第 14 页

In honor of Thorwaldsen a musical-poetic academy was established, and the poets, who were invited to do so by Heiberg, wrote and read each one a poem in praise of him who had returned home. I wrote of Jason who fetched the golden fleece—that is to say, Jason-Thorwaldsen, who went forth to win golden art. A great dinner and a ball closed the festival, in which, for the first time in Denmark, popular life and a subject of great interest in the realms of art were made public.

From this evening I saw Thorwaldsen almost daily in company or in his studio: I often passed several weeks together with him at Nys÷, where he seemed to have firmly taken root, and where the greater number of his works, executed in Denmark, had their origin. He was of a healthful and simple disposition of mind, not without humor, and, therefore, he was extremely attached to Holberg the poet: he did not at all enter into the troubles and the disruptions of the world.

One morning at Nys÷—at the time when he was working at his own statue—I entered his work-room and bade him good morning; he appeared as if he did not wish to notice me, and I stole softly away again. At breakfast he was very parsimonious in the use of words, and when somebody asked him to say something at all events, he replied in his dry way:—

"I have said more during this morning than in many whole days, but nobody heard me. There I stood, and fancied that Andersen was behind me, for he came, and said good morning—so I told him a long story about myself and Byron. I thought that he might give one word in reply, and turned myself round; and there had I been standing a whole hour and chattering aloud to the bare walls."

We all of us besought him to let us hear the whole story yet once more; but we had it now very short.

"Oh, that was in Rome," said he, "when I was about to make Byron's statue; he placed himself just opposite to me, and began immediately to assume quite another countenance to what was customary to him. 'Will not you sit still?' said I; 'but you must not make these faces.' 'It is my expression,' said Byron. 'Indeed?' said I, and then I made him as I wished, and everybody said, when it was finished, that I had hit the likeness. When Byron, however, saw it, he said, 'It does not resemble me at all; I look more unhappy.'"

"He was, above all things, so desirous of looking extremely unhappy," added Thorwaldsen, with a comic expression.

It afforded the great sculptor pleasure to listen to music after dinner with half-shut eyes, and it was his greatest delight when in the evening the game of lotto began, which the whole neighborhood of Nys÷ was obliged to learn; they only played for glass pieces, and on this account I am able to relate a peculiar characteristic of this otherwise great man—that he played with the greatest interest on purpose to win. He would espouse with warmth and vehemence the part of those from whom he believed that he had received an injustice; he opposed himself to unfairness and raillery, even against the lady of the house, who for the rest had the most childlike sentiments towards him, and who had no other thought than how to make everything most agreeable to him. In his company I wrote several of my tales for children—for example, "Ole Luck Oin," ("Ole Shut Eye,") to which he listened with pleasure and interest. Often in the twilight, when the family circle sate in the open garden parlor, Thorwaldsen would come softly behind me, and, clapping me on the shoulder, would ask, "Shall we little ones hear any tales tonight?"

In his own peculiarly natural manner he bestowed the most bountiful praise on my fictions, for their truth; it delighted him to hear the same stories over and over again. Often, during his most glorious works, would he stand with laughing countenance, and listen to the stories of the Top and the Ball, and the Ugly Duckling. I possess a certain talent of improvising in my native tongue little poems and songs. This talent amused Thorwaldsen very much; and as he had modelled, at Nys÷, Holberg's portrait in clay, I was commissioned to make a poem for his work, and he received, therefore, the following impromptu:—

"No more shall Holberg live," by Death was said,

"I crush the clay, his soul's bonds heretofore."

"And from the formless clay, the cold, the dead,"

Cried Thorwaldsen, "shall Holberg live once more."

One morning, when he had just modelled in clay his great bas-relief of the Procession to Golgotha, I entered his study.

"Tell me," said he, "does it seem to you that I have dressed Pilate properly?"

"You must not say anything to him," said the Baroness, who was always with him: "it is right; it is excellent; go away with you!"

Thorwaldsen repeated his question.

"Well, then," said I, "as you ask me, I must confess that it really does appear to me as if Pilate were dressed rather as an Egyptian than as a Roman."

