Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 095.djvu/273

266 work is entitled "Gabrieli's Posthumous Letters." The first volume of these letters was published in 1826 or 1827; the remainder about two years ago.

Hans Christian Andersen is probably better known in England than any other Danish writer. He was born at Odensee, Funen. in 1805, in an humble rank of society, and has raised himself entirely by his own genius. It would be needless here to give any outline of his life, that having been sufficiently dwelt on by the translators of his works. Those which have appeared in English consist of tales, longer and shorter, fairy legends, and fanciful stories of various kinds. His longest romance is the "Improvvisatore," of which that popular and accomplished authoress, Mrs. Howitt, has given to the British public a spirited translation. The same lady has also rendered into English, "O. T.," published by Andersen, in 1836, and "Kun en Spillemand" ("Only a Fiddler"), which came out in Denmark the following year. Andersen’s dramatic works, which are inferior to his romances, legends, and "Eventyr," have not been generally successful in Denmark; but his poetry is much admired. His poems are less known in this country than his prose works. They are extremely pretty: some of them full of feeling, some very fanciful, others humorous. Andersen partakes more of the nature of the dove than of that of the eagle; he seeks no lofty eyrie—he gazes not on the blazing sun with an eye bright as its meridian rays; he loves to linger among shady groves, and on the margin of limpid streams; his fancy revels amidst mermaids' caves and scenes of fairy land. One is reminded, when reading his "Eventyr," and little poems, of the sort of peaceful, dreamy pleasure, which one enjoys when loitering, on a warm summer's day, under embowering trees, listening to the rustling of the leaves, to the lulling sound of some rivulet near, or to the distant dashing of the waves on a level shore. All very soothing and sweet; but a kind of listless enjoyment, to which an active mind could not long submit. Andersen tells, himself, in one of his little poems, what he loves: