uccess of the
lyrical drama "Little Kirsten" (1846); and the somewhat ambitious epic
"Ahasverus" comes very near being a failure. The next ventures of the
versatile and indefatigable poet were the novel "The Two Baronesses"
(1849), and the fairy comedies "More than Pearls and Gold" (1849),
adapted from a German original, "The Sandman"[23] (1850), and "The Elder
Tree Mother" (1851). The comedies "He was not Born" (1864), "On
Langebro" and "When the Spaniards were Here" (1869), complete the cycle
of his dramatic labors. But the most amusing thing he did, showing how
incapable he was of taking the measure of his faculties, was to write a
novel, "To Be or Not to Be" (1857), in which he proposed once and
forever to down the giant Unbelief, prove the immortality of the soul,
and produce "peace and reconciliation between Nature and the Bible." It
was nothing less than the evidences of Christianity in novelistic form
with which he designed to favor an expectant world. "If[24] I can solve
this problem," he naively wrote to a friend, "then the monster
materialism, devouring everything divine, will die." But rarely was a
bigger Gulliver tackled by a tinier Liliputian. The book not only fell
flat, but it was only the world-wide renown and the good intention of
its author which saved it from derision.

[23] Danish, Ole Lukoeie.

[24] Hansen: Illustreret Dansk Litteratur Historie, ii. p. 560.

Though Andersen never attained in Copenhagen an uncontested recognition
of his talent, honors both from at home and abroad were showered upon
him. The fame which undeniably was his commanded respect, but scarcely
approval. Heiberg made merry at his obscurity in the country of his
birth and his celebrity beyond its boundaries, and represented him as
reading "The Mulatto" to the Sultan's wives and the "Moorish Maiden" to
those who were to be strangled, kneeling in rapture, while the Grand
Eunuch, crowned his head with laurels. But in spite of obloquy and
ridicule, Andersen continued his triumphant progress through all the
lands of the civilized world, and even beyond it. In 1875 his tale, "The
Story of a Mother," was published simultaneously in fifteen languages,
in honor of his seventieth birthday. A few months later (August 4th) he
died at the villa Rolighed, near Copenhagen. His life was indeed as
marvellous as any of his tales. A gleam of light from the wonderland in
which he dwelt seems to have fallen upon his cradle and to have
i