admiration to which they are entitled, both from the purity and grandeur of their conception, and the felicity of their execution. For ourselves, we do not hesitate to say, that we look upon the Jason as the finest piece of sculpture which the present age has produced. There is a noble and grand simplicity in the attitude of the principal figure in the groupe, worthy of the antique. The head is fine and commanding, full of beauty and of vigour; the arm is extended bearing the fleece, and is executed with the greatest muscular precision. It is indeed the beau ideal of a heroic warrior, full of life and grace, and shews altogether an elevation of conception in the artist, worthy of the best æra of Athenian sculpture. In his basso relievo of Night flying over the world, there is an embodying of ideal beauty, inferior to none, perhaps superior to any modern creation of the chisel. There is in it a beautiful alternation of rest and motion exquisitely blended into each other; it displays also a lightness and animation of which it would have been difficult to have conceived the marble to be susceptible. His Psyche, Bacchus, and Cupid, his Priam bearing Hector from the field, his Ganimede presenting drink to the eagle of Jove, are all masterpieces, and it is pleasing to reflect that it is to the patronage afford. ed by our countrymen to this foreign artist that we indebted for them. They are all to be found in English collections.

On his return from Italy, Thorvaldsen was welcomed by his countrymen with enthusiasm and delight. The highest honours were lavished on this distinguished sculptor. Princes swelled his train, poets celebrated his triumphs, and medals were struck in commemoration of the glorious epoch of his returning, crowned with fame and with honours, to his native shore,

Such honours Denmark to Thorvaldsen paid, And peaceful slept the mighty sculptor's

shade.

Whatever celebrity the painters of Denmark may have acquired, has been chiefly confined to their own country. Of these, the late Professor Juel is the most eminent, and since his death there has arisen no rival to his fame. The tone of his colouring wanted softness, but his paintings are uniformly characterized by a masterly strength of

outline, and a skill in the distribution of his lights which mark him a superior artist. Of the living Danish painters we shall say nothing, being quite destitute of materials for forming any judgment of their merits. According to Mr Feldberg, Professor Eckersberg, Mr Dahl, and Mr Moller, are the most eminent.

Having discussed the fine arts, we now turn to the subject of Danish literature and Danish literati, one more consonant to our talents and pursuits. We regret that this subject occupies so small a portion of Mr Feldberg's work, and trust that in the future numbers of his work, this cause of complaint will be obviated.

Those of our readers who have had the good fortune to meet with a small volume of admirable translations from the Danish, published in 1808, will agree with us, we think, in forming a very high estimate of the poetical talent now existing in Denmark. Who the translator is, we know not; but he is embued with the very spirit of his originals, and eminently qualified by his talents to do them ample justice;-and we trust, for their sakes as well as ours, he will not stop short in his career. Of the Danish poets, we are inclined to rank none before Mr Foersom, the translator of Shakespeare. The boldness of this attempt has been equalled only by its success, and it is bestowing the very highest praise on Mr Foersom to say that in his hands Shakespeare has not been debased. Much of Shakespeare is untranslateable. Many, very many, of his beauties are so embodied in the language in which he wrote, so entwined with its idiom, so essentially English, as to be altogether unconvertible into another tongue. No one knew this better than Foersom, and no one was more sensible of the difficulties of his undertaking. He has failed, it is true, where eminently successful, and the whole success was impossible, but he is often work is Shakespearian to a degree not attained by any other translator. The following extract will shew the difficulties which Mr Foersom had to encounter in the progress of his work, while its conclusion proves that he at least possessed the enjoyment, "Laudari a viro laudato."

