The True Story of My Life

of our most beautiful places; the beechwoods there hang like a garland over the white chalk cliffs, from which a view is obtained far over the Baltic. I wis

d derive from this summer excursion, or what a

tic extend immense woods and hills; towards the North Sea, mountains and quicksands, scenery of a grand and solitary character; and between the two, infinite expa

pinion Andersen never wrote anything finer in the way of description than many parts of this work, though as a story it is not equal to his others.-M. H.] In the cities, where my "Journey on Foot" and my comic poems were known, I met with a good reception. Funen revealed her rural life to me; and, not far from my birth-place of Odense, I passed several weeks at the country seat of the

ark eyes fi

world, my hom

in them, and c

arth will thei

on: she loved another; she married him. It was not till several years later that I felt and acknowledged that it was best, both for her and for myself, that things had fallen out as they were. She

me precisely for that which a far deeper feeling had expelled from my breast. A new collection of Poetry, "Fancies and Sketches," which was published for the new year, showed satisfactorily what my heart suffered. A pa

Heine's poems, and they were very attractive for young Orla. He lived in the country, in the neighborhood of the castle of Fredericksberg. I went there to see him, and he sang as I came one of Heine's verses, "Thalatta, Thalatta, du eviges Meer." We read Heine together; the afternoon and the evening passed, and I was obliged to remain there all ni

word. A gentleman, now a clergyman, at that time a writer of vaudevilles and a critic, was not ashamed, in a company where I was, to go through several of my poems in this style; so that a little girl of six years old, who heard with amazement that he discovered everything to be wrong, took the book, and pointing out the conjunction and, said, "There is yet a little word about which you have not scolded." He felt what a reproof lay in the remark of the child; he looked ashamed and kissed the little one. All this wounded me; but I had, since my school-days, become somewhat timid, and that caused me to take it all quietly: I was morbidly sensitive, and I was good-natured to a fault. Everybody knew it, and some were on that account almost cruel to me. Everybody wished to teach me; almost everybody said that I was spoiled by praise, and therefore they would speak the truth to

little journey,-for instance, to North Germany,-in o

s for the first time,-the Harzgebirge. The world expanded so astonishingly before me. My good humor returned to me, as to the bird of passage. S

is eyes I shall never forget. I left him with tears, and prayed most fervently to God for strength to enable me to pursue the way after which my whole soul strove-strength, which should enable me to express that which I felt in my soul; and that when I next saw Tieck, I might be known

od Danish; I gave him my poems, and he was the first who translated any of them, and thus introduced me into Germany. It was thus he spoke of me at that time in the Morgenblatt: "Gifted with wit, fancy, humor, and a national naivet , Andersen has still in his power tones which awaken deeper echoes. He understands, in particular, how with pe

ch he had in my later writings may be seen by the printed le

re still prevailed at home the same petty pleasure in dragging out my faults, the same perpetual schooling of me; and I was weak enough to endure it from those who were officious meddlers. I seldom made a joke of it; but if I did so, it was called arrogance and va

of it here; I feel a necessity to do so; here to protest against the accusation of vanity, which, since no ot

ive, nay, impossible. I translated a few pieces for the theatre,-La Quarantaine, and La Reine de seize ans; and as, at that time, a young composer of the name of Hartmann, a grandson of him who composed the Danish folks-song of "King Christian stood by the tall, tall mast," wished for text to an opera, I was of course ready to write it. Through the writings of Hoffman, my attention had been turned to the masked comedies

tice which would be dealt to me. I needed money to live, and, what still more determined me to it, I felt flattered to have to work with Weyse our most celebrated composer. It delighted me that he, who had first spoken in my favor at Siboni's house, now, as artist, sought a noble connection with me. I had scarcely half finished the text, when I was already blamed for having made use of a well-known romance. I wished to give it up; but Weyse consoled me, and encouraged me to proceed. Afterwards, before he had finished the music, when I was about to travel abroad, I committed my fate, as regarded the text, entirely to his hands. He wrote whole verses of it, and the altered conclusion is wholly his own. I

