Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 095.djvu/152

Rh Yet o'er the wanderer’s spirit sadness steals.

And everywhere a blank—a want—it feels;

The peasants dancing to the shepherd’s reed

By Arno’s banks, less gladly do I heed

Than the wild birds that from our falcons speed.

And Eloisa’s grove seems thorns beside

The tangled bushy copse, where oft I sank

In rapture, with my first love by my side.

Less high seems Schrekhorn’s summit than the bank

From which to grasp the distant moon I sought.

And raised to God was my first childish thought.

Here—here alone remembrance fondly strays

O'er the wild wanderings of youth's gladsome days.

Painting in brighter tints all that hath been.

Till softer, lovlier seems each distant scene.

Here, harbour of my joys! in thy calm sea

The stars of heaven reflected seem to me

More glittering, that I gaze on them in thee!

Notwithstanding the feelings towards his native land expressed in these verses, Baggesen spent a large portion of his life in foreign countries, and died at Hamburg in 1826. Baggesen was, perhaps, the most popular poet in Denmark until Oehlenschlæger (of whom no was extremely jealous) appeared, whose commanding genius soon placed him at the head of the literature of his country.

Adam Oehlenschlæger was bom iu 1779. His father was steward of the royal castle of Frederiksberg, near Copenhagen. He began life as an actor, but soon quitted that calling, and became a student at the university. At an early age be entered on his literary career, in the course of which ho has won not merely a European, but an undying celebrity. During the earliest part of this century his works, translated by himself into the language of Germany, made a great sensation in that country; and this is of itself no small praise to him, when it is considered how studded was the literature of Germany with brilliant luminaries of its own. Madame de Staël was one of the first to circulate the fame of Oehlenschlæger throughout the world, for he was mentioned with much and just applause in her admirable work, "De L'Allemagne." "Oehlenschlæger," says she, "has represented, in a manner at once truthful and poetical, the history and the fables of those countries which were formerly inhabited by the Scandinavians. We know little of the north which stands on the confines of the living earth. … The frigid air which congeals the breath, returns the heat into the soul ; and nature, in these climates, seems only made to throw roan back upon himself. The heroes in the fictions of northern poetry are gigantic; superstition, in their characters, is united to strength, whilst everywhere else it appears the companion of weakness. … Oehlenschlæger has created an entirely new path, in taking for the subjects of his pieces the heroic traditions of his country; and if his example be followed, the literature of the North may one day become as celebrated as that of Germany."

Among Oehlenschlæger's numerous works may be named his "Norden's Guder" ("Gods of the North"), which he styles "an epic poem;" but it is rather a succession of poems, containing the adventures of Thor (one of the most important of the Scandinavian gods) with Lokè, who accompanies him on a journey. Lokè was a spirit of mischief, "who