"With this view he projected a translation of Shakespeare, beginning, as was natural to a Dane, with Hamlet. Julius Cæsar was

added; and both tragedies appeared in the year 1807. With that refined delicacy and sense of propriety which characterised all Mr Foersom's words and actions, he inscribed the translation to an exalted personage who was most intimately connected with the poet's country-the princess whom, it will be recollected, Mr Southey so feelingly mentions, while describing the sufferings of her mother, Queen Carolina Matilda. He prefixed the following dedicatory lines to her Royal Highness Princess Louisa Augusta, Princess Royal of Denmark:

• Snatch'd from the scenic monarch's glorious

crown,

A few stray gems I bring. Before thy feet, Exalted fair, in every charm complete, With reverence and delight I lay them down. Their home was ever in the princely breast:

That crowned vestal, western sun of fame, She loved them; and in their unfading flame The image of her brightness shines confess'd. As when the flow'rets of the spring unfold Their censers, with the pearls of morn replete,

Nature's sweet sacrifice, the lordly sun Joys to illume them; on my offering bold, Sun of the north, from thy resplendent seat,

Of all thy countless rays, oh! shed but one!'

"Foersom had previously submitted his translation of Julius Cæsar to the Royal Board of Theatrical Managers, in the hope that it might be brought upon the stage ;but the royal managers did not consider the tragedy fit for representation. They expressed, however, their high sense of the merits of the translation, and presented Mr Foersom with a gratuity of fifty rix-dollars, which then amounted to about £10. This he acknowledges in his preface, with the feelings of Samuel Johnson, when he ad dressed his famous letter to Lord Chesterfield.

"The public received the translations of Hamlet and Julius Cæsar with unqualified approbation. They were reviewed with great spirit in the 19th Number of the Literary Intelligencer of Copenhagen, for 1807, by the late Captain Abrahamson, a most distinguished veteran in literature, He took occasion to remark, that the Danish translator possessed the most intimate know. ledge of the writings of the British bard, and would therefore naturally feel a desire to transfer them into his own language. He stated, that Foersom had given the text of his author with the fidelity which the admirers of Shakespeare were entitled to require; and, in fact, that he had executed his task quite con amore; at the same time expressing his conviction, that the happiest results might be anticipated from Mr Foersom's translations of Shakespeare's other plays.

The testimony of a man so competent to sit in judgment upon the subject as Captain Abrahamson, was the more gratifying to Foersom, as he had experienced considerable difficulties in bringing the translation before the public. He, indeed,

complains in his preface, that he had for years sought a publisher, even on terms unfairly fair. The value of money in Denmark has varied so much of late years, that it is not possible to state precisely what the booksellers may have paid. But in a letter now before me, dated 6th July, 1816, Foersom observes, The pen frequently drops from my hand, when I reflect that I do not earn dry bread by the translation of Shakespeare, and that I must even think myself well paid if a bookseller gives me 200 rix-bank-dollars (then about £7) for translating two of Shakespeare's tragedies, and reading the proofs for the press.'

"It redounds so much the more to his honour that he persevered in the undertaking which he had so successfully begun. A second edition of Hamlet and Julius Cæsar was called for; and, in 1810, his translations of King Lear and Romeo and Juliet were published.

"About this time, the writer of these lines became acquainted with Mr Foersom. He had in the preceding year read the translations of Hamlet and Julius Cæsar, and, in consequence, formed a wish to see the translator. Through a common friend, Mr Na, thansson, of whom honourable mention has already been made, this object was attained. He saw Mr Foersom, for the first time, at the Theatre-Royal of Copenhagen, whete he performed the part of Charles Surface, in the School for Scandal, which was acted for the benefit of Mr Schwartz, one of the best actors in Denmark, who had travelled in England, and was well known to Garrick, George Keate, and other distinguished characters. The part of the gay and thought. less Charles was evidently unsuited to the translator of Shakespeare; in fact, he had undertaken it at a moment's notice, the person who usually performed it having been taken ill. After the play, Mr Foer

som came into Mr Nathansson's box, and soon, by his engaging and unassuming manner, raised as high an opinion of his personal character as I had long since formed of his mental endowments.

