few +days, conversed with me for an hour, and invited me to tea the following +evening. He had been married since I had last been at his house, and his +wife, a young, clear-skinned lady with black plaits, brown eyes and an +extremely graceful figure, was as fresh as a rose, and talked with the +outspoken freedom of youth, though expressing herself in carefully +selected words. + +After a few days, Taine, who was generally very formal with strangers, +treated me with conspicuous friendliness. He offered at once to +introduce me to Renan, and urgently advised me to remain six months in +Paris, in order to master the language thoroughly, so that I might +enlighten Frenchmen on the state of things in the North, as well as +picture the French to my fellow-countrymen. Why should I not make French +my auxiliary language, like Turgenieff and Hillebrandt! + +Taine knew nothing of German belles lettres. As far as philosophy was +concerned, he despised German Aesthetics altogether, and laughed at me +for believing in "Aesthetics" at all, even one day introducing me to a +stranger as "A young Dane who does not believe in much, but is weak +enough to believe in Aesthetics." I was not precisely overburdened by +the belief. But a German Aesthetic, according to Taine's definition, was +a man absolutely devoid of artistic perception and sense of style, who +lived only in definitions. If you took him to the theatre to see a sad +piece, he would tear his hair with delight, and exclaim: "_Voilà das +Tragische!_" + +Of the more modern German authors, Taine knew only Heine, of whom he was +a passionate admirer and whom, by reason of his intensity of feeling, he +compared with Dante. A poem like the _Pilgrimage to Kevlaar_ roused +his enthusiasm. Goethe's shorter poems, on the other hand, he could not +appreciate, chiefly no doubt because he did not know German sufficiently +well. He was not even acquainted with the very best of Goethe's short +things, and one day that I asked him to read one poem aloud, the words +in his mouth rang very French. + +_Lieber dur Laydénn möcht ee mee schlag'e, als so feel Frödenn des +Laybengs airtrah'ge_, was intended to be-- + + Lieber durch Leiden, + Möcht ich mich schlagen + Als so viel Freuden + Des Lebens ertragen. + +Goethe's prose he did not consider good, but heavy and prolix, and +lacking in descriptive power. He would praise Voltaire's prose at his +expense. "You perceive the figure and its movements far more clearly," +he said. The German romanticists disgusted him; their style, also, was +too inartistic for him (_ils ne savent pas écrire, cela me dégoûte +d'eux_). + +I frequently met friends at his house, amongst others, Marcelin, who had +been his friend from boyhood, and upon whom, many years later, he wrote +a melancholy obituary. This man, the proprietor of that supremely +worldly paper, _La Vie Parisienne_, was a powerful, broad- +shouldered, ruddy-cheeked man, who looked the incarnation of health and +very unlike one's preconception of the editor of the most frivolous and +fashionable weekly in Paris. He was a draughtsman and an author, had +studied the history of the last few centuries in engravings, and himself +owned a collection of no fewer than 300,000. What Taine had most admired +in him was the iron will with which, left, at nineteen years of age, +penniless, and defectively educated, as head of his family, he had kept +his mother and brothers and sisters by his work. Next to that Taine +admired his earnestness. Marcelin, who was generally looked upon as +belonging to gay Paris, was a solitary-minded man, an imaginative +recreator of the peoples of the past, as they were and went about, of +their ways and customs. He it was who opened Taine's eyes to the wealth +of contributions to history locked up in collections of engravings, more +especially perhaps as regarded people's external appearance, and what +the exterior revealed. Another friend who came to Taine at all sorts of +times was Gleyre, the old painter, who had been born in French +Switzerland, but was otherwise a Parisian. And he was not the only +deeply idealistic artist with whom Taine was connected in the bonds of +friendship. Although a fundamental element of Taine's nature drew him +magnetically to the art that was the expression of strength, tragic or +carnal strength, a swelling exuberance of life, there was yet room in +his soul for sympathy with all artistic endeavour, even the purely +emotional. That which drew him to the idealistic painters was, at +bottom, the same quality as drew him to Beethoven and Chopin. + +Gleyre's best-known picture is the painting in the Louvre, somewhat weak +in colouring, but showing much feeling, a Nile subject representing a +man sitting on the banks of the river and watching the dreams of his +youth, represented as beautiful women, fleeing from him on a decorated +dahabeah, which is disappearing. The title is _Lost Illusions_. +There is more strength in the painting, much reproduced in engraving, of +a Roman army, conquered by Divico the Helvetian, passing under the yoke +--a picture which, as an expression of the national pride of the Swiss, +has been placed in the Museum at Lausanne. + +Still, it was the man himself, rather than his pictures, that Taine +thought so much of. Intellectually, Taine was in his inmost heart an +admirer of the Italian and the English Renaissance, when most pagan and +most unrestrained; his intellectual home was the Venice of the sixteenth +century; he would have been in his right place at one of the festivals +painted by Veronese, and should have worn the rich and tasteful costume +of that period. But socially, and as a citizen, he was quite different, +was affectionate and subdued and calm, excessively conventional; +temperate in all his judgments, as in his life. + +If I succeeded in winning his good-will, it was most emphatically not +because I had written a book about him, which, for that matter, he could +not understand; he barely glanced through it; he read, at most, the +appreciative little review that Gaston Paris did me the honour to write +upon it in the _Revue Critique_. But it appealed to him that I had +come to France from pure love of knowledge, that I might become +acquainted with men and women and intellectual life, and that I had +spent my youth in study. + +He grew fond of me, advised me as a father or an elder brother might +have done, and smiled at my imprudences--as for instance when I almost +killed myself by taking too strong a sleeping draught--(_vous êtes +imprudent, c'est de votre âge_). He sometimes reproached me with not +jotting down every day, as he did, whatever had struck me; he talked to +me about his work, about the projected Essay on Schiller that came to +nothing on account of the war, of his _Notes sur l'Angleterre_, +which he wrote in a little out-of-the-way summer-house containing +nothing save the four bare whitewashed walls, but a little table and a +chair. He introduced into the book a few details that I had mentioned to +him after my stay in England. + +When we walked in the garden at his country-house at Châtenay, he +sometimes flung his arm round my neck--an act which roused great +astonishment in the Frenchmen present, who could scarcely believe their +eyes. They knew how reserved he usually was. + +It quite irritated Taine that the Danish Minister did nothing for me, +and introduced me nowhere, although he had had to procure me a free pass +to the theatre. Again and again he reverted to this, though I had never +mentioned either the Minister or the Legation to him. But the +revolutionary blood in him was excited at what he regarded as a slight +to intellectual aristocracy. "What do you call a man like that? A +Junker?" I said no. "Never mind! it is all the same. One feels that in +your country you have had no revolution like ours, and know nothing +about equality. A fellow like that, who has not made himself known in +any way whatever, looks down on you as unworthy to sit at his table and +does not move a finger on your behalf, although that is what he is there +for. When I am abroad, they come at once from the French Embassy to +visit me, and open to me every house to which they have admittance. I am +a person of very small importance in comparison with Benedetti, but +Benedetti comes to see me as often as I will receive him. We have no +lording of it here." + +These outbursts startled me, first, because I had never in the least +expected or even wished either to be received by the Danish Minister or +to be helped by him; secondly, because it revealed to me a wide +difference between the point of view in the Romance countries, in France +especially, and that in the North. In Denmark, I had never had the +entrée to Court or to aristocratic circles, nor have I ever acquired it +since, though, for that matter, I have not missed it in the least. But +in the Romance countries, where the aristocratic world still +occasionally possesses some wit and education, it is taken as a matter +of course that talent is a patent of nobility, and, to the man who has +won himself a name, all doors are open, indeed, people vie with one +another to secure him. That a caste division like that in the North was +quite unknown there, I thus learnt for the first time. + + +IV. + +Through Taine, I very soon made the acquaintance of Renan, whose +personality impressed me very much, grand and free of mind as he was, +without a trace of the unctuousness that one occasionally meets in his +books, yet superior to the verge of paradox. + +He was very inaccessible, and obstinately refused to see people. But if +he were expecting you, he would spare you several hours of his valuable +time. + +His house was furnished with exceeding simplicity. On one wall of his +study hung two Chinese water-colours and a photograph of Gérôme's +_Cleopatra before Caesar_; on the opposite wall, a very beautiful +photograph of what was doubtless an Italian picture of the Last Day. +That was all the ornamentation. On his table, there always lay a Virgil +and a Horace in a pocket edition, and for a long time a French +translation of Sir Walter Scott. + +What surprised me most in Renan's bearing was that there was nothing +solemn about it and absolutely nothing sentimental. He impressed one as +being exceptionally clever and a man that the opposition he had met with +had left as it found him. He enquired about the state of things in the +North. When I spoke, without reserve, of the slight prospect that +existed of my coming to the front with my opinions, he maintained that +victory was sure. (_Vous l'emporterez! vous l'emporterez_!) Like +all foreigners, he marvelled that the three Scandinavian countries did +not try to unite, or at any rate to form an indissoluble Union. In the +time of Gustavus Adolphus, he said, they had been of some political +importance; since then they had retired completely from the historical +stage. The reason for it must very probably be sought for in their +insane internecine feuds. + +Renan used to live, at that time, from the Spring onwards, at his house +in the country, at Sèvres. So utterly unaffected was the world-renowned +man, then already forty-seven years of age, that he often walked from +his house to the station with me, and wandered up and down the platform +till the train came. + +His wife, who shared his thoughts and worshipped him, had chosen her +husband herself, and, being of German family, had not been married after +the French manner; still, she did not criticise it, as she thought it +was perhaps adapted to the French people, and she had seen among her +intimate acquaintances many happy marriages entered into for reasons of +convenience. They had two children, a son, Ary, who died in 1900 after +having made a name for himself as a painter, and written beautiful poems +(which, however, were only published after his death), and a daughter, +Noémi (Madame Psichari) who, faithfully preserving the intellectual +heritage she has received from her great father, has become one of the +centres of highest Paris, a soul of fire, who fights for Justice and +Truth and social ideas with burning enthusiasm. + + +V. + +A source of very much pleasure to me was my acquaintance with the old +author and Collège de France Professor, Philarète Chasles. Grégoire +introduced me to him and I gradually became at home, as it were, in his +house, was always a welcome visitor, and was constantly invited there. +In his old age he was not a man to be taken very seriously, being +diffusive, vague and vain. But there was no one else so communicative, +few so entertaining, and for the space of fifty years he had known +everybody who had been of any mark in France. He was born in 1798; his +father, who was a Jacobin and had been a member of the Convention, did +not have him baptised, but brought him up to believe in Truth, (hence +the name Philarète,) and apprenticed him to a printer. At the +Restoration of the Royal Family, he was imprisoned, together with his +father, but released through the influence of Chateaubriand; he then +went to England, where he remained for full seven years (1819-1826), +working as a typographer, and made a careful study of English +literature, then almost unknown in France. After having spent some +further time in Germany, he returned to Paris and published a number of +historical and critical writings. + +Philarète Chasles, as librarian to the Mazarin Library, had his +apartments in the building itself, that is, in the very centre of Paris; +in the Summer he lived in the country at Meudon, where he had had his +veranda decorated with pictures of Pompeian mosaic. He was having a +handsome new house with a tower built near by. He needed room, for he +had a library of 40,000 volumes. + +His niece kept house for him; she was married to a German from Cologne, +Schulz by name, who was a painter on glass. The pair lived apart. Madame +Schulz was pretty, caustic, spiteful, and blunt. Her daughter, the +fourteen-year-old Nanni, was enchantingly lovely, as developed and +mischievous as a girl of eighteen. Everyone who came to the house was +charmed with her, and it was always full of guests, young students from +Alsace and Provence, young negroes from Hayti, young ladies from +Jerusalem, and poetesses who would have liked to read their poems aloud +and would have liked still better to induce Chasles to make them known +by an article. + +Chasles chatted with everyone, frequently addressing his conversation to +me, talking incessantly about the very men and women that I most cared +to hear about, of those still living whom I most admired, such as George +Sand, and Mérimée, and, in fact, of all the many celebrities he had +known. As a young man, he had been taken to the house of Madame +Récamier, and had there seen Chateaubriand, an honoured and adored old +man, and Sainte-Beuve an eager and attentive listener, somewhat +overlooked on account of his ugliness, in whom there was developing that +lurking envy of the great, and of those women clustered round, which he +ought to have combatted, to produce just criticism. + +Chasles had known personally Michelet and Guizot, the elder Dumas and +Beyle, Cousin and Villemain, Musset and Balzac; he knew the Comtesse +d'Agoult, for so many years the friend of Liszt, and Madame Colet, the +mistress, first of Cousin, then of Musset, and finally of Flaubert, of +whom my French uncle, who had met her on his travels, had drawn me a +very unattractive picture. Chasles was on terms of daily intimacy with +Jules Sandeau; even as an old man he could not forget George Sand, who +had filched the greater part of his name and made it more illustrious +than the whole became. Sandeau loved her still, forty years after she +had left him. + +Chasles was able, in a few words, to conjure up very vividly the images +of the persons he was describing to his listener, and his anecdotes +about them were inexhaustible. He took me behind the scenes of +literature and I saw the stage from all its sides. The personal history +of his contemporaries was, it is quite true, more particularly its +chronicle of scandals, but his information completed for me the severe +and graceful restraint of all Taine said. And side by side with his +inclination for gay and malicious gossip, Chasles had a way of sketching +out great synopses of intellectual history, which made one realise, as +one reflected,' the progress of development of the literatures with +which one was familiar. Those were pleasant evenings, those moonlight +Spring evenings in the open veranda out there at Meudon, when the old +man with the sharp-pointed beard and the little skull-cap on one side of +his head, was spokesman. He had the aptest and most amusing way of +putting things. For instance, to my question as to whether Guizot had +really been as austere by nature as he was in manner, he replied: "It is +hard to say; when one wishes to impress, one cannot behave like a +harlequin." + +Although I had a keen enough eye for Philarète Chasles' weaknesses, I +felt exceedingly happy in his house. There I could obtain without +difficulty the information I wished for, and have the feeling of being +thoroughly "in Paris." Paris was and still is the only city in the world +that is and wishes to be the capital not only of its own country but of +Europe; the only one that takes upon itself as a duty, not merely to +meet the visitor half-way by opening museums, collections, buildings, to +him, but the only one where people habitually, in conversation, initiate +the foreigner in search of knowledge into the ancient, deep culture of +the nation, so that its position with regard to that of other races and +countries is made clear to one. + + +VI. + +I had not let a single day elapse before I took my seat again in the +_Théâtre Français_, to which I had free admission for an indefinite +period. The first time I arrived, the doorkeeper at the theatre merely +called the sub-officials together; they looked at me, noted my +appearance, and for the future I might take my seat wherever I liked, +when the man at the entrance had called out his _Entrée_. They were +anything but particular, and in the middle of the Summer, after a visit +of a month to London, I found my seat reserved for me as before. + +The first evening after my arrival, I sat, quietly enjoying +_Hernani_ (the lyric beauty of which always rejoiced my heart), +with Mounet-Sully in the leading rôle, Bressant as Charles V, and as +Doña Sol, Mlle. Lloyd, a minor actress, who, however, at the conclusion +of the piece, rose to the level of the poetry. The audience were so much +in sympathy with the spirit of the piece that a voice from the gallery +shouted indignantly: "_Le roi est un lâche!_" Afterwards, during +the same evening, I saw, in a transport of delight, Mme. de Girardin's +charming little piece, _La Joie fait Peur_. A certain family +believe that their son, who is a young naval officer, fallen in the far +East, has been cruelly put to death. He comes back, unannounced, to his +broken-hearted mother, his despairing bride, his sister, and an old man- +servant. This old, bent, faithful retainer, a stock dramatic part, was +played by Régnier with the consummate art that is Nature itself staged. +He has hidden the returned son behind a curtain for fear that his +mother, seeing him unexpectedly, should die of joy. The sister comes in. +Humming, the servant begins to dust, to prevent her going near the +curtain; but unconsciously, in his delight, his humming grows louder and +louder, until, in a hymn of jubilation, tratara-tratara! he flings the +broom up over his head, then stops short suddenly, noticing that the +poor child is standing there, mute with astonishment, not knowing what +to think. Capital, too, was the acting of a now forgotten actress, Mlle. +Dubois, who played the young girl. Her exclamation, as she suddenly sees +her brother, "_Je n'ai pas peur, va_!" was uttered so lightly and +gaily, that all the people round me, and I myself, too, burst into +tears. + +I was much impressed by Edmond Thierry, then director of the _Théâtre +Français_. I thought him the most refined man I had so far met, +possessed of all the old French courtesy, which seemed to have died out +in Paris. A conversation with him was a regular course in Dramaturgy, +and although a young foreigner like myself must necessarily have been +troublesome to him, he let nothing of this be perceptible. I was so +charmed by him that nearly two years later I introduced a few +unimportant words of his about Molière's _Misanthrope_ into my +lectures on the first part of _Main Currents in European +Literature_, simply for the pleasure of mentioning his name. + +It was, moreover, a very pleasant thing to pay him a visit, even when he +was interrupted. For actors streamed in and out of his house. One day, +for instance, the lovely Agar burst into the room to tell her tale of +woe, being dissatisfied with the dress that she was to wear in a new +part. I saw her frequently again when war had been declared, for she it +was who, every evening, with overpowering force and art, sang the +_Marseillaise_ from before the footlights. + +The theatrical performances were a delight to me. I had been charmed as +much only by Michael Wiehe and Johanne Luise Heiberg in my salad days +when they played together in Hertz's _Ninon_. But my artistic +enjoyment went deeper here, for the character portrayal was very much +more true to life. The best impressions I had brought with me of Danish +art were supremely romantic, Michael Wiehe as Henrik in _The +Fairies_, as the Chevalier in _Ninon_, as Mortimer in Schiller's +_Mary Stuart_. But this was the real, living thing. + +One evening I saw _Ristori_ play the sleep-walking scene in Macbeth +with thrilling earnestness and supreme virtuosity. You felt horror to +the very marrow of your bones, and your eyes filled with tears of +emotion and anxiety. Masterly was the regular breathing that indicated +slumber, and the stiff fingers when she washed her hands and smelt them +to see if there were blood upon them. But Mme. Favart, who with artistic +self-restraint co-ordinated herself into the whole, without any +virtuosity at all, produced no less an effect upon me. As the leading +character in Feuillet's _Julie_, she was perfection itself; when I +saw her, it seemed to me as though no one at home in Denmark had any +idea of what feminine characterisation was. What had been taken for such +(Heiberg's art, for instance,) only seemed like a graceful and brilliant +convention, that fell to pieces by the side of this. + +The performances at the _Théâtre Français_ lasted longer than they +do now. In one evening you could see Gozlan's _Tempête dans un verre +d'Eau_, Augier's _Gabrielle_, and Banville's _Gringoire_. +When I had seen Mme. Favart and Régnier in _Gabrielle_, Lafontaine +as Louis XI, his wife as Loyse, Mlle. Ponsin as Nicole, and Coquelin, at +that time still young and fresh, as Gringoire, I felt that I had enjoyed +one of the greatest and most elevating pleasures the world had to offer. +I went home, enraptured and enthusiastic, as much edified as the +believer returning from his church. I could see _Gringoire_ a dozen +times in succession and find only one expression for what I felt: "This +is holy." + +The piece appealed to me so much, no doubt, because it was more in +agreement than the rest with what in Denmark was considered true poetry. +But during the three years since I had last seen him, Coquelin had made +immense strides in this rôle. He rendered it now with an individuality, +a heartfelt sincerity and charm, that he had not previously attained; in +contrast to harsh King Louis and unfeeling Loyse, was so poor, and +hungry, and ill and merry and tender and such a hero and such a genius-- +that I said to myself: "Who, ever has seen this, has lived." + +Quite a short while after my arrival--April 12, 1870--I saw for the +first time Sarah Bernhardt, who had just begun to make a name at the +Odéon. She was playing in George Sand's beautiful and mutinous drama +_L'autre_, from which the great-grandmother in Björnson's +_Leonarda_ is derived. The piece is a plea for the freedom of love, +or rather, for indulgence with regard to what are branded by society as +the sins of love. Sarah Bernhardt was the young girl who, in her +innocence, judges all moral irregularities with the utmost severity, +until her eyes are opened to what the world really is. She is, without +knowing it, the child of unlawful love, and the father's curse is that +of not daring to be anything to his child--whom he has educated and over +whom he watches--not daring to claim his right to her affection, as he +would otherwise stain her mother's memory. In his presence, the young +girl utters all the hard words that society has for those who break her +laws; she calls her unknown father false and forsworn. George Sand has +collected all the justified protests and every prejudice for this young +girl to utter, because in her they inspire most respect, and are to +their best advantage.--So far her father has not revealed himself. Then +at last it dawns upon her that it is he, her benefactor, who is the +_other one_ whom she has just condemned, and as the curtain falls +she flings herself, melted, into his arms. + +Sarah played the part with great modesty, with what one might assume to +be the natural melancholy of the orphan, and the enthusiasm of the young +virgin for strict justice, and yet in such wise that, through all the +coldness, through the expressive uncertainty of her words, and +especially through the lovely, rich ring of her voice, one suspected +tenderness and mildness long held back. + + +VII. + +I tried, while I was in Paris, to understand something of the +development of French literature since the beginning of the century, to +arrange it in stages, and note the order of their succession; I wanted, +at the same time, to form for myself a similar general view of Danish +literature, and institute parallels between the two, being convinced +beforehand that the spirit of the age must be approximately the same in +two European countries that were, so to speak, intellectually allied. +This was my first naïve attempt to trace The Main Currents in Nineteenth +Century Literature. + +The French poetry of the nineteenth century seemed to me to fall into +three groups: Romanticism, the School of Common Sense, the Realistic +Art. I defined them as follows: + +I. What the French call _Romanticism_ has many distinguishing +marks. It is, firstly, a _break with Graeco-Roman antiquity_. It +therefore harks back to the Gallic, and to the Middle Ages. It is a +resurrection of the poets of the sixteenth century. But the attempt is a +failure, for Ronsard and the Pleiad [Footnote: The poets who formed the +first and greater Pleiad were, besides Ronsard, Dubellay, Remi, Belleau, +Jodelle, Dorat, Baif and Pontus de Thiard.] are also Greek-taught, are +Anacreontics. If we except the _Chanson de Roland_, there is no +original mediaeval literature that can be compared with the Icelandic. +For that reason the choice of subjects is extended from the Middle Ages +in France to the Middle Ages in other countries, for instance, Germany, +whence Victor Hugo derives his drama _Les Burgraves_. The poets +select foreign matter, Alfred de Vigny treats Chatterton and Musset +Italian and Spanish themes. Mérimée harks back to the French Middle Ages +(The Peasant Rising), but as he there finds too little originality, he +flees, as a poet, to less civilised nationalities, Spaniards, South +Americans, Corsicans, Russians, etc. Romanticism becomes ethnographical. + +Its second distinguishing mark is _tempestuous violence_. It is +connected with the 1830 revolution. It attacks society and the +conditions of property (Saint Simon, Fourier, Proudhon), attacks +marriage and the official verdict upon sexual relations (Dumas) +Antony Rousseau's old doctrine that Nature is good, the natural state +the right one, and that society alone has spoilt everything. George Sand +in particular worships Rousseau, and writes in essential agreement with +him. + +In the later French literature the influence of Voltaire and that of +Rousseau are alternately supreme. Voltaire rules until 1820, Rousseau +again until 1850, then Voltaire takes the reins once more with About, +Taine, and Sarcey. In Renan Voltaire is merged with Rousseau, and now, +later still, Diderot has taken the place of both. + +II. The _School of Common Sense_ (_l'école de bon sens_) follows upon +Romanticism. As the latter worshipped passion, so the School of Common +Sense pays homage to sound human intelligence. In certain individuals it +is possible to trace the transition--Musset's _Un Caprice_ in +contrast with the wanton works of his youth. George Sand's village +novels, in contrast with her novels on Marriage. The popular tone and +the landscape drawing here, which, for that matter, are all derived from +Rousseau, lead on into a tranquil idyl. Works like Ponsard's +_Lucrèce_ and Augier's _Gabrielle_ show the reaction from +Romanticism. In the tragedy it is Lucrèce, in the modern play, +Gabrielle, upon whom the action hinges. In Ponsard and Augier common +sense, strict justice, and a conventional feeling of honour, are +acclaimed. Marriage is glorified in all of Ponsard, Augier and Octave +Feuillet's dramas. Literature has no doubt been influenced in some +degree by the ruling orders of the monarchy of July. Louis Philippe was +the bourgeois King. An author like Scribe, who dominates the stages of +Europe, is animated by the all-powerful bourgeois spirit, educated and +circumscribed as it was. Cousin, in his first manner, revolutionary +Schellingism, corresponded to romanticism; his eclecticism as a +moralising philosopher corresponds to the School of Common Sense. The +distinctive feature which they have in common becomes a so-called +Idealism. Ponsard revives the classical traditions of the seventeenth +century. In criticism this endeavour in the direction of the sensible +and the classical, is represented by Nisard, Planche, and Sainte-Beuve +in his second manner. + +III. The third tendency of the century Is _Realistic Art_, with +physiological characteristics. It finds its support in positivist +philosophy; Herbart in Germany, Bentham and Mill in England, Comte and +Littré in France. In criticism, Sainte-Beuve's third manner. On the +stage, the younger Dumas. In novels, the brothers Goncourt, and +Flaubert. In Art, a certain brutality in the choice of subject, +_Gérôme and Régnault_. In politics, the accomplished fact (_le +fait accompli_), the Empire, the brutal pressure from above and +general levelling by universal suffrage from below. In lyric poetry, the +strictly technical artists of form of the _Parnasse_, Coppée, who +describes unvarnished reality, and the master workmen (_les maîtres de +la facture_), Leconte Delisle, Gautier and his pupils, who write +better verse than Lamartine and Hugo, but have no new thoughts or +feelings--the poetic language materialists. + +In conclusion, a great many indistinct beginnings, of which it is as yet +impossible to say whither they are tending. + +This, my first attempt to formulate for myself a general survey of one +of the great literatures of the nineteenth century, contained much that +was true enough, but revealed very plainly the beginner's lack of +ability to estimate the importance of phenomena, an inclination to over- +estimate purely evanescent apparitions, and a tendency to include that +which was merely externally similar, under one heading. The +insignificant School of Common Sense could not by any means be regarded +as marking an epoch. Neither, with any justice, could men like Augier +and Dumas be placed in different groups. The attempt to point out +realism in the lyric art was likewise exceedingly audacious. + +However, this division and grouping seemed to me at that time to be a +great discovery, and great was my disappointment when one day I +consulted Chasles on the subject and he thought it too forced, and +another day submitted it to Renan, who restricted himself to the reply: + +"No! no! Things do not proceed so systematically!" + +As this survey of the literature of France was also intended to guide me +with regard to the Danish, I groped my way forward in the following +manner: + +I. _Romanticism_. Oehlenschläger's attitude towards the past +corresponds exactly to Victor Hugo's; only that the resurrection of the +Middle Ages in poetry is much more successful (_Earl Hakon, The Gods +of the North_), by reason of the fresh originality in Snorre and the +_Edda_. Grundtvig's _Scenes from the Lives of the Warriors of the +North_ likewise owes all its value to the Edda and the Sagas. +Oehlenschläger's _Aladdin_ is the Northern pendant to Hugo's _Les +Orientales_. Gautier, as a poet, Delacroix as a painter, affect the +East, as Oehlenschläger does in _Ali and Gulhyndi_. Steffens and +Sibbern, as influenced by Schelling, correspond to Cousin. Hauch not +infrequently seeks his poetic themes in Germany, as do Nodier and Gérard +de Nerval. Ingemann's weak historical novels correspond to the French +imitations of Sir Walter Scott (Alfred de Vigny's _Cinq-Mars_, +Dumas' _Musketeers_). Oehlenschläger's tragedies correspond to the +dramas of Victor Hugo. With the Danes, as with the French, hatred of +intelligence, as cold; only that the Danes glorify imagination and +enthusiasm, the French, passion. Romanticism lasts in Denmark (without +Revolutions and Restorations) until about 1848, as in France. + +II. The _School of Common Sense_ is in Denmark partly a worship of +the sound sense of the people, partly a moralising tendency. Grundtvig, +with his popular manner, his appreciation of the unsophisticated peasant +nature, had points of contact with the pupils of Rousseau. Moralising +works are Heiberg's _A Soul after Death_, Paludan-Müller's _Adam +Homo_, and Kierkegaard's _Either-Or_. The funny thing about the +defence of marriage contained in this last book is that it defends what +no one in Denmark attacks. It can only be understood from the +contemporary movement in the intellectual life of Europe, which is now +asserting the universal validity of morality, as it formerly did the +right of passion. Its defence of Protestantism corresponds to Octave +Feuillet's defence of Catholicism, only that Feuillet is conciliatory, +Kierkegaard vehement. Björnson's peasant novels, which are a +continuation of Grundtvig and Blicher, are, by their harmony and their +peaceable relations to all that is, an outcome of love of common sense; +they have the same anti-Byronic stamp as the School of Common Sense. The +movement comes to us ten years later. But Björnson has simultaneously +something of Romanticism and something of Realism. We have not men to +place separately in the various frames. + +III. _Realistic Art_. There is so far only an attempt at a +realistic art. + +Thus, in Björnson's _Arne_ and _Sigurd Slembe_. Note also an +attempt in Bergsöe's clumsy use of realistic features, and in his +seeking after effect. Richardt corresponds in our lyric art as an artist +in language to the poets of the _Parnasse_, while Heiberg's +philosophy and most of his poetry may be included in the School of +Common Sense. Bröchner's _Ideal Realism_ forms the transitional +stage to the philosophy of Reality. Ibsen's attack upon the existing +state of things corresponds to realism in the French drama. He is Dumas +on Northern soil. In the _Love Comedy_, as a scoffer he is +inharmonious. In _Peer Gynt_, he continues in the moralising +tendency with an inclination to coarse and brutal realistic effects +(relations with Anitra). + +In Germany we find ourselves at the second stage still, sinking deeper +and deeper into dialect and popular subjects (from Auerbach to Claus +Groth and Fritz Reuter). + +It is unnecessary to point out to readers of the present day how +incomplete and arbitrary this attempt at a dissection of Danish +literature was. I started from the conviction that modern intellectual +life in Europe, in different countries, must necessarily in all +essentials traverse the same stages, and as I was able to find various +unimportant points of similarity in support of this view, I quite +overlooked the fact that the counterbalancing weight of dissimilarities +rendered the whole comparison futile. + + +IX. + +As, during my first stay in Paris, I had frequently visited Madame +Victorine, the widow of my deceased uncle, and her children, very +cordial relations had since existed between us, especially after my +uncle's faithless friend had been compelled to disgorge the sums sent +from Denmark for her support, which he had so high-handedly kept back. +There were only faint traces left of the great beauty that had once been +hers; life had dealt hardly with her. She was good and tender-hearted, +an affectionate mother, but without other education than was usual in +the Parisian small bourgeois class to which she belonged. All her +opinions, her ideas of honour, of propriety, of comfort and happiness, +were typical of her class. + +Partly from economy, partly from a desire not to waste the precious +time, I often, in those days, restricted my midday meal. I would buy +myself, at a provision dealer's, a large veal or ham pie and eat it in +my room, instead of going out to a restaurant. One day Victorine +surprised me at a meal of this sort, and exclaimed horrified: +_"Comment? vous vous nourrissez si mal!"_ To her, it was about the +same as if I had not had any dinner at all. To sit at home without a +cloth on the table, and cut a pie in pieces with a paper knife, was to +sink one's dignity and drop to poor man's fare. + +Her thoughts, like those of most poor people in France and elsewhere, +centred mostly on money and money anxieties, on getting on well in the +world, or meeting with adversity, and on how much this man or the other +could earn, or not earn, in the year. Her eldest son was in St. +Petersburg, and he was doing right well; he was good and kind and sent +his mother help when he had a little to spare. He had promised, too, to +take charge of his next brother. But she had much anxiety about the +little ones. One of them was not turning out all that he should be, and +there were the two youngest to educate. + +There was a charming celebration in the poor home when little Emma went +to her first communion, dressed all in white, from head to foot, with a +long white veil and white shoes, and several other little girls and boys +came just as smartly dressed, and presents were given and good wishes +offered. Little Henri looked more innocent than any of the little girls. + +Victorine had a friend whom she deemed most happy; this was Jules +Clarétie's mother, for, young though her son was, he wrote in the +papers, wrote books, too, and earned money, so that he was able to +maintain his mother altogether. He was a young man who ought to be held +in high estimation, an author who was all that he should be. There was +another author whom she detested, and that was P.L. Möller, the Dane: + +"Jacques, as you know, was always a faithful friend of Monsieur Möller; +he copied out a whole book for him, [Footnote: _The Modern Drama in +France and Denmark_, which won the University Gold Medal for Möller.] +when he himself was very busy. But then when Jacques died--_pauvre +homme!_--he came and paid visits much too often and always at more and +more extraordinary times, so that I was obliged to forbid him the house." + + +X. + +In a students' hotel near the Odéon, where a few Scandinavians lived, I +became acquainted with two or three young lawyers and more young abbés +and priests. If you went in when the company were at table in the dining +room, the place rang again with their noisy altercations. The advocates +discussed politics, literature and religion with such ardour that the +air positively crackled. They were apparently practising to speak one +day at the Bar or in the Chamber. It was from surroundings such as these +that Gambetta emerged. + +The young abbés and priests were very good fellows, earnest believers, +but so simple that conversations with them were only interesting because +of their ignorance and lack of understanding. Scandinavians in Paris who +knew only Roman Catholic priests from _Tartufe_ at the theatre, had +very incorrect conceptions regarding them. Bressant was the cold, +elegant hypocrite, Lafontaine the base, coarse, but powerful cleric, +Leroux the full-blooded, red-faced, voluptuary with fat cheeks and +shaking hands, whose expression was now angry, now sickly sweet. +Northern Protestants were very apt to classify the black-coated men whom +they saw in the streets and in the churches, as belonging to one of +these three types. But my ecclesiastical acquaintances were as free from +hypocrisy as from fanaticism. They were good, honest children of the +commonalty, with, not the cunning, but the stupidity, of peasants. + +Many a day I spent exploring the surroundings of Paris in their company. +We went to St. Cloud and Sèvres, to Versailles and St. Germain, to Saint +Denis, to Montmorency and Enghien, or to Monthléry, a village with an +old tower from the thirteenth century, and then breakfasted at +Longjumeau, celebrated for its postillion. There Abbé Leboulleux +declared himself opposed to cremation, for the reason that it rendered +the resurrection impossible, since God himself could not collect the +bones again when the body had been burnt. It was all so amiable that one +did not like to contradict him. At the same meal another was giving a +sketch of the youth of Martin Luther; he left the church--_on se +demande encore pourquoi_. In the innocence of his heart this abbé +regarded the rebellion of Luther less as an unpermissible than as an +inexplicable act. + + +XI. + +The society of the Italian friends of my first visit gave me much +pleasure. My first call at the Pagellas' was a blank; at the next, I was +received like a son of the house and heaped with reproaches for not +having left my address; they had tried to find me at my former hotel, +and endeavoured in vain to learn where I was staying from Scandinavians +whom they knew by name; now I was to spend all the time I could with +them, as I used to do in the old days. They were delighted to see me +again, and when I wished to leave, drove me home in their carriage. I +resumed my former habit of spending the greater part of my spare time +with Southerners; once more I was transported to Southern Europe and +South America. The very first day I dined at their house I met a jovial +old Spaniard, a young Italian, who was settled in Egypt, and a very +coquettish young Brazilian girl. The Spaniard, who had been born in +Venezuela, was an engineer who had studied conditions in Panama for +eleven years, and had a plan for the cutting of the isthmus. He talked a +great deal about the project, which Lesseps took up many years +afterwards. + +Pagella, too, was busy with practical plans, setting himself technical +problems, and solving them. Thus he had discovered a new method of +constructing railway carriages on springs, with a mechanism to prevent +collisions. He christened this the _Virginie-ressort_, after his +wife, and had had offers for it from the Russian government. + +An Italian engineer, named Casellini, who had carried out the +construction for him, was one of the many bold adventurers that one met +with among the Southerners in Paris. He had been sent to Spain the year +before by Napoleon III to direct the counter-revolution there. Being an +engineer, he knew the whole country, and had been in constant +communication with Queen Isabella and the Spanish Court in Paris. He +gave illuminating accounts of Spanish corruptibility. He had bribed the +telegraph officials in the South of Spain, where he was, and saw all +political telegrams before the Governor of the place. In Malaga, where +he was leading the movement against the Government, he very narrowly +escaped being shot; he had been arrested, his despatches intercepted and +1,500 rifles seized, but he bribed the officials to allow him to make +selection from the despatches and destroy those that committed him. In +Madrid he had had an audience of Serrano, after this latter had +forbidden the transmission from the town of any telegrams that were not +government telegrams; he had taken with him a telegram drawn up by the +French party, which sounded like an ordinary business letter, and +secured its being sent off together with the government despatches. +Casellini had wished to pay for the telegram, but Serrano had dismissed +the suggestion with a wave of his hand, rung a bell and given the +telegram to a servant. It was just as in Scribe's _Queen Marguerite's +Novels_, the commission was executed by the enemy himself. + +Such romantic adventures did not seem to be rare in Spain. Prim himself +had told the Pagellas how at the time of the failure of the first +insurrection he had always, in his flight, (in spite of his defective +education, he was more magnanimous and noble-minded than any king), +provided for the soldiers who were sent out after him, ordered food and +drink for them in every inn he vacated, and paid for everything +beforehand, whereas the Government let their poor soldiers starve as +soon as they were eight or ten miles from Madrid. + +I often met a very queer, distinguished looking old Spaniard named Don +José Guell y Rente, who had been married to a sister of King Francis, +the husband of King Isabella, but had been separated from her after, as +he declared, she had tried to cut his throat. As witness to his +connubial difficulties, he showed a large scar across his throat. He was +well-read and, amongst other things, enthusiastically admired +Scandinavian literature because it had produced the world's greatest +poet, Ossian, with whom he had become acquainted in Cesarotti's Italian +translation. It was useless to attempt to explain to him the difference +between Scandinavia and Scotland. They are both in the North, he would +reply. + + +XII. + +A young American named Olcott, who visited Chasles and occasionally +looked me up, brought with him a breath from the universities of the +great North American Republic. A young German, Dr. Goldschmidt, a +distinguished Sanscrit scholar, a man of more means than I, who had a +pretty flat with a view over the Place du Châtelet, and dined at good +restaurants, came, as it were, athwart the many impressions I had +received of Romance nature and Romance intellectual life, with his +violent German national feeling and his thorough knowledge. As early as +the Spring, he believed there would be war between Germany and France +and wished in that event to be a soldier, as all other German students, +so he declared, passionately wished. He was a powerfully built, +energetic, well-informed man of the world, with something of the rich +man's habit of command. He seemed destined to long life and quite able +to stand fatigue. Nevertheless, his life was short. He went through the +whole of the war in France without a scratch, after the conclusion of +peace was appointed professor of Sanscrit at the University of conquered +Strasburg, but died of illness shortly afterwards. + +A striking contrast to his reticent nature was afforded by the young +Frenchmen of the same age whom I often met. A very rich and very +enthusiastic young man, Marc de Rossiény, was a kind of leader to them; +he had 200,000 francs a year, and with this money had founded a weekly +publication called "_L'Impartial_," as a common organ for the +students of Brussels and Paris. The paper's name, _L'Impartial_, +must be understood in the sense that it admitted the expression of every +opinion with the exception of defence of so-called revealed religion. +The editorial staff was positivist, Michelet and Chasles were patrons of +the paper, and behind the whole stood Victor Hugo as a kind of honorary +director. The weekly preached hatred of the Empire and of theology, and +seemed firmly established, yet was only one of the hundred ephemeral +papers that are born and die every day in the Latin quarter. When it had +been in existence a month, the war broke out and swept it away, like so +many other and greater things. + + +XIII. + +Of course I witnessed all that was accessible to me of Parisian public +life. I fairly often found my way, as I had done in 1866, to the Palais +de Justice to hear the great advocates plead. The man I enjoyed +listening to most was Jules Favre, whose name was soon to be on every +one's lips. The younger generation admired in him the high-principled +and steadfast opponent of the Empire in the Chamber, and he was regarded +as well-nigh the most eloquent man in France. As an advocate, he was +incomparable. His unusual handsomeness,--his beautiful face under a +helmet of grey hair, and his upright carriage,--were great points in his +favour. His eloquence was real, penetrating, convincing, inasmuch as he +piled up fact upon fact, and was at the same time, as the French manner +is, dramatic, with large gesticulations that made his gown flutter +restlessly about him like the wings of a bat. It was a depressing fact +that afterwards, as the Minister opposed to Bismarck, he was so unequal +to his position. + +I was present at the _Théâtre Français_ on the occasion of the +unveiling of Ponsard's bust. To the Romanticists, Ponsard was nothing +less than the ass's jawbone with which the Philistines attempted to slay +Hugo. But Émile Chasles, a son of my old friend, gave a lecture upon +him, and afterwards _Le lion amoureux_ was played, a very tolerable +little piece from the Revolutionary period, in which, for one thing, +Napoleon appears as a young man. There are some very fine revolutionary +tirades in it, of which Princess Mathilde, after its first +representation, said that they made her _Republican_ heart +palpitate. The ceremony in honor of this little anti-pope to Victor Hugo +was quite a pretty one. + +Once, too, I received a ticket for a reception at the French Academy. +The poet Auguste Barbier was being inaugurated and Silvestre de Sacy +welcomed him, in academic fashion, in a fairly indiscreet speech. +Barbier's _Jamber_ was one of the books of poems that I had loved +for years, and I knew many of the strophes by heart, for instance, the +celebrated ones on Freedom and on Napoleon; I had also noticed how +Barbier's vigour had subsided in subsequent collections of poems; in +reality, he was still living on his reputation from the year 1831, and +without a doubt most people believed him to be dead. And now there he +stood, a shrivelled old man in his Palm uniform, his speech revealing +neither satiric power nor lofty intellect. It was undoubtedly owing to +his detestation of Napoleon (_vide_ his poem _L'Idole_) that +the Academy, who were always agitating against the Empire, had now, so +late in the day, cast their eyes upon him. Bald little Silvestre de +Sacy, the tiny son of an important father, reproached him for his verses +on Freedom, as the bold woman of the people who was not afraid to shed +blood. + +"That is not Freedom as I understand it," piped the little man,--and one +believed him,--but could not refrain from murmuring with the poet: + + C'est que la Liberté n'est pas une comtesse + Du noble Faubourg St. Germain, + Une femme qu'un cri fait tomber en faiblesse, + Qui met du blanc et du carmin; + C'est une forte femme. + + +XIV. + +A very instructive resort, even for a layman, was the Record Office, for +there one could run through the whole history of France in the most +entertaining manner with the help of the manuscripts placed on view, +from the most ancient papyrus rolls to the days of parchment and paper. +You saw the documents of the Feudal Lords' and Priests' Conspiracies +under the Merovingians and the Capets, the decree of divorce between +Philip Augustus and Ingeborg, and letters from the most notable +personages of the Middle Ages and the autocracy. The period of the +Revolution and the First Empire came before one with especial vividness. +There was Charlemagne's monogram stencilled in tin, and that of Robert +of Paris, reproduced in the same manner, those of Louis XIV. and +Molière, of Francis the Catholic and Mary Stuart. There were letters +from Robespierre and Danton, requests for money and death-warrants from +the Reign of Terror, Charlotte Corday's last letters from prison and the +original letters of Napoleon from St. Helena. + +In June I saw the annual races at Longchamps for the first time. Great +was the splendour. From two o'clock in the afternoon to six there was an +uninterrupted stream of carriages, five or six abreast, along the Champs +Elysées; there were thousands of _lorettes_ (as they were called at +that time) in light silk gowns, covered with diamonds and precious +stones, in carriages decorated with flowers. Coachmen and footmen wore +powdered wigs, white or grey, silk stockings and knee-breeches and a +flower in the buttonhole matching the colour of their livery and the +flowers which hung about the horses' ears. Some of the carriages had no +coachman's box or driver, but were harnessed to four horses ridden by +postillions in green satin or scarlet velvet, with white feathers in +their caps. + +The only great _demi-mondaine_ of whom I had hitherto caught a +glimpse was the renowned Madame de Païva, who had a little palace by the +side of the house in which Frölich the painter lived, in the Champs +Elysées. Her connection with Count Henckel v. Donnersmark permitted her +to surround herself with regal magnificence, and, to the indignation of +Princess Mathilde, men like Gautier and Renan, Sainte-Beuve and +Goncourt, Saint-Victor and Taine, sat at her table. The ladies here were +younger and prettier, but socially of lower rank. The gentlemen went +about among the carriages, said _tu_ without any preamble to the +women, and squeezed their hands, while their men-servants sat stolid, +like wood, seeming neither to hear nor see. + +This race-day was the last under the Empire. It is the one described in +Zola's _Nana_. The prize for the third race was 100,000 francs. +After English horses had been victorious for several years in +succession, the prize was carried off in 1870--as in _Nana_--by a +native-born horse, and the jubilation was great; it was a serious +satisfaction to national vanity. + +At that time, the Tuileries were still standing, and I was fond of +walking about the gardens near closing time, when the guard beat the +drums to turn the people out. It was pleasant to hear the rolling of the +drums, which were beaten by two of the Grenadier Guard drummers and a +Turco. Goldschmidt had already written his clever and linguistically +very fine piece of prose about this rolling of the drums and what it +possibly presaged: Napoleon's own expulsion from the Tuileries and the +humiliation of French grandeur before the Prussians, who might one day +come and drum this grandeur out. But Goldschmidt had disfigured the +pretty little piece somewhat by relating that one day when, for an +experiment, he had tried to make his way into the gardens after the +signal for closing had sounded, the Zouave had carelessly levelled his +bayonet at him with the words: _"Ne faites pas des bêtises!"_ This +levelling of the bayonet on such trivial provocation was too tremendous, +so I made up my mind one evening to try myself. The soldier on guard +merely remarked politely: "_Fermé, monsieur, on va sortir._" + +I little dreamed that only a few months later the Empress would steal +secretly out of the palace, having lost her crown, and still less that +only six months afterwards, during the civil war, the Tuileries would be +reduced to ashes, never to rise again. + + +XV. + +At that time the eyes of the Danes were fixed upon France in hope and +expectation that their national resuscitation would come from that +quarter, and they made no distinction between France and the Empire. +Although the shortest visit to Paris was sufficient to convince a +foreigner not only that the personal popularity of the Emperor was long +since at an end, but that the whole government was despised, in Denmark +people did not, and would not, know it. In the Danish paper with the +widest circulation, the Daily Paper, foreign affairs were dealt with by +a man of the name of Prahl, a wildly enthusiastic admirer of the Empire, +a pleasant man and a brainy, but who, on this vital point, seemed to +have blinkers on. From all his numerous foreign papers, he deduced only +the opinions that he held before, and his opinions were solely +influenced by his wishes. He had never had any opportunity of procuring +information at first hand. He said to me one day: + +"I am accused of allowing my views to be influenced by the foreign +diplomatists here, I, who have never spoken to one of them. I can +honestly boast of being unacquainted with even the youngest attaché of +the Portuguese Ministry." His remarks, which sufficiently revealed this +fact, unfortunately struck the keynote of the talk of the political +wiseacres in Denmark. + +Though the Danes were so full of the French, it would be a pity to say +that the latter returned the compliment. It struck me then, as it must +have struck many others, how difficult it was to make people in France +understand that Danes and Norsemen were not Germans. From the roughest +to the most highly educated, they all looked upon it as an understood +thing, and you could not persuade them of anything else. As soon as they +had heard Northerners exchange a few words with each other and had +picked up the frequently recurring _Ja_, they were sufficiently +edified. Even many years after, I caught the most highly cultured +Frenchmen (such as Edmond de Concourt), believing that, at any rate on +the stage, people spoke German in Copenhagen. + +One day in June I began chatting on an omnibus with a corporal of +Grenadiers. When he heard that I was Danish, he remarked: "German, +then." I said: "No." He persisted in his assertion, and asked, +cunningly, what _oui_ was in Danish. When I told him he merely +replied, philosophically, "Ah! then German is the mother tongue." It is +true that when Danes, Norwegians and Swedes met abroad they felt each +other to be compatriots; but this did not prevent them all being classed +together as Germans; that they were not Englishmen, you saw at a glance. +Even when there were several of them together, they had difficulty in +asserting themselves as different and independent; they were a Germanic +race all the same, and people often added, "of second-class importance," +since the race had other more pronounced representatives. + +The only strong expression of political opinion that was engineered in +France then was the so-called plebiscite of May, 1870; the government +challenged the verdict of the entire male population of France upon the +policy of Napoleon III. during the past eighteen years, and did so with +the intention, strangely enough not perceived by Prime Minister +Ollivier, of re-converting the so-called constitutional Empire which had +been in existence since January 1, 1870, into an autocracy. Sensible +people saw that the plebiscite was only an objectionable comedy; a +favourable reply would be obtained all over the country by means of +pressure on the voters and falsification of votes; the oppositionist +papers showed this up boldly in articles that were sheer gems of wit. +Disturbances were expected in Paris on the 9th of May, and here and +there troops were collected. But the Parisians, who saw through the +farce, remained perfectly indifferent. + +The decision turned out as had been expected; the huge majority in Paris +was _against_, the provincial population voted _for_, the Emperor. + + +XVI. + +On July 5th I saw John Stuart Mill for the first time. He had arrived in +Paris the night before, passing through from Avignon, and paid a visit +to me, unannounced, in my room in the Rue Mazarine; he stayed two hours +and won my affections completely. I was a little ashamed to receive so +great a man in so poor a place, but more proud of his thinking it worth +his while to make my acquaintance. None of the French savants had ever +had an opportunity of conversing with him; a few days before, Renan had +lamented to me that he had never seen him. As Mill had no personal +acquaintances in Paris, I was the only person he called upon. + +To talk to him was a new experience. The first characteristic that +struck me was that whereas the French writers were all assertive, he +listened attentively to counter-arguments; it was only when his attitude +in the woman question was broached that he would not brook contradiction +and overwhelmed his adversaries with contempt. + +At that time Mill was without any doubt, among Europe's distinguished +men, the greatest admirer of French history and French intellectual life +to be found outside of France; but he was of quite a different type from +the French, even from those I esteemed most highly. The latter were +comprehensive-minded men, bold and weighty, like Taine, or cold and +agile like Renan, but they were men of intellect and thought, only +having no connection with the practical side of life. They were not +adapted to personal action, felt no inclination to direct interference. + +Mill was different. Although he was more of a thinker than any of them, +his boldness was not of the merely theoretic kind. He wished to +interfere and re-model. None of those Frenchmen lacked firmness; if, +from any consideration, they modified their utterances somewhat, their +fundamental views, at any rate, were formed independently; but their +firmness lay in defence, not in attack; they wished neither to rebuke +nor to instigate; their place was the lecturer's platform, rather than +the tribune. Mill's firmness was of another kind, hard as steel; both in +character and expression he was relentless, and he went to work +aggressively. He was armed, not with a cuirass, but a glaive. + +Thus in him I met, for the first time in my life, a figure who was the +incarnation of the ideal I had drawn for myself of the great man. This +ideal had two sides; talent and character: great capacities and +inflexibility. The men of great reputation whom I had met hitherto, +artists and scientists, were certainly men richly endowed with talents; +but I had never hitherto encountered a personality combining talents +with gifts of character. Shortly before leaving home, I had concluded +the preface to a collection of criticisms with these words: "My +watchword has been: As flexible as possible, when it is a question of +understanding, as inflexible as possible, when it is a question of +speaking," and I had regarded this watchword as more than the motto of a +little literary criticism. Now I had met a grand inflexibility of ideas +in human form, and was impressed for my whole life long. + +Unadapted though I was by nature to practical politics, or in fact to +any activity save that of ideas, I was far from regarding myself as mere +material for a scholar, an entertaining author, a literary historian, or +the like. I thought myself naturally fitted to be a man of action. But +the men of action I had hitherto met had repelled me by their lack of a +leading principle. The so-called practical men at home, lawyers and +parliamentarians, were not men who had made themselves masters of any +fund of new thoughts that they wished to reduce to practical effect; +they were dexterous people, well-informed of conditions at their elbow, +not thinkers, and they only placed an immediate goal in front of +themselves. In Mill I learnt at last to know a man in whom the power of +action, disturbance, and accomplishment were devoted to the service of +modern sociological thought. + +He was then sixty-four years old, but his skin was as fresh and clear as +a child's, his deep blue eyes young. He stammered a little, and nervous +twitches frequently shot over his face; but there was a sublime nobility +about him. + +To prolong the conversation, I offered to accompany him to the Windsor +Hotel, where he was staying, and we walked the distance. As I really had +intended to go over to England at about that time, Mill proposed my +crossing with him. I refused, being afraid of abusing his kindness, but +was invited to visit him frequently when I was in England, which I did +not fail to do. A few days afterwards I was in London. + + +XVII. + +My French acquaintances all said the same thing, when I told them I +wanted to go over to England: "What on earth do you want there?" Though +only a few hours' journey from England, they had never felt the least +curiosity to see the country. "And London! It was said to be a very dull +city; it was certainly not worth putting one's self out to go there." Or +else it was: "If you are going to London, be careful! London is full of +thieves and rascals; look well to your pockets!" + +Only a few days later, the Parisians were shaken out of their calm, +without, however, being shaken out of their self-satisfaction. The Duc +de Grammont's speech on the 6th of July, which amounted to the statement +that France was not going to stand any Hohenzollern on the throne of +Spain, made the people fancy themselves deeply offended by the King of +Prussia, and a current of martial exasperation ran through the irritable +and misled people, who for four years had felt themselves humiliated by +Prussia's strong position. All said and believed that in a week there +would be war, and on both sides everything was so ordered that there +might be. There was still hope that common sense might get the better of +warlike madness in the French Government; but this much was clear, there +was going to be a sudden downfall of everything. + +Between Dover and Calais the waves beat over the ship. From Dover, the +train went at a speed of sixty miles an hour, and made one think him a +great man who invented the locomotive, as great as Aristotle and Plato +together. It seemed to me that John Stuart Mill was that kind of man. He +opened, not roads, but railroads; his books were like iron rails, +unadorned, but useful, leading to their goal. And what will there was in +the English locomotive that drew our train,--like the driving instinct +of England's character! + +Two things struck me on my journey across, a type of mechanical +Protestant religiosity which was new to me, and the knowledge of the two +languages along the coasts. A pleasant English doctor with whom I got +into conversation sat reading steadily in a little Gospel of St. John +that he carried with him, yawning as he read. The seamen on the ship and +the coast dwellers both in England and France spoke English and French +with about equal ease. It is probably the same in all border countries, +but it occurred to me that what came about here quite naturally will in +time be a possibility all over the world, namely, the mastery of a +second and common language, in addition to a people's own. + +I drove into London through a sea of houses. When I had engaged a room, +changed my clothes, and written a letter that I wanted to send off at +once, the eighteen-year-old girl who waited on me informed me that no +letters were accepted on Sundays. As I had some little difficulty in +making out what she said, I supposed she had misunderstood my question +and thought I wanted to speak to the post-official. For I could not help +laughing at the idea that even the letterboxes had to enjoy their +Sabbath rest. But I found she was right. At the post-office, even the +letter-box was shut, as it was Sunday; I was obliged to put my letter in +a pillar-box in the street. + +In Paris the Summer heat had been oppressive. In London, to my surprise, +the weather was fresh and cool, the air as light as it is in Denmark in +Autumn. My first visit was to the Greek and Assyrian collections in the +British Museum. In the Kensington Museum and the Crystal Palace at +Sydenham, I added to my knowledge of Michael Angelo, to whom I felt +drawn by a mighty affection. The admiration for his art which was to +endure undiminished all my life was even then profound. I early felt +that although Michael Angelo had his human weaknesses and limitations, +intellectually and as an artist he is one of the five or six elect the +world has produced, and scarcely any other great man has made such an +impression on my inner life as he. + +In the British Museum I was accosted by a young Dane with whom I had +sometimes ridden out in the days of my riding lessons; this was Carl +Bech, now a landed proprietor, and in his company I saw many of the +sights of London and its environs. He knew more English than I, and +could find his way anywhere. That the English are rigid in their +conventions, he learnt one day to his discomfort; he had put on a pair +of white trousers, and as this was opposed to the usual precedent and +displeased, we were stared at by every man, woman and child we met, as +if the young man had gone out in his underclothing. I had a similar +experience one day as I was walking about the National Gallery with a +young German lady whose acquaintance I had made. An Englishwoman stopped +her in one of the rooms to ask: + +"Was it you who gave up a check parasol downstairs?" and receiving an +answer in the affirmative, she burst out laughing in her face and went +off. + +On July 16th came the great daily-expected news. War was declared, and +in face of this astounding fact and all the possibilities it presented, +people were struck dumb. The effect it had upon me personally was that I +made up my mind to return as soon as possible to France, to watch the +movement there. In London, where Napoleon III. was hated, and in a +measure despised, France was included in the aversion felt for him. +Everywhere, when I was asked on which side my sympathies were, they +broke in at once: "We are all for Prussia." + + +XVIII. + +As often as I could, I took the train to Blackheath to visit John Stuart +Mill. He was good and great, and I felt myself exceedingly attracted by +his greatness. There were fundamental features of his thought and mode +of feeling that coincided with inclinations of my own; for instance, the +Utilitarian theory, as founded by Bentham and his father and developed +by him. I had written in 1868: "What we crave is no longer to flee from +society and reality with our thoughts and desires. On the contrary, we +wish to put our ideas into practice in society and life. That we may not +become a nation of poetasters, we will simply strive towards actuality, +the definite goal of Utility, which the past generation mocked at. Who +would not be glad to be even so little useful?" + +Thus I found myself mentally in a direction that led me towards Mill, +and through many years' study of Comte and Littré, through an +acquaintance with Mill's correspondence with Comte, I was prepared for +philosophical conversations concerning the fundamental thoughts of +empiric philosophy as opposed to speculative philosophy, conversations +which, on Mill's part, tended to represent my entire University +philosophical education at Copenhagen as valueless and wrong. + +But what drew me the most strongly to Mill was not similarity of +thought, but the feeling of an opposed relationship. All my life I had +been afraid of going further in a direction towards which I inclined. I +had always had a passionate desire to perfect my nature--to make good my +defects. Julius Lange was so much to me because he was so unlike me. Now +I endeavoured to understand Mill's nature and make it my own, because it +was foreign to mine. By so doing I was only obeying an inner voice that +perpetually urged me. When others about me had plunged into a subject, a +language, a period, they continued to wrestle with it to all eternity, +made the thing their speciality. That I had a horror of. I knew French +well; but for fear of losing myself in French literature, which I could +easily illustrate, I was always wrestling with English or German, which +presented greater difficulties to me, but made it impossible for me to +grow narrow. I had the advantage over the European reading world that I +knew the Northern languages, but nothing was further from my thoughts +than to limit myself to opening up Northern literature to Europe. Thus +it came about that when the time in my life arrived that I felt +compelled to settle outside Denmark I chose for my place of residence +Berlin, the city with which I had fewest points in common, and where I +could consequently learn most and develop myself without one-sidedness. + +Mill's verbally expressed conviction that empiric philosophy was the +only true philosophy, made a stronger impression upon me than any +assertion of the kind that I had met with in printed books. The results +of empiric philosophy seemed to me much more firmly based than those of +the newer German philosophy. At variance with my teachers, I had come to +see that Hume had been right rather than Kant. But I could not conform +to the principle of empiric philosophy. After all, our knowledge is not +ultimately based merely on experience, but on that which, prior to +experience, alone renders experience possible. Otherwise not even the +propositions of Mathematics can be universally applicable. In spite of +my admiration for Mill's philosophical works, I was obliged to hold to +the rationalistic theory of cognition; Mill obstinately held to the +empiric. "Is not a reconciliation between the two possible?" I said. "I +think that one must _choose_ between the theories," replied Mill. I +did not then know Herbert Spencer's profoundly thoughtful reconciliation +of the teachings of the two opposing schools. He certainly maintains, as +does the English school, that all our ideas have their root in +experience, but he urges at the same time, with the Germans, that there +are innate ideas. The conscious life of the individual, that cannot be +understood from the experience of the individual, becomes explicable +from the inherited experience of the race. Even the intellectual form +which is the condition of the individual's apprehension is gradually +made up out of the experience of the race, and consequently innate +without for that reason being independent of foregoing experiences. But +I determined at once, incited thereto by conversations with Mill, to +study, not only his own works, but the writings of James Mill, Bain, and +Herbert Spencer; I would endeavour to find out how much truth they +contained, and introduce this truth into Denmark. + +I was very much surprised when Mill informed me that he had not read a +line of Hegel, either in the original or in translation, and regarded +the entire Hegelian philosophy as sterile and empty sophistry. I +mentally confronted this with the opinion of the man at the Copenhagen +University who knew the history of philosophy best, my teacher, Hans +Bröchner, who knew, so to speak, nothing of contemporary English and +French philosophy, and did not think them worth studying. I came to the +conclusion that here was a task for one who understood the thinkers of +the two directions, who did not mutually understand one another. + +I thought that in philosophy, too, I knew what I wanted, and saw a road +open in front of me. + +However, I never travelled it. The gift for abstract philosophical +thought which I had possessed as a youth was never developed, but much +like the tendency to verse-making which manifested itself even earlier, +superseded by the historio-critical capacity, which grew strong in me. +At that time I believed in my natural bent for philosophy, and did so +even in July, 1872, when I sketched out and began a large book: "_The +Association of Ideas, conceived and put forward as the fundamental +principle of human knowledge_," but the book was never completed. The +capacity for abstraction was too weak in me. + +Still, if the capacity had no independent development, it had a +subservient effect on all my criticism, and the conversations with Mill +had a fertilising and helpful influence on my subsequent intellectual +life. + + +XIX. + +Some weeks passed in seeing the most important public buildings in +London, revelling in the treasures of her museums and collections, and +in making excursions to places in the neighbourhood and to Oxford. I was +absorbed by St. Paul's, saw it from end to end, and from top to bottom, +stood in the crypt, where Sir Christopher Wren lies buried,--_Si +monumentum requiris, circumspice_--mentally compared Wellington's +burial-place here with that of Napoleon on the other side of the +Channel, then went up to the top of the building and looked out to every +side over London, which I was already so well acquainted with that I +could find my way everywhere alone, take the right omnibuses, and the +right trains by the underground, without once asking my way. I spent +blissful hours in the National Gallery. This choice collection of +paintings, especially the Italian ones, afforded me the intense, +overwhelming delight which poetry, the masterpieces of which I knew +already, could no longer offer me. At the Crystal Palace I was +fascinated by the tree-ferns, as tall as fruit-trees with us, and by the +reproductions of the show buildings of the different countries, an +Egyptian temple, a house from Pompeii, the Lions' den from the Alhambra. +Here, as everywhere, I sought out the Zoological Gardens, where I +lingered longest near the hippopotami, who were as curious to watch when +swimming as when they were on dry land. Their clumsiness was almost +captivating. They reminded me of some of my enemies at home. + +Oxford, with the moss-grown, ivy-covered walls, with all the poetry of +conservatism, fascinated me by its dignity and its country freshness; +there the flower of the English nature was expressed in buildings and +trees. The antiquated and non-popular instruction, however, repelled me. +And the old classics were almost unrecognisable in English guise, for +instance, the anglicised _veni, vidi, vici_, which was quoted by a +student. + +The contrast between the English and the French mind was presented to me +in all its force when I compared Windsor Castle with Versailles. The +former was an old Northern Hall, in which the last act of +Oehlenschläger's _Palnatoke_ would have been well staged. + +I saw all that I could: the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Hall and +Abbey, the Tower and the theatres, the Picture Gallery at Dulwich with +Rembrandt's _Girl at the Window_, the one at Hampton Court, with +the portrait of Loyola ascribed to Titian, sailed down the river to +Greenwich and lingered in the lovely Gardens at Kew, which gave me a +luxuriant impression of English scenery. I also saw the Queen's model +farm. Every animal was as splendid a specimen as if it had been intended +for an agricultural show, the dairy walls were tiled all over. The +bailiff regretted that Prince Albert, who had himself made the drawings +for a special kind of milk containers, had not lived to see them made. +It was not without its comic aspect to hear him inform you sadly, +concerning an old bullock, that the Queen herself had given it the name +of _Prince Albert_. + +For me, accustomed to the gay and grotesque life deployed in an evening +at the dancing-place of the Parisian students in the _Closerie des +lilas_, it was instructive to compare this with a low English +dancing-house, the Holborn Casino, which was merely sad, stiff, and +repulsive. + +Poverty in London was very much more conspicuous than in Paris; it +spread itself out in side streets in the vicinity of the main arteries +in its most pitiable form. Great troops, regular mobs of poor men, women +and children in rags, dispersed like ghosts at dawn, fled away hurriedly +and vanished, as soon as a policeman approached and made sign to them to +pass on. There was nothing corresponding to it to be seen in Paris. +Crime, too, bore a very different aspect here. In Paris, it was decked +out and audacious, but retained a certain dignity; here, in the evening, +in thickly frequented streets, whole swarms of ugly, wretchedly dressed, +half or wholly drunken women could be seen reeling about, falling, and +often lying in the street. + +Both the tendency of the English to isolate themselves and their social +instincts were quite different from those of the French. I was permitted +to see the comfortably furnished Athenaeum Club in Pall Mall, membership +of which was so much desired that people of high standing would have +their names on the list for years beforehand, and these clubs +corresponded to the cafés in Paris, which were open to every passer-by. +I noticed that in the restaurants the tables were often hidden behind +high screens, that the different parties who were dining might not be +able to see one another. + + +XX. + +The house in London where I was happiest was Antonio Gallenga's. A +letter from the Hauchs was my introduction there, and I was received and +taken up by them as if they had known me and liked me for years. + +Antonio Gallenga, then a man of seventy, who nevertheless gave one an +impression of youthfulness, had a most eventful life behind him. He had +been born at Parma, was flung into prison at the age of twenty as a +conspirator under Mazzini, was banished from Piedmont, spent some time +at Malta, in the United States and in England, where he earned his +living as a journalist and teacher of languages, and in 1848 returned to +Italy, where he was active as a liberal politician. After the battle of +Novara, he was again obliged to take refuge in London; but he was +recalled to Piedmont by Cavour, who had him elected deputy for +Castellamonte. He wrote an Italian Grammar in English, and, likewise in +English, the _History of Piedmont_, quarrelled with Mazzini's +adherents, withdrew from parliamentary life, and in preference to +settling down permanently in Italy elected to be war correspondent to +the _Times_. In that capacity he took part from 1859 onwards in the +campaigns in Italy, in the North American States, in Denmark, and in +Spain. His little boy was still wearing the Spanish national costume. +Now he had settled down in London, on the staff of the _Times_, and +had just come into town from the country, as the paper wished him to be +near, on account of the approaching war. Napoleon III., to whom Gallenga +had vowed an inextinguishable hatred, had been studied so closely by him +that the Emperor might be regarded as his specialty. He used the +energetic, violent language of the old revolutionary, was with all his +heart and soul an Italian patriot, but had, through a twenty years' +connection with England, acquired the practical English view of +political affairs. Towards Denmark, where he had been during the most +critical period of the country's history, he felt kindly; but our war +methods had of course not been able to excite his admiration; neither +had our diplomatic negotiations during the war. + +Gallenga was a well-to-do man; he owned a house in the best part of +London and a house in the country as well. He was a powerful man, with +passionate feelings, devoid of vanity. It suited him well that the +_Times_, as the English custom is, printed his articles unsigned; +he was pleased at the increased influence they won thereby, inasmuch as +they appeared as the expression of the universal paper's verdict. His +wife was an Englishwoman, pleasant and well-bred, of cosmopolitan +education and really erudite. Not only did she know the European +languages, but she wrote and spoke Hindustani. She was a splendid +specimen of the English housekeeper, and devoted herself +enthusiastically to her two exceedingly beautiful children, a boy of +eleven and a little girl of nine. The children spoke English, Italian, +French, and German with equal facility and correctness. + +Mrs. Gallenga had a more composite and a deeper nature than her husband, +who doubted neither the truth of his ideas, nor their salutary power. +She shared his and my opinions without sharing our confidence in them. +When she heard me say that I intended to assert my ideas in Denmark, and +wage war against existing prejudices, she would say, in our long +conversations: + +"I am very fond of Denmark; the people there seem to me to be happy, +despite everything, and the country not to be over-populated. In any +case, the population finds ample means of outlet in sea-life and +emigration. Denmark is an idyllic little country. Now you want to +declare war there. My thoughts seek down in dark places, and I ask +myself whether I really believe that truth does any good, whether in my +secret heart I am convinced that strife is better than stagnation? I +admire Oliver Cromwell, but I sympathise with Falkland, who died with +'Peace! Peace!' [Footnote: Sir Lucius Cary, second Viscount Falkland, +who fell at Newbury, Sept. 20, 1643.] on his lips. I am afraid that you +will have to bear a great deal. You will learn that the accoutrements of +truth are a grievously heavy coat of mail. You will call forth reaction. +Even that is the least. But reaction will come about in your own mind; +after a long time, I mean. Still, you are strong; it will be a reaction +of the kind that keeps aloof in order to spring farther and better. Your +unity will not go to pieces. You are a kind of cosmos." + +When the conversation turned upon England and English conditions, she +protested against the opinion prevalent on the continent since Byron's +day, that English society was infested with hypocrisy. + +"I do not think that hypocrisy is characteristic of English thought. We +have, of course, like every serious people, our share of hypocrites; in +a frivolous nation hypocrisy has no pretext for existence. But its +supremacy amongst us is over. Apathetic orthodoxy, and superficial ideas +of the correct thing, ruled England during the first half of the +century. The intellectual position of the country is different now. No +one who has not lived in England has any idea how serious and real the +belief here is in the tough doctrine of the Trinity, who, in human form, +walked about in Galilee. Good men, noble men, live and work for this +dogma, perform acts of love for it. We, you and I, have drunk from other +sources; but for these people it is the fountain of life. Only it is +depressing to see this doctrine in its Roman Catholic form winning +greater power everywhere every day. In Denmark, intellectual stagnation +has hindered it hitherto; you have political, but not yet religious, +freedom. Belgium has both, and Belgium is at the present time the most +fiery Catholic power there is. France is divided between extreme +materialism and Madonna worship. When European thought--between 1820 and +1860, let us say--rebelled against every kind of orthodoxy, and, as +always happens with rebellion, made mistakes and went too far, France +played a wretched rôle. It is a Celtic land, and Celtic it will remain; +it desires, not personal freedom, but a despotic levelling, not equality +before the law, but the base equality which is inimical to excellence, +not the brotherhood that is brotherly love, but that which gives the bad +the right to share with the good. That is why the Empire could be +victorious in France, and that is why the Roman Catholic Church, even in +its most modern, Byzantine form, is triumphant there." + +So thoroughly English was Anna Gallenga's way of looking at things, in +spite of an education which had included the chief countries in Europe. +So blindly did she share the prejudice that the French are essentially +Celtic. And so harshly did she judge, in spite of a scepticism, feminine +though it was, that was surprising in a woman. + + +XXI. + +Don Juan Prim, Count of Reus, Marques de los Castillejos, would now be +forgotten outside Spain were it not that Régnault's splendid equestrian +picture of him, as he is receiving the homage of the people (on a fiery +steed, reminding one of Velasquez), keeps his memory green in everyone +who visits the Gallery of the Louvre. At that time his name was on every +tongue. The victorious general and revolutionary of many years' standing +had since 1869 been Prime Minister of Spain, and had eagerly endeavoured +to get a foreign prince for the throne who would be dependent upon him +and under whom he would be able to keep the power in his own hands. He +had now offered the throne of Spain to Leopold of Hohenzollern, but +without having assured himself of the consent of the Powers. That of +Prussia was of course safe enough, and for six weeks Napoleon had looked +on benevolently at the negotiations, and acted as though the arrangement +had his approval, which Prim had the more reason to suppose since +Leopold was related to the Murat family, and the Emperor had raised no +objection to a Hohenzollern ascending the throne of Roumania. +Consequently, Prim was thunderstruck when France suddenly turned round +and seized upon this trivial pretext for a breach of the peace. + +He was in regular correspondence with the Gallengas, whom he had seen a +good deal of during the years, after the unsuccessful rebellion against +Queen Isabella, that he had spent in London. At that time he had been a +man of fifty, and, with his little body and large head, had looked very +strange among Englishmen. He was of modest birth, but denied the fact. +He was now a Spanish grandee of the first class, but this was through a +patent bestowed on him for courage in the war with Morocco; he had +little education, did not know a word of English, wrote French with a +purely fantastic orthography, but had excellent qualities as a Liberal, +an army chief, and a popular leader. Still, he was not pleased that +Régnault had painted him greeted by the enthusiastic cheers of an +untidy, ragged mob of rebels; he would have preferred to be receiving +the acclamations of regular troops, and of the highest men and women in +the nation, as now, at the conclusion of his career, he really was. Only +a few months later (in December, 1870), he was shot by an assassin in +the streets of Madrid. + +In Prim's communications to Gallenga, the attitude of the French +government appeared to me in a most unfavourable light. Ollivier, the +Premier, I had long despised; it did not need much political acumen to +see that he was an ambitious and conceited phrase-monger, who would let +himself be led by the nose by those who had disarmed him. The Emperor +himself was a wreck. I had had no doubt of that since I had one day seen +him at very close quarters in the Louvre, where he was inspecting some +recently hung, decorative paintings. It was quite evident that he could +not walk alone, but advanced, half-sliding, supported by two tall +chamberlains, who each gave him an arm. His eyes were half-closed and +his gaze absolutely dulled. The dressed and waxed moustache, which ran +to a needle-like point, looked doubly tasteless against his wax mask of +a face. He was the incarnation of walking decrepitude, vapid and slack. +Quite evidently he had committed the blunder of trusting to a split in +Germany. In his blindness he explained that he had come to free the +Germans, who had, against their will, been incorporated into Prussia, +and all Germany rose like one man against him. And in his foolish +proclamation he declared that he was waging this war for the sake of the +civilising ideals of the first Republic, as if Germany were now going to +be civilised for the first time, and as if he, who had made an end of +the second Republic by a _coup d'état_, could speak in the name of +Republican freedom. His whole attitude was mendacious and mean, and the +wretched pretext under which he declared war could not but prejudice +Europe against him. In addition to this, as they knew very well in +England, from the earlier wars of the Empire, he had no generals; his +victories had been soldier victories. + +I was very deeply impressed, in the next place, by the suicide of +Prévost-Paradol. I had studied most carefully his book, _La France +Nouvelle_; I had seen in this friend and comrade of Taine and of +Renan the political leader of the future in France. No one was so well +acquainted with its resources as he; no one knew better than he what +policy ought to be followed. If he had despaired, it was because he +foresaw that the situation was hopeless. He had certainly made mistakes; +first, in believing that in January it had been Napoleon's serious +intention to abrogate personal control of the state, then that of +retaining, despite the long hesitation so well known to me, his position +as French Envoy to North America, after the plebiscite. That he should +now have turned his pistol against his own forehead told me that he +regarded the battle as lost, foresaw inevitable collapse as the outcome +of the war. When at first all the rumours and all the papers announced +the extreme probability of Denmark's taking part in the war as France's +ally, I was seized with a kind of despair at the thought of the folly +she seemed to be on the verge of committing. I wrote to my friends, +would have liked, had I been permitted, to write in every Danish paper a +warning against the martial madness that had seized upon people. It was +only apparently shared by the French. Even now, only a week after the +declaration of war, and before a single collision had taken place, it +was clear to everyone who carefully followed the course of events that +in spite of the light-hearted bragging of the Parisians and the Press, +there was deep-rooted aversion to war. And I, who had always counted +Voltaire's _Micromégas_ as one of my favourite tales, thought of +where Sirius, the giant, voices his supposition that the people on the +earth are happy beings who pass their time in love and thought, and of +the philosopher's reply to him: "At this moment there are a hundred +thousand animals of our species, who wear hats, engaged in killing a +hundred thousand more, who wear turbans, or in being killed by them. And +so it has been all over the earth from time immemorial." Only that this +time not a hundred thousand, but some two million men were being held in +readiness to exterminate each other. + +What I saw in London of the scenic art at the Adelphi Theatre, the +Prince of Wales' Theatre and the Royal Strand Theatre was disheartening. +Molière was produced as the lowest kind of farce, Sheridan was acted +worse than would be permitted in Denmark at a second-class theatre; but +the scenic decorations, a greensward, shifting lights, and the like, +surpassed anything that I had ever seen before. + +More instructive and more fascinating than the theatres were the +parliamentary debates and the trials in the Law Courts. I enjoyed in +particular a sitting of the Commons with a long debate between Gladstone +and Disraeli, who were like representatives of two races and two opposed +views of life. Gladstone was in himself handsomer, clearer, and more +open, Disraeli spoke with a finer point, and more elegantly, had a +larger oratorical compass, more often made a witty hit, and evoked more +vigorous response and applause. Their point of disagreement was the +forthcoming war; Disraeli wished all the documents regarding it to be +laid before parliament; Gladstone declared that he could not produce +them. In England, as elsewhere, the war that was just breaking out +dominated every thought. + + +XXII. + +The Paris I saw again was changed. Even on my way from Calais I heard, +to my astonishment, the hitherto strictly forbidden _Marseillaise_ +hummed and muttered. In Paris, people went arm in arm about the streets +singing, and the _Marseillaise_ was heard everywhere. The voices +were generally harsh, and it was painful to hear the song that had +become sacred through having been silenced so long, profaned in this +wise, in the bawling and shouting of half-drunken men at night. But the +following days, as well, it was hummed, hooted, whistled and sung +everywhere, and as the French are one of the most unmusical nations on +earth, it sounded for the most part anything but agreeable. + +In those days, while no collision between the masses of troops had as +yet taken place, there was a certain cheerfulness over Paris; it could +be detected in every conversation; people were more lively, raised their +voices more, chatted more than at other times; the cabmen growled more +loudly, and cracked their whips more incessantly than usual. + +Assurance of coming victory was expressed everywhere, even among the +hotel servants in the Rue Racine and on the lips of the waiters at every +restaurant. Everybody related how many had already volunteered; the +number grew from day to day; first it was ten thousand, then seventy- +five thousand, then a hundred thousand. In the Quartier Latin, the +students sat in their cafés, many of them in uniform, surrounded by +their comrades, who were bidding them good-bye. It was characteristic +that they no longer had their womenfolk with them; they had flung them +aside, now that the matter was serious. Every afternoon a long stream of +carriages, filled with departing young soldiers, could be seen moving +out towards the Gare du Nord. From every carriage large flags waved. +Women, their old mothers, workwomen, who sat in the carriages with them, +held enormous bouquets on long poles. The dense mass of people through +which one drove were grave; but the soldiers for the most part retained +their gaiety, made grimaces, smoked and drank. + +Nevertheless, the Emperor's proclamation had made a very poor +impression. It was with the intention of producing an effect of +sincerity that he foretold the war would be long and grievous, +(_longue et pénible_); with a people of the French national +character it would have been better had he been able to write "terrible, +but short." Even now, when people had grown accustomed to the situation, +this proclamation hung like a nightmare over them. I was all the more +astonished when an old copy of the _Daily Paper_ for the 30th of +July fell into my hands, and I read that their correspondent (Topsöe, +recently arrived in Paris) had seen a bloused workman tear off his hat, +after reading the proclamation, and heard him shout, "_Vive la +France_!" So thoughtlessly did people continue to feed the Danish +public with the food to which it was accustomed. + +Towards the 8th or 9th of August I met repeatedly the author of the +article. He told me that the Duc de Cadore had appeared in Copenhagen on +a very indefinite errand, but without achieving the slightest result. +Topsöe, for that matter, was extraordinarily ignorant of French affairs, +had only been four weeks in France altogether, and openly admitted that +he had touched up his correspondence as well as he could. He had never +yet been admitted to the _Corps législatif_, nevertheless he had +related how the tears had come into the eyes of the members and the +tribunes the day when the Duc de Grammont "again lifted the flag of +France on high." He said: "I have been as unsophisticated as a child +over this war," and added that Bille had been more so than himself. + + +XXIII. + +One could hardly praise the attitude of the French papers between the +declaration of war and the first battles. Their boasting and exultation +over what they were going to do was barely decent, they could talk of +nothing but the victories they were registering beforehand, and, first +and last, the entry into Berlin. The insignificant encounter at +Saarbrücken was termed everywhere the _première victoire!_ The +caricatures in the shop-windows likewise betrayed terrible arrogance. +One was painfully reminded of the behaviour of the French before the +battle of Agincourt in Shakespeare's _Henry V._ + +It was no matter for surprise that a populace thus excited should parade +through the streets in an evening, shouting _"A Berlin! A Berlin!"_ + +National enthusiasm could vent itself in the theatres, in a most +convenient manner, without making any sacrifice. As soon as the audience +had seen the first piece at the Théâtre Français, the public clamoured +for _La Marseillaise_, and brooked no denial. A few minutes later +the lovely Mlle. + +Agar came in, in a Greek costume. Two French flags were held over her +head. She then sang, quietly, sublimely, with expression at the same +time restrained and inspiring, the _Marseillaise_. The countless +variations of her voice were in admirable keeping with her animated and +yet sculptural gesticulation, and the effect was thrilling, although +certain passages in the song were hardly suitable to the circumstances +of the moment, for instance, the invocation of Freedom, the prayer to +her to fight for her defenders. When the last verse came, she seized the +flag and knelt down; the audience shouted, "_Debout_!" All rose and +listened standing to the conclusion, which was followed by mad applause. + +People seized upon every opportunity of obtruding their patriotism. One +evening _Le lion amoureux_ was given. In the long speech which +concludes the second act, a young Republican describes the army which, +during the Revolution, crossed the frontier for the first time and +utterly destroyed the Prussian armies. The whole theatre foamed like the +sea. + + +XXIV. + +Those were Summer days, and in spite of the political and martial +excitement, the peaceful woods and parks in the environs of Paris were +tempting. From the Quartier Latin many a couple secretly found their way +to the forests of St. Germain, or the lovely wood at Chantilly. In the +morning one bought a roast fowl and a bottle of wine, then spent the +greater part of the day under the beautiful oak-trees, and sat down to +one's meal in the pleasant green shade. Now and again one of the young +women would make a wreath of oak leaves and twine it round her +companion's straw hat, while he, bareheaded, lay gazing up at the tree- +tops. For a long time I kept just such a wreath as a remembrance, and +its withered leaves roused melancholy reflections some years later, for +during the war every tree of the Chantilly wood had been felled; the +wreath was all that remained of the magnificent oak forest. + + +XXV. + +The news of the battle of Weissenburg on August 4th was a trouble, but +this chiefly manifested itself in profound astonishment. What? They had +suffered a defeat? But one did not begin to be victorious at once; +victory would soon follow now. And, indeed, next morning, the news of a +victory ran like lightning about the town. It had been so confidently +expected that people quite neglected to make enquiries as to how and to +what extent it was authenticated. There was bunting everywhere; all the +horses had flags on their heads, people went about with little flags in +their hats. As the day wore on it turned out to be all a false report, +and the depression was great. + +Next evening, as I came out of the _Théâtre Français_, there stood +the Emperor's awful telegram to read, several copies of it posted up on +the columns of the porch: "Macmahon has lost a battle. Frossard is +retreating. Put Paris in a condition of defence as expeditiously as +possible!" Then, like everyone else, I understood the extent of the +misfortune. Napoleon had apparently lost his head; it was very +unnecessary to publish the conclusion of the telegram. + +Immediately afterwards was issued the Empress' proclamation, which was +almost silly. "I am with you," it ran--a charming consolation for the +Parisians. + +Astonishment produced a kind of paralysis; anger looked round for an +object on which to vent itself, but hardly knew whom to select. Besides, +people had really insufficient information as to what had happened. The +_Siècle_ printed a fairly turbulent article at once, but no +exciting language in the papers was required. Even a foreigner could +perceive that if it became necessary to defend Paris after a second +defeat, the Empire would be at an end. + +The exasperation which had to vent itself was directed at first against +the Ministers, and ridiculously enough the silence imposed on the Press +concerning the movements of the troops (_le mutisme_) was blamed +for the defeat at Weissenburg; then the exasperation swung back and was +directed against the generals, who were dubbed negligent and incapable, +until, ponderously and slowly, it turned against the Emperor himself. + +But with the haste that characterises French emotion, and the rapidity +with which events succeeded one another, even this exasperation was of +short duration. It raged for a few days, and then subsided for want of +contradiction of its own accord, for the conviction spread that the +Emperor's day was irrevocably over and that he continued to exist only +in name. A witness to the rapidity of this _volte face_ were three +consecutive articles by Edmond About in _Le Soir_. The first, +written from his estate in Saverne, near Strassburg. was extremely +bitter against the Emperor; it began: "_Napoleone tertio feliciter +regnante_, as people said in the olden days, I have seen with my own +eyes, what I never thought to see: Alsace overrun by the enemy's +troops." The next article, written some days later, in the middle of +August, when About had come to Paris, called the Emperor, without more +ado, "The last Bonaparte," and began: "I see that I have been writing +like a true provincial; in the provinces at the moment people have two +curses on their lips, one for the Prussians, and one for those who began +the war; in Paris, they have got much farther; there they have only one +curse on their lips, one thought, and one wish; there are names that are +no more mentioned in Paris than if they belonged to the twelfth +century." + +What he wrote was, at the moment, true and correct. I was frequently +asked in letters what the French now said about the government and the +Emperor. The only answer was that all that side of the question was +antiquated in Paris. If I were to say to one of my acquaintances: +_"Eh! bien, que dites-vous de l'empereur_?" the reply would be: +_"Mais, mon cher, je ne dis rien de lui. Vous voyez si bien que moi, +qu'il ne compte plus. C'est un homme par terre. Tout le monde le sait; +la gauche même ne l'attaque plus."_ Even General Trochu, the Governor +of the capital, did not mention Napoleon's name in his proclamation to +Paris. He himself hardly dared to send any messages. After having been +obliged to surrender the supreme command, he followed the army, like a +mock emperor, a kind of onlooker, a superfluous piece on the board. +People said of him: "_On croit qu'il se promène un peu aux environs de +Châlons._" + +As can be seen from this, the deposition of the Emperor had taken place +in people's consciousness, and was, so to speak, publicly settled, +several weeks before the battle of Sedan brought with it his surrender +to the King of Prussia and the proclamation of the French Republic. The +Revolution of September 4th was not an overturning of things; it was +merely the ratification of a state of affairs that people were already +agreed upon in the capital, and had been even before the battle of +Gravelotte. + +In Paris preparations were being made with the utmost energy for the +defence of the city. All men liable to bear arms were called up, and +huge numbers of volunteers were drilled. It was an affecting sight to +see the poor workmen drilling on the Place du Carrousel for enrolment in +the volunteer corps. Really, most of them looked so bloodless and +wretched that one was tempted to think they went with the rest for the +sake of the franc a day and uniform. + + +XXVI. + +Anyone whose way led him daily past the fortifications could see, +however technically ignorant he might be, that they were exceedingly +insignificant. Constantly, too, one heard quoted Trochu's words: "I +don't delude myself into supposing that I can stop the Prussians with +the matchsticks that are being planted on the ramparts." Strangely +enough, Paris shut herself in with such a wall of masonry that in +driving through it in the Bois de Boulogne, there was barely room for a +carriage with two horses. They bored loop-holes in these walls and +ramparts, but few doubted that the German artillery would be able to +destroy all their defences with the greatest ease. + +Distribute arms to the civil population, as the papers unanimously +demanded, from readily comprehensible reasons, no one dared to do. The +Empress' Government had to hold out for the existing state of things; +nevertheless, in Paris,--certainly from about the 8th August,--people +were under the impression that what had been lost was lost irrevocably. + +I considered it would be incumbent upon my honour to return to Denmark, +if we were drawn into the war, and I lived with this thought before my +eyes. I contemplated with certainty an approaching revolution in France; +I was vexed to think that there was not one conspicuously great and +energetic man among the leaders of the Opposition, and that such a poor +wretch as Rochefort was once more daily mentioned and dragged to the +front. Of Gambetta no one as yet thought, although his name was +respected, since he had made himself felt the last season as the most +vehement speaker in the Chamber. But it was not speakers who were +wanted, and people did not know that he was a man of action. + +The Ministry that followed Ollivier's inspired me with no confidence. +Palikao, the Prime Minister, was termed in the papers an _iron man_ +(the usual set phrase). It was said that he "would not scruple to clear +the boulevards with grape"; but the genius needed for such a performance +was not overwhelming. What he had to do was to clear France of the +Germans, and that was more difficult. + +Renan had had to interrupt the journey to Spitzbergen which he had +undertaken in Prince Napoleon's company; the Prince and his party had +only reached Tromsöe, when they were called back on account of the war, +and Renan was in a state of the most violent excitement. He said: "No +punishment could be too great for that brainless scoundrel Ollivier, and +the Ministry that has followed his is worse. Every thinking man could +see for himself that the declaration of this war was madness. (_A-t-on +jamais vu pareille folie, mon Dieu, mon Dieu, c'est navrant. Nous sommes +un peuple désarçonné._)" In his eyes, Palikao was no better than a +robber, Jérôme David than a murderer. He considered the fall of +Strasburg imminent. He was less surprised than I at the unbounded +incapacity shown by the French fleet under the difficult conditions; all +plans for a descent on Northern Germany had already been given up, and +the French fleet was unable to set about even so much as a blockade of +the ports, such as the Danes had successfully carried out six years +before. + +Taine was as depressed as Renan. He had returned from Germany, where he +had gone to prepare a treatise on Schiller, on account of the sudden +death of Madame Taine's mother. As early as August 2d, when no battle +had as yet been fought, he felt exceedingly anxious, and he was the +first Frenchman whom I heard take into consideration the possibility of +the defeat of France; he expressed great sorrow that two nations such as +France and Germany should wage national war against each other as they +were doing. "I have just come from Germany," he remarked, "where I have +talked with many brave working-men. When I think of what it means for a +man to be born into the world, nursed, brought up, instructed, and +equipped; when I think what struggling and difficulties he must go +through himself to be fit for the battle of life, and then reflect how +all that is to be flung into the grave as a lump of bleeding flesh, how +can I do other than grieve! With two such statesmen as Louis Philippe, +war could certainly have been averted, but with two quarrelsome men like +Bismarck and Napoleon at the head of affairs, it was, of course, +inevitable." + +Philarète Chasles saw in the defeats a confirmation of the theory that +he proclaimed, day in, day out, namely: that the Latin races were on the +rapid down-grade; Spain and Portugal, Italy, Roumania, the South +American republics, were, in his opinion, in a state of moral +putrefaction, France a sheer Byzantium. It had been a piece of +foolhardiness without parallel to try to make this war a decisive racial +struggle between the nation that, as Protestant, brought free research +in its train and one which had not yet been able to get rid of the Pope +and political despotism. Now France was paying the penalty. + +Out in the country at Meudon, where he was, there had--probably from +carelessness--occurred repeated explosions, the last time on August +20th. Twenty cases of cartridges had just been sent to Bazaine; a +hundred still remained, which were to start the day that they were +urgently required. They blew up, and no one in the town doubted that the +explosion was the work of Prussian spies. For things had come to such a +pass that people saw Prussian spies everywhere. (During the first month +of the war all Germans were called Prussians.) Importance was attached +to the fact that General Frossard's nephew, a young lieutenant who lay +wounded in Chasles' tower-house, from a sword-thrust in the chest, and +was usually delirious, at the crash had jumped up and come to his +senses, crying out: "It is treachery! It is Chamber No. 6 blowing up!" +As a matter of fact, that was where the cartridges were. It was said +that at Meudon traces had been found of the same explosive as had been +used in bombs against the Emperor during the first days of May (a plot +that had probably been hatched by the police). The perpetrator, +however,--doubtless for good reasons--was not discovered. + +Whatever vanity there was about old Philarète Chasles left him +altogether during this critical time, which seemed to make good men +better still. His niece, too, who used to be loud-voiced and conceited, +was quite a different person. One day that I was at their house at +Meudon, she sat in a corner for a long time crying quietly. Out there, +they were all feverishly anxious, could not rest, craved, partly to hear +the latest news, partly to feel the pulse of Paris. One day after +dinner, Chasles invited me to go into town with him, and when we arrived +he took a carriage and drove about with me for two hours observing the +prevailing mood. We heard countless anecdotes, most of them apocryphal, +but reflecting the beliefs of the moment: The Empress had sent three +milliards (!) in French gold to the Bank of England. The Emperor, who +was jealous of Macmahon since the latter had rescued him at Magenta, had +taken the command of the Turcos from the Marshal, although the latter +had said in the Council of War: "The Turcos must be given to me, they +will not obey anyone else." And true it was that no one else had any +control over them. If one had committed theft, or misbehaved himself in +any other way, and Macmahon. whom they called only "Our Marshal," rode +down the front of their lines and scolded them, they began to cry, +rushed up and kissed his feet, and hung to his horse, like children +asking for forgiveness. And now someone had made the great mistake of +giving them to another general. And, the commander being anxious to +dazzle the Germans with them, they and the Zouaves had been sent first +into the fire, in spite of Bazaine's very sensible observation: "When +you drive, you do not begin at a galop." And so these picked troops were +broken up in their first engagement. It was said that of 2,500 Turcos, +only 29 were left. + +An anecdote like the following, which was told to us, will serve to show +how popular legends grow up, in virtue of the tendency there is to +reduce a whole battle to a collision between two generals, just as in +the Homeric age, or in Shakespeare: The Crown Prince of Prussia was +fighting very bravely at Wörth, in the front ranks. That he threw the +Turcos into confusion was the result of a ray of sunlight falling on the +silver eagle on his helmet. The Arabs thought it a sign from Heaven. +Macmahon, who was shooting in the ranks, was so near the Crown Prince +that the latter shouted to him in French: "_Voilà un homme!_" but +the Frenchman surpassed him in chivalrous politeness, for he saluted, +and replied: "_Voilà un héros!_" + + +XXVII. + +After my return to Paris, I had taken lessons from an excellent language +teacher, Mademoiselle Guémain, an old maid who had for many years taught +French to Scandinavians, and for whom I wrote descriptions and remarks +on what I saw, to acquire practise in written expression. She had known +most of the principal Northerners who had visited Paris during the last +twenty years, had taught Magdalene Thoresen, amongst others, when this +latter as a young woman had stayed in Paris. She was an excellent +creature, an unusual woman, intellectual, sensitive, and innocent, who +made an unforgettable impression upon one. Besides the appointed lesson- +times, we sometimes talked for hours together. How sad that the lives of +such good and exceptional women should vanish and disappear, without any +special thanks given to them in their life-times, and with no one of the +many whom they have benefitted to tell publicly of their value. She +possessed all the refinement of the French, together with the modesty of +an old maid, was both personally inexperienced, and by virtue of the +much that she had seen, very experienced in worldly things. I visited +her again in 1889, after the lapse of nineteen years, having learned her +address through Jonas Lie and his wife, who knew her. I found her older, +but still more charming, and touchingly humble. It cut me to the heart +to hear her say: _"C'est une vraie charité que vous me faites de venir +me voir."_ + +Mlle. Guémain was profoundly affected, like everyone else, by what we +were daily passing through during this time of heavy strain. As a woman, +she was impressed most by the seriousness which had seized even the most +frivolous people, and by the patriotic enthusiasm which was spreading in +ever wider circles. She regarded it as deeper and stronger than as a +rule it was. + + +XXVIII. + +The temper prevailing among my Italian friends was very different. The +Italians, as their way was, were just like children, laughed at the +whole thing, were glad that the Prussians were "drubbing" the French, to +whom, as good patriots, they wished every misfortune possible. The +French had behaved like tyrants in Italy; now they were being paid out. +Besides which, the Prussians would not come to Paris. But if they did +come, they would be nice to them, and invite them to dinner, like +friends. Sometimes I attempted to reply, but came off badly. One day +that I had ventured a remark to a large and ponderous Roman lady, on the +ingratitude of the Italians towards the French, the good lady jumped as +if a knife had been stuck into her, and expatiated passionately on the +infamy of the French. The Romans were,--as everyone knew,--the first +nation on earth. The French had outraged them, had dared to prevent them +making their town the capital of Italy, by garrisoning it with French +soldiers who had no business there, so that they had themselves asked +for the Nemesis which was now overtaking them, and which the Italians +were watching with flashing eyes. She said this, in spite of her anger, +with such dignity, and such a bearing, that one could not but feel that, +if she were one day called upon to adorn a throne, she would seat +herself upon it as naturally, and as free from embarrassment, as though +it were nothing but a Roman woman's birthright. + + +XXIX. + +In the meantime, defeats and humiliations were beginning to confuse the +good sense of the French, and to lead their instincts astray. The crowd +could not conceive that such things could come about naturally. The +Prussians could not possibly have won by honourable means, but must have +been spying in France for years. Why else were so many Germans settled +in Paris! The French were paying now, not for their faults, but for +their virtues, the good faith, the hospitality, the innocent welcome +they had given to treacherous immigrants. They had not understood that +the foreigner from the North was a crafty and deceitful enemy. + +It gradually became uncomfortable for a foreigner in Paris. I never went +out without my passport. But even a passport was no safeguard. It was +enough for someone to make some utterly unfounded accusation, express +some foolish, chance suspicion, for the non-Frenchman to be maltreated +as a "spy." Both in Metz and in Paris, in the month of August, people +who were taken for "Prussians" were hanged or dismembered. In the latter +part of August the papers reported from the Dordogne that a mob there +had seized a young man, a M. de Moneys, of whom a gang had asserted that +he had shouted _"Vive la Prusse!"_ had stripped him, bound him with +ropes, carried him out into a field, laid him on a pile of damp wood, +and as this would not take fire quick enough, had pushed trusses of +straw underneath all round him, and burnt him alive. From the +_Quartier La Vilette_ in Paris, one heard every day of similar +slaughter of innocent persons who the people fancied were Prussian +spies. Under such circumstances, a trifle might become fatal. One +evening at the end of August I had been hearing _L'Africaine_ at the +grand opera, and at the same time Marie Sass' delivery of the +_Marseillaise_--she sang as though she had a hundred fine bells in +her voice, but she sang the national anthem like an aria. Outside the +opera-house I hailed a cab. The coachman was asleep; a man jogged him to +wake him, and he started to drive. I noticed that during the drive he +looked at his watch and then drove on for all that he was worth, as fast +as the harness and reins would stand. When I got to the hotel I handed +him his fare and a four sous' tip. He bawled out that it was not enough; +he had been _de remise_; he had taken me for someone else, being +waked so suddenly; he had been bespoken by another gentleman. I laughed +and replied that that was his affair, not mine; what had it got to do with +me? But as all he could demand, if he had really been _de remise_, +was two sous more, and as, under the ordinances prevailing, it was +impossible to tell whether he was or not, I gave him the two sous; but no +tip with it, since he had no right to claim it, and I had not the +slightest doubt that he was lying. Then he began to croak that it was a +shame not to give a _pourboire_, and, seeing that did not help +matters, as I simply walked up the hotel steps, he shouted in his +ill-temper, first _"Vous n'êtes pas Français!"_ and then _"Vous +êtes Prussien!"_ No sooner had he said it than all the hotel servants +who were standing in the doorway disappeared, and the people in the street +listened, stopped, and turned round. I grasped the danger, and flew into a +passion. In one bound I was in the road, I rushed at the cabman, seized +him by the throat and shook my hand, with its knuckle-duster upon it, +threateningly at his head. Then he forgot to abuse me and suddenly whined: +_"Ne frappez pas, monsieur!"_ mounted his box, and drove very tamely +away. In my exasperation I called the hotel waiters together and poured +scorn on them for their cowardice. + +In spite of the season, it was uncomfortable weather, and the temper of +the town was as uncomfortable as the weather. As time went on, few +people were to be seen about the streets, but there was a run on the +gunmakers' and sword-smiths'. By day no cheerful shouts or songs rang +out, but children of six or seven years of age would go hand in hand in +rows down the street in the evenings, singing _"Mourir pour la +patrie,"_ to its own beautiful, affecting melody. But these were the +only gentle sounds one heard. Gradually, the very air seemed to be +reeking with terror and frenzy. Exasperation rolled up once more, like a +thick, black stream, against the Emperor, against the ministers and +generals, and against the Prussians, whom people thought they saw +everywhere. + + +XXX. + +Foreigners were requested to leave Paris, so that, in the event of a +siege, the city might have no unnecessary mouths to feed. +Simultaneously, in Trochu's proclamation, it was announced that the +enemy might be outside the walls in three days. Under such +circumstances, the town was no longer a place for anyone who did not +wish to be shut up in it. + +One night at the end of August, I travelled from Paris to Geneva. At the +departure station the thousands of German workmen who had been expelled +from Paris were drawn up, waiting, herded together like cattle,--a +painful sight. These workmen were innocent of the war, the defeats, and +the spying service of which they were accused; now they were being +driven off in hordes, torn from their work, deprived of their bread, and +surrounded by inimical lookers-on. + +As it had been said that trains to the South would cease next day, the +Geneva train was overfilled, and one had to be well satisfied to secure +a seat at all. My travelling companions of the masculine gender were +very unattractive: an impertinent and vulgar old Swiss who, as it was a +cold night, and he had no travelling-rug, wrapped himself up in four or +five of his dirty shirts--a most repulsive sight; a very precise young +Frenchman who, without a vestige of feeling for the fate of his country +and nation, explained to us that he had long had a wish to see Italy, +and had thought that now, business being in any case at a standstill, +the right moment had arrived. + +The female travellers in the compartment were a Parisian, still young, +and her bright and charming fifteen-year-old daughter, whose beauty was +not unlike that of Mlle. Massin, the lovely actress at the _Théâtre du +Gymnase_. The mother was all fire and flame, and raved, almost to +tears, over the present pass, cried shame on the cowardice of the +officers for not having turned out the Emperor; her one brother was a +prisoner at Königsberg; all her male relations were in the field. The +daughter was terror-struck at the thought that the train might be +stopped by the enemy--which was regarded as very likely--but laughed at +times, and was divided between fear of the Prussians and exceeding +anxiety to see them: _"J'aimerais bien pouvoir dire que j'aie vu des +Prussiens!"_ + +At one station some soldiers in rout, with torn and dusty clothes, got +into our carriage; they looked repulsive, bespattered with mud and clay; +they were in absolute despair, and you could hear from their +conversation how disorganised discipline was, for they abused their +officers right and left, called them incapable and treacherous, yet +themselves gave one the impression of being very indifferent soldiers. +The young sergeant major who was leading them was the only one who was +in anything like spirits, and even he was not much to boast of. It was +curious what things he believed: Marshal Leboeuf had had a Prussian +officer behind his chair, disguised as a waiter, at Metz, and it had +only just been discovered. Russia had lent troops to Prussia, and put +them into Prussian uniforms; otherwise there could not possibly be so +many of them. But Rome, too, was responsible for the misfortunes of +France; the Jesuits had planned it all, because the country was so +educated; they never liked anybody to learn anything. + +After Culoz commenced the journey through the lovely Jura mountains. On +both sides an immense panorama of high, wooded mountain ridges, with +poverty-stricken little villages along the mountain sides. At Bellegarde +our passports were demanded; no one was allowed to cross the frontier +without them--a stupid arrangement. The Alps began to bound our view. +The train went on, now through long tunnels, now between precipices, now +again over a rocky ridge, whence you looked down into the valley where +the blue-green Rhone wound and twined its way between the rocks like a +narrow ribbon. The speed seemed to be accelerating more and more. The +first maize-field. Slender poplars, without side-branches, but wholly +covered with foliage, stood bent almost into spirals by the strong wind +from the chinks of the rocks. The first Swiss house. + + +XXXI. + +There was Geneva, between the Alps, divided by the southern extremity of +Lake Leman, which was spanned by many handsome bridges. In the centre, a +little isle, with Rousseau's statue. A little beyond, the Rhone rushed +frothing and foaming out of the lake. From my window I could see in the +distance the dazzling snow peak of Mont Blanc. + +After Paris, Geneva looked like a provincial town. The cafés were like +servants' quarters or corners of cafés. There were no people in the +streets, where the sand blew up in clouds of dust till you could hardly +see out of your eyes, and the roads were not watered. In the hotel, in +front of the mirror, the New Testament in French, bound in leather; you +felt that you had come to the capital of Calvinism. + +The streets in the old part of the town were all up and down hill. In +the windows of the booksellers' shops there were French verses against +France, violent diatribes against Napoleon III. and outbursts of +contempt for the nation that had lost its virility and let itself be +cowed by a tyrant. By the side of these, portraits of the Freethinkers +and Liberals who had been driven from other countries and found a refuge +in Switzerland. + +I sailed the lake in every direction, enraptured by its beauty and the +beauty of the surrounding country. Its blueness, to which I had never +seen a parallel, altogether charmed me in the changing lights of night +and day. On the lake I made the acquaintance of a very pleasant Greek +family, the first I had encountered anywhere. The eldest daughter, a +girl of fourteen, lost her hat. I had a new silk handkerchief packed +amongst my things, and offered it to her. She accepted it and bound it +round her hair. Her name was Maria Kumelas. I saw for the first time an +absolutely pure Greek profile, such as I had been acquainted with +hitherto only from statues. One perfect, uninterrupted line ran from the +tip of her nose to her hair. + + +XXXII. + +I went for excursions into Savoy, ascended La Grande Salève on donkey- +back, and from the top looked down at the full length of the Leman. + +I drove to the valley of Chamounix, sixty-eight miles, in a diligence +and four; about every other hour we had relays of horses and a new +driver. Whenever possible, we went at a rattling galop. Half-way I heard +the first Italian. It was only the word _quattro_; but it filled me +with delight. Above the high, wooded mountains, the bare rock projected +out of the earth, at the very top. The wide slopes up which the wood +ascended, until it looked like moss on stone, afforded a view miles in +extent. The river Arve, twisting itself in curves, was frequently +spanned by the roadway; it was of a greyish white, and very rapid, but +ugly. Splendid wooden bridges were thrown over it, with abysms on both +sides. Midway, after having for some time been hidden behind the +mountains, Mont Blanc suddenly appeared in its gleaming splendour, +positively tiring and paining the eye. It was a new and strange feeling +to be altogether hemmed in by mountains. It was oppressive to a plain- +dweller to be shut in thus, and not to be able to get away from the +immutable sheet of snow, with its jagged summits. Along the valley of +the stream, the road ran between marvellously fresh walnut-trees, plane- +trees, and avenues of apple trees; but sometimes we drove through +valleys so narrow that the sun only shone on them two or three hours of +the day, and there it was cold and damp. Savoy was plainly enough a poor +country. The grapes were small and not sweet; soil there was little of, +but every patch was utilised to the best advantage. In one place a +mountain stream rushed down the rocks; at a sharp corner, which jutted +out like the edge of a sloping roof, the stream was split up and +transformed into such fine spray that one could perceive no water at +all; afterwards the stream united again at the foot of the mountain, and +emptied itself with frantic haste into the river, foaming greyish white, +spreading an icy cold around. The changes of temperature were striking. +Under shelter, hot Summer, two steps further, stern, inclement Autumn, +air that penetrated to the very marrow of your bones. You ran through +every season of the year in a quarter of an hour. + +The other travellers were English people, all of one pattern, +unchangeable, immovable. If one of them had buttoned up his coat at the +beginning of the drive, he did not unbutton it on the way, were he never +so warm, and if he had put leather gloves on, for ten hours they would +not be off his hands. The men yawned for the most part; the young ladies +jabbered. The English had made the whole country subservient to them, +and at the hotels one Englishman in this French country was paid more +attention to than a dozen Frenchmen. + +Here I understood two widely different poems: Hauch's Swiss Peasant, and +Björnson's Over the Hills and Far Away. Hauch had felt this scenery and +the nature of these people, by virtue of his Norwegian birth and his +gift of entering into other people's thought; Björnson had given +unforgettable expression to the feeling of imprisoned longing. But for +the man who had been breathing street dust and street sweepings for four +months, it was good to breathe the strong, pure air, and at last see +once more the clouds floating about and beating against the mountain +sides, leaning, exhausted, against a declivity and resting on their +journey. Little children of eight or ten were guarding cattle, children +such as we know so well in the North, when they come with their marmots; +they looked, without exception, like tiny rascals, charming though they +were. + +I rode on a mule to Montanvert, and thence on foot over the Mer de +Glace, clambered up the steep mountain side to Chapeau, went down to the +crystal Grotto and rode from there back to Chamounix. The ride up in the +early hours of the morning was perfect, the mountain air so light; the +mists parted; the pine-trees round the fresh mountain path exhaled a +penetrating fragrance. An American family with whom I had become +acquainted took three guides with them for four persons. One worthy old +gentleman who was travelling with his young daughter, would not venture +upon this feat of daring, but his daughter was so anxious to accompany +us that when I offered to look after her she was entrusted to my care. I +took two mules and a guide, thinking that sufficient. From Montanvert +and down to the glacier, the road was bad, a steep, rocky path, with +loose, rolling stones. When we came to the Ice Sea, the young lady, as +was natural, took the guide's hand, and I, the last of the caravan, +strode cautiously along, my alpenstock in my hand, over the slippery, +billow-like ice. But soon it began to split up into deep crevasses, and +farther on we came to places where the path you had to follow was no +wider than a few hands' breadth, with yawning precipices in the ice on +both sides. I grew hot to the roots of my hair, and occasionally my +heart stood still. It was not that I was actually afraid. The guide +shouted to me: "Look neither to right nor left; look at your feet, and +turn out your toes!" I had only one thought--not to slip!--and out on +the ice I grew burningly hot. When at last I was across, I noticed that +I was shaking. Strangely enough, I was trembling at the _thought_ +of the blue, gaping crevasses on both sides of me, down which I had +barely glanced, and yet I had passed them without a shudder. The +beginning of the crossing had been comparatively easy; it was only that +at times it was very slippery. But in the middle of the glacier, +progress was very uncomfortable; moraines, and heaps of gigantic blocks +lay in your path, and all sorts of stone and gravel, which melted +glaciers had brought down with them, and these were nasty to negotiate. +When at last you had them behind you, came le _Mauvais Pas_, which +corresponded to its name. You climbed up the precipitous side of the +rock with the help of an iron railing drilled into it. But foothold was +narrow and the stone damp, from the number of rivulets that rippled and +trickled down. Finally it was necessary at every step to let go the +railing for a few seconds. The ascent then, and now, was supposed to be +quite free from danger, and the view over the glaciers which one gained +by it, was a fitting reward for the inconvenience. Even more beautiful +than the summit of Mont Blanc itself, with its rounded contours, were +the steep, gray, rocky peaks, with ice in every furrow, that are called +_l'Aiguille du Dru_. These mountains, which as far as the eye could +range seemed to be all the same height, although they varied from 7,000 +to 14,800 feet, stretched for miles around the horizon. + +The ice grotto here was very different from the sky-blue glacier grotto +into which I had wandered two years earlier at Grindelwald. Here the ice +mass was so immensely high that not the slightest peep of daylight +penetrated through it into the excavated archway that led into the ice. +It was half-dark inside, and the only light proceeded from a row of +little candles stuck into the crevices of the rock. The ice was jet +black in colour, the light gleaming with a golden sheen from all the +rounded projections and jagged points. It was like the gilt +ornamentation on a velvet pall. + +When I returned from Chamounix to Geneva, the proprietor of the hotel +was standing in the doorway and shouted to me: "The whole of the French +army, with the Emperor, has been taken prisoner at Sedan!"-- +"Impossible!" I exclaimed. "It is quite certain," he replied; "it was in +the German telegrams, and so far there has not come a single unveracious +telegram from the Germans." + +The next day a Genevese paper published the news of the proclamation of +the Republic in France. + +Simultaneously arrived a letter from Julius Lange, attacking me for my +"miserly city politics," seriously complaining that "our declaration of +war against Prussia had come to nothing," and hoping that my stay in +France had by now made me alter my views. + +In his opinion, we had neglected "an opportunity of rebellion, that +would never recur." + + +XXXIII. + +Lake Leman fascinated me. All the scenery round looked fairy-like to me, +a dream land, in which mighty mountains cast their blue-black shadows +down on the turquoise water, beneath a brilliant, sparkling sunshine +that saturated the air with its colouring. My impressions of Lausanne, +Chillon, Vevey, Montreux, were recorded in the first of my lectures at +the University the following year. The instruments of torture at +Chillon, barbaric and fearsome as they were, made me think of the still +worse murderous instruments being used in the war between France and +Germany. It seemed to me that if one could see war at close quarters, +one would come to regard the earth as peopled by dangerous lunatics. +Political indifference to human life and human suffering had taken the +place of the premeditated cruelty of the Middle Ages. Still, if no +previous war had ever been so frightful, neither had there ever been so +much done to mitigate suffering. While fanatic Frenchwomen on the +battlefields cut the noses off wounded Germans, and mutilated them when +they could, and while the Germans were burning villages and killing +their peaceful inhabitants, if one of them had so much as fired a shot, +in all quietness the great societies for the care of the wounded were +doing their work. And in this Switzerland especially bore the palm. +There were two currents then, one inhuman and one humane, and of the +two, the latter will one day prove itself the stronger. Under Louis XIV. +war was still synonymous with unlimited plundering, murder, rape, +thievery and robbery. Under Napoleon I. there were still no such things +as ambulances. The wounded were carted away now and again in waggons, +piled one on the top of each other, if any waggons were to be had; if +not, they were left as they lay, or were flung into a ditch, there to +die in peace. Things were certainly a little better. + + +XXXIV. + +In Geneva, the news reached me that--in spite of a promise Hall, as +Minister, had given to Hauch, when the latter asked for it for me--I was +to receive no allowance from the Educational Department. To a repetition +of the request, Hall had replied: "I have made so many promises and +half-promises, that it has been impossible to remember or to keep them." +This disappointment hit me rather hard; I had in all only about £50 +left, and could not remain away more than nine weeks longer without +getting into debt, I, who had calculated upon staying a whole year +abroad. Circumstances over which I had no control later obliged me, +however, to remain away almost another year. But that I could not +foresee, and I had no means whatever to enable me to do so. Several of +my acquaintances had had liberal allowances from the Ministry; Krieger +and Martensen had procured Heegaard £225 at once, when he had been +anxious to get away from Rasmus Nielsen's influence. It seemed to me +that this refusal to give me anything augured badly for the appointment +I was hoping for in Denmark. I could only earn a very little with my +pen: about 11_s_. 3_d_. for ten folio pages, and as I did not +feel able, while travelling, to write anything of any value, I did not +attempt it. It was with a sort of horror that, after preparing for long +travels that were to get me out of the old folds, I thought of the +earlier, narrow life I had led in Copenhagen. All the old folds seemed, +at this distance, to have been the folds of a strait-waistcoat. + + +XXXV. + +With abominable slowness, and very late, "on account of the war," the +train crawled from Geneva, southwards. Among the travellers was a +rhetorical Italian master-mason, from Lyons, an old Garibaldist, the +great event of whose life was that Garibaldi had once taken lunch alone +with him at Varese. He preserved in his home as a relic the glass from +which the general had drunk. He was talkative, and ready to help +everyone; he gave us all food and drink from his provisions. Other +travellers told that they had had to stand in queue for fully twelve +hours in front of the ticket office in Paris, to get away from the town. + +The train passed the place where Rousseau had lived, at Madame de +Warens'. In an official work on Savoy, written by a priest, I had +recently read a summary dismissal of Rousseau, as a calumniator of his +benefactress. According to this author, it certainly looked as though, +to say the least of it, Rousseau's memory had failed him amazingly +sometimes. The book asserted, for instance, that the Claude of whom he +speaks was no longer alive at the time when he was supposed to be +enjoying Madame de Warens' favours. + +We passed French volunteers in blouses bearing a red cross; they shouted +and were in high good humour; passed ten districts, where numbers of +cretins, with their hideous excrescences, sat by the wayside. At last we +arrived,--several hours behind time,--at St. Michel, at the foot of Mont +Cenis; it was four o'clock in the afternoon, and I was beginning to feel +tired, for I had been up since four in the morning. At five o'clock we +commenced the ascent, to the accompaniment of frightful groanings from +the engine; all the travellers were crowded together in three wretched +little carriages, the small engine not being able to pull more. Gay +young French girls exulted at the idea of seeing "Italy's fair skies." +They were not particularly fair here; the weather was rough and cloudy, +in keeping with abysms and mountain precipices. But late at night the +journey over Mont Cenis was wonderful. High up on the mountain the +moonlight gleamed on the mountain lake. And the way was dominated, from +one rocky summit, by the castle of Bramans with its seven imposing +forts. + +The locomotive stopped for an hour, for want of water. We were thus +obliged to sleep at the little Italian town of Susa (in a glorious +valley under Mont Cenis), the train to Turin having left three hours +before. Susa was the first Italian town I saw. When the train came in +next morning to the station at Turin, a crowd of Italian soldiers, who +were standing there, shouted: "The Prussians for ever!" and winked at +me. "What are they shouting for?" I asked a young Turin fellow with whom +I had had some long conversations. "It is an ovation to you," he +replied. "People are delighted at the victory of the Prussians, and they +think you are a Prussian, because of your fair moustache and beard." + + +XXXVI. + +An overwhelming impression was produced upon me by the monuments of +Turin, the River Po, and the lovely glee-singing in the streets. For the +first time, I saw colonnades, with heavy curtains to the street, serve +as pavements, with balconies above them. Officers in uniforms gleaming +with gold, ladies with handkerchiefs over their heads instead of hats, +the mild warmth, the brown eyes, brought it home to me at every step +that I was in a new country. + +I hurried up to Costanza Blanchetti. _Madame la comtesse est à la +campagne. Monsieur le comte est sorti._ Next morning, as I was +sitting in my room in the Hotel Trombetta, Blanchetti rushed in, pressed +me to his bosom, kissed me on both cheeks, would not let me go, but +insisted on carrying me off with him to the country. + +We drove round the town first, then went by rail to Alpignano, where +Costanza was staying with a relative of the family, Count Buglioni di +Monale. Here I was received like a son, and shown straight to my room, +where there stood a little bed with silk hangings, and where, on the +pillow, there lay a little, folded-up thing, likewise of white silk, +which was an enigma to me till, on unfolding it, I found it was a night- +cap, the classical night-cap, tapering to a point, which you see at the +theatre in old comedies. The Buglionis were gentle, good-natured people, +rugged and yet refined, an old, aristocratic country gentleman and his +wife. Nowhere have I thought grapes so heavy and sweet and aromatic as +there. The perfume from the garden was so strong and fragrant. +Impossible to think of a book or a sheet of paper at Alpignano. We +walked under the trees, lay among the flowers, enjoyed the sight and the +flavour of the apricots and grapes, and chatted, expressing by smiles +our mutual quiet, deep-reaching sympathy. + +One evening I went into Turin with Blanchetti to see the play. The lover +in _La Dame aux Camélias_ was played by a young Italian named +Lavaggi, as handsome as an Antinous, a type which I often encountered in +Piedmont. With his innate charm, restful calm, animation of movement and +the fire of his beauty, he surpassed the acting of all the young lovers +I had seen on the boards of the French theatres. The very play of his +fingers was all grace and expression. + + +XXXVII. + +On my journey from Turin to Milan, I had the mighty Mont Rosa, with its +powerful snow mass, and the St. Bernard, over which Buonaparte led his +tattered troops, before my eyes. We went across maize fields, through +thickets, over the battlefield of Magenta. From reading Beyle, I had +pictured Milan as a beautiful town, full of free delight in life. Only +to see it would be happiness. And it was,--the cupola gallery, the dome, +from the roof of which, immediately after my arrival, I looked out over +the town, shining under a pure, dark-blue sky. In the evening, in the +public gardens, I revelled in the beauty of the Milanese women. Italian +ladies at that time still wore black lace over their heads instead of +hats. Their dresses were open in front, the neck being bare half-way +down the chest. I was struck by the feminine type. Upright, slender- +waisted women; delicate, generally bare hands; oval faces, the eyebrows +of an absolutely perfect regularity; narrow noses, well formed, the +nostrils curving slightly upwards and outwards--the models of Leonardo +and Luini. + +The _Last Supper_, in the church of St. Maria delle Grazie, and the +drawings in the Ambrose Library, brought me closer to Leonardo than I +had ever been able to get before, through reproductions; I saw the true +expression in the face of the Christ in the _Last Supper_, which +copies cannot avoid distorting. + + +XXXVIII. + +A violent affection for Correggio, and a longing to see his works where +they are to be found in greatest number, sent me to Parma. + +I reached the town at night; no gas, no omnibus from any hotel. An out- +porter trotted with my portmanteau on his back through wide, pitch-dark, +deserted, colonnaded streets, past huge palaces, until, after half an +hour's rapid walk, we arrived at the hotel. The day before my arrival +dall'Ongaro had unveiled the beautiful and beautifully situated statue +of Correggio in the Market Square. I first investigated the two domes in +the Cathedral and San Giovanni Evangelista, then the ingratiating +pictorial decoration of the convent of San Paolo. In the Museum, where I +was pretty well the only visitor, I was so eagerly absorbed in studying +Correggio and jotting down my impressions, that, in order to waste no +time, I got the attendant to buy my lunch, and devoured it,--bread, +cheese, and grapes,--in the family's private apartments. They were +pleasant, obliging people, and as I bought photographs for a +considerable amount from them, they were very hospitable. They talked +politics to me and made no secret of their burning hatred for France. + +There were other things to see at Parma besides Correggio, although for +me he dominated the town. There was a large exhibition of modern Italian +paintings and statuary, and the life of the people in the town and round +about. In the streets stood carts full of grapes. Four or five fellows +with bare feet would stamp on the grapes in one of these carts; a trough +led from the cart down to a vat, into which the juice ran, flinging off +all dirt in fermentation. + +It was pleasant to walk round the old ramparts of the town in the +evening glow, and it was lively in the ducal park. One evening little +knots of Italian soldiers were sitting there. One of them sang in a +superb voice, another accompanied him very nicely on the lute; the +others listened with profound and eager attention. + + +XXXIX. + +After this came rich days in Florence. Everything was a delight to me +there, from the granite paving of the streets, to palaces, churches, +galleries, and parks. I stood in reverence before the Medici monuments +in Michael Angelo's sanctuary. The people attracted me less; the women +seemed to me to have no type at all, compared with the lovely faces and +forms at Milan and Parma. The fleas attracted me least of all. + +Dall 'Ongaro received every Sunday evening quite an international +company, and conversation consequently dragged. With the charming +Japanese wife of the English consul, who spoke only English and +Japanese, neither of her hosts could exchange a word. There were +Dutchmen and Swiss there with their ladies; sugar-sweet and utterly +affected young Italian men; handsome young painters and a few prominent +Italian scientists, one of whom, in the future, was to become my friend. + +I had a double recommendation to the Danish Minister at Florence, from +the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and from an old and intimate friend of +his in Copenhagen. When I presented my letters, he exclaimed, in +annoyance: "These special recommendations again! How often must I +explain that they are unnecessary, that all Danes, as such, are welcome +to my house!"--This was the delicate manner in which he let me +understand that he was not inclined to do anything whatever for me. +Moreover, he began at once with regrets that his family were absent, so +that he was not in housekeeping, and could not entertain anyone. + +At a production of Émile Augier's _Le Fils de Giboyer_, at which +all the foreign diplomatists were present, he, too, turned up. While the +other diplomatists greeted each other silently with a nod, he made more +of the meeting than any one else did, went from place to place in the +stalls, shook hands, spoke French, German, English and Italian by turns, +was all things to all men, then came and sat down by me, made himself +comfortable, and in a moment was fast asleep. When he began to snore, +one after another of his colleagues turned their heads, and smiled +faintly. He slept through two acts and the intervals between them, in +spite of the voices from the stage and the loud talking between the +acts, and woke up in the middle of the third act, to mumble in my ear, +"It is not much pleasure to see the piece played like this." + +At my favourite restaurant, _Trattoria dell'antiche carrozze_, I +was one day witness to a violent dispute between a Polish noble who, for +political reasons, had fled from Russian Poland, and Hans Semper, a +Prussian, author of a book on Donatello. The latter naturally worshipped +Bismarck, the former warmly espoused the cause of Denmark. When I left, +I said politely to him: + +"I thank you for having so warmly defended my country; I am a Dane." The +next day the Pole came to look for me at the restaurant, and a closer +acquaintance resulted. We went for many walks together along the +riverside; he talking like a typical Polish patriot, I listening to his +dreams of the resuscitated Poland that the future was to see. I mention +this only because it affords an example of the remarkable coincidences +life brings about, which make one so easily exclaim: "How small the +world is!" This Pole became engaged several years afterwards to a young +Polish girl and left her, without any explanation, having got entangled +with a Russian ballet dancer. I made her acquaintance at Warsaw fifteen +years after I had met him at Florence. She was then twenty-six years of +age, and is one of the women who have taught me most; she told me the +story of her early youth and of the unengaging part my acquaintance of +1870 had played in it. + +At Florence I saw Rossi as Hamlet. The performance was a disappointment +to me, inasmuch as Rossi, with his purely Italian nature, had done away +with the essentially English element in Hamlet. The keen English humour, +in his hands, became absurd and ridiculous. Hamlet's hesitation to act, +he overlooked altogether. Hamlet, to him, was a noble young man who was +grieved at his mother's ill-behaviour. The details he acted like a +virtuoso. For instance, it was very effective during the mimic play, +when, lying at Ophelia's feet, he crushes her fan in his hands at the +moment when the King turns pale. I derived my chief enjoyment, not from +the acting, but from the play. It suddenly revealed itself to me from +other aspects, and I fell prostrate in such an exceeding admiration for +Shakespeare that I felt I should never rise again. It was touching to +hear the Italians' remarks on _Hamlet_. The piece was new to them. +You frequently heard the observation: "It is a very philosophical +piece." As people changed from place to place, and sat wherever they +liked, I overheard many different people's opinions of the drama. The +suicide monologue affected these fresh and alert minds very powerfully. + +That evening, moreover, I had occasion to observe human cowardice, which +is never accounted so great as it really is. There was a noise behind +the scene during the performance, and immediately afterwards a shout of +_Fuoco!_ The audience were overmastered by terror. More than half +of them rushed to the doors, pulled each other down, and trampled on the +fallen, in their endeavours to get out quickly enough; others rushed up +on the stage itself. As there was not the least sign of fire visible, I +of course remained in my seat. A few minutes later one of the actors +came forward and explained that there had been no fire; a fight between +two of the scene-shifters had been the cause of all the alarm. The good- +humoured Italians did not even resent the fellows having thus disturbed +and interrupted the performance. + +John Stuart Mill had given me an introduction to Pasquale Villari, who, +even at that time, was _commendatore professore_, and held a high +position on the Board of Education, but was still far from having +attained the zenith of his fame and influence. When the reserve of the +first few days had worn off, he was simply splendid to me. When anything +I said struck him as being to the point, he pressed my hands with all +the ardour of youth, and he applauded every joke I attempted with +uproarious laughter. + +Some twenty years were to elapse before I saw him again. Then he called +upon me in Copenhagen, wishing to make my acquaintance, without in the +least suspecting that I was the young man who, so long before, had come +to him from Mill. He looked with amazement at books in which he had +written with his own hand, and at old letters from himself which I +produced. I visited him again in 1898. His books on Machiavelli and +Savonarola entitle him to rank among the foremost students and exponents +of Italy. + +I went one day to the great annual fair at Fiesole. Shouting and +shrieking, the people drove down the unspeakably dusty road with such +haste, carelessness and high spirits that conveyances struck against +each other at every moment. It was the life represented in Marstrand's +old-time pictures. In crowded Fiesole, I saw the regular Tuscan country +type, brown eyes, yellow or clear, white skin, thin, longish face, brown +or fair, but never black hair, strong, healthy bodies. The masculine +type with which I was acquainted from the soldiers, was undeniably +handsomer than our own, in particular, was more intelligent; the young +women were modest, reserved in their manner, seldom entered into +conversation with the men, and despite the fire in their eyes, +manifested a certain peasant bashfulness, which seems to be the same +everywhere. + + +XL. + +Vines twine round the fruit-trees; black pigs and their families make +their appearance in tribes; the lake of Thrasymene, near which Hannibal +defeated the Romans, spreads itself out before us. The train is going +from Florence to Rome. Towards mid-day a girl enters the carriage, +apparently English or North American, with brown eyes and brown hair, +that curls naturally about her head; she has her guitar-case in her +hand, and flings it up into the net. Her parents follow her. As there is +room in the compartment for forty-eight persons without crowding, she +arranges places for her parents, and after much laughter and joking the +latter settle off to sleep. The Italians stare at her; but not I. I sit +with my back to her. She sits down, back to back with me, then turns her +head and asks me, in Italian, some question about time, place, or the +like. I reply as best I can. She (in English): "You are Italian?" On my +reply, she tells me: "I hardly know twenty words in Italian; I only +speak English, although I have been living in Rome for two years." + +She then went on to relate that she was an American, born of poor +parents out on the Indian frontier; she was twenty-six years old, a +sculptor, and was on her way from Carrara, where she had been +superintending the shipment of one of her works, a statue of Lincoln, +which the Congress at Washington had done her the honour of ordering +from her. It was only when she was almost grown up that her talent had +been discovered by an old sculptor who happened to pay a visit and who, +when he saw her drawing, had, half in jest, given her a lump of clay and +said: "Do a portrait of me!" She had then never seen a statue or a +painting, but she evinced such talent that before long several +distinguished men asked her to do busts of them, amongst others, +Lincoln. She was staying at his house that 14th April, 1865, when he was +murdered, and was consequently selected to execute the monument after +his death. She hesitated for a long time before giving up the modest, +but certain, position she held at the time in a post-office; but, as +others believed in her talent, she came to Europe, stayed first in +Paris, where, to her delight, she made the acquaintance of Gustave Doré, +and where she modelled a really excellent bust of Père Hyacinthe, +visited London, Berlin, Munich, Florence, and settled down in Rome. +There she received plenty of orders, had, moreover, obtained permission +to execute a bust of Cardinal Antonelli, was already much looked up to, +and well-to-do. In a few weeks she was returning to America. + +As she found pleasure in talking to me, she exclaimed without more ado: +"I will stay with you," said a few polite things to me, and made me +promise that I would travel with her to Rome from the place where we +were obliged to leave the train, the railway having been broken up to +prevent the Italian troops entering the Papal States. At Treni a Danish +couple got into the train, a mediocre artist and his wife, and with +national astonishment and curiosity watched the evident intimacy between +the young foreigner and myself, concerning which every Scandinavian in +Rome was informed a few days later. + +From Monte Rotondo, where the bridge had been blown up, we had to walk a +long distance, over bad roads, and were separated in the throng, but she +kept a place for me by her side. Thus I drove for the first time over +the Roman Campagna, by moonlight, with two brown eyes gazing into mine. +I felt as though I had met one of Sir Walter Scott's heroines, and won +her confidence at our first meeting. + + +XLI. + +Vinnie Ream was by no means a Scott heroine, however, but a genuine +American, and doubly remarkable to me as being the first specimen of a +young woman from the United States with whom I became acquainted. Even +after I had seen a good deal of her work, I could not feel wholly +attracted by her talent, which sometimes expressed itself rather in a +pictorial than a plastic form, and had a fondness for emotional effects. +But she was a true artist, and a true woman, and I have never, in any +woman, encountered a will like hers. She was uninterruptedly busy. +Although, now that the time of her departure was so near, a few boxes +were steadily being packed every day at her home, she received every day +visits from between sixteen and twenty-five people, and she had so many +letters by post that I often found three or four unopened ones amongst +the visiting cards that had been left. Those were what she had +forgotten, and if she had read them, she had no time to reply to them. +Every day she sat for a few hours to the clever American painter Healy, +who was an admirer of her talent, and called her abilities genius. Every +day she worked at Antonelli's bust. To obtain permission to execute it, +she had merely, dressed in her most beautiful white gown, asked for an +audience of the dreaded cardinal, and had at once obtained permission. +Her intrepid manner had impressed the hated statesman of the political +and ecclesiastical reaction, and in her representation of him he +appeared, too, in many respects nobler and more refined than he was. But +besides modelling the cardinal's bust, she put the finishing touches to +two others, saw to her parents' household affairs and expenses, and +found time every day to spend a few hours with me, either in a walk or +wandering about the different picture-galleries. + +She maintained the family, for her parents had nothing at all. But when +the statue of Lincoln had been ordered from her, Congress had +immediately advanced ten thousand dollars. So she was able to live free +from care, though for that matter she troubled not at all about money. +She was very ignorant of things outside her own field, and the words +_my work_ were the only ones that she spoke with passion. What she +knew, she had acquired practically, through travel and association with +a multiplicity of people. She hardly knew a dozen words of any language +besides English, and was only acquainted with English and American +writers; of poets, she knew Shakespeare and Byron best; from life and +books she had extracted but few general opinions, but on the other hand, +very individual personal views. These were based upon the theory that +the lesser mind must always subordinate itself to the higher, and that +the higher has a right to utilise freely the time and strength of the +lesser, without being called to account for doing so. She herself was +abjectly modest towards the artists she looked up to. Other people might +all wait, come again, go away without a reply. + +Rather small of stature, strong and healthy,--she had never been ill, +never taken medicine,--with white teeth and red cheeks, quick in +everything, when several people were present she spoke only little and +absently, was as cold, deliberate and composed as a man of strong +character; but at the same time she was unsuspecting and generous, and +in spite of her restlessness and her ambitious industry, ingratiatingly +coquettish towards anyone whose affection she wished to win. It was +amusing to watch the manner in which she despatched the dutifully +sighing Italians who scarcely crossed the threshold of her studio before +they declared themselves. She replied to them with a superabundance of +sound sense and dismissed them with a jest. + +One day that I went to fetch her to the Casino Borghese, I found her +dissolved in tears. One of the two beautiful doves who flew about the +house and perched on her shoulders, and which she had brought with her +from Washington, had disappeared in the night. At first I thought that +her distress was half jest, but nothing could have been more real; she +was beside herself with grief. I realised that if philologians have +disputed as to how far Catullus' poem of the girl's grief over the dead +sparrow were jest or earnest, it was because they had never seen a girl +weep over a bird. Catullus, perhaps, makes fun a little of the grief, +but the grief itself, in his poem too, is serious enough. + +In the lovely gardens of the Villa Borghese, Vinnie Ream's melancholy +frame of mind was dispersed, and we sat for a long time by one of the +handsome fountains and talked, among other things, of our pleasure in +being together, which pleasure was not obscured by the prospect of +approaching parting, because based only on good-fellowship, and with no +erotic element about it. Later in the evening, she had forgotten her +sorrow altogether in the feverish eagerness with which she worked, and +she kept on, by candle-light, until three o'clock in the morning. + +A poor man, an Italian, who kept a little hotel, came in that evening +for a few minutes; he sometimes translated letters for Vinnie Ream. As +he had no business with me, I did not address any of my remarks to him; +she, on the contrary, treated him with extreme kindness and the greatest +respect, and whispered to me: "Talk nicely to him, as you would to a +gentleman, for that he is; he knows four languages splendidly; he is a +talented man. Take no notice of his plain dress. We Americans do not +regard the position, but the man, and he does honour to his position." I +had not been actuated by the prejudices she attributed to me, +nevertheless entered into conversation with the man, as she wished, and +listened with pleasure to his sensible opinions. (He spoke, among other +things, of Northern art, and warmly praised Carl Bloch's +_Prometheus_.) + + +XLII. + +Vinnie Ream's opinion of me was that I was the most impolitic man that +she had ever known. She meant, by that, that I was always falling out +with people (for instance, I had at once offended the Danes in Rome by +some sharp words about the wretched Danish papers), and in general made +fewer friends and more enemies all the time. She herself won the +affection of everyone she wished, and made everyone ready to spring to +do her bidding. She pointed out to me how politic she had had to be over +her art. When she had wished to become a sculptor, everyone in her +native place had been shocked at the un-femininity of it, and people +fabled behind her back about her depraved instincts. She, for her part, +exerted no more strength than just enough to carry her point, let people +talk as much as they liked, took no revenge on those who spread +calumnies about her, showed the greatest kindliness even towards the +evil-disposed, and so, she said, had not an enemy. There was in her a +marvellous commingling of determination to progress rapidly, of self- +restraint and of real good-heartedness. + +On October 20th there was a great festival in Rome to celebrate the +first monthly anniversary of the entry of the Italians into the town. +Young men went in the evening with flags and music through the streets. +Everybody rushed to the windows, and the ladies held out lamps and +candles. In the time of the popes this was only done when the Host was +being carried in solemn procession to the dying; it was regarded +therefore as the greatest honour that could be paid. Everyone clapped +hands and uttered shouts of delight at the improvised illumination, +while the many beautiful women looked lovely in the flickering +lamplight. The 23d again was a gala day, being the anniversary of the +death of Enrico Cairoli--one of the celebrated brothers; he fell at +Mentana;--and I had promised Vinnie Ream to go to see the fête with her; +but she as usual having twenty callers just when we ought to have +started, we arrived too late. Vinnie begged of me to go with her instead +to the American chapel; she must and would sing hymns, and really did +sing them very well. + +The chapel was bare. On the walls the ten commandments and a few other +quotations from Holy Writ, and above a small altar, "Do this in +remembrance of me," in Gothic lettering. I had to endure the hymns, the +sermon (awful), and the reading aloud of the ten commandments, with +muttered protestations and Amens after each one from the reverent +Americans. When we went out I said nothing, as I did not know whether +Vinnie might not be somewhat moved, for she sang at the end with great +emotion. However, she merely took my arm and exclaimed: "That minister +was the most stupid donkey I have ever heard in my life; but it is nice +to sing." Then she began a refutation of the sermon, which had hinged +chiefly on the words: "_Thy sins are forgiven thee_," and of the +unspeakable delight it should be to hear this. Vinnie thought that no +rational being would give a fig for forgiveness, unless there followed +with it a complete reinstatement of previous condition. What am I +benefitted if ever so many heavenly beings say to me: "I _pretend_ +you have not done it" if I know that I have! + +The last week in October we saw marvellous Northern Lights in Rome. The +northern half of the heavens, about nine o'clock in the evening, turned +a flaming crimson, and white streaks traversed the red, against which +the stars shone yellow, while every moment bluish flashes shot across +the whole. When I discovered it I went up to the Reams' and fetched +Vinnie down into the street to see it. It was an incredibly beautiful +atmospheric phenomenon. Next evening it manifested itself again, on a +background of black clouds, and that was the last beautiful sight upon +which Vinnie and I looked together. + +Next evening I wrote: + + Vinnie Ream leaves to-morrow morning; I said good-bye to her this + evening. Unfortunately a great many people were there. She took my hand + and said: "I wish you everything good in the world, and I know that you + wish me the same." And then: Good-bye. A door opens, and a door closes, + and people never meet again on this earth, never again, never--and + human language has never been able to discover any distinction between + good-bye for an hour, and good-bye forever. People sit and chat, smile + and jest. Then you get up, and the story is finished. Over! over! And + that is the end of all stories, says Andersen. + + All one's life one quarrels with people as dear to one as Ploug is to + me. I have a well-founded hope that I may see Rudolph Schmidt's profile + again soon, and a hundred times again after that; but Vinnie I shall + never see again. + + I did not understand her at first; I had a few unpleasant conjectures + ready. I had to have many conversations with her before I understood her + ingenuousness, her ignorance, her thorough goodness, in short, all her + simple healthiness of soul. Over! + + When I was teasing her the other day about all the time I had wasted in + her company, she replied: "_People do not waste time with their + friends_," and when I exclaimed: "What do I get from you?" she + answered, laughing: + + "_Inspiration_." And that was the truth. Those great brown eyes, + the firm eyebrows, the ringleted mass of chestnut brown hair and the + fresh mouth--all this that I still remember, but perhaps in three months + shall no longer be able to recall, the quick little figure, now + commanding, now deprecating, is to me a kind of inspiration. I have + never been in love with Vinnie; but most people would think so, to hear + the expressions I am now using. But I love her as a friend, as a mind + akin to my own. There were thoughts of our brains and strings of our + hearts, which always beat in unison. Peace be with her! May the cursed + world neither rend her nor devour her; may she die at last with the + clear forehead she has now! I am grateful to her. She has communicated + to me a something good and simple that one cannot see too much of and + that one scarcely ever sees at all. Finally, she has shown me again the + spectacle of a human being entirely happy, and good because happy, a + soul without a trace of bitterness, an intellect whose work is not a + labour. + + It is not that Vinnie is--or rather was, since she is dead for me--an + educated girl in the Copenhagen sense of the word. The verdict of the + Danish educational establishments upon her would be that she was a + deplorably uneducated girl. She was incomprehensibly dull at languages. + She would be childishly amused at a jest or joke or compliment as old as + the hills (such as the Italians were fond of using), and think it new, + for she knew nothing of the European storehouse of stereotyped remarks + and salted drivel. Her own conversation was new; a breath of the + independence of the great Republic swept through it. She was no fine + lady, she was _an American girl_, who had not attained her rank by + birth, or through inherited riches, but had fought for it herself with a + talent that had made its way to the surface without early training, + through days and nights of industry, and a mixture of enthusiasm and + determination. + + She was vain; she certainly was that. But again like a child, delighted + at verses in her honour in the American papers, pleased at homage and + marks of distinction, but far more ambitious than vain of personal + advantages. She laughed when we read in the papers of Vinnie Ream, that, + in spite of the ill-fame creative lady artists enjoy, far from being a + monster with green eyes, she ventured to be beautiful. + + She was a good girl. There was a certain deep note about all that her + heart uttered. She had a mind of many colours. And there was the very + devil of a rush and Forward! March! about her, _always in a hurry_. + + And now--no Roman elegy--I will hide her away in my memory: + + Here lies + VINNIE REAM + Sculptor + of Washington, U.S.A. + Six-and-twenty years of age + This recollection of her is retained by + One who knew her + for seventeen days + and will never forget her. + +I have really never seen Vinnie Ream since. We exchanged a few letters +after her departure, and the rest was silence. + +Her statue of Abraham Lincoln stands now in a rotunda on the Capitol, +for which it was ordered. Later, a Congress Committee ordered from her a +statue of Admiral Farragut, which is likewise erected in Washington. +These are the only two statues that the government of the United States +has ever ordered from a woman. Other statues of hers which I have seen +mentioned bear the names of _Miriam, The West, Sappho, The Spirit of +Carnival_, etc. Further than this, I only know that she married +Richard L. Hoxie, an engineer, and only a few years ago was living in +Washington. + + +XLIII. + +It was a real trouble to me that the Pope, in his exasperation over the +conquest of Rome--in order to make the accomplished revolution recoil +also on the heads of the foreigners whom he perhaps suspected of +sympathy with the new order of things--had closed the Vatican and all +its collections. Rome was to me first and foremost Michael Angelo's +Sistine Chapel, Raphael's Stanzas and Loggias, and now all this +magnificent array, which I had travelled so far to see, was closed to me +by an old man's bad temper. + +But there was still enough to linger over in Rome. The two palaces that +seemed to me most deserving of admiration were the Farnese and the +Cancellaria, the former Michael Angelo's, the latter Bramante's work, +the first a perpetuation in stone of beauty and power, the second, of +grace and lightness. I felt that if one were to take a person with no +idea of architecture and set him in front of these buildings, there +would fall like scales from his eyes, and he would say: "Now I know what +the building art means." + +Luini's exquisite painting, _Vanity and Modesty_, in the Galleria +Sciarra, impressed me profoundly. It represented two women, one nun- +like, the other magnificently dressed. The latter is Leonardo's well- +known type, as a magically fascinating personality. Its essential +feature is a profoundly serious melancholy, but the beauty of the figure +is seductive. She is by no means smiling, and yet she looks as though a +very slight alteration would produce a smile, and as though the heavens +themselves would open, if smile she did. The powerful glance of the dark +blue eyes is in harmony with the light-brown hair and the lovely hands. +"It would be terrible to meet in real life a woman who looked like +that," I wrote; "for a man would grow desperate at his inability to win +her and desperate because the years must destroy such a marvel. That is +why the gracious gods have willed it otherwise; that is why she does not +exist. That is why she is only a vision, a revelation, a painting, and +that is why she was conceived in the brain of Leonardo, the place on +earth most favoured by the gods, and executed by Luini, that all +generations might gaze at her without jealousy, and without dread of the +molestations of Time." + +One day, at the Museo Kircheriano, where I was looking at the admirable +antiquities, I made acquaintance with a Jesuit priest, who turned out to +be exceedingly pleasant and refined, a very decent fellow, in fact. He +spoke Latin to me, and showed me round; at an enquiry of mine, he +fetched from his quarters in the Collegio Romano a book with +reproductions from the pagan section of the Lateran Museum, and +explained to me some bas-reliefs which I had not understood. His +obligingness touched me, his whole attitude made me think. Hitherto I +had only spoken to one solitary embryo Jesuit,--a young Englishman who +was going to Rome to place himself at the service of the Pope, and who +was actuated by the purest enthusiasm; I was struck by the fact that +this second Jesuit, too, seemed to be a worthy man. It taught me how +independent individual worth is of the nature of one's convictions. + +Most of the Italians I had so far been acquainted with were simple +people, my landlord and his family, and those who visited them, and I +sometimes heard fragments of conversation which revealed the common +people's mode of thought to me. In one house that I visited, the +mistress discovered that her maid was not married to her so-called +husband, a matter in which, for that matter, she was very blameless, +since her parents had refused their consent, and she had afterwards +allowed herself to be abducted. Her mistress reproached her for the +illegal relations existing. She replied, "If God wishes to plunge anyone +into misery, that person is excused."--"We must not put the blame of +everything upon God," said the mistress.--"Yes, yes," replied the girl +unabashed; "then if the Devil wishes to plunge a person into misery, the +person is excused."--"Nor may we put the blame of our wrongdoing on the +Devil," said the mistress.--"Good gracious," said the girl, "it must be +the fault of one or other of them, everybody knows that. If it is not +the one, it is the other." + +At the house of the Blanchettis, who had come to Rome, I met many Turin +and Roman gentlemen. They were all very much taken up by an old Sicilian +chemist of the name of Muratori, who claimed that he had discovered a +material which looked like linen, but was impervious to bullets, sword- +cuts, bayonet-thrusts, etc. Blanchetti himself had fired his revolver at +him at two paces, and the ball had fallen flat to the ground. There +could be no question of juggling; Muratori was an honourable old +Garibaldist who had been wounded in his youth, and now went about on +crutches, but, since we have never heard of its being made practical use +of, it would seem that there was nothing in it. + +I did not care to look up all the Italians to whom I had introductions +from Villari. But I tried my luck with a few of them. The first was Dr. +Pantaleoni, who had formerly been banished from the Papal States and who +left the country as a radical politician, but now held almost +conservative views. He had just come back, and complained bitterly of +all the licentiousness. "Alas!" he said, "we have freedom enough now, +but order, order!" Pantaleoni was a little, eager, animated man of +fifty, very much occupied, a politician and doctor, and he promised to +introduce me to all the scholars whose interests I shared. As I felt +scruples at taking up these gentlemen's time, he exclaimed wittily: "My +dear fellow, take up their time! To take his time is the greatest +service you can render to a Roman; he never knows what to do to kill +it!" + +The next man I went to was Prince Odescalchi, one of the men who had +then recently risen to the surface, officially termed the hero of the +Young Liberals. Pantaleoni had dubbed him a blockhead, and he had not +lied. He turned out to be a very conceited and frothy young man with a +parting all over his head, fair to whiteness, of strikingly Northern +type, with exactly the same expressionless type of face as certain of +the milksops closely connected with the Court in Denmark. + + +XLIV. + +There were a great many Scandinavians in Rome; they foregathered at the +various eating-houses and on a Saturday evening at the Scandinavian +Club. Some of them were painters, sculptors and architects, with their +ladies, there were some literary and scientific men and every +description of tourists on longer or shorter visits to the Eternal City. +I held myself aloof from them. Most of them had their good qualities, +but they could not stand the test of any association which brought them +into too close contact with one another, as life in a small town does. +They were divided up into camps or hives, and in every hive ruled a lady +who detested the queen bee of the next one. So it came about that the +Scandinavians lived in perpetual squabbles, could not bear one another, +slandered one another, intrigued against one another. When men got drunk +on the good Roman wine at the _osterie_, they abused one another +and very nearly came to blows. Moreover, they frequently got drunk, for +most of them lost their self-control after a few glasses. Strangely +enough, in the grand surroundings, too much of the Northern pettiness +came to the surface in them. One was continually tempted to call out to +the ladies, in Holberg's words: "Hold your peace, you good women!" and +to the men: "Go away, you rapscallions, and make up your quarrels!" + +There were splendid young fellows among the artists, but the painters, +who were in the majority, readily admitted that technically they could +learn nothing at all in Rome, where they never saw a modern painting; +they said themselves that they ought to be in Paris, but the authorities +in Christiania and Copenhagen were afraid of Paris: thence all bad and +dangerous influences proceeded, and so the painters still journey to +Rome, as their fathers did before them. + + +XLV. + +Towards the middle of November the Pope opened the Vatican. But in face +of the enormous conflux of people, it was not easy to get a +_permesso_ from the consul, and that could not be dispensed with. I +had just made use of one for the Vatican sculpture collection, one day, +when I felt very unwell. I ascribed my sensations at first to the +insufferable weather of that month, alternately sirocco and cold sleet, +or both at once; then I was seized with a dread of the climate, of Rome, +of all these strange surroundings, and I made up my mind to go home as +quickly as possible. The illness that was upon me was, without my +knowing it, the cause of my fear. The next day I was carried downstairs +by two vile-smelling labourers and taken by Vilhelm Rosenstand the +painter, who was one of the few who had made friends with me and shown +me kindness, to the Prussian hospital on the Tarpeian Rock, near the +Capitol. + +Here a bad attack of typhoid fever held me prisoner in my bed for some +few months, after a compatriot, who had no connection whatever with me, +had been so inconsiderate as to inform my parents by telegraph how ill I +was, and that there was little hope for me. + +The first month I was not fully conscious; I suffered from a delusion of +coercion. Thus it seemed to me that the left side of my bed did not +belong to me, but to another man, who sometimes took the place; and that +I myself was divided into several persons, of which one, for instance, +asked my legs to turn a little to the one side or the other. One of +these persons was Imperialist, and for that reason disliked by the +others, who were Republicans; nevertheless, he performed great +kindnesses for them, making them more comfortable, when it was in his +power. Another strangely fantastic idea that held sway for a long time +was that on my head, the hair of which had been shorn by the hospital +attendant rather less artistically than one cuts a dog's, there was a +clasp of pearls and precious stones, which I felt but could not see. + +Afterwards, all my delusions centred on food. + +I was very much neglected at the hospital. The attendance was wretched. +The highly respected German doctor, who was appointed to the place, had +himself an immense practice, and moreover was absolutely taken up by the +Franco-Prussian war. Consequently, he hardly ever came, sometimes stayed +away as long as thirteen days at a stretch, during all which time a +patient who might happen to be suffering, say, from constipation, must +lie there without any means of relief. My bed was as hard as a stone, +and I was waked in the night by pains in my body and limbs; the pillow +was so hard that the skin of my right ear was rubbed off from the +pressure. There were no nurses. There was only one custodian for the +whole hospital, a Russian fellow who spoke German, and who sometimes had +as many as fourteen patients at a time to look after, but frequently +went out to buy stores, or visit his sweetheart, and then all the +patients could ring at once without any one coming. After I had passed +the crisis of my illness, and consequently began to suffer terribly from +hunger, I was ordered an egg for my breakfast; I sometimes had to lie +for an hour and a half, pining for this egg. Once, for three days in +succession, there were no fresh eggs to be had. So he would bring for my +breakfast nothing but a small piece of dry bread. One day that I was +positively ill with hunger, I begged repeatedly for another piece of +bread, but he refused it me. It was not malice on his part, but pure +stupidity, for he was absolutely incapable of understanding how I felt. +And to save fuel, he let me suffer from cold, as well as from hunger; +would never put more than one wretched little stick at a time into the +stove. Everything was pinched to an incredible extent. Thus it was +impossible for me to get a candle in the evening before it was +absolutely dark, and then never more than one, although it made my eyes +water to try to read. Candles and firing, it appears, were not put down +in the bill. And yet this hospital is kept up on subscriptions from all +the great Powers, so there must be someone into whose pockets the money +goes. Most of us survived it; a few died who possibly might have been +kept alive; one was preserved for whom the Danish newspapers have +beautiful obituaries ready. + +Over my head, in the same building, there lived a well-known German +archaeologist, who was married to a Russian princess of such colossal +physical proportions that Roman popular wits asserted that when she +wished to go for a drive she had to divide herself between two cabs. +This lady had a great talent for music. I never saw her, but I became +aware of her in more ways than one: whenever she crossed the floor on +the third story, the ceiling shook, and the boards creaked, in a manner +unbearable to an invalid. And just when I had settled myself off, and +badly wanted to sleep, towards eleven o'clock at night, the heavy lady +above would sit down at her grand piano, and make music that would have +filled a concert hall resound through the place. + +After a month had passed, the doctor declared that I had "turned the +corner," and might begin to take a little food besides the broth that up +till then had been my only nourishment. A little later, I was allowed to +try to get up. I was so weak that I had to begin to learn to walk again; +I could not support myself on my legs, but dragged myself, with the help +of the custodian, the four or five steps from the bed to a sofa. + +Just at this time I received two letters from Copenhagen, containing +literary enquiries and offers. The first was from the editor of the +_Illustrated Times_, and enquired whether on my return home I would +resume the theatrical criticisms in the paper; in that case they would +keep the position open for me. I gave a negative reply, as I was tired +of giving my opinion on a Danish drama. The second letter, which +surprised me more, was from the editor of the, at that time, powerful +_Daily Paper_, Steen Bille, offering me the entire management of +the paper after the retirement of Molbech, except so far as politics +were concerned, the editor naturally himself retaining the latter. As +Danish things go, it was a very important offer to a young man. It +promised both influence and income, and it was only my profound and +ever-increasing determination not to give myself up to journalism that +made me without hesitation dictate a polite refusal. I was still to weak +to write. My motive was simply and solely that I wished to devote my +life to knowledge. But Bille, who knew what power in a little country +like Denmark his offer would have placed in my hands, hardly understood +it in this way, and was exceedingly annoyed at my refusal. It gave the +first impulse to his altered feeling toward me. I have sometimes +wondered since whether my fate in Denmark might not have been different +had I accepted the charge. It is true that the divergence between what +the paper and I, in the course of the great year 1871, came to +represent, would soon have brought about a split. The Commune in Paris +caused a complete _volte face_ of the liberal bourgeoisie in +Denmark, as elsewhere. + + +XLVI. + +While I was still too weak to write, I received a letter from Henrik +Ibsen (dated December 20, 1870), which impressed me greatly. Henrik +Ibsen and I had been on friendly terms with one another since April, +1866, but it was only about this time that our intimacy began to emit +sparks, an intimacy which was destined to have a very widening influence +upon me, and which is perhaps not without traces on the stages of his +poetical progress. + +Ibsen thought I had already recovered, and wrote to me as to a +convalescent. He complained bitterly of the conquest of Rome by the +Italians: Rome was now taken from "us men" and given over to the +"politicians"; it had been a spot sacred to peace, and was so no +longer.--This assertion was at variance with my religion. It seemed to +me unpermissible to desire, for aesthetic reasons, to see the +restoration of an ecclesiastical régime, with its remorseless system of +oppression. Human happiness and intellectual progress were worth more +than the retention of the idylls of naiveté. I replied to him by +declaring my faith in freedom and soon he outdid me in this, as in other +domains. + +But there was one other part of the letter that went to my heart and +rejoiced me. It was where Ibsen wrote that what was wanted was a revolt +in the human mind, and in that I ought to be one of the leaders. These +words, which were in exact agreement with my own secret hope, fired my +imagination, ill though I was. It seemed to me that after having felt +myself isolated so long, I had at last met with the mind that understood +me and felt as I did, a real fellow-fighter. As soon as I was once more +fit to use my pen, I wrote a flaming reply in verse (headed, The +Hospital in Rome, the night of January 9, 1871). In it I described how +solitary I had been, in my intellectual fight and endeavour, and +expressed my contentment at having found a brother in him. + + +XLVII. + +Among the Danes, and there were not many of them, who frequently came to +see me at the hospital, I must mention the kind and tactful musician +Niels Ravnkilde, whom I had known when I was a child. He had been living +in Rome now for some twenty years. He was gentle and quiet, good- +looking, short of stature, modest and unpretending, too weak of +character not to be friends with everyone, but equipped with a natural +dignity. When a young music master in Copenhagen, he had fallen in love +with a young, wealthy girl, whose affections he succeeded in winning in +return, but he was turned out of the house by her harsh, purse-proud +father, and in desperation had left Denmark to settle down in Rome. As +his lady-love married soon after and became a contented wife and mother, +he remained where he was. He succeeded in making his way. + +He gradually became a favourite teacher of music among the ladies of the +Roman aristocracy, who sometimes invited him to their country-houses in +the Summer. He was on a good footing with the native maestros most in +request, who quickly understood that the modest Dane was no dangerous +rival. Graceful as Ravnkilde was in his person, so he was in his art; +there was nothing grand about him. But he was clever, and had a natural, +unaffected wit. His difficult position as a master had taught him +prudence and reserve. He was obligingness personified to travelling +Scandinavians, and was proud of having, as he thought, made the +acquaintance in Rome of the flower of the good society of the Northern +countries. Even long after he had come to the front, he continued to +live in the fourth storey apartment of the Via Ripetta, where he had +taken up his abode on his arrival in Rome, waited upon by the same +simple couple. His circumstances could not improve, if only for the +reason that he sent what he had to spare to relatives of his in +Copenhagen, who had a son who was turning out badly, and lived by +wasting poor Ravnkilde's savings. After having been the providence of +all Danish travellers to Rome for thirty years, certain individuals who +had influence with the government succeeded in obtaining a distinction +for him. The government then gave him, not even the poor little +decoration that he ought to have had twenty years before, but--brilliant +idea!--awarded him the title of _Professor_, which in Italian, of +course, he had always been, and which was a much more insignificant +title than _Maestro_, by which he was regularly called. + +Ravnkilde wrote my letters at the hospital for me, and the day I came +out we drove away together to the French restaurant to celebrate the +occasion by a dinner. + +I went from there up to Monte Pincio in a glorious sunshine, rejoiced to +see the trees again, and the people in their Sunday finery, and the +lovely women's faces, as well as at being able to talk to people once +more. It was all like new life in a new world. I met a good many +Scandinavians, who congratulated me, and a young savant, Giuseppe +Saredo, who, as professor of law, had been removed from Siena to Rome, +and with whom, at the house of dall'Ongaro at Florence, I had had some +delightful talks. We decided that we would keep in touch with one +another. + + +XLVIII. + +It was only this one day, however, that happiness and the sun shone upon +me. On the morrow pains in my right leg, in which there was a vein +swollen, made me feel very unwell. So ignorant was the doctor that he +declared this to be of no importance, and gave me a little ointment with +which to rub my leg. But I grew worse from day to day, and after a very +short time my leg was like a lump of lead. I was stretched once more for +some months on a sick-bed, and this weakened me the more since very +heroic measures were used in the treatment of the complaint, a violent +attack of phlebitis. The leg was rubbed every day from the sole of the +foot to the hip with mercury ointment, which could not be without its +effect on my general health. + +Still, I kept up my spirits finely. Among the Scandinavians who showed +me kindness at this time I gratefully remember the Danish painters +Rosenstand and Mackeprang, who visited me regularly and patiently, and +my friend Walter Runeberg, the Finnish sculptor, whose cheerfulness did +me good. + +Other Scandinavians with whom I was less well acquainted came to see me +now and again, but they had one very annoying habit. It was customary at +that time for all letters to be addressed, for greater security, to the +Danish consulate, which served the purpose of a general Scandinavian +consulate. Anyone who thought of coming to see me would fetch what +letters had arrived for me that day and put them in his pocket to bring +me. The letters I ought to have had at ten o'clock in the morning I +generally received at seven in the evening. But these gentlemen often +forgot to pay their visit at all, or did not get time, and then it would +happen that after having gone about with the letters in their pockets +for a few days, they took them back to the consulate, whence they were +sent to me, once, three days late. As my whole life on my sick-bed was +one constant, painful longing for letters from home, the more so as my +mother, all the time I was in bed, was lying dangerously ill, I felt +vexed at the thoughtless behaviour of my compatriots. + +However, I had not travelled so far to meet Northmen, and I learnt far +more from the one Italian who sat by my bedside day after day, Giuseppe +Saredo. It was amusing to note the difference between his ways and the +Northmen's. He did not come in; he exploded. At six o'clock in the +evening, he would rush in without knocking at the door, shouting at one +and the same time Italian to the people of the house, and French to me. +He talked at a furious rate, and so loudly that people who did not know +might have fancied we were quarrelling, and he changed his seat once a +minute, jumped up from the easy chair and seated himself half in the +window, began a sentence there and finished it sitting on my bed. And +every second or third day he either himself brought books to entertain +me or sent large parcels by a messenger. + +He had risen to be professor at the University of the the capital, +without ever having been either student or graduate. His family were too +poor for him to study. For many years, when a lad, he had never eaten +dinner. His occupation, when at last he began to get on, was that of +proof-reader in a printing establishment, but he tried to add to his +income by writing melodramas for the boulevard theatres in Turin. + +He thought he had written over fifty. He told me: "The manager generally +came to me on a Sunday, when we were at liberty, and said: 'We must have +a new play for next Sunday.' On Monday the first act was finished, on +Tuesday the second, etc.; and every act was delivered as it was written, +and the parts allotted. Sometimes the last act was only finished on +Saturday morning, which, however, would not prevent the piece being +played on Sunday evening." In a number of the _Revue des deux +Mondes_ for 1857 we found Saredo mentioned among the melodramatists +of Italy. This must have been ferreted out privately, since he always +wrote these melodramas anonymously, he having determined, with naïve +conceit, "not to stain his future reputation." When he was twenty-one, +he tried to raise himself from this rank to that of a journalist, and +succeeded; he sent all sorts of articles to three newspapers. From his +twenty-first to his twenty-fourth year he wrote for the daily papers, +and wrote gay accounts of the volatile lives of young Italian +journalists with the ladies of the theatres. Then he fell in love with +the lady who later became his wife (known as a novelist under the +pseudonym of Ludovico de Rosa), and from that time forth never looked at +another woman. All his life he cherished a great admiration for his wife +and gratitude towards her. + +When he had commenced his legal work, he strained every nerve to the +utmost, and obtained his professorships in the various towns through +competition, without having followed the usual University path. "I have +always had the most unshaken faith in my star," he said one day, "even +when, from hunger or despair, thoughts of suicide occurred to me. When I +broke my black bread, I said to myself: 'The day will come when I shall +eat white.'" + +Like all Italians at that time, Saredo detested and despised modern +France. As far as reconquered Rome was concerned, he regarded her with +sorrowful eyes. "There are only nobility, ecclesiastics, and workmen +here," he said; "no middle classes, no industry and no trade. Absurd +tariff laws have up till now shut off the Papal States from the +surrounding world. And what a government! A doctor, who after his second +visit did not make his patient confess to a priest, lost his official +post, if he happened to hold one, and was in any case sent to prison for +five months. A doctor who did not go to Mass a certain number of times +during the week was prohibited practising. The huge number of tied-up +estates made buying and selling very difficult. The new government has +struck the nobility a fatal blow by abolishing entailed property and +lands. The calling in of the ecclesiastical property by the State is +giving the towns a chance to breathe." + +Whenever I revisited Italy, I saw Saredo. His heroism during the +inquiries into the irregularities in Naples in 1900-1901 made his name +beloved and himself admired in his native country. He died in 1902, the +highest life official in Italy; since 1897 he had been President of the +Council. + + +XLIX. + +I came under an even greater debt of gratitude than to Saredo, to the +good-natured people in whose house I lay ill. I was as splendidly looked +after as if I had made it a specified condition that I should be nursed +in case of illness. + +My landlady, Maria, especially, was the most careful nurse, and the best +creature in the world, although she had the physiognomy of a regular +Italian criminal, when her face was in repose. The moment she spoke, +however, her features beamed with maternal benevolence. After the +hospital, it was a decided change for the better. I was under no one's +tyranny and did not feel as though I were in prison; I could complain if +my food was bad, and change _trattoria_, when I myself chose. +Everything was good. + +As long as I was well, I had taken hardly any notice of the people in +the house, hardly exchanged a word with them; I was out all day, and +either hastily asked them to do my room, or to put a little on the fire. +It was only when I fell ill that I made their acquaintance. + +Let me quote from my notes at the time: + +Maria is forty, but looks nearly sixty. Her husband is a joiner, a +stout, good-looking man, who works all day for his living, and has a +shop. Then there is Maria's niece, the nineteen-year-old Filomena, a +tall, handsome girl. Every evening they have fine times, laugh, sing, +and play cards. On Sunday evening they go out to the fair (_alla +fiera_) and look at the things without buying. Others have to pay a +lire to go in, but they go in free, as they know some of the people. On +festival occasions Maria wears a silk dress. + +There is a crucifix over my bed, an oleograph of the Madonna and child +and a heart, embroidered with gold on white, horribly pierced by the +seven swords of pain, which were supposed to be nails; on the centre of +the heart, you read, partly in Latin, partly in Greek letters: + +JESU XPI PASSIO. + +All the same, Maria is very sceptical. Yesterday, on the evening of my +birthday, we had the following conversation: + +_Myself_: "Here you celebrate your saints' day; not your birthday; +but, you know, up in the North we have not any saints"--and, thinking it +necessary to add a deep-drawn religious sigh, I continued: "We think it +enough to believe in God." "Oh! yes," she said slowly, and then, a +little while after: "That, too, is His own business." "How?" "Well," she +said, "You know that I am dreadfully ignorant; I know nothing at all, +but I think a great deal. There are these people now who are always +talking about the Lord. I think it is all stuff. When I married, they +said to me: 'May it please the Lord that your husband be good to you.' I +thought: If I had not been sensible enough to choose a good husband, it +would not help me much what should please the Lord. Later on they said: +'May it please the Lord to give you sons.' I had some, but they died +when they were little ones. Then I thought to myself: 'If my husband and +I do not do something in the matter, it won't be much use for the Lord +to be pleased to give them to us. Nature, too, has something to say to +it. (_Anche la natura è una piccola cosa_.) You have no idea, sir, +how we have suffered from priests here in the Papal State. Everyone had +to go to Confession, and as of course they did not wish to confess their +own sins, they confessed other people's,--and told lies, too,--and in +that way the priests knew everything. If the priest had heard anything +about a person, he or she would get a little ticket from him: 'Come to +me at such and such a time! 'Then, when the person went, he would say: +'Are you mad to live with such and such a person without being +married!'--and all the while he himself had a woman and a nest full of +children. Then he would say: 'I won't have you in my parish,' and he +would publish the poor thing's secret to the whole world. Or, if he were +more exasperated, he would say: 'Out of the Pope's country!' and send +for a few carabineers; they would take one to a cart and drive one to +the frontier; there, there were fresh carabineers, who took one farther +--and all without trial, or any enquiry. Often the accusation was false. +But we were ruled by spies, and all their power was based on the +confessional, which is nothing but spying. Shortly before Easter, a +priest came and counted how many there were in the house. If afterwards +there were one who did not go to mass, then his name was stuck up on the +church door as an infidel, in disgrace. It is many years now since I +have been to any confessor. When I die, I shall say: 'God, forgive me my +sins and my mistakes,' and shall die in peace without any priest." + +Whatever we talk about, Maria always comes back to her hatred of the +priests. The other day, we were speaking of the annoyance I had been +subjected to by a compatriot of mine, K.B., who came to see me, but +looked more particularly at a large _fiasco_ I had standing there, +containing four bottles of Chianti. He tasted the wine, which was very +inferior, declared it 'nice,' and began to drink, ten glasses straight +off. At first he was very polite to me, and explained that it was +impossible to spend a morning in a more delightful manner than by +visiting the Sistine Chapel first, and me in my sick-room afterwards, +but by degrees he became ruder and ruder, and as his drunkenness +increased I sank in his estimation. At last he told me that I was +intolerably conceited, and started abusing me thoroughly. Lying +defenceless in bed, and unable to move, I was obliged to ring for Maria, +and whisper to her to fetch a few gentlemen from the Scandinavian Club, +who could take the drunken man home, after he had wasted fully six hours +of my day. I managed in this way to get him out of the door. He was +hardly gone than Maria burst out: "_Che porcheria!_" and then +added, laughing, to show me her knowledge of languages: "_Cochonnerie, +Schweinerei!_" She has a remarkable memory for the words she has +heard foreigners use. She knows a number of French words, which she +pronounces half like Italian, and she also knows a little Russian and a +little German, having, when a young girl, kept house for a Russian +prince and his family. + +"I feel," she said to me, "that I could have learnt both French and +German easily, if I could have _compared_ them in a book. But I can +neither read nor write. These wretched priests have kept us in +ignorance. And now I am old and good for nothing. I was forty a little +while ago, and that is too old to learn the alphabet. Do you know, +signore, how it originally came about that I did not believe, and +despised the priests? I was twelve years old, and a tall girl, and a +very good-looking girl, too, though you cannot see that, now that I am +old and ugly." (You can see it very plainly, for her features are haughty +and perfectly pure of line; it is only that her expression, when she +sits alone, is sinister.) "I lost my father when I was five years old. +About that time my mother married again, and did not trouble herself any +more about me, as she had children with her new husband. So I was left +to myself, and ran about the streets, and became absolutely +ungovernable, from vivacity, life, and mischief, for I was naturally a +very lively child. Then one day I met a mule, alone; the man had left +it; I climbed up, and seated myself upon it, and rode about, up and down +the street, until a dog came that frightened the mule and it kicked and +threw me over its head. There I lay, with a broken collar-bone, and some +of the bone stuck out through the skin. Then a doctor came and wanted to +bind it up for me, but I was ashamed for him to see my breast, and would +not let him. He said: 'Rubbish! I have seen plenty of girls.' So I was +bound up and for six weeks had to lie quite still. In the meantime a +priest, whom they all called Don Carlo--I do not know why they said Don +--came to see me, and when I was a little better and only could not move +my left arm, he said to me one day, would I go and weed in his garden, +and he would give me money for it. So I went every day into the garden, +where I could very well do the work with one arm. He came down to me, +brought me sweets and other things, and asked me to be his friend. I +pretended not to understand. He said, too, how pretty I was, and such +things. Then at last one day, he called me into his bedroom, and first +gave me sweets, and then set me on his knee. I did not know how to get +away. Then I said to him: 'It is wrong, the Madonna would not like it.' +Do you know, sir, what he replied? He said: 'Child! there is no Madonna +(_non c'è Madonna_) she is only a bridle for the common people' +(_è un freno per il populo basso_). Then I was anxious to run +away, and just then my mother passed by the garden, and as she did not +see me there, called, 'Anna Maria! Anna Maria!' I said: 'Mother is +calling me,' and ran out of the room. Then mother said to me: 'What did +the priest say to you, and what did he do to you? You were in his +bedroom.' I said: 'Nothing'; but when my mother went to confession, +instead of confessing her sins, she said over and over again to him: +'What have you done to my daughter? I will have my daughter examined, to +see what sort of a man you are.' He declared: 'I will have you shot if +you do' (_una buona schioppettata_). So mother did not dare to go +farther in the matter. But she would not believe me." + +Here we were interrupted by the Russian woman from next door coming in; +she is married, more or less, to a waiter, and she complained of his +volatility, and cried with jealousy. "Once I was just as weak," said +Maria. "When I was newly married I was so jealous of my husband, that I +could neither eat nor drink if any one came to me and said: 'This +evening he is with such and such a one.' If I tried to eat, I was sick +at once. I am just as fond of him as I was then, but I am cured now. If +I saw his infidelity with my own eyes, I should not feel the least bit +hurt about it. Then, I could have strangled him." + + + + +FILOMENA + +Italian Landladies--The Carnival--The Moccoli Feast--Filomena's Views + + +Filomena sings lustily from early morning till late at night, and her +name suits her. The Greek Philomela has acquired this popular form, and +in use is often shortened to Filomé. + +The other day I made her a present of a bag of English biscuits. Her +face beamed as I have never besides seen anything beam but the face of +my _cafetière_--he is a boy of twelve--when now and again he gets a +few _soldi_ for bringing me my coffee or tea. Anyone who has only +seen the lighting up of Northern faces has no conception,--as even +painters admit,--of such transfiguration. Yes, indeed! Filomena's tall +figure and fresh mountain blood would freshen up the Goldschmidtian +human race to such an extent that they would become better men and women +in his next books. + +I have seen a little of the Carnival. This morning Filomena came to my +room, to fetch a large Italian flag which belongs there. "I am going to +wave it on Thursday," she said, and added, with blushing cheeks, "then I +shall have a mask on." But this evening she could not restrain herself. +For the first time during the five months I have lived here, and for the +first time during the month I have been ill, she came in without my +having called or rung for her. She had a red silk cap on, with a gold +border. "What do you say to that, sir!" she said, and her clear laughter +rang through the room. It revived my sick self to gaze at ease at so +much youth, strength and happiness; then I said a few kind words to her, +and encouraged by them she burst into a stream of eloquence about all +the enjoyment she was promising herself. This would be the first +carnival she had seen; she came from the mountains and was going back +there this Spring. She was in the seventh heaven over her cap. She +always reminds me, with her powerful frame, of the young giantess in the +fairy tale who takes up a peasant and his plough in the hollow of her +hand. + +Filomena is as tall as a moderately tall man, slenderly built, but with +broad shoulders. She impresses one as enjoying life thoroughly. She has +herself made all she wears--a poor little grey woollen skirt with an +edging of the Italian colours, which has been lengthened some nine +inches at the top by letting in a piece of shirting. A thin red-and- +black-striped jacket that she wears, a kind of loose Garibaldi, is +supposed to hide this addition, which it only very imperfectly does. Her +head is small and piquant; her hair heavy, blue-black; her eyes light +brown, of exquisite shape, smiling and kind. She has small, red lips, +and the most beautiful teeth that I remember seeing. Her complexion is +brown, unless she blushes; then it grows darker brown. Her figure is +unusually beautiful, but her movements are heavy, so that one sees at +once she is quite uneducated. Still, she has a shrug of the shoulders, +ways of turning and twisting her pretty head about, that are absolutely +charming. + +I have sent Filomena into the town to buy a pound of figs for me and one +for herself. While she is away, I reflect that I cannot sufficiently +congratulate myself on my excellent landlady, and the others. As a rule, +these Roman lodging-house keepers are, judging by what one hears, +perfect bandits. When F., the Norwegian sculptor, lay dangerously ill, +the woman in whose house he was did not even speak to him; she went out +and left him alone in the house. When the Danish dilettante S. was at +death's door, his landlady did not enter his room once a day, or give +him a drink of water, and he was obliged to keep a servant. V.'s +landlady stole an opera-glass, a frock-coat, and a great deal of money +from him. Most foreigners are swindled in a hundred different ways; if +they make a stain on the carpet, they must pay for a new one. Maria +looks after me like a mother. Every morning she rubs me with the +ointment the doctor has prescribed. When I have to have a bath, she +takes me in her arms, without any false shame, and puts me in the water; +then takes me up and puts me to bed again; after my sojourn in the +hospital, I am not very heavy. What I am most astonished at is the +indulgent delicacy of these people. For instance, Maria has forbidden +her good-natured husband, whom, like Filomena, I like to call _Zio_ +(uncle), to eat garlic (the favourite food of the Romans) while I am +ill, that I may not be annoyed in my room by the smell. I have only to +say a word, and she and her niece run all my errands for me. Indeed, the +other day, Maria exclaimed, quite indignantly: "Sir, do not say +'_when_ you go into the town, will you buy me this or that?' Are we +robbers, are we scoundrels? Only say, 'go,' and I will go." I never say +to her: "Will you do me a favour?" without her replying: "Two, sir." +Yes, and she heaps presents upon me; she and Filomena bring me, now a +bundle of firewood, now a glass of good wine, now macaroni, etc. All the +Danes who come here are astonished, and say: "You have got deucedly good +people to look after you." + +Maria's greatest pleasure is talking. She has no time for it in the day. +In the evening, however, she tidies my room slowly, entertaining me all +the time. When she has quite finished, at the time of day when others +are drowsy or go to bed, she still likes to have just a little more +conversation, and she knows that when I see she has put the last thing +into its place, her task for the day is ended, and I shall dismiss her +with a gracious _Buona sera, bon riposo!_ To put off this moment as +long as possible, she will continue to hold some object in her hand, +and, standing in the favourite position of the Romans, with her arms +akimbo, and some toilet article under her arm, will hold a long +discourse. She sometimes looks so indescribably comic that I almost +choke with suppressed laughter as we talk. + +To-day is the first day of the Carnival. So even Filomena has been out +this evening in tri-coloured trousers. + +... I am interrupted by the inmates of all the floors returning from the +Carnival, all talking at once, and coming straight in to me to show me +their dress. Amongst them from the Carnival, all talking at once, and +coming straight in to me to show me their dress. Amongst them are guests +from the mountains, tall, dark men, in exceedingly fantastic garb. They +tell me how much they have enjoyed themselves. Filomena has naïvely made +me a present of a few burnt almonds with sugar upon them, that she has +had in her trouser pockets, and informs me with impetuous volubility how +she has talked to all the people she met, "who do not know her and whom +she does not know." She has had one of my white shirts on, which she had +embroidered all over with ribbons till it looked like a real costume. +She is beaming with happiness. The tambourine tinkles all the evening in +the street; they are dancing the tarantella to it down below, and it is +difficult to go to sleep. Maria stays behind, when the others have gone, +to finish her day's work. It is a sight for the gods to see her doing it +with a gold brocade cap on her head, and in red, white and green +trousers! + +None of them guess what a torment it is to me to lie and hear about the +Carnival, which is going on a few streets from where I am lying, but +which I cannot see. When shall I spend a Winter in Rome again? And no +other Carnival will be to compare with this one after the Romans for ten +years have held altogether aloof from it, and one hardly even on +_Moccoli Eve_ saw more than two carriages full of silly Americans +pelting one another with confetti, while the porters and the French +soldiers flung jibes and dirt at each other. Now Rome is free, +jubilation breaks out at all the pores of the town, and I, although I am +in Rome, must be content to see the reflection of the festival in a few +ingenuous faces. + +It is morning. I have slept well and am enjoying the fresh air through +the open windows. Heavens! what a lovely girl is standing on the balcony +nearly opposite, in a chemise and skirt! I have never seen her there +before. Olive complexion, blue-black hair, the most beautiful creature; +I cannot see her features distinctly. Now they are throwing something +across to her from the house next door to us, on a piece of twine; I +think they are red flowers. They almost touch her, and yet she cannot +catch them, and laughing stretches out both hands a second, a third and +fourth time, equally unsuccessfully. Why, it is our Filomena, visiting +the model the other side the street. She gives up the attempt with a +little grimace, and goes in. + +Loud voices are singing the Bersagliere hymn as a duet under my window. +Verily, things are alive in _Purificazione_ to-day. The contagion +of example affects a choir of little boys who are always lying outside +the street door, and they begin to sing the Garibaldi march for all they +are worth. Our singers at the theatre at home would be glad of such +voices. The whole street is ringing now; all are singing one of Verdi's +melodies. + +I am sitting up in bed. At the side of my bed, Filomena, with her black, +heavy hair well dressed, and herself in a kind of transitional toilette; +her under-garment fine, the skirt that of a festival gown, on account of +the preparations for the Carnival; her top garment the usual red jacket. +She is standing with her hand on her hip, but this does not make her +look martial or alarming. + +_I_--You ate _magro_ to-day? (It was a fast day.) + +_She_--Good gracious! _Magro_ every day just now! + +_I_--Do you know, Filomena, that I eat _grasso_? + +_She_--Yes, and it is your duty to do so. + +_I_--Why? + +_She_--Because you are ill, and you must eat meat; the Pope himself +ate meat when he was ill. Religion does not mean that we are to injure +our health. + +_I_--How do you know, Filomena, what Religion means? + +_She_--From my Confessor. I had a little headache the other day, +and he ordered me at once to eat meat. + +_I_--The worst of it is that I have no Confessor and do not go to +church. Shall I be damned for that? + +_She_--Oh! no, sir, that does not follow! Do you think I am so +stupid as not to see that you others are far better Christians than we? +You are good; the friends who come to see you are good. The Romans, on +the other hand, who go to church one day, kill people the next, and will +not let go about the streets in peace. + +I am quite sorry that she is to go home at Easter; I shall miss her face +about the house. But I have missed more. + +Late evening. They have come back from the Carnival. Filomena came in +and presented me with an object the use of which is an enigma to me. A +roll of silver paper. Now I see what it is, a Carnival cap. My Danish +friend R. declares she has got it into her head that when I am better I +shall marry her, or rather that Maria has put it into her head. I +thought I would see how matters stood. I began talking to Maria about +marriages with foreigners. Maria mentioned how many girls from Rome and +Capri had married foreigners, but added afterwards, not without +significance, addressing me: "It is not, as you believe, and as you said +once before, that a girl born in a warm country would complain of being +taken to a cold one. If she did, she would be stupid. But a Roman girl +will not do for a foreign gentleman. The Roman girls learn too little." + +Much, the lower classes certainly do not learn. Before I came, Filomena +did not know what ink was. Now I have discovered that she does not know +what a watch is. She reckons time by the dinner and the Ave Maria. Not +long ago her uncle spent a week in trying to teach this great child to +make and read figures, but without success. Not long ago she had to +write to her mother in the mountains, so went to a public writer, and +had it done for her. She came in to me very innocently afterwards to +know whether the right name and address were upon it. I told her that +she could very well have let me write the letter. Since then, all the +people in the house come to me when there is anything they want written, +and ask me to do it for them. + +The news of my skill has spread. Apropos of letters, I have just read +the four letters that I received to-day. Filomena is perpetually +complaining of my sweetheart's uncontrollable passion as revealed in +this writing madness. She imagines that all the letters I receive from +Denmark are from one person, and that person, of course, a woman. She +herself hardly receives one letter a year. + +I have (after careful consideration) committed a great imprudence, and +escaped without hurt. I had myself carried down the stairs, drove to the +Corso, saw the Carnival, and am back home again. I had thought first of +driving up and down the Corso in a carriage, but did not care to be +wholly smothered with confetti, especially as I had not the strength to +pelt back. Nor could I afford to have the horses and carriage decorated. +So I had a good seat in a first-floor balcony engaged for me, first row. +At 3 o'clock I got up, dressed, and was carried down. I was much struck +by the mild Summer air out of doors (about the same as our late May), +and I enjoyed meeting the masked people in the streets we passed +through. The few but rather steep stairs up to the balcony were a +difficulty. But at last I was seated, and in spite of sickness and +weakness, enjoyed the Carnival in Rome on its most brilliant day. I was +sitting nearly opposite to the high box of Princess Margharita, from +which there was not nearly so good a view as from my seat. This was what +I saw: All the balconies bedecked with flags; red, white and green +predominating. In the long, straight street, the crowd moving in a tight +mass. In between them, an up and a down stream of carriages, drawn at a +walking pace by two horses, and forced at every moment to stop. The +streets re-echoed with the jingle of the horses' bells, and with shouts +of glee at a magnificently decorated carriage, then at some unusually +beautiful women, then at a brisk confetti fight between two carriages, +or a carriage and a balcony. And this air, re-echoing with the ring of +bells, with shouting, and with laughter, was no empty space. Anyone +reaching the Corso, as I had done, after the play had only been going on +for an hour and a half, found themselves in the midst of a positive +bombardment of tiny little aniseed balls, or of larger plaster balls, +thrown by hand, from little tin cornets, or half-bushel measures, and +against which it is necessary to protect one's self by a steel wire mask +before the face. For whilst some gentle young ladies almost pour the +confetti down from their carriages, so that it falls like a soft shower +of rain, many of the Romans fling it with such force that without a mask +the eyes might suffer considerably. The brim of one's hat, and every +fold in one's clothes, however, are full of little balls. Most people go +about with a huge, full bag by their side, others on the balconies have +immense baskets standing, which are hardly empty before they are re- +filled by eager sellers. All the ladies standing in the windows, who +were disguised as Turkish ladies, or workwomen from the port, had a deep +wooden trough, quite full, brought outside their windows, and into this +supply dipped continually--in the street, which had been covered with +soil for the sake of the horse-racing, was a crowd of people in fancy +dress, many of them having great fun, and being very amusing. One old +woman in a chemise was amongst the best. A young fellow, dressed +entirely in scarlet, more particularly amused himself by putting the +officers of the National Guard, who were walking about to keep order, +out of countenance. When they were looking especially stern, he would go +up to them and tickle them on the cheeks, and talk baby talk to them, +and they had to put the best face they could on it. The street life and +the pedestrians, however, did not attract much attention. All the +interest was centred on the carriages, and the games between them and +the windows and balconies. The people in carriages were all in fancy +dress. Amongst them one noticed charming groups of Roman ladies in light +cloaks of red silk with a red steel wire mask before their faces, +through which one could catch a glimpse of their features; there was a +swarm of delightful figures, certainly half of them in men's clothes, +armed young sailors, for instance. Fine, happy faces! And the young men, +how handsome! Not flashing eyes, as people affectedly say, but happy +eyes; a good, healthy physique, an expression which seemed to say that +they had breathed in sunshine and happiness and all the beatitude of +laziness, all the mild and good-humoured comfort of leisure, all their +lives long. One party had a colossal cart with outriders and postilions, +and hung in the yards and stood on the thwarts of a large cutter poised +upon it, in becoming naval officers' dress, flinging magnificent +bouquets to all the beautiful ladies who drove past. The bouquets would +have cost several lire each, and they flung them by the hundred, so they +must have been young fellows of means. The throwing of confetti is +merely bellicose and ordinary. Infinitely more interesting is the +coquettish, ingratiating, genuinely Italian flinging backwards and +forwards of bouquets. The grace and charm of the manner in which they +are flung and caught, nothing can surpass; there may be real passion in +the way in which six or seven bouquets in succession are flung at one +and the same lady, who never omits to repay in similar coin. One +carriage was especially beautiful; it had a huge square erection upon +it, entirely covered with artificial roses and greenery, which reached +almost to the second storey of the houses, and upon it, in two rows, +facing both sides of the streets, stood the loveliest Roman girls +imaginable, flinging bouquets unceasingly. Most of the carriages have +tall poles sticking up with a crossway bar at the top, and there are +bouquets on every bar, so there is a constant supply to draw from. +Beautiful Princess Margharita was, of course, the object of much homage, +although her balcony was on the second floor. One form this took was +very graceful. A few young gentlemen in blue and white drove slowly +past; one of them had a large flat basket filled with lovely white +roses; he stuck a long halberd through the handle and hoisted the basket +up to the Princess, being richly rewarded with bouquets. One wag hit +upon an idea that was a brilliant success. At five o'clock he sent a +bladder, in the shape of a huge turkey, up in the flickering sunlight. +It was so fixed up as to move its head about, with an expression of +exceedingly ridiculous sentimentality, now to the right, now caressingly +to the left, as it ascended. The whole Corso rang again with laughter +and clapping. The horse-racing at the end was not of much account. The +horses start excited by the rocket let off at their tails, and by all +the sharp pellets hanging around about them, to say nothing of the +howling of the crowd. At six o'clock I was at home and in bed. + +K.B. has been here to see me; Filomena hates and despises him from the +bottom of her heart since the day that he got drunk on my wine. When he +was gone she said: "_Brutta bestia_, I forgot to look whether he +was clean to-day." She and Maria declare that he is the only one of all +my acquaintances who does not wear clean linen. This point of +cleanliness is a mild obsession of Filomena's just now. She prides +herself greatly on her cleanliness, and asks me every day whether she is +clean or not. She is a new convert to cleanliness, and renegades or +newly initiated people are in all religions the most violent. When I +came to the house, her face was black and she washed her hands about +once a day. R--- then remarked about her--which was a slight +exaggeration--that if one were to set her up against the wall, she would +stick fast. She noticed with unfeigned astonishment how many times I +washed myself, and asked for fresh water, how often I had clean shirts, +etc. This made a profound impression on her young mind, and after I came +back from the hospital she began in earnest to rub her face with a +sponge and to wash herself five or six times a day, likewise to wash the +handkerchiefs she wears round her neck. Maria looks on at all this with +surprise. She says, like the old woman in Tonietta, by Henrik Hertz: "A +great, strong girl like that does not need to wash and splash herself +all over like an Englishwoman." The lectures she has given me every time +I have wanted to wash myself, on the harm water does an invalid, are +many and precious. Whenever I ask for water I might be wanting to commit +suicide; it is only after repeated requests that she brings it, and then +with a quiet, resigned expression, as if to say: "I have done my best to +prevent this imprudence: I wash my hands of all responsibility." +Filomena, in her new phase of development, is quite different. She looks +at my shirt with the eyes of a connoisseur, and says: "It will do for +to-morrow; a clean one the day after to-morrow!" or, "Did you see what +beautiful cuffs the tall, dark man (M. the painter) had on yesterday?" +or, "Excuse my skirt being so marked now, I am going to have a clean one +later in the day," or, "Is my cheek dirty? I don't think so, for I have +washed myself twice to-day; you must remember that I am very dark- +complexioned, almost like a Moor." Or else there will be a triumphal +entry into my room, with a full water-can in her hand, one of the very +large ones that are used here. "What is that, Filomena? What am I to do +with that?" "Look, sir, it is full." "Well, what of that?" "It is the +waiter's water-can; it has been standing there full for ten days +(scornfully): he is afraid of water; he only uses it for his coffee." +She has forgotten how few months it is since she herself was afraid of +water. + +She came in while I was eating my supper, and remarked: "You always read +at your meals; how can you eat and read at the same time? I do not know +what reading is like, but I thought it was more difficult than that. It +is a great misfortune for me that I can neither read nor write. +Supposing I were to be ill like you, how should I pass away the time! +There was no school at Camarino, where I was born, and I lived in the +country till I was eighteen, and learnt nothing at all. We were nine +brothers and sisters; there was seldom any food in the house; sometimes +we worked; sometimes we lay on the ground. It is unfortunate that I +cannot read, for I am not at all beautiful; if I could only do +something, I should be able to get a husband." + +"Don't you know any of the letters, Filomena?" + +"No, sir." "Don't trouble about that. You are happier than I, who know a +great deal more than you. You laugh and sing all day long; I neither +laugh nor sing." "Dear sir, you will laugh, and sing as well, when you +get home. Then your little girl (_ragazza_) who is so _appassionato_ +that she writes four letters a day, will make _fête_ for you, and I +think that when you go to the _osteria_ with your friends you laugh. +It is enough now for you to be patient." As she had spoken about getting +a husband, I asked: "Are your sisters married?" "They are all older than +I, and married." (Saving her pride in the first part of her reply.) After +a few minutes' reflection she went on: "I, for my part, will not have a +husband under thirty; the young ones all beat their wives." Shortly +afterwards, I put an end to the audience. We had had a few short +discussions, and I had been vanquished, apparently by her logic, but +chiefly by reason of her better mastery of the language, and because I +defended all sorts of things in joke. At last I said: "Have you noticed, +Filomena, that when we argue it is always you who silence me? So you can +see, in spite of all my reading, that you have better brains than I." This +compliment pleased her; she blushed and smiled, without being able to find +a reply. + +She realises the Northern ideal of the young woman not spoilt by novel- +reading. Nor does she lack intelligence, although she literally does not +know what North and South mean; she is modest, refined in her way, and +happy over very little. For the moment she is engaged in making the +little dog bark like mad by aggravatingly imitating the mewing of a cat. + +Later. The boy from the café brings me my supper. What has become of +Filomena? I wonder if she is out? I cannot hear her having her evening +fight with the boy in the passage. She likes to hit him once a day for +exercise. + +Maria comes in. "Do you hear the cannon, sir? What do you think it is?" +I reply calmly: "It is war; the Zouaves (papal troops) are coming." +Maria goes out and declares the reply of the oracle in the next room. +Some cannon salutes really were being fired. Maria hurries down into the +street to hear about it and Filomena comes in to me. "I am afraid," she +says. "Do you mean it?" She was laughing and trembling at the same time. +I saw that the fear was quite real. "Is it possible that you can be so +afraid? There is not really any war or any Zouaves, it was only a joke." +That pacified her. "I was afraid, if you like," said she, "when the +Italians (the Romans never call themselves Italians) marched into Rome. +One shell came after another; one burst on the roof of the house +opposite." "Who are you for, the Pope or Vittorio?" "For neither. I am a +stupid girl; I am for the one that will feed and clothe me. But I have +often laughed at the Zouaves. One of them was standing here one day, +taking pinch after pinch of snuff, and he said to me: 'The Italians will +never enter Rome.' I replied: 'Not if they take snuff, but they will if +they storm the town.'" "Do you think that the Pope will win?" "No, I +think his cause is lost. Perhaps there will even come a time when no one +goes to churches here." _She_: "Who goes to church! The girls to +meet their lovers; the young men to see a pretty shop-girl. We laugh at +the priests." "Why?" "Because they are ridiculous: if it thunders, they +say at once that it is a sign from God. The sky happens to be flaming +red, like it was last October. That was because the Italians entered +Rome in September. Everything is a sign from God, a sign of his anger, +his exasperation. He is not angry, that is clear enough. If he had not +wanted the Italians to come in, they would not have come, but would all +have died at once." She said this last with great earnestness and +pathos, with an upward movement of her hand, and bowed her head, like +one who fears an unknown power. Maria returned, saying people thought +the shots meant that Garibaldi had come. Said I: "There, he is a brave +man. Try to be like him, Filomena. It is not right for a big strong girl +to tremble." _She_: "I am not strong, but still, I am stronger than +you, who have been weakened so much by your illness,--and yet, who +knows, you have been much better the last few days. Shall we try?" I +placed my right hand in hers, first tested her strength a little, and +then found to my surprise that her arm was not much stronger than that +of an ordinary lady; then I bent my fingers a little, and laid her very +neatly on the floor. I was sitting in bed; she was on her knees in front +of the bed, but I let her spring up. It was a pretty sight; the blue- +black hair, the laughing mouth with the fine, white teeth, the brown, +smiling eyes. As she got up, she said: "You are well now; I am not sorry +to have been conquered." + + * * * * * + +Have taken my second flight. I have been at the Moccoli fête, had myself +carried and driven there and back, like last time. Saredo had taken a +room on the Corso; I saw everything from there, and now I have the +delightful impressions of it all left. What exuberant happiness! What +jubilation! What childlike gaiety! It is like going into a nursery and +watching the children play, hearing them shout and enjoy themselves like +mad, as one can shout and enjoy things one's self no longer. + +I arrived late and only saw the end of the processions; far more +carriages, wilder shouting, more madness,--bacchantic, stormy,--than +last time. The whole length of the Corso was one shriek of laughter. And +how many lovely faces at the windows, on the balconies and verandas! +Large closed carriages with hidden music inside and graceful ladies on +the top. As _i preti_ (the Catholic papers) had said that all who +took part in the Carnival were paid by the government, a number of men +and women, in the handsomest carriages--according to the _Nuova +Roma_ for to-day, more than 20,000--had the word _pagato_ (paid) +fastened to their caps, which evoked much amusement. Then the lancers +cleared the street at full galop for the horse races (_barberi_), +and at once an immense procession of Polichinelli and ridiculous +equestrians in Don Quixote armour organised itself and rode down the +Corso at a trot in parody. Then came the mad, snorting horses. Then a +few minutes,--and night fell over the seven heights of Rome, and the +Corso itself lay in darkness. Then the first points of light began to +make their appearance. Here below, one little shimmer of light, and up +there another, and two there, and six here, and ten down there to the +left, and hundreds on the right, and then thousands, and many, many +thousands. From one end of the great long street to the other, from the +first floor to the roof of every house and every palace, there is one +steady twinkling of tiny flames, of torches, of large and small lights; +the effect is surprising and peculiar. As soon as the first light +appeared, young men and girls ran and tried to blow each other's candles +out. Even the children took part in the game; I could see into several +houses, where it was going on briskly. Then, from every side-street +decorated carriages began to drive on to the Corso again, but this time +every person held a candle in his hand. Yes, and that was not all! at +least every other of the large waggons--they were like immense boxes of +flowers--had, on poles, or made fast, Bengal fire of various colours, +which lighted up every house they went past, now with a red, now with a +green flare. And then the thousands of small candles, from every one in +the throng, from carriages, balconies, verandas, sparkled in the great +flame, fighting victoriously with the last glimmer of daylight. People +ran like mad down the Corso and fanned out the lights in the carriages. +But many a Roman beauty found a better way of lighting up her features +without exposing herself to the risk of having her light put out. +Opposite me, for instance, on the second floor, a lovely girl was +standing in a window. In the shutter by her side she had fixed one of +those violent red flares so that she stood in a bright light, like +sunlight seen through red glass, and it was impossible not to notice +her. Meanwhile, the people on the balconies held long poles in their +hands, with which they unexpectedly put out the small candles in the +carriages. You heard incessantly, through the confusion, the shouts of +individuals one to another, and their jubilation when a long-attempted +and cleverly foiled extinguishing was at length successful, and the +clapping and shouts of _bravo!_ at an unusually brightly lighted +and decorated carriage. The pickpockets meanwhile did splendid business; +many of the Danes lost their money. + +At eight o'clock I was in bed again, and shortly afterwards the people +of the house came home for a moment. Filomena looked splendid, and was +very talkative. "_Lei é ingrassato_," she called in through the +door. It is her great pleasure that the hollows in my cheeks are +gradually disappearing. She was now ascribing a special efficacy in this +direction to Moccoli Eve. + + * * * * * + +At half-past ten in the morning, there is a curious spectacle in the +street here. At that time Domenico comes and the lottery begins. +Lotteries are forbidden in Rome, but Domenico earns his ten lire a day +by them. He goes about this and the neighbouring streets bawling and +shouting until he has disposed of his ninety tickets. + +Girls and women lean out through the windows and call out the numbers +they wish to have--in this respect they are boundlessly credulous. They +do not believe in the Pope; but they believe that there are numbers +which they must become possessed of that day, even at the highest price, +which is two soldi. The soldi are thrown out through the window, and +each one remembers her own number. Then Domenico goes through all the +numbers in a loud voice, that there may be no cheating. A child draws a +number out of the bag, and Domenico shouts: "Listen, all Purificazione, +No. 34 has won, listen, Purificazione, 34 ... 