part in the history of Danish criticism, that I must speak of him rather more fully. He is an industrious collector, writes extremely correct Danish, and his Danish dictionary, let him be reproached with whatever want he may, is a most highly useful work; but, as a judge of aesthetic works, he is one-sided, and even fanatically devoted to party spirit. He belongs, unfortunately, to the men of science, who are only one sixty-fourth of a poet, and who are the most incompetent judges of aesthetics. He has, for example, by his critiques on Ingemann's romances, shown how far he is below the poetry which he censures. He has himself published a volume of poems, which belong to the common run of books, "A Ramble through Denmark," written in the fade, flowery style of those times, and "A Journey through Ge

the temple. The deceased Baggesen sent polemical letters from Paradise, which resembled in the highest degree the style of that author. They contained a sort of apotheosis of Heiberg, and in

nts, but not me. I felt the wound of the sharp knife deeply. My enemies now regarded me as entirely shut out from the world of spirits. I however in a short time published a little book, "Vignettes to the Danish Poets," in which I characterized the dead and the living authors in a few lines each, but only spoke

at this present time. I felt, what since then has become an acknowledged fact, that travelling would be the best school for me. In the mean time I was told that to bring it under consideration I must endeavor to obtain from the most distinguished poets and men of science a kind of recommendation; because this very

opular life; Heiberg declared that, since the days of Wessel, no Danish poet had possessed so much humor as myself; Oersted remarked, every one, they who were against me as well as those who were for me, agreed on one subject, and this was that I was a true poet. Thi

t, as it will probably be the only time in which you will get abroad. You shall hear what people say about yo

More than one sorrow oppressed my heart, and although I opened the chambers of my heart to the world, one or two of them I keep locked, nevertheless. On setting out on my journey, my pr

poet, she elevated my mind; yes, and if there be tenderness and purity in anything which I have written, they are among those things for which I have especially to be thankful to her. Another character of great importance to me was Collin's son Edward. Brought up under fortunate circumstances of life, he was possessed of that courage and determination which I wanted. I felt that he sincerely loved me, and I full of affection, threw myself upon him with my whole soul; he passed on calmly and practically through the business of life. I often mistook him at the very moment when he felt for

arily along the shore, when a merman rose up from the waves and decoyed her by his speeches. She followed him to the bottom of the sea, remained there seven years, and bore him seven children. One day, as she sat by the cradle, she heard the church bells sounding down to her in the depths of the sea, and a longing seized her heart to go to church. By her prayers and tears she induced the merman to conduct her to the upper world again, promising so

will venture to say that the whole grew out of my heart; all the

oleon's pillar. I gazed on the world-experienced King Louis Philippe, who is evidently defended by Providence. I saw the Duke of Orleans, full of health and the enjoyment of life, dancing at the gay people's ball, in the gay Maison de Ville. Accident led in Paris to my first meeting with Heine, the poet, who at that time occupied the throne in my poetical world. When I told him how happy this meeting an

is, he gave me a cordial reception, and I had a vi

equal kindness. Victor

ris, and the whole mont

from home. Could my frie

At length, however, a

rge sum in postage. My

was, indeed, my first

ngle written word, no

a lampoon upon me, and

tage unpaid, probably

ble malice wounded me

uthor was, perhaps h

riend, and pressed my

I also h

the place in company. Letters are read by each other; news of home is received and talked over, and at last they hardly know whether they are in a foreign land or their own. I had given way to the same weakness in Paris; and i

ds, although I could not understand their patois; they shouted loudly into my ear, because they fancied I must be deaf, as I could not understand them. In the evenings, in that elevated region, there was a repose and a stillness in nature, and the sound of the evening bells ascended to us from the French frontier. At some distance from th

ast few years, I fancy, this poem has been somewhat more read, and has met with its friends. It was, however, a step forwards, and it decided, as it were, unconsciously to me, my pure lyrical phasis. It has been also of late critically adjudged in Denmark,

ses one porti