"Will you allow me, Mr Foersom, to account for the wonderful success with which you have translated Shakespeare?" said I. He bowed assent, and I proceeded :— In my boyhood, I read in Professor Abraham Kall's history about the Pythagorean doctrine of the transmigration of souls, and I must beg to express my belief, that the spirit of Shakespeare animates the Danish form now standing before me.' Mr Föersom modestly remarked, that a Dane enjoy. ed peculiar facilities in translating from the English.

An intimacy ensued. Indeed the moments I passed with Mr Foersom at Copenhagen, in 1810, were of singular value in the wretched state of the world at that juncture."

Of such contemporary authors as are noticed in the work of Mr Feldberg, proceed we now with brevity to speak. Evald is a poet of considerable powers. He has written several pieces for the stage, which have been eminently succesful, and display a masterly talent for the delineation of human passion, and those evanescent aspirations after virtue, to which even the guiltiest bosom cannot entirely cease to be alive. As a specimen of his talents, we give the following song, which, among some bad taste, shews considerable descriptive power.

"King Christian took his fearless stand 'Midst smoke and night;

A thousand weapons rang around,
The red blood sprung from many a wound,
'Midst smoke and steam to the profound
Sunk Sweden's might!

Fly, sons of Swedes! what heart may dare
With Denmark's Christian to compare
In fight?'

"Niels Juel beheld the storm roll nigh; The hour is come!"

He waves the crimson flag on high,
The blows in doubling volleys fly,
Tis come,' the foes of Denmark cry,
'Our day of doom!

Fly ye who can! what warrior dares
Meet Denmark's Juel, that man prepares

His tomb!'

"Sea of the North! aloft behold
Thy third bolt fly!

Thy chilly lap receives the bold,
For terror fights with Tordenskiod,
And Sweden's shrieks, like death-bell toll'd,
Ring through thy sky.

Onward the bolt of Denmark rolls;
Swedes! to Heaven commit your souls,
And fly!'

and it may be questioned, whether the pain of the fall does not frequently more than counterbalance the pleasure of the excursion. His course is lofty, but not equable. When we travel with him, we sometimes cleave the impalpable sky with the swiftness of the falcon, and, at others, are jolted along a detestable road, in a vehicle slower and more cumbrous than the Newcastle waggon. And yet it is perhaps the highest praise of this extraordinary genius, that, maltreated as we are, we never wish to stop, but are content to journey on with him to the last. Such of our readers as are anxious to acquire a more intimate knowledge of the cha racter and distinctive beauties of Oeh

lenschlager than could possible be derived from any description of our own, we beg to refer to the beautiful translations of some of his most popular dramas which have already appeared in this miscellany.-Baggesen is the Moore, and Ramdohr is the Jeffrey of Denmark; the one has all the lightness, the brilliancy, and the sparkling effervescence of fancy, which distinguish the bard of Lalla Rookh, and the other adds a greater depth and solidity of acquirement to the splendid powers of illustration and of reasoning distinctive of the Caledonian Aristarchus. In short, he carries heavier metal, and is the cock of a more extended walk than Mr Jeffrey has ever occupied. No man possesses a finer and more discriminative taste in the fine arts than Ramdohr. With regard to literature, he stands also on much higher ground than Mr Jeffrey can pretend to. There is no department of it which he has

way

To might and fame!

Receive thy friend, whose spirit warm
Springs to meet danger's coming form,
As thy waves rise against the storm,
And mounts to flame!

'Midst song and mirth life's path I'll tread,
And hasten to my ocean-bed
Through fame."