"It seems to me so too," said Thorwaldsen, seizing the clay with his hand, and destroying the figure.

"Now you are guilty of his having annihilated an immortal work," exclaimed the Baroness to me with warmth.

"Then we can make a new immortal work," said he, in a cheerful humor, and modelled Pilate as he now remains in the bas-relief in the Ladies' Church in Copenhagen.

His last birth-day was celebrated there in the country. I had written a merry little song, and it was hardly dry on the paper, when we sang it, in the early morning, before his door, accompanied by the music of jingling fire-irons, gongs, and bottles rubbed against a basket. Thorwaldsen himself, in his morning gown and slippers, opened his door, and danced round his chamber; swung round his Raphael's cap, and joined in the chorus. There was life and mirth in the strong old man.

On the last day of his life I sate by him at dinner; he was unusually good-humored; repeated several witticisms which he had just read in the Corsair, a well-known Copenhagen newspaper, and spoke of the journey which he should undertake to Italy in the summer. After this we parted; he went to the theatre, and I home.

On the following morning the waiter at the hotel where I lived said, "that it was a very remarkable thing about Thorwaldsen—that he had died yesterday."

"Thorwaldsen!" exclaimed I; "he is not dead, I dined with him yesterday."

"People say that he died last evening at the theatre," returned the waiter. I fancied that he might be taken ill; but still I felt a strange anxiety, and hastened immediately over to his house. There lay his corpse stretched out on the bed; the chamber was filled with strangers; the floor wet with melted snow; the air stifling; no one said a word: the Baroness Stampe sate on the bed and wept bitterly. I stood trembling and deeply agitated.

A farewell hymn, which I wrote, and to which Hartmann composed the music, was sung by Danish students over his coffin.

CHAPTER VII.

In the summer of 1842, I wrote a little piece for the summer theatre, called, "The Bird in the Pear-tree," in which several scenes were acted up in the pear-tree. I had called it a dramatic trifle, in order that no one might expect either a great work or one of a very elaborate character. It was a little sketch, which, after being performed a few times, was received with so much applause, that the directors of the theatre accepted it; nay, even Mrs. Heiberg, the favorite of the public, desired to take a part in it. People had amused themselves; had thought the selection of the music excellent. I knew that the piece had stood its rehearsal—and then suddenly it was hissed. Some young men, who gave the word to hiss, had said to some others, who inquired from them their reasons for doing so, that the trifle had too much luck, and then Andersen would be getting too mettlesome.

I was not, on this evening, at the theatre myself, and had not the least idea of what was going on. On the following I went to the house of one of my friends. I had head-ache, and was looking very grave. The lady of the house met me with a sympathizing manner, took my hand, and said, "Is it really worth while to take it so much to heart? There were only two who hissed, the whole house beside took your part."

"Hissed! My part! Have I been hissed?" exclaimed I.

It was quite comic; one person assured me that this hissing had been a triumph for me; everybody had joined in acclamation, and "there was only one who hissed."

After this, another person came, and I asked him of the number of those who hissed. "Two," said he. The next person said "three," and said positively there were no more. One of my most veracious friends now made his appearance, and I asked him upon his conscience, how many he had heard; he laid his hand upon his heart, and said that, at the very highest, they were five.

"No," said I, "now I will ask nobody more; the number grows just as with Falstaff; here stands one who asserts that there was only one person who hissed."

Shocked, and yet inclined to set it all right again, he replied, "Yes, that is possible, but then it was a strong, powerful hiss."

By my last works, and through a rational economy, I had now saved a small sum of money, which I destined to the purposes of a new journey to Paris, where I arrived in the winter of 1843, by way of D sseldorf, through Belgium.

Marmier had already, in the R vue de Paris, written an article on me, La Vie d'un Po te. He had also translated several of my poems into French, and had actually honored me with a poem which is printed in the above-named R vue. My name had thus reached, like a sound, the ears of some persons in the literary world, and I here met with a surprisingly friendly reception.