34." The disappointed +faces disappear into the houses. All those who have had 33, 35 and 36 +rail against unjust Fate, in strong terms. + +At the first rattle of the lottery bag, Filomena rushes in here, opens +the window, and calls for a certain number. If anyone else wants it, she +must manage to find two soldi in her pocket. If I fling a few soldi from +my bed towards the window, this facilitates the search. However, we +never win. Filomena declares that I have indescribable ill-luck in +gambling, and suggests a reason. + + * * * * * + +She was again singing outside. I called her, wanting to know what it was +she kept singing all the time. "They are songs from the mountains," she +replied, "all _canzone d'amore_." "Say them slowly, Filomena. I +will write them down." I began, but was so delighted at the way she +repeated the verses, her excellent declamatory and rhythmic sense, that +I was almost unable to write. And to my surprise, I discovered that they +were all what we call ritornellos. But written down, they are dull +larvae, compared with what they are with the proper pronunciation and +expression. What is it Byron says?: + + I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, + Which melts like kisses from a female mouth, + And sounds as if it should be writ on satin. + +I shall really feel a void when Filomena goes away. The unfortunate part +of it is that her dialect pronunciation is so difficult to make out, and +that she swallows so many syllables in order to make the metre right, as +there are generally too many feet, and it is only the delicacy of her +declamation that makes up for the incorrectness of the rhymes and the +verses. For instance, she constantly says _lo_ instead of _il_ +(_lo soldato_), and she can never tell me how many words there are +in a line, since neither she nor Maria knows what a single word, as +opposed to several, is, and because it is no use spelling the word to +her and asking: "Is that right?" since she cannot spell, and does not +recognise the letters. Saredo tells me that a driver who once drove him +and his wife about for five days in Tuscany sang all day long like +Filomena, and improvised all the time. This is what she, too, does +continually; she inserts different words which have about the same +meaning, and says: "It is all the same" (_c'è la stessa cosa_). On +the other hand, she always keeps to the metre, and that with the most +graceful intonation; never a faulty verse: + + Fior di giacinto! + La donna che per l'uomo piange tanto-- + Il pianto delle donne è pianto finto. + + Amore mio! + Non prendite le fiori di nessuno, + Se vuoi un garofletto, lo do io. + + Fior di limone! + Limone è agra, e le fronde son' amare, + Ma son' più' amare le pene d'amor'. + + Lo mi' amore che si chiama Peppe, + Lo primo giuocatore delle carte + Prende 'sto cuore e giuoca a tre-sette. + +[Footnote: + + Flower of the hyacinth! + The woman who weeps so much for the man's sake-- + Yet, the complaint of women is a feigned one. + + My love! + Do not accept flowers from anyone. + If thou wilt have a wall-flower, I will give it thee. + + Flower of the lemon! + The lemon is sharp, and its leaves are bitter; + But more bitter are the torments of love. + + My beloved, whose name is Peppe, + He is the first to play cards, + He has taken this heart and is playing a game of Three to Seven with + it.] + +In this way I wrote out some scores. + + * * * * * + +Spent an hour teaching Filomena her large letters up to N, and making +her say them by rote, and with that end in view have divided them into +three portions--ABCD--EFG--ILMN. She manages all right, except that she +always jumps E and L. Lesson closed: "Were you at church to-day, +Filomena?" "No, I have nothing to confess." "Did you go to church last +Sunday?" "No, I have not been for six weeks now. I have committed no +sin. What wrong do I do? I have no love affair, nothing." "What used you +to confess?" "A few bad words, which had slipped out. Now I do nothing +wrong." "But one can go wrong, without committing any sin, when one is +high-minded, for instance." "I am not high-minded. If you, on the other +hand, were to imagine yourself better than the friends who come to visit +you, that would be quite natural; for you are better." + + * * * * * + +The day has been long. This evening the girl had errands to do for me. +She came in here after her Sunday walk in the Campagna. I said: "Shall +we read?" (Just then a band of young people passed along the street with +a harmonica and a lot of castanets, and commenced a song in honour of +Garibaldi. With all its simplicity, it sounded unspeakably affecting; I +was quite softened.) She replied: "With pleasure." I thought to myself: +"Now to see whether she remembers a word of what I said to her +yesterday." But she went on at once: "Signore, I have been industrious." +She had bought herself an ABC and had taught herself alone not only all +the large letters, but also all the little ones, and had learnt them all +off by heart as well. I was so astonished that I almost fell back in the +bed. "But what is this, Filomena? Have you learnt to read from someone +else?" "No, only from you yesterday. But for five years my only wish has +been to learn to read, and I am so glad to be able to." I wanted to +teach her to spell. "I almost think I can a little." And she was already +so far that--without spelling first--she read a whole page of two-letter +spellings, almost without a mistake. She certainly very often said: "Da +--ad," or read _fo_ for _of_, but her progress was amazing. +When she spells, she takes the words as a living reality, not merely as +words, and adds something to them, for instance, _s--a, sa; l--i, li; +r--e, re; salire alle scale_, (jump down the stairs.) "Filomena, I +could teach you to read in three weeks." _She_: "I have always +thought it the greatest shame for a man or woman not to be able to +read." I told her something about the progress of the human race, that +the first men and women had been like animals, not at all like Adam and +Eve. "Do you think I believe that Eve ate an apple and that the serpent +could speak? _Non credo mente_. Such things are like _mal'occhi_ +(belief in the evil eye)." And without any transition, she begins, +_sempre allegra_, as she calls herself--to sing a gay song. Just +now she is exceedingly delighted with a certain large red shawl. There +came a pedlar to the door; she sighed deeply at the sight of the +brilliant red; so I gave it her. + +She is a great lover and a connoisseur of wine, like myself. We taste +and drink together every dinner-time. As she always waits upon me, I +often give her a little cake and wine while I am eating. Now we have +begun a new wine, white Roman muscat. But I change my wine almost every +other day. Filomena had taken the one large bottle and stacked up +newspapers round it on the table, so that if K.B. came he should not see +it. It so happened that he came to-day, whilst I was dining and she +eating with me. There was a ring; she wanted to go. "Stay; perhaps it is +not for me at all; and in any case, I do not ask anyone's permission for +you to be here." He came in, and said in Danish, as he put his hat down: +"Oh, so you let the girl of the house dine with you; I should not care +for that." Filomena, who noticed his glance in her direction, and his +gesture, said, with as spiteful a look, and in as cutting a voice as she +could muster: "_Il signore prende il suo pranzo con chi lui pare e +piace._" (The gentleman eats with whomsoever he pleases.) "Does she +understand Danish?" he asked, in astonishment. "It looks like it," I +replied. When he had gone, her _furia_ broke loose. I saw her +exasperated for the first time, and it sat very comically upon her. "Did +you ask him whom _he_ eats with? Did he say I was ugly? Did you ask +him whether his _ragazza_ was prettier?" (She meant a Danish lady, +a married woman, with whom she had frequently met K.B. in the street.) + +She said to me yesterday: "There is one thing I can do, sir, that you +cannot. I can carry 200 pounds' weight on my head. I can carry two +_conchas_, or, if you like to try me, all that wood lying there." +She has the proud bearing of the Romans. + +Read with Filomena for an hour and a half. She can now spell words with +three letters fairly well. This language has such a sweet ring that her +spelling is like music. And to see the innocent reverence with which she +says _g-r-a, gra_,--it is what a poet might envy me. And then the +earnest, enquiring glance she gives me at the end of every line. It is +marvellous to see this complete absorption of a grown-up person in the +study of _a-b, ab_, and yet at the same time there is something +almost great in this ravenous thirst for knowledge, combined with +incredulity of all tradition. It is a model such as this that the poets +should have had for their naïve characters. In Goethe's _Roman Elegies_, +the Roman woman's figure is very inconspicuous; she is not drawn as a +genuine woman of the people, she is not naïve. He knew a Faustina, but +one feels that he afterwards slipped a German model into her place. +Filomena has the uncompromising honesty and straightforwardness of an +unspoilt soul. Her glance is not exactly pure, but free--how shall I +describe it? Full, grand, simple. With a _concha_ on her head, she would +look like a caryatid. If I compare her mentally with a feminine character +of another poet, Lamartine's Graziella, an Italian girl of the lower +classes, like herself, I cannot but think Graziella thin and poetised, +down to her name. The narrator, if I remember rightly, teaches her to +read, too; but Graziella herself does not desire it; it is he who +educates her. Filomena, on the contrary, with her anxiety to learn, is +an example and a symbol of a great historic movement, the poor, oppressed +Roman people's craving for light and knowledge. Of Italy's population of +twenty-six millions, according to the latest, most recent statistics, +seventeen millions can neither read nor write. She said to me to-day: +"What do you really think, sir, do you not believe that the Holy Ghost +is _una virtù_ and cannot be father of the child?" "You are right, +Filomena." "That is why I never pray." "Some day, when you are very +unhappy, perhaps you will pray." "I have been very unhappy; when I was +a child I used to suffer horribly from hunger. I had to get up at five +o'clock in the morning to work and got eight _soldi_ for standing all day +long in a vineyard in the sun and digging with a spade, and as corn was +dear and meat dear, we seven children seldom had a proper meal. Last year, +too, I was hungry often, for it was as the proverb says: 'If I eat, I +cannot dress myself, and if I dress myself I cannot eat.' (What a sad and +illuminating proverb!) Sir, if there were any Paradise, you would go +there, for what you do for me. If I can only read and write, I can earn +twice as much as I otherwise could. Then I can be a _cameriera_, +and bring my mistress a written account of expenditure every week." + +Filomena knows that Saredo is a professor at the University. But she +does not know what a professor or a University is. She puts her question +like this: "Probably my idea of what a university is, may not be quite +correct?" + +No one comes now. An invalid is very interesting at first, and arouses +sympathy. If he continue ill too long, people unconsciously think it +impossible for him to get well, and stay away. So the only resource left +me all day is to chat with Filomena, to whom Maria has entrusted the +nursing of me. Every evening I read with her; yesterday she had her +fourth lesson, and could almost read straight off. Her complexion and +the lower part of her face are like a child's; her undeveloped mental +state reveals itself, thus far, in her appearance. I told her yesterday, +as an experiment, that there were five continents and in each of them +many countries, but she cannot understand yet what I mean, as she has no +conception of what the earth looks like. She does not even know in what +direction from Rome her native village, Camerino, lies. I will try to +get hold of a map, or a globe. Yesterday, we read the word +_inferno_. She said: "There is no hell; things are bad enough on +earth; if we are to burn afterwards, there would be two hells." "Good +gracious! Filomena, is life so bad? Why, you sing all day long." "I sing +because I am well; that is perfectly natural, but how can I be content?" +"What do you wish for then?" "So much money (_denari_) that I +should be sure of never being hungry again. You do not know how it +hurts. Then there is one other thing I should like, but it is +impossible. I should like not to die; I am so horribly afraid of death. +I should certainly wish there were a Paradise. But who can tell! Still, +my grandmother lived to be a hundred all but three years, and she was +never ill for a day; when she was only three years from being a hundred +she still went to the fields like the rest of us and worked, and was +like a young woman (_giovanotta_). Mother is forty-two, but +although she is two years older than my aunt, she looks quite young. +_Chi lo sa!_ Perhaps I may live to be a hundred too, never be ill-- +I never have been yet, one single day,--and then go in and lie down on +the bed like she did and be dead at once." + +"She really is sweet!" said R. this evening. The word does not fit. Her +laugh, her little grimaces, her witticisms, quaint conceits and gestures +are certainly very attractive, but her mode of expression, when she is +talking freely, is very unreserved, and if I were to repeat some of her +remarks to a stranger, he would perhaps think her coarse or loose. "We +shall see what sort of a girl you bring home to us when you are well +again, and whether you have as good taste as our Frenchman. Or perhaps +you would rather visit her? I know how a fine gentleman behaves, when he +visits his friend. She is often a lady, and rich. He comes, knocks +softly at the door, sits down, and talks about difficult and learned +things. Then he begs for a kiss, she flings her arms round his neck; +_allora, il letto rifatto, va via."_ She neither blushes nor feels +the slightest embarrassment when she talks like this. "How do you know +such things, when you have no experience?" "People have told me; I know +it from hearsay. I myself have never been in love, but I believe that it +is possible to love one person one's whole life long, and never grow +tired of him, and never love another. You said the other day (for a +joke?) that people ought to marry for a year or six months; but I +believe that one can love the same person always." + +In such chat my days pass by. I feel as though I had dropped down +somewhere in the Sabine Mountains, been well received in a house--Maria +is from Camarino, too,--and were living there hidden from the world +among these big children. + +Yesterday, Uncle had his National Guard uniform on for the first time. +He came in to show himself. I told him that it suited him very well, +which delighted him. Filomena exhibited him with admiration. When Maria +came home later on, she asked the others at once: "Has the +_signore_ seen him? What did he say? Does not he want to see him +again?" + +Written down a score of ritornellos; I have chosen the best of them. +Many of them are rather, or very, indecent. But, as Filomena says: "You +do not go to Hell for singing _canzone_; you cannot help what they +are like." The indecent ones she will only say at a terrific rate, and +not a second time. But if one pay attention, they are easy to +understand. They are a mixture of audacity and simple vulgarity. They +all begin with flowers. She is too undeveloped to share the educated +girl's abhorrence of things that are in bad taste; everything natural, +she thinks, can be said, and she speaks out, quite unperturbed. Still, +now she understands that there are certain things--impossible things-- +that I do not like to hear her say. + +I was sitting cutting a wafer (to take powders with) into oblates. +_She_: "You must not cut into consecrated things, not even put the +teeth into it. The priest says: 'Thou shalt not bite Christ.'" +Unfortunately, she has not any real impression of religion, either of +its beauty or its underlying truth. None of them have any idea of what +the New Testament is or contains; they do not know its best-known +quotations and stories. Religion, to them, is four or five rigmaroles, +which are printed in our _Abecedario_, the Creed, the Ave Maria, +the various Sacraments, etc., which they know by heart. These they +reject, but they have not the slightest conception of what Christianity +is. If I quote a text from the New Testament, they have never heard it. + +But they can run the seven cardinal virtues, and the seven other +virtues, off by rote. One of these last, that of instructing the +ignorant, is a virtue which the priesthood (partly for good reasons) +have not practised to any remarkable extent in this country. + +Yesterday Maria came home in a state of great delight, from a +_trattoria_, where a gentleman had spoken _tanto bene, tanto +bene_ against religion and the Pope and the priests; there were a few +_Caccialepri_ present (a derogatory expression for adherents of the +priests), who had just had to come down a peg or two. When she had +finished, to my astonishment, she said to me, _exactly this_: "It +is Nature that is God, is it not so?" + +An expression almost symbolical of the ignorance and credulity of the +Romans is their constant axiom, _Chi lo sa?_ (Who knows?) I said to +Maria the other day, after she had said it for the fourth time in a +quarter of an hour: "My good Maria! The beginning of wisdom is not to +fear God, but to say _Perche_? (why?), instead of _Chi lo sa_?" + +Yesterday, while I was eating my dinner, I heard Filomena's story. She +came to Rome last December: "You think I came because Maria wanted to +help mother. I came to Rome because there was a man who wanted to marry +me." "What was his name?" "His name was Peppe." _"Lo mi' amore, che si +chiama Peppe."_... "Ah, I do not love him at all. No, the thing is +that at Camerino all the men beat their wives. My sister, for instance, +has always a black eye, and red stripes on her back. My friend Marietta +always gets beaten by her husband, and the more he beats her, the more +she loves him: sometimes she goes away from him for a few days to her +sister, but she always goes back again." "What has that to do with our +friend Peppe?" "Well, you see, mother knew that Peppe's brother beat his +wife all day and all night; so she would not give me to him." "Yes, it +was bad, if it were a family failing." "So one evening father said to +me: 'Your aunt has written to us from Rome, to ask whether you will pay +her a visit of a few days.' And he showed me a false letter. Aunt cannot +write and knew nothing about any letter. I did not want to, much, said I +would not, but came here all the same, and found that I was to stay +here, and that mother did not want me to have Peppe. So I began to cry, +and for five whole days I cried all the time and would neither eat nor +drink. Then I thought to myself: It is all over between Peppe and me. +Shall I cry myself to death for a man? So I left off crying, and very +soon forgot all about him. And after a week's time I did not care +anything about the whole matter, and sang and was happy, and now I want +to stay in Rome always." + +Last night I got up for a little, read with Filomena, and determined to +go in and have supper with the family in their little room. Filomena +opened the door wide, and called out along the corridor: +_"Eccolo!"_ and then such a welcome as there was for the invalid, +now that he had at last got up! and I was obliged to drink two large +beer-glasses of the home-grown wine. First Maria told how it was that I +had always had everything so punctually whilst I was ill. It was because +Filomena had made the little boy from the _café_ believe that I was +going to give him my watch when I got well, if he never let anything get +cold. So the boy ran as though possessed, and once fell down the stairs +and broke everything to atoms. "He is delirious," said Filomena one day, +"and talks of nothing but of giving you his watch." "How can he be so +ill," said the boy suspiciously, "when he eats and drinks?" "Do you want +the watch or not?" said Filomena, and off the lad ran. I let the others +entertain me. Maria said: "You told Filomena something yesterday about +savages; I know something about them, too. Savage people live in China, +and the worst of all are called Mandarins. Do you know what one of them +did to an Italian lady? She was with her family over there; suddenly +there came a Mandarin, carried her off, and shut her up in his house. +They never found her again. Then he had three children by her; but one +day he went out and forgot to shut the door; she ran quickly out of the +house, down to the water, and saw a ship far away. Do you know what the +mandarin did, sir, when he came home and found that his wife was gone? +He took the three children, tore them through the middle, and threw the +pieces out into the street." It reminded one of Lucidarius, and other +mediaeval legends. Then our good _zio_, the honest uncle, began, +and told Maria and Filomena the history of Napoleon I., fairly +correctly. He had heard it from his master Leonardo, who taught him his +trade; the man had taken part in five of the campaigns. The only +egregious mistake he made was that he thought the Austrians had +gradually poisoned the Duke of Reichstadt, because he threatened to +become even more formidable than his father. But that the old grenadier +might easily have believed. The thing that astonished me was that the +narrative did not make the slightest impression upon either Maria or +Filomena. I asked Filomena if she did not think it was very remarkable. +But she clearly had a suspicion that it was all lies, besides, what has +happened in the world before her day is of as little importance to her +as what goes on in another planet; finally, she abominates war. +_Zio_ concluded his story with childlike self-satisfaction: "When I +learnt about all this, I was only an apprentice; now I am _mastro +Nino_." + +These last few days that I have been able to stumble about the room a +little, I have had a feeling of delight and happiness such as I have +hardly experienced before. The very air is a fête. The little black- +haired youngsters, running about this picturesquely steep street, are my +delight, whenever I look out of the window. All that is in front of me: +the splendours of Rome, the Summer, the art of Italy, Naples in the +South, Venice in the North, makes my heart beat fast and my head swim. I +only need to turn round from the window and see Filomena standing behind +me, knitting, posed like a living picture by Küchler to feel, with +jubilation: I am in Rome. Saredo came to-day at twelve o'clock, and saw +me dressed for the first time. I had put on my nicest clothes. I called +Filomena, had three dinners fetched, and seated between him and her, I +had my banquet. I had just said: "I will not eat any soup to-day, unless +it should happen to be _Zuppa d'herba_." Filomena took the lid off +and cried: _"A punto."_ This is how all my wishes are fulfilled +now. I had a fine, light red wine. It tasted so good that if the gods +had known it they would have poured their nectar into the washtub. +Filomena poured it out, singing: + + L'acqua fa mare, + Il vino fa cantare; + Il sugo della gresta + Fa gira' la testa. + + (Water is bad for one; + Wine makes one sing; + The juice of the grape + Makes the head swim.) + +To-morrow I may go out. After Sunday, I shall leave off dining at home. +On Sunday Filomena goes to Camerino. + + + + +SECOND LONGER STAY ABROAD + +(_Continued_) + +Reflections on the Future of Denmark--Conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo--Frascati--Native Beauty--New Susceptibilities--Georges +Noufflard's Influence--The Sistine Chapel and Michael Angelo--Raphael's +Loggias--A Radiant Spring. + + +I + +Saredo said to me one day: "I am not going to flatter you--I have no +interest in doing so; but I am going to give you a piece of advice, +which you ought to think over. Stay in Italy, settle down here, and you +will reach a far higher position than you can possibly attain in your +own country. The intellectual education you possess is exceedingly rare +in Italy; what I can say, without exaggeration, is that in this country +it is so extraordinary that it might be termed an active force. Within +two years you would be a power in Italy, at home, you will never be more +than a professor at a University. Stay here! Villari and I will help you +over your first difficulties. Write in French, or Italian, which you +like, and as you are master of the entire range of Germanic culture, +which scarcely any man in Italy is, you will acquire an influence of +which you have not the least conception. A prophet is never honoured in +his own country. We, on the other hand, need you. So stay here! Take Max +Müller as an example. It is with individuals as with nations; it is only +when they change their soil that they attain their full development and +realise their own strength." + +I replied: "I am deaf to that sort of thing. I love the Danish language +too well ever to forsake it. Only in the event of my settlement in +Denmark meeting with opposition, and being rendered impossible, shall I +strap on my knapsack, gird up my loins, and hie me to France or Italy; I +am glad to hear that the world is not so closed to me as I had formerly +believed." + +My thoughts were much engaged on my sick-bed by reflections upon the +future of Denmark. The following entry is dated March 8, 1871: + + What do we mean by _our national future_, which we talk so much + about? We do not purpose to extend our borders, to make conquests, or + play any part in politics. For that, as is well comprehensible, we know + we are too weak. I will leave alone the question as to whether it is + possible to live without, in one way or another, growing, and ask: What + do we want? _To continue to exist_. How exist? We want to get + Slesvig back again, for as it is we are not _existing_; we are + sickening, or else we are living like those lower animals who even when + they are cut in pieces, are quite nimble; but it is a miserable life. We + are in a false position with regard to Germany. The centripetal force + that draws the individual members of one nationality together, and which + we in Denmark call Danishness, that which, further, draws nationalities + of the same family together, and which in Denmark is called + _Scandinavianism_, must logically lead to a sympathy for the + merging of the entire race, a kind of _Gothogermanism_. If we seek + support from France, we shall be behaving like the Poles, turning for + help to a foreign race against a nation of our own. I accuse us, not of + acting imprudently, but of fighting against a natural force that is + stronger than we. We can only retard, we cannot annihilate, the + attraction exerted by the greater masses on the lesser. We can only hope + that we may not live to feel the agony. + + Holland and Denmark are both threatened by Germany, for in this + geography is the mighty ally of Germany. The most enlightened Dane can + only cherish the hope that Denmark, conquered, or not conquered, will + brave it out long enough for universal civilisation, by virtue of the + level it has reached, to bring our independence with it. As far as the + hope which the majority of Danes cherish is concerned (including the + noble professors of philosophy), of a time when Nemesis (reminiscence of + theology!), shall descend on Prussia, this hope is only an outcome of + foolishness. And even a Nemesis upon Prussia will never hurt Germany, + and thus will not help us. + + But the main question is this: If we--either through a peaceable + restoration of Slesvig, or after fresh wars, or through the dawning of + an era of peace and civilisation--regain our integrity and independence, + shall we exist then? Not at all. Then we shall sicken again. A country + like Denmark, even including Slesvig, is nowadays no country at all. A + tradesman whose whole capital consists of ten rigsdaler is no tradesman. + The large capitals swallow up the small. The small must seek their + salvation in associations, partnerships, joint-stock companies, etc. + + Our misfortune lies in the fact that there is no other country with + which we can enter into partnership except Sweden and Norway, a little, + unimportant state. By means of this association, which for the time + being, is our sheet-anchor, and which, by dint of deploying enormous + energy, might be of some importance, we can at best retard our + destruction by a year or two. But the future! Has Denmark any future? + + It was France who, to her own unspeakable injury, discovered, or rather, + first proclaimed, the principle of nationality, a principle which at + most could only give her Belgium and French Switzerland, two neutral + countries, guaranteed by Europe, but which gave Italy to Piedmont, + Germany to Prussia, and which one day will give Russia supremacy over + all the Slavs. + + Even before the war, France was, as it were, squeezed between bucklers; + she had no possible chance of gaining anything through her own precious + principle, and did not even dare to apply it to the two above-mentioned + points. While she fearfully allowed herself to be awarded Savoy and + Nice, Prussia grew from nineteen million inhabitants to fifty millions; + and probably in a few years the Germans of Austria will fall to Germany + as well. Then came the war, and its outcome was in every particular what + Prévost-Paradol, with his keen foresight, had predicted: "Afterwards," + he wrote, "France, with Paris, will take up in Europe the same position + as Hellas with Athens assumed in the old Roman empire; it will become + the city of taste and the noble delights; but it will never be able to + regain its power." It has, in fact, been killed by this very theory of + nationality; for the only cognate races, Spain and Italy, are two + countries of which the one is rotten, the other just entered upon the + convalescent stage. Thus it is clear that Germany will, for a time, + exercise the supreme sway in Europe. But the future belongs neither to + her nor to Russia, but, if not to England herself, at any rate to the + Anglo-Saxon race, which has revealed a power of expansion in comparison + with which that of other nations is too small to count. Germans who go + to North America, in the next generation speak English. The English have + a unique capacity for spreading themselves and introducing their + language, and the power which the Anglo-Saxon race will acquire cannot + be broken in course of time like that of ancient Rome; for there are no + barbarians left, and their power is based, not on conquest, but on + assimilation, and the race is being rejuvenated in North America. + + How characteristic it is of our poor little country that we always hear + and read of it as "one of the oldest kingdoms in the world." That is + just the pity of it. If we were only a young country! There is only one + way by which we can rejuvenate ourselves. First, to merge ourselves into + a Scandinavia; then, when this is well done and well secured, to + approach the Anglo-Saxon race to which we are akin. Moral: Become an + Anglo-Saxon and study John Stuart Mill! + +And I studied Mill with persevering attention, where he was difficult, +but instructive, to follow, as in the _Examination of Hamilton's +Philosophy_, which renews Berkeley's teachings, and I read him with +delight where, accessible and comprehensible, he proclaims with +freshness and vigour the gospel of a new age, as in the book _On +Liberty_ and the one akin to it, _Representative Government_. + + +II + +During the months of February and March, my conversations with Giuseppe +Saredo had been all I lived for. We discussed all the questions which +one or both of us had at heart, from the causes of the expansion of +Christianity, to the method of proportionate representation which Saredo +knew, and correctly traced back to Andrae. When I complained that, by +reason of our different nationality, we could hardly have any +recollections in common, and by reason of our different languages, could +never cite a familiar adage from childhood, or quote a common saying +from a play, that the one could not thoroughly enjoy the harmony of +verses in the language of the other, Saredo replied: "You are no more a +Dane than I am an Italian; we are compatriots in the great fatherland of +the mind, that of Shakespeare and Goethe, John Stuart Mill, Andrae, and +Cavour. This land is the land of humanity. Nationality is milk, humanity +is cream. What is there in all the world that we have not in common? It +is true that we cannot enjoy together the harmony of some Northern +verses, but we can assimilate together all the great ideas, and we have +for each other the attraction of the relatively unknown, which fellow- +countrymen have not." + +He very acutely characterised his Italian compatriots: "Our intelligence +amounts to prudence and common sense. At a distance we may appear self- +luminous; in reality we are only passivity and reflected light. +Solferino gave us Lombardy, Sadowa gave us Venice, Sedan gave us Rome. +We were just active enough to take advantage of fortunate circumstances, +and passively clever enough not to wreck our advantage by stupidity. In +foreign novels we are scoundrels of the deepest dye, concocters of +poisons and wholesale swindlers. In reality we are indifferent and +indolent. _Dolce far niente_, these words, which, to our shame, are +repeated in every country in Italian, are our watchword. But things +shall be different, if it means that the few amongst us who have a +little share of head and heart have to work themselves to death--things +shall be different. Massimo d'Azeglio said: 'Now we have created an +Italy; there remains to create Italians.' That was a true saying. Now we +are creating the new people, and what a future there is before us! Now +it is we who are taking the leadership of the Latin race, and who are +giving back to our history its brilliance of the sixteenth century. At +present our Art is poor because we have no popular type; but wait! In a +few years Italy will show a profile no less full of character than in +the days of Michael Angelo, and Benvenuto Cellini." + + +III + +Then the moment arrived when all abstract reflections were thrust aside +once more by convalescence. I was well again, after having been shut up +for over four months. I still felt the traces of the mercury poisoning, +but I was no longer tied to my bed, and weak though I was, I could walk. + +And on the very first day,--it was March 25th--armed with a borrowed +stick (I possessed none, having never used a stick before), and equipped +with a little camp-stool, I took the train to Frascati, where there was +a Madonna Fête. + +It was life opening out before me again. All that I saw, witnessed to +its splendour. First, the scenery on the way, the Campagna with its +proud ruins, and the snow-covered Sabine Mountains, the whole +illuminated by a powerful Summer sun; the villas of old Romans, with +fortress-like thick walls, and small windows; then the fertile lava +soil, every inch of which was under vineyard cultivation. At last the +mountains in the neighborhood of Frascati. A convent crowned the highest +point; there, in olden days, the first Italian temple to Jupiter had +stood, and there Hannibal had camped. Underneath, in a hollow, like an +eagle's nest, lay Rocca di Papa. By the roadside, fruit-trees with +violet clusters of blossoms against a background of stone-pines, +cypresses, and olive-groves. + +I reached Frascati station. There was no carriage to be had up to the +town, so I was obliged to ascend the hill slowly on foot, a test which +my leg stood most creditably. In the pretty market-place of Frascati, +with its large fountain which, like Acqua Paola, was divided into three +and flung out a tremendous quantity of water, I went into an +_osteria_ and asked for roast goat with salad and Frascati wine, +then sat down outside, as it was too close within. Hundreds of people in +gay costumes, with artificial flowers and silver feathers in their +headgear, filled the square in front of me, crowded the space behind me, +laughed and shouted. + +The people seemed to be of a grander type, more lively, animated and +exuberant, than at the fair at Fiesole. The women were like Junos or +Venuses, the men, even when clad in abominable rags, looked like +Vulcans, blackened in their forges; they were all of larger proportions +than Northern men and women. A Roman beau, with a riding-whip under his +arm, was making sheep's eyes at a young local beauty, his courtship +accompanied by the whines of the surrounding beggars. A _signora_ +from Albano was lecturing the waiter with the dignity of a queen for +having brought her meat that was beneath all criticism, yes, she even +let the word _porcheria_ escape her. A brown-bearded fellow came +out of the inn with a large bottle of the heavenly Frascati wine, which +the landlords here, even on festival occasions, never mix with water, +and gave a whole family, sitting on donkeys, to drink out of one glass; +then he went to two little ones, who were holding each other round the +waist, sitting on the same donkey; to two youths who were riding +another; to a man and wife, who sat on a third, and all drank, like the +horsemen in Wouwerman's pictures, without dismounting. + +I got into an old, local omnibus, pulled by three horses, to drive the +two miles to Grotta Ferrata, where the fair was. But the vehicle was +hardly about to start up-hill when, with rare unanimity, the horses +reared, behaved like mad, and whirled it round four or five times. The +driver, a fellow with one eye and a grey cap with a double red camelia +in it, being drunk, thrashed the horses and shouted, while an old +American lady with ringlets shrieked inside the omnibus, and bawled out +that she had paid a franc beforehand, and now wanted to get out. The +road was thronged with people walking, and there was just as many riding +donkeys, all of them, even the children, already heated with wine, +singing, laughing, and accosting everybody. Many a worthy woman +supported her half-drunk husband with her powerful arm. Many a +substantial _signora_ from Rocca di Papa sat astride her mule, +showing without the least bashfulness her majestic calves. + +At Grotta Ferrata, the long, long street presented a human throng of +absolute density without the slightest crush, for no one stuck his +elbows into his neighbour's sides. The eye could only distinguish a mass +of red, yellow and white patches in the sunlight, and in between them a +few donkeys' heads and mules' necks. The patches were the kerchiefs on +the women's heads. Folk stood with whole roast pigs in front of them on +a board, cutting off a piece with a knife for anyone who was hungry; +there were sold, besides, fruits, knives, ornaments, provisions, and +general market wares. One _osteria_, the entrance to which was hung +all over with sausages, onions and vegetables, in garlands, had five +huge archways open to the street. Inside were long tables, at which +people sat, not on benches, but on trestles, round bars supported by two +legs, and ate and drank in the best of good spirits, and the blackest +filth, for the floor was the black, sodden, trampled earth. Just over +the way, arbours had been made from trees, by intertwining their +branches and allowing them to grow into one another; these were quite +full of gay, beautiful girls, amongst them one with fair hair and brown +eyes, who looked like a Tuscan, and from whom it was difficult to tear +one's eyes away. + +After having inspected the courtyard of an old monastery, the lovely +pillars of which rejoiced my heart, I sat down a little on one side in +the street where the fair was, on my little camp-stool, which roused the +legitimate curiosity of the peasant girls. They walked round me, looked +at me from behind and before, and examined with grave interest the +construction of my seat. In front of me sat an olive and lemon seller. +Girls bargained with him as best they could in the press, others stood +and looked on. I had an opportunity here of watching their innate +statuesque grace. When they spoke, the right arm kept time with their +speech. When silent, they generally placed one hand on the hip, bent, +but not clenched. There were various types. The little blonde, blue-eyed +girl with the mild Madonna smile, and absolutely straight nose, and the +large-made, pronounced brunette. But the appearance of them all was such +that an artist or a poet could, by a slight transformation, have +portrayed from them whatever type of figure or special characteristic he +required. In my opinion, the form Italian beauty took, and the reason of +the feeling one had in Italy of wading in beauty, whereas one hardly +ever saw anything in the strict sense of the word beautiful in +Copenhagen, and rarely in Paris, was, that this beauty was the beauty of +the significant. All these women looked to be unoppressed, fullblown, +freely developed. All that makes woman ugly in the North: the cold, the +thick, ugly clothes that the peasant women wear, the doublet of +embarrassment and vapidity which they drag about with them, the strait- +waistcoat of Christiansfeldt morality in which they are confined by the +priests, by protestantism, by fashion, by custom and convention--none of +this oppressed, confined or contracted women here. These young peasant +girls looked as if they had never heard such words as "You must not," or +"You shall not," and as here in Italy there is none of the would-be +witty talk, the grinning behind people's backs, which takes the life out +of all intrepidity in the North, no one thought: "What will people say?" +Everyone dressed and deported himself with complete originality, as he, +or rather as she, liked. Hence eyes were doubly brilliant, blood coursed +twice as red, the women's busts were twice as rounded and full. + + +IV + +From this time forth I had a strange experience. I saw beauty +everywhere. If I sat at the window of a café on the Corso on a Sunday +morning, as the ladies were going to Mass, it seemed to me that all the +beauty on earth was going past. A mother and her three daughters went +by, a mere grocer's wife from the Corso, but the mother carried herself +like a duchess, had a foot so small that it could have lain in the +hollow of my hand, and the youngest of the three daughters was so +absolutely lovely that people turned to look after her; she might +perhaps have been fifteen years of age, but there was a nobility about +her austere profile, and she had a way of twisting her perfect lips into +a smile, that showed her to be susceptible to the sweetest mysteries of +poetry and music. My long illness had so quickened the susceptibility of +my senses to impressions of beauty that I lived in a sort of +intoxication. + +In the Scandinavian Club I was received with endless expressions of +sympathy, courteous remarks, and more or less sincerely meant +flatteries, as if in compensation for the suffering I had been through. +All spoke as though they had themselves been deeply distressed, and +especially as though Copenhagen had been sitting weeping during my +illness. I certainly did not believe this for a moment, but all the same +it weighed down a little, the balance of my happiness, and the first +meetings with the Northern artists in these glorious surroundings were +in many respects very enjoyable. The Scandinavian Club was in the +building from which you enter the Mausoleum of Augustus, a colossal +building in the form of a cross, several storeys in height. A festival +had been got up on the flat roof for a benevolent object one of the +first evenings in April. You mounted the many flights of stairs and +suddenly found yourself, apparently, in an immense hall, but with no +roof save the stars, and brilliantly illuminated, but with lights that +paled in the rays of the Italian moon. We took part in the peculiarly +Italian enjoyment of watching balloons go up; they rose by fire, which +exhausted the air inside them and made them light. Round about the moon +we could see red and blue lights, like big stars; one balloon ignited up +in the sky, burst into bright flames, and looked very impressive. + +Troops of young women, too, were sitting there, and dazzled anew a young +man who for a second time had given the slip to the old gentleman with +the scythe. There was one young servant girl from the country, in +particular, a child of thirteen or fourteen, to whom I called the +attention of the painters, and they went into ecstasies over her. The +type was the same as that which Raphael has reproduced in his Sistine +Madonna. Her clear, dark blue eyes had a look of maidenly shyness, and +of the most exquisite bashfulness, and yet a look of pride. She wore a +string of glass beads round her lovely neck. We ordered two bottles of +wine to drink her health, and, while we were drinking it, the rotunda +was lighted up from a dozen directions with changing Bengal fire. The +ladies looked even handsomer, the glass lamps dark green in the gleam, +the fire-borne balloons rose, the orchestra played, the women smiled at +the homage of their friends and lovers--all on the venerable Mausoleum +of Augustus. + + +V + +I made the acquaintance that evening of a young and exceedingly engaging +Frenchman, who was to become my intimate friend and my travelling +companion. He attracted me from the first by his refined, reserved, and +yet cordial manner. + +Although only thirty-five years of age, Georges Noufflard had travelled +and seen surprisingly much. He was now in Italy for the second time, +knew France and Germany, had travelled through Mexico and the United +States, had visited Syria, Egypt, Tunis, and Algiers to the last oasis. +When the conversation touched upon Art and Music, he expressed himself +in a manner that revealed keen perception, unusual knowledge, and a very +individual taste. + +The following morning, when we met on the Corso, he placed himself at my +disposal, if he could be of use to me; there was nothing he had arranged +to do. He asked where I was thinking of going; as he knew Rome and its +neighbourhood as well as I knew my mother's drawing-room, I placed +myself in his hands. We took a carriage and drove together, first to the +baths of Caracalla, then to the Catacombs, where we very nearly lost our +way, and thought with a thrill of what in olden times must have been the +feelings of the poor wretches who fled there, standing in the dark and +hearing footsteps in the distance, knowing that it was their pursuers +coming, and that they were inevitably going to be murdered, where there +was not even room to raise a weapon in their own defence. Next we drove +to _San Paolo fuori le mure_, of the burning of which Thorwaldsen's +Museum possesses a painting by Leopold Robert, but which at that time +had been entirely re-built in the antique style. It was the most +beautiful basilica I had ever seen. We enjoyed the sight of the +courtyard of the monastery nearly 1,700 years old, with its fine +pillars, all different, and so well preserved that we compared, in +thought, the impressions produced by