But, in the walks of dramatic literature, Oehlenschlager is unrivalled. He possesses a sway over our feelings to which no other poet of his age and nation can make any pretensions. Yet this power, we think, he isnot always sufficiently careful not to abuse. In the wildness of his imagination, he delights to soar into the loftiest regions of poetry, and suddenly to dash us to the ground;

writings do not bear record of his having excelled. No wonder, then, that in his own country, his criticisms are received with deference and respect; that authors bow to his decision with a reverence, altogether unknown to the grumbling and lacerated victims of the Edinburgh or the Quarterly. Mr Bag gesen is the friend and associate of this distinguished individual, and worthy of the honour. His poems are like jewels of the first water, small but valuable. There is a tenderness and delicacy of sentiment, a splendour of imagination in the whole, which renders them very enchanting. We know of no extended work in which Mr Baggesen has exerted himself. No author is more capable of doing justice to one,

and we trust, that ere long, he will consecrate his fame to after-ages in an epic poem, as he has already done in the lighter, though not less difficult walks of the art. To shew the estimation in which these two distinguished persons are held in Denmark, we lay

before them an epigram by Thaarup, which two of our contributors have been kind enough to translate. As the merits of these translations are somewhat different, we beg to submit them both to the judgment of our readers:

BY DR SCOTT.

If in a dungeon I were thrown
By some fell tyrant's cruel rage,
Two authors left to me alone,

To charm me with their speaking page.

Homer nor Virgil would I chuse
To sooth of solitude the damn'd bore;
I'd seek in Baggesen my muse,
And find philosophy in Ramdohr.

For what toils, what sufferingswould not such praise afford an ample recompence! Having thrown together these few hasty observations on some of the great men, of whom notice is introduced by Mr Feldberg in his work, we shall conclude the present article with a few extracts from the lighter part of the volume before us. There is a great deal of statistical information contained in it, and the local descriptions are executed with a talent and truth, which prove Mr Feldberg to be no unobservant spectator of nature, under all her forms. The following description of Cronenburgh Castle will be interesting to our readers, from the knowledge that it formed the prison of the unfortunate Queen Caroline Matilda :

"The Castle of Cronenburgh, in the vicinity of Elsinore, was built by Frederick II. in the boldest style of Gothic architecture. Mr Boesen, an honest old historian of the place, while describing the position, solidity, and magnificence of the castle, affirms, that it may rank with the noblest castles, not only in the North, but in all Europe.

"This venerable edifice is connected with subjects of traditional, dramatic, and historical interest. On descending into the casemates, the story of Holger Danske, (or Ogier the Dane, as he is called in the French romances), will amuse the mind in these damp and dismal vaults. It is thus related by Mr Thiele: For many ages the din of arms was now and then heard in the vaults beneath the Castle of Cronenburgh. No man knew the cause, and there was not in all the land a man bold enough

BY ODOHERTY.

If a king should be so incorrect,
As into a dungeon to cram me,
And bid me two authors select,
To lighten my solitude, damme!
Though the want of old Ebony's Maga-
zine,

I still must consider a damn'd bore;
For poet, I'd pick out Bill Baggesen-
For critic, I'd pitch upon Ramdohr.
to descend into the vaults. At last a slave,
who had forfeited his life, was told, that
his crime should be forgiven if he could
bring intelligence of what he found in the
vaults. He went down, and came to a
when he knocked. He found himself in a
large iron door, which opened of itself
deep vault. In the centre of the ceiling
hung a lamp, which was nearly burnt out;
and, below, stood a huge stone-table, round
which some steel-clad warriors sat, resting
their heads on their arms, which they had
laid crossways. He who sat at the head of
the table then rose up. It was Holger the
Dane. But when he raised his head from
his arms, the stone-table burst right in
twain, for his beard had grown through it.
The slave durst not give him his hand, but
'Give me thy hand!' said he to the slave.
dented with his fingers. At last he let go
put forth an iron bar, which Holger in-
his hold, muttering, It is well! I am
glad that there are yet men in Denmark.'

"Leaving the casemates, and ascending the ramparts, Englishmen will find themselves on classic ground. Here they may indulge the fancy of Mr Matthison, the celebrated Swiss poet, who made the venerable ghost of Hamlet's father appear on the platform, when he exclaimed

There are more things in heaven and earth,
Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.'