At Victor Hugo's invitation, I saw his abused Burggraves. Mr. and Mrs. Ancelot opened their house to me, and there I met Martinez della Rosa and other remarkable men of these times. Lamart ne seemed to me, in his domestic, and in his whole personal appearance, as the prince of them all. On my apologizing because I spoke such bad French, he replied, that he was to blame, because he did not understand the northern languages, in which, as he had discovered in late years, there existed a fresh and vigorous literature, and where the poetical ground was so peculiar that you had only to stoop down to find an old golden horn. He asked about the Trollh tta canal, and avowed a wish to visit Denmark and Stockholm. He recollected also our now reigning king, to whom, when as prince he was in Castellamare, he had paid his respects; besides this, he exhibited for a Frenchman, an extraordinary acquaintance with names and places in Denmark. On my departure he wrote a little poem for me, which I preserve amongst my dearest relics.

I generally found the jovial Alexander Dumas in bed, even long after mid-day: here he lay, with paper, pen, and ink, and wrote his newest drama. I found him thus one day; he nodded kindly to me, and said, "Sit down a minute; I have just now a visit from my muse; she will be going directly." He wrote on; spoke aloud; shouted a viva! sprang out of bed, and said, "The third act is finished!"

One evening he conducted me round into the various theatres, that I might see the life behind the scenes. We wandered about, arm in arm, along the gay Boulevard.

I also have to thank him for my acquaintance with Rachel. I had not seen her act, when Alexander Dumas asked me whether I had the desire to make her acquaintance. One evening, when she was to come out as Phedra he led me to the stage of the Th atre Fran ais. The Representation had begun, and behind the scenes, where a folding screen had formed a sort of room, in which stood a table with refreshments, and a few ottomans, sate the young girl who, as an author has said, understands how to chisel living statues out of Racine's and Corneille's blocks of marble. She was thin and slenderly formed, and looked very young. She looked to me there, and more particularly so afterwards in her own house, as an image of mourning; as a young girl who has just wept out her sorrow, and will now let her thoughts repose in quiet. She accosted us kindly in a deep powerful voice. In the course of conversation with Dumas, she forgot me. I stood there quite superfluous. Dumas observed it, said something handsome of me, and on that I ventured to take part in the discourse, although I had a depressing feeling that I stood before those who perhaps spoke the most beautiful French in all France. I said that I truly had seen much that was glorious and interesting, but that I had never yet seen a Rachel, and that on her account especially had I devoted the profits of my last work to a journey to Paris; and as, in conclusion, I added an apology on account of my French, she smiled and said, "When you say anything so polite as that which you have just said to me, to a Frenchwoman, she will always think that you speak well."

When I told her that her fame had resounded to the North, she declared that it was her intention to go to Petersburg and Copenhagen: "and when I come to your city", she said, "you must be my defender, as you are the only one there whom I know; and in order that we may become acquainted, and as you, as you say, are come to Paris especially on my account, we must see each other frequently. You will be welcome to me. I see my friends at my house every Thursday. But duty calls," said she, and offering us her hand, she nodded kindly, and then stood a few paces from us on the stage, taller, quite different, and with the expression of the tragic muse herself. Joyous acclamations ascended to where we sat.

As a Northlander I cannot accustom myself to the French mode of acting tragedy. Rachel plays in this same style, but in her it appears to be nature itself; it is as if all the others strove to imitate her. She is herself the French tragic muse, the others are only poor human beings. When Rachel plays people fancy that all tragedy must be acted in this manner. It is in her truth and nature, but under another revelation to that with which we are acquainted in the north.

At her house everything is rich and magnificent, perhaps too recherch . The innermost room was blue-green, with shaded lamps and statuettes of French authors. In the salon, properly speaking, the color which prevailed principally in the carpets, curtains, and bookcases was crimson. She herself was dressed in black, probably as she is represented in the well-known English steel engraving of her. Her guests consisted of gentlemen, for the greater part artists and men of learning. I also heard a few titles amongst them. Richly apparelled servants announced the names of the arrivals; tea was drunk and refreshments handed round, more in the German than the French style.