the two mighty churches, San Paolo +and San Pietro. Then we dined together and plunged into interminable +discussions until darkness fell. From that day forth we were +inseparable. Our companionship lasted several months, until I was +obliged to journey North. But the same cordial relations continued to +subsist between us for more than a quarter of a century, when Death +robbed me of my friend. + +Georges Noufflard was the son of a rich cloth manufacturer at Roubaix, +and at an early age had come into possession of a considerable fortune. +This, however, was somewhat diminished through the dishonesty of those +who, after the death of his father, conducted the works in his name. He +had wanted to become a painter, but the weakness of his eyes had obliged +him to give up Art; now he was an Art lover, and was anxious to write a +book on the memorials and works of art in Rome, too great an +undertaking, and for that reason never completed; but at the same time, +he pursued with passion the study of music, played Beethoven, Gluck and +Berlioz, for me daily, and later on published books on Berlioz and +Richard Wagner. + +As a youth he had been an enthusiast such as, in the Germanic countries, +they fancy is impossible elsewhere, to such an extent indeed as would be +regarded even there as extraordinary. At seventeen years of age he fell +in love with a young girl who lived in the same building as himself. He +was only on terms of sign language with her, had not even secured so +much as a conversation with her. None the less, his infatuation was so +great that he declared to his father that he wished to marry her. The +father would not give his consent, and her family would not receive him +unless he was presented by his father. The latter sent him to America +with the words: "Forget your love and learn what a fine thing +industrialism is." He travelled all over the United States, found all +machinery loathsome, since he had not the most elementary knowledge of +the principles of mechanics, and no inclination for them, and thought +all the time of the little girl from whom they wished to separate him. +It did not help matters that the travelling companion that had been +given him lived and breathed in an atmosphere of the lowest debauchery, +and did his best to initiate the young man into the same habits. On his +return home he declared to his father that he persisted in his choice. +"Good," said his father, "Asia Minor is a delightful country, and so is +Northern Africa; it will also do you good to become acquainted with +Italy." So he set off on his travels again, and this time was charmed +with everything he saw. Then his father died, and he became pretty much +his own master and free to do as he liked. Then he learned that the +father of the girl had been guilty of a bank fraud. His family would not +receive hers, if, indeed, herself. So he gave up his intention; he did +not wish to expose her to humiliation and did not wish himself to have a +man of ill-fame for his father-in-law; he set off again on his travels, +and remained a long time away. "The proof that I acted wisely by so +doing," he said in conclusion, "is that I have completely forgotten the +girl; my infatuation was all fancy." + +When he commenced by telling me that for three years he had loved, and +despite all opposition, wished to marry a girl to whom he had never +spoken, I exclaimed: "Why, you are no Frenchman!" When he concluded by +telling me that after remaining constant for three years he had +abandoned her for a fault that not she, but her father, had committed, I +exclaimed: "How French you are, after all!" + +While mutual political, social, and philosophical interests drew me to +Giuseppe Saredo, all the artistic side of my nature bound me to Georges +Noufflard. Saredo was an Italian from a half-French part,--he was born +at Savona, near Chambéry,--and his culture was as much French as +Italian; Noufflard was a Frenchman possessed by such a love for Italy +that he spoke the purest Florentine, felt himself altogether a +Southerner, and had made up his mind to take up his permanent abode in +Italy. He married, too, a few years afterwards, a lovely Florentine +woman, and settled down in Florence. + +What entirely won my heart about him was the femininely delicate +consideration and unselfish devotion of his nature, the charm there was +about his manner and conversation, which revealed itself in everything +he did, from the way in which he placed his hat upon his head, to the +way in which he admired a work of art. But I could not have associated +with him day after day, had I not been able to learn something from him. +When we met again ten years later, it turned out that we had nothing +especially new to tell each other. I had met him just at the right +moment. + +It was not only that Noufflard was very well and widely informed about +the artistic treasures of Italy and the places where they were to be +found, but his opinions enriched my mind, inasmuch as they spurred me on +to contradiction or surprised me and won my adherence. Fresh as Julius +Lange's artistic sense had been, there was nevertheless something +doctrinaire and academic about it. An artist like Bernini was horrible, +and nothing else to him; he had no sympathy for the sweet, half-sensual +ecstasy of some of Bernini's best figures. He was an enemy of +eighteenth-century art in France, saw it through the moral spectacles +which in the Germanic countries had come into use with the year 1800. It +was easy for Noufflard to remain unbiased by Northern doctrines, for he +did not know them; he had the free eye of the beauty lover for every +revelation of beauty, no matter under what form, and had the +intellectual kinship of the Italianised Frenchman for many an artist +unappreciated in the North. On the other hand, he naturally considered +that we Northmen very much over-estimated our own. It was impossible to +rouse any interest in him for Thorwaldsen, whom he considered absolutely +academic. "You cannot call him a master in any sense," he exclaimed one +day, when we had been looking at Thorwaldsen bas-reliefs side by side +with antiques. I learnt from my intimacy with Noufflard how little +impression Thorwaldsen's spirit makes on the Romance peoples. That +indifference to him would soon become so widespread in Germany, I did +not yet foresee. + +Noufflard had a very alert appreciation of the early Renaissance, +especially in sculpture; he was passionately in love with the natural +beauties of Italy, from North to South, and he had a kind of national- +psychological gift of singling out peculiarly French, Italian or German +traits. He did not know the German language, but he was at home in +German music, and had studied a great deal of German literature in +translation; just then he was reading Hegel's "Aesthetics," the +abstractions in which veritably alarmed him, and to which he very much +preferred modern French Art Philosophy. In English Science, he had +studied Darwin, and he was the first to give me a real insight into the +Darwinian theory and a general summary of it, for in my younger days I +had only heard it attacked, as erroneous, in lectures by Rasmus Nielsen +on teleology. + +Georges Noufflard was the first Frenchman of my own age with whom I had +been intimate and whose character I partly understood and entered into, +partly absorbed into my own. If many of the various opinions evident in +my first lectures were strikingly emancipated from Danish national +prejudices which no one hitherto had attempted to disturb, I owed this +in a great measure to him. Our happy, harmonious intimacy in the Sabine +Hills and in Naples was responsible, before a year was past, for whole +deluges of abuse in Danish newspapers. + + +VI + +One morning, the Consul's man-servant brought me a _permesso_ for +the Collection of Sculpture in the Vatican for the same day, and a +future _permesso_ for the Loggias, Stanzas, and the Sistine Chapel. +I laid the last in my pocket-book. It was the key of Paradise. I had +waited for it so long that I said to myself almost superstitiously: "I +wonder whether anything will prevent again?" The anniversary of the day +I had left Copenhagen the year before, I drove to the Vatican, went at +one o'clock mid-day up the handsome staircase, and through immense, in +part magnificently decorated rooms to the Sistine Chapel. I had heard so +much about the disappointment it would be that not the very slightest +suggestion of disappointment crossed my mind. Only a feeling of supreme +happiness shot through me: at last I am here. I stood on the spot which +was the real goal of my pilgrimage. I had so often examined +reproductions of every figure and I had read so much about the whole, +that I knew every note of the music beforehand. Now I heard it. + +A voice within me whispered: So here I stand at last, shut in with the +mind that of all human minds has spoken most deeply home to my soul. I +am outside and above the earth and far from human kind. This is his +earth and these are his men, created in his image to people his world. +For this one man's work is a world, which, though that of one man only, +can be placed against the productions of a whole nation, even of the +most splendid nation that has ever lived, the Greeks. Michael Angelo +felt more largely, more lonely, more mightily than any other. He created +out of the wealth of a nature that in its essence was more than earthly. +Raphael is more human, people say, and that is true; but Michael Angelo +is more divine. + +After the lapse of about an hour, the figures detached themselves from +the throng, to my mental vision, and the whole composition fixed itself +in my brain. I saw the ceiling, not merely as it is to-day, but as it +was when the colours were fresh, for in places there were patches, the +bright yellow, for instance, which showed the depth of colouring in +which the whole had been carried out. It was Michael Angelo's intention +to show us the ceiling pierced and the heavens open above it. Up to the +central figures, we are to suppose that the walls continue straight up +to the ceiling, as though the figures sat upright. Then all confusion +disappears, and all becomes one perfect whole. + +The principal pictures, such as the creation of Adam, Michael Angelo's +most philosophical and most exquisite painting, I had had before my eyes +upon my wall every day for ten years. The expression in Adam's face was +not one of languishing appeal, as I had thought; he smiled faintly, as +if calmly confident of the dignity of the life the finger of God is +about to bestow upon him. The small, bronze-painted figures, expressed +the suspension and repose of the ceiling; they were architectonic +symbols. The troops of young heroes round about the central pillars were +Michael Angelo's ideals of Youth, Beauty and Humanity. The one resting +silently and thoughtfully on one knee is perhaps the most splendid. +There is hardly any difference between his build and that of Adam. Adam +is the more spiritual brother of these young and suffering heroes. + +I felt the injustice of all the talk about the beginnings of +grotesqueness in Michael Angelo's style. There are a few somewhat +distorted figures, Haman, the knot of men and women adoring the snake, +Jonas, as he flings himself backwards, but except these, what calm, what +grandiose perfection! And which was still more remarkable, what imposing +charm! Eve, in the picture of "The Fall," is perhaps the most adorable +figure that Art has ever produced; her beauty, in the picture on the +left, was like a revelation of what humanity really ought to have been. + +It sounded almost like a lie that one man had created this in twenty-two +months. Would the earth ever again produce frescoes of the same order? +The 360 years that had passed over it had damaged this, the greatest +pictorial work on earth, far less than I had feared. + +A large aristocratic English family came in: man, wife, son, daughter, +another daughter, the governess, all expensively and fashionably +dressed. They stood silent for a moment at the entrance to the hall. +Then they came forward as far as about the middle of the hall, looked up +and about a little, said to the custodian: "Will you open the door for +us?" and went out again very gracefully. + + +VII + +I knew Raphael's Loggias from copies in _l'École des Beaux Arts_ in +Paris. But I was curious to see how they would appear after this, and +so, although there was only three-quarters of an hour left of the time +allotted to me on my _permesso_, I went up to look at them. My +first impression, as I glanced down the corridor and perceived these +small ceiling pictures, barely two feet across, was: "Good gracious! +This will be a sorry enjoyment after Michael Angelo!" I looked at the +first painting, God creating the animals, and was quite affected: There +goes the good old man, saying paternally: "Come up from the earth, all +of you, you have no idea how nice it is up here." My next impression +was: "How childish!" But my last was: "What genius!" How charming the +picture of the Fall, and how lovely Eve! And what grandeur of style +despite the smallness of the space. A God a few inches high separates +light from darkness, but there is omnipotence in the movement of His +arm. Jacob sees the ladder to Heaven in his dream; and this ladder, +which altogether has six angels upon it, seems to reach from Earth to +Heaven, infinitely long and infinitely peopled; above, we see God the +Father, at an immense distance, spread His gigantic embrace (which +covers a space the length of two fingers). There was the favourite +picture of my childhood, Abraham prostrated before the Angels, even more +marvellous in the original than I had fancied it to myself, although it +is true that the effect of the picture is chiefly produced by its beauty +of line. And there was Lot, departing from Sodom with his daughters, a +picture great because of the perfect illusion of movement. They go on +and on, against the wind and storm, with Horror behind them and Hope in +front, at the back, to the right, the burning city, to the left, a +smiling landscape. How unique the landscapes on all these pictures are, +how marvellous, for instance, that in which Moses is found on the Nile! +This river, within the narrow limits of the picture, looked like a huge +stream, losing itself in the distance. + +It was half-past five. My back was beginning to ache in the place which +had grown tender from lying so long; without a trace of fatigue I had +been looking uninterruptedly at pictures for four hours and a half. + + +VIII + +Noufflard's best friend in Rome was a young lieutenant of the +Bersaglieri named Ottavio Cerrotti, with whom we were much together. +Although a Roman, he had entered the Italian army very young, and had +consequently been, as it were, banished. Now, through the breach at +Porta Pia, he had come back. He was twenty-four years of age, and the +naïvest Don Juan one could possibly meet. He was beloved by the +beautiful wife of his captain, and Noufflard, who frequented their +house, one day surprised the two lovers in tears. Cerrotti was crying +with his lady-love because he had been faithless to her. He had +confessed to her his intimacy with four other young ladies; so she was +crying, and the end of it was that he cried to keep her company. + +At meals, he gave us a full account of his principal romance. He had one +day met her by chance in the gardens of the Palazzo Corsini, and since +that day, they had had secret meetings. But the captain had now been +transferred to Terni, and tragedy had begun. Letters were constantly +within an ace of being intercepted, they committed imprudences without +count. He read aloud to us, without the least embarrassment, the letters +of the lady. The curious thing about them was the moderation she +exercised in the expression of her love, while at the same time her +plans for meetings were of the most foolhardy, breakneck description. + +Another fresh acquaintance that I made in those days was with three +French painters, Hammon, Sain and Benner, who had studios adjoining one +another. Hammon and Sain both died long since, but Benner, whom I met +again in Paris in 1904, died, honoured and respected, in 1905. I was +later on at Capri in company with Sain and Benner, but Hammon I saw only +during this visit to Rome. His pretty, somewhat sentimental painting, +_Ma soeur n'y est pas_, hung, reproduced in engraving, in every +shop-window, even in Copenhagen. He was painting just then at his clever +picture, _Triste Rivage_. + +Hammon was born in Brittany, of humble, orthodox parents, who sent him +to a monastery. The Prior, when he surprised him drawing men and women +out of his head, told him that painting was a sin. The young man himself +then strongly repented his inclination, but, as he felt he could not +live without following it, he left the monastery, though with many +strong twinges of conscience. + +Now that he was older, he was ruining himself by drink, but had +manifested true talent and still retained a humorous wit. One day that I +was with him, a young man came to the studio and asked for his opinion +of a painting; the man talked the whole time of nothing but his mother, +of how much he loved her and all that he did for her. Hammon's patience +gave out at last. He broke out: "And do you think, sir, that _I_ +have murdered my mother? I love her very much, I assure you, _not +enough to marry her_, I grant, but pretty well, all the same." After +that he always spoke of him as "the young man who loves his mother." + + +IX + +I felt as though this April, this radiant Spring, were the most glorious +time in my life, I was assimilating fresh impressions of Art and Nature +every hour; the conversations I was enjoying with my Italian and French +friends set me day by day pondering over new thoughts; I saw myself +restored to life, and a better life. At the beginning of April, +moreover, some girls from the North made their triumphal entry into the +Scandinavian Club. Without being specially beautiful or remarkable, they +absolutely charmed me. It was a full year since the language of home had +sounded in my ears from the lips of a girl, since I had seen the smile +in the blue eyes and encountered the heart-ensnaring charm, in jest, or +earnest, of the young women of the North. I had recently heard the +entrancing castrato singing at St. Peter's, and, on conquering my +aversion, could not but admire it. Now I heard once more simple, but +natural, Danish and Swedish songs. Merely to speak Danish again with a +young woman, was a delight. And there was one who, delicately and +unmistakably and defencelessly, showed me that I was not indifferent to +her. That melted me, and from that time forth the beauties of Italy were +enhanced tenfold in my eyes. + +All that I was acquainted with in Rome, all that I saw every day with +Georges Noufflard, I could show her and her party, from the most +accessible things, which were nevertheless fresh to the newcomers, such +as the Pantheon, Acqua Paola, San Pietro in Montorio, the grave of +Cecilia Metella, and the grottoes of Egeria, to the great collections of +Art in the Vatican, or the Capitol, or in the wonderful Galleria +Borghese. All this, that I was accustomed to see alone with Noufflard, +acquired new splendour when a blonde girl walked by my side, asking +sensible questions, and showing me the gratitude of youth for good +instruction. With her nineteen years I suppose she thought me +marvellously clever. But the works of Art that lay a little outside the +beaten track, I likewise showed to my compatriots. I had never been able +to tolerate Guido Reni; but his playing angels in the chapel of San +Gregorio excited my profound admiration, and it was a satisfaction to me +to pour this into the receptive ear of a girl compatriot. These angels +delighted me so that I could hardly tear myself away from them. The fine +malice, the mild coquetry, even in the expression of the noblest purity +and the loftiest dignity, enchanted us. + +I had been in the habit of going out to the environs of Rome with +Georges Noufflard, for instance, to the large, handsome gardens of the +Villa Doria Pamfili, or the Villa Madama, with its beautiful frescoes +and stucco-work, executed by Raphael's pupils, Giulio Romano and others, +from drawings by that master. But it was a new delight to drive over the +Campagna with a girl who spoke Danish by my side, and to see her +Northern complexion in the sun of the South. With my French friend, I +gladly joined the excursions of her party to Nemi, Albano, Tivoli. + +Never in my life had I felt so happy as I did then. I was quite +recovered. Only a fortnight after I had risen from a sick-bed that had +claimed me four months and a half, I was going about, thanks to my +youth, as I did before I was ill. For my excursions, I had a comrade +after my own heart, well-bred, educated, and noble-minded; I fell in +love a little a few times a week; I saw lakes, fields, olive groves, +mountains, scenery, exactly to my taste. I had always a _permesso_ +for the Vatican collections in my pocket. I felt intoxicated with +delight, dizzy with enjoyment. + +It seemed to me that of all I had seen in the world, Tivoli was the most +lovely. The old "temple of the Sibyl" on the hill stood on consecrated +ground, and consecrated the whole neighbourhood. I loved those +waterfalls, which impressed me much more than Trollhättan [Footnote: +Trollhättan, a celebrated waterfall near Göteborg in Sweden.], had done +in my childhood. In one place the water falls down, black and boiling, +into a hollow of the rock, and reminded me of the descent into Tartarus; +in another the cataract runs, smiling and twinkling with millions of +shining pearls, in the strong sunlight. In a third place, the great +cascade rushes down over the rocks. There, where it touches the nether +rocks, rests the end of the enormous rainbow which, when the sun shines, +is always suspended across it. Noufflard told me that Niagara itself +impressed one less. We scrambled along the cliff until we stood above +the great waterfall, and could see nothing but the roaring, foaming +white water, leaping and dashing down; it looked as though the seething +and spraying masses of water were springing over each other's heads in a +mad race, and there was such power, such natural persuasion in it, that +one seemed drawn with it, and gliding, as it were, dragged into the +abyss. It was as though all Nature were disembodied, and flinging +herself down. + +Like a Latin, Noufflard personified it all; he saw the dance of nymphs +in the waves, and their veils in the clouds of spray. My way of +regarding Nature was diametrically opposite, and pantheistic. I lost +consciousness of my own personality, felt myself one with the falling +water and merged myself into Nature, instead of gathering it up into +figures. I felt myself an individuality of the North, conscious of my +being. + + +X + +One afternoon a large party of us had taken our meal at an inn on the +lake of Nemi. The evening was more than earthly. The calm, still, +mountain lake, the old, filled-up crater, on the top of the mountain, +had a fairy-like effect. I dropped down behind a boulder and lay for a +long time alone, lost in ecstasy, out of sight of the others. All at +once I saw a blue veil fluttering in the breeze quite near me. It was +the young Danish girl, who had sat down with me. The red light of the +evening, Nemi and she, merged in one. Not far away some people were +setting fire to a blaze of twigs and leaves; one solitary bird warbled +across the lake; the cypresses wept; the pines glowered; the olive trees +bathed their foliage in the mild warmth; one cloud sailed across the +sky, and its reflection glided over the lake. One could not bear to +raise the voice. + +It was like a muffled, muffled concert. Here were life, reality and +dreams. Here were sun, warmth and light. Here were colour, form and +line, and in this line, outlined by the mountains against the sky, the +artistic background of all the beauty. + +Noufflard and I accompanied our Northern friends from Albano to the +station; they were going on as far as Naples, and thence returning home. +We said good-bye and walked back to Albano in the mild Summer evening. +The stars sparkled and shone bright, Cassiopaeia showed itself in its +most favourable position, and Charles's Wain stood, as if in sheer high +spirits, on its head, which seemed to be its recreation just about this +time. + +It, too, was evidently a little dazed this unique, inimitable Spring. + + + + +INDEX + + +Aagesen, Professor +Aarestrup, Emil +About, Edmond +Adam +_Adam Homo_ +_Adventures on a Walking Tour_ +Aeneid, The +Aeschylus +Agar, Mlle. +_Aladdin_ +Alcibiades +Algreen-Ussing, Frederik +Algreen-Ussing, Otto +_Ali and Gulhyndi_ +Alibert, Mr. +Andersen, H.C. +_Angelo_ +Angelo, Michael +_Antony_ +Apel +Aristotle +_Arne_ +Arrest, Professor d' +Art, Danish, French, German dramatic +Astronomy +Auerbach, Berthold +Augier +Augustenborg, Duke of + +Baagöe +Baggesen +Bain +Banville +Barbier, Auguste +Bazaine +Beaumarchais +Bech, Carl +Bendix, Victor +Benner +Bentham +Bergen, Carl von +Bergh, Rudolp +Bergsöe +Bernhardt, Sarah +Bible, The +Bille +Bismarck +Bissen, Wilhelm +Björnson +Blanchetti, Costanza +Blicher +Bluhme, Geheimeraad +Borup +Bov +_Boy, A Happy_ +_Brand_ +Bretteville +Bröchner, H. +Brohan, The Sisters +Brussels +Bruun, Emil +_Buch der Lieder_ +_Burgraves, Les_ +Byron + +Caesar +_Caprice, Un_ +Caro +Casellini +Catullus +Cerrotti, Ottavio +Chamounix +Chanson de Roland +Chasles, Émile +Chasles, Philarète +Chatterton +Choteau, Marie +Christian VIII. +Christian IX. +Christianity +Cinq-Mars +Clarétie, Jules +Clausen +Cologne +Comte +Copenhagen +Coppée +Coquelin +Corday, Charlotte +Correggio +Cousin +Criticisms and Portraits +Crone + +Dame aux Camélias, La +Danish Literature +Dante +Darwin +David, C.N. +David, Ludvig +Delacroix +Delisle +Devil, The +Dichtung und Wahrheit +Disraeli, +Divina Commedia +Don Juan +Don Quixote +Dörr, Dr. +Drachmann +Drama, German +Driebein +Dualism in Our Modern Philosophy +Dubbels +Dubois, Mlle. +Dumas +Dumas, The Younger + +Eckernförde +Edda, The +Edward, Uncle +Either-Or +Esselbach, Madam +Ethica +Euripides + +Falkman +Farum +Faust +Favart, Madame +Favre, Jules +Feuerbach, Ludwig +Feuillet, Octave +Fights, Between the +Filomena +Fils de Giboyer, Le +Fisher Girl, The +Flaubert +Florence +Fontane, M. +For Self-Examination +For Sweden and Norway +Fourier +France Nouvelle, La +Frascati +Frederik VII +French Literature +French Philosophers of the Nineteenth Century, The +French Revolution +Frithiof's Saga +Frossard +_Gabrielle_ +Gallenga, Antonio +Gambetta +Gautier +_Geneva_ +Gerhard +Germany +Gérôme +_Gerusalemme liberata_, Tasso's +_Ghost Letters_ +_Ghosts_ +Girardin +Gladstone +Gleyre +God +_Gods of the North, The_ +Goethe +Goldschmidt, Dr. +Goldschmidt, M. +Goncourt, the brothers; Edmond de +_Government, Representative_ +Gram, Professor +Grammont, The Duc de +Grégoire +_Gringoire_ +Grönbeck, +Groth, Claus +Grundtvig +Guell y Rente, Don José +Guémain, Mademoiselle +Guizot + +Hage, Alfred +Hagemeister, Mr. +_Hakon, Earl_ +Hall +Hamburg +_Hamilton's Philosophy, Examination of_ +_Hamlet_ +Hammerich +Hammon +Hansen, Octavius +Hauch; Rinna +Hebbel +Hegel +Heiberg, Johan Ludvig +Heiberg, Johanne Louise +Heine +Hello, Ernest +Henrietta +Herbart +_Hernani_ +_Hero of Our Time, A_ +Hertz, Henrik +History, The Philosophy of +_History of English Literature,_ +Hobbema +Hohlenberg, Pastor +Holberg +Holst, Professor H.P. +Homer +Hoppe, Mr. +Horace +Höyen +Hugo, Victor +Hume +Huysmann +Hvasser + +Ibsen +_Indiana_ +Ingeborg +Ingemann +Inger +_Inheritance, The_ +_Intelligence, De l'_ + +Jacob, Uncle +_Jacques_ +_Jamber_ +Janet +Jens. +Jesus. +_Jesus, Life of_. +Jews. +_Joie fait Peur, La_. +Judaism. +_Judith_. +Julius, Uncle. +Jutland. + +Kaalund. +Kant. +Kappers. +Karoline. +Key, Ellen. +Kierkegaard, Sören. +_King Svorre_. +Krieger. +Klareboderne. +Kleist, Heinrich. +_Knowledge and Faith, On_. + +Lafontaine, Mr. +Lamartine. +Lange, Julius. +_Laocoon_. +_Last Supper, Leonardo's_. +Lavaggi. +Law. +_Law, Interpretation of the_. +Leconte. +Lehmann, Orla. +Leman, Lake. +Leonardo. +Leopold of Hohenzollern. +Lermontof. +Lessing. +Lévêque. +_Liberty, On_. +_Lion Amoureux, Le_. +Literature; + Danish; + European; + French. +_Literature, History of_, Thortsen's. +Little Red Riding-Hood. +Littré. +Logic of Fundamental Ideas. +Louise, Mademoiselle. +_Love Comedy_. +_Lucrèce_. +Ludvig. +Luini. +Lund, Jörgen. +Lund, Troels. + +M., Mademoiselle Mathilde. +_Macbeth_. +Machiavelli. +Mackeprang. +Macmahon. +_Madvig_. +Malgren. +Manderström, Count. +Marat. +Marcelin. +Maren. +Margharita, Princess. +Maria. +_Mariage de Figaro, Le_. +Marmier, Xavier. +Martensen, Bishop. +Martial. +Mary. +Mathilde, Princess. +Maximilian, Emperor. +Mérimée. +Meza, General de. +Michelet. +Micromégas. +Milan. +Mill, James. +Mill, John Stuart +_Misanthrope, Le_ +Möhl +Molière +Möller, Kristian +Möller, Poul +Möller, P.L. +Monrad +Mounet-Sully +Muddie +_Musketeers, Les Trois_ +Musset, Alfred de + +_Nana_ +Napoleon III +Nerval, Gérard de +_Niebelungenlied, The_ +Niels +Nielsen, Frederik +Nielsen, Rasmus +Nina K. +Nisard +Nodier +Nörregaard +_Notes sur l'Angleterre_ +_Notre Dame de Paris_ +Noufflard, Georges +Nutzhorn, Frederick +Nybböl +Nycander + +Odescalchi, Prince +Odyssey, The +Oehlenschläger +Oersted, Anders Sandöe +Olcott +Ollivier, Prime Minister +_Once upon a Time_ +_Orientales, Les_ +_Over the Hills and Far Away_ +Ovid + +P.P. +Pagella +Païva, Madame de +Palikao +Paludan-Müller, Caspar +Paludan-Müller, Frederick +Paludan-Müller, Jens +Pantaleoni, Dr. +Pantheism +Paris +Paris, Gaston +Pascal +Patti, Adelina +Paulsen, Harald +Peer +_Peer Gynt_ +Per +Petersen, Emil +Philippe, Louis +Philoctetes +Philosophy +Piedmont, History of +Pilgrimage to Kevlaar +Pindar +Planche +Plato +Plautus +Ploug, Carl +_Poetry, The Infinitely Small and the Infinitely Great in_ +Ponsard +Prahl +Prévost-Paradol +Prim, Don Juan +Prose Writings, Heiberg's +Proudhon + +_Rabbi and Knight_ +Raphael +Raupach +Ravnkilde, Niels +Realism, Ideal +Ream, Vinnie +Régnault +Régnier +Relling +Rembrandt +Renan +Renan, M., L'Allemagne et l'Athéisme au 19me Siècle +Reuter, Fritz +Reventlow, Counts +Ribbing +Richardt, Christian +Ristori +Rochefort +Rode, Gotfred +Rode, Vilhelm +Roman Elegies +Rome +Rosenstand, Vilhelm +Rosette, Aunt +Rosiény, Marc de +Rossi +Rothe, Clara +Rousseau +Rubens +Runeberg, Walter +Ruysdael + +Sacy, Silvestre de +Sain +Saint Simon +Saint-Victor +Sainte-Beuve +Sand, George +Sarah, Aunt +Saredo, Giuseppe +Savonarola +Savoy +Scenes from the Lives of the Warriors of the North +Schandorph +Schätzig +Schelling +Schiödte, J.C. +Schleswig +Schmidt, Rudolf +School of Life, The +Scott, Sir Walter +Scribe +Sebastian +Serrano +Shakespeare +Sheridan +Sibbern +Sickness unto Death +Signe's Story +Sigurd Slembe +Slesvig +Snoilsky, Carl +Snorre +Socrates +Sofus +Sommer, Major +Sophocles +Soul after Death, A +Spang, Pastor +Spang, The Sisters +Spencer, Herbert +Spendthrift, A +Spinoza +Stebbins +Steen, Bookseller +Stockholm +Stuart, Mary +Student, The +Studies in Aesthetics +Style, Le +Subjection of Women +Supplice d'une Femme, Le +Swiss Peasant +Switzerland +Synnöve + +Taine +_Tartuffe_ +Tasso +Terence +Testa, Costanza +Theocritus +Thierry, Edmond +Thomsen, Grimur +Thomsen, Wilhelm. +Thoresen, Magdalene +Thortsen +Thorwaldsen +_Tonietta_ +Topsöe, V. +_Tragic Fate, The Idea of_ +Trepka, Alma +Trier, Ernst +Trochu, General +Ussing, Dean + +Valdemar +_Valentine_ +_Vanity and Modesty_, Luini's +Veuillot +Victorine, Aunt +Vigny, Alfred de +Villari, Pasquale +Vilsing +Virgil +Vischer, Fr. Th. +Voltaire +Voltelen +Vries + +Wickseil, Knut +Wiehe, Michael +_Wild Duck_ +Winckelmann +Winther, Christian +Wirsen +_Without a Center_ + +Ziegler, Clara +Zola + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, RECOLLECTIONS OF MY CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH *** + +This file should be named 8rchy10.txt or 8rchy10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 8rchy11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 8rchy10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we usually do not +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +We are now trying to release all our eBooks one year in advance +of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing. +Please be encouraged to tell us about any error or corrections, +even years after the official publication date. + +Please note neither this listing nor its contents are final til +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg eBooks is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. + +Most people start at our Web sites at: +http://gutenberg.net or +http://promo.net/pg + +These Web sites include award-winning information about Project +Gutenberg, including how to donate, how to help produce our new +eBooks, and how to subscribe to our email newsletter (free!). + + +Those of you who want to download any eBook before announcement +can get to them as follows, and just download by date. This is +also a good way to get them instantly upon announcement, as the +indexes our cataloguers produce obviously take a while after an +announcement goes out in the Project Gutenberg Newsletter. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05 or +ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext05 + +Or /etext04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, +91 or 90 + +Just search by the first five letters of the filename you want, +as it appears in our Newsletters. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours +to get any eBook selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. Our +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If the value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour in 2002 as we release over 100 new text +files per month: 1240 more eBooks in 2001 for a total of 4000+ +We are already on our way to trying for 2000 more eBooks in 2002 +If they reach just 1-2% of the world's population then the total +will reach over half a trillion eBooks given away by year's end. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away 1 Trillion eBooks! +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only about 4% of the present number of computer users. + +Here is the briefest record of our progress (* means estimated): + +eBooks Year Month + + 1 1971 July + 10 1991 January + 100 1994 January + 1000 1997 August + 1500 1998 October + 2000 1999 December + 2500 2000 December + 3000 2001 November + 4000 2001 October/November + 6000 2002 December* + 9000 2003 November* +10000 2004 January* + + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been created +to secure a future for Project Gutenberg into the next millennium. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +As of February, 2002, contributions are being solicited from people +and organizations in: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, +Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, +Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, +Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New +Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, +Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South +Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West +Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. + +We have filed in all 50 states now, but these are the only ones +that have responded. + +As the requirements for other states are met, additions to this list +will be made and fund raising will begin in the additional states. +Please feel free to ask to check the status of your state. + +In answer to various questions we have received on this: + +We are constantly working on finishing the paperwork to legally +request donations in all 50 states. If your state is not listed and +you would like to know if we have added it since the list you have, +just ask. + +While we cannot solicit donations from people in states where we are +not yet registered, we know of no prohibition against accepting +donations from donors in these states who approach us with an offer to +donate. + +International donations are accepted, but we don't know ANYTHING about +how to make them tax-deductible, or even if they CAN be made +deductible, and don't have the staff to handle it even if there are +ways. + +Donations by check or money order may be sent to: + + PROJECT GUTENBERG LITERARY ARCHIVE FOUNDATION + 809 North 1500 West + Salt Lake City, UT 84116 + +Contact us if you want to arrange for a wire transfer or payment +method other than by check or money order. + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been approved by +the US Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) organization with EIN +[Employee Identification Number] 64-622154. Donations are +tax-deductible to the maximum extent permitted by law. As fund-raising +requirements for other states are met, additions to this list will be +made and fund-raising will begin in the additional states. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +You can get up to date donation information online at: + +http://www.gutenberg.net/donation.html + + +*** + +If you can't reach Project Gutenberg, +you can always email directly to: + +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +Prof. Hart will answer or forward your message. + +We would prefer to send you information by email. + + +**The Legal Small Print** + + +(Three Pages) + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN EBOOKS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this eBook, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you may distribute copies of this eBook if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS EBOOK +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +eBook, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this eBook by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this eBook on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM EBOOKS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBook, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBooks, +is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor Michael S. Hart +through the Project Gutenberg Association (the "Project"). +Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this eBook +under the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +Please do not use the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark to market +any commercial products without permission. + +To create these eBooks, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's eBooks and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other eBook medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] Michael Hart and the Foundation (and any other party you may +receive this eBook from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm eBook) disclaims +all liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this eBook within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS EBOOK IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE EBOOK OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold Michael Hart, the Foundation, +and its trustees and agents, and any volunteers associated +with the production and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm +texts harmless, from all liability, cost and expense, including +legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the +following that you do or cause: [1] distribution of this eBook, +[2] alteration, modification, or addition to the eBook, +or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this eBook electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + eBook or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this eBook in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word + processing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The eBook, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The eBook may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the eBook (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + eBook in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the eBook refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Foundation of 20% of the + gross profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation" + the 60 days following each date you prepare (or were + legally required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent + periodic) tax return. Please contact us beforehand to + let us know your plans and to work out the details. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +Project Gutenberg is dedicated to increasing the number of +public domain and licensed works that can be freely distributed +in machine readable form. + +The Project gratefully accepts contributions of money, time, +public domain materials, or royalty free copyright licenses. +Money should be paid to the: +"Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +If you are interested in contributing scanning equipment or +software or other items, please contact Michael Hart at: +hart@pobox.com + +[Portions of this eBook's header and trailer may be reprinted only +when distributed free of all fees. Copyright (C) 2001, 2002 by +Michael S. Hart. Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be +used in any sales of Project Gutenberg eBooks or other materials be +they hardware or software or any other related product without +express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN EBOOKS*Ver.02/11/02*END* + diff --git a/old/8rchy10.zip b/old/8rchy10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..3532517 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/8rchy10.zip diff --git a/old/8rchy10h.zip b/old/8rchy10h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..85445a0 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/8rchy10h.zip |