Page:Fairy tales and stories (Andersen, Tegner).djvu/104

72 poet! The air is so wonderfully clear, the clouds are so magnificent, and the trees and greensward smell so sweet. Ah! I have not felt like this for many years!"

We can already notice that he had become a poet; not that it was noticeable in his appearance, for it is foolish to suppose that a poet is different from other people, among whom you may find far more poetical natures than in many of the great poets we recognize. The difference is simply that the poet has a better intellectual memory; he can retain the idea and the feeling till they are clearly and plainly embodied in words, which the others cannot do. But to be transformed from a commonplace nature to a more highly gifted one is always a wonderful transition; and that is what happened to the clerk.

"What a delicious fragrance!" he said; "how it reminds me of the violets at Aunty Loue's! Ah! I was a little boy then! Bless me, I have not thought of that for many a day! The good old lady! She lived just behind the Exchange. She always kept a twig or a couple of green shoots in water, no matter how severe the winter was. The scent of the violets pervaded the whole room, while I put hot copper pennies against the frozen window-panes to make peep-holes.

"What an interesting view it was! Out in the canal lay the ice-bound ships, quite deserted by their crews; a screaming crow was the only living creature on board. But when the spring came, a busy life began; amid singing and cheering the ice was sawed in pieces, the ships were tarred and rigged, and set sail for foreign lands; but I remain here, and must always remain sitting here in the police office, and see others taking out their passports to go abroad. That's my lot, alas, alas!" he sighed deeply, but stopped suddenly. "Bless me, what is the matter with me? I have never thought or felt like this before. It must be the spring air. I feel both anxious and happy."

He felt in his pocket for his papers. "These will give me something else to think about," he said, and let his eyes wander over the first page. "'Sigbrith, an Original Tragedy in Five Acts,'" he read. "What's this?—and it's in my own handwriting! Have I written this tragedy? 'The Intrigue on the Ramparts, or the Day of Prayer'—a vaudeville. Where can I have got this from? Somebody must have put it in my pocket! Why—here's a letter!" It was from the manager of the theater; the plays were rejected, and the letter was not at all politely worded. "H'm, h'm!" said the clerk, and sat down on a bench; his imagination was all alive, and his heart was quite tender; unconsciously he seized hold of one of the nearest flowers; it was a simple little daisy; the flower told him in a minute what would take a botanist many lectures to explain. It told him about the myth of its birth, about the power of the sunlight, which expanded its delicate leaves and made it so fragrant. He then thought of the struggles of life, which likewise awaken feelings in our hearts. Light