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Spindles rattle, wheels turn round, Spinning-songs depart; Songs which youth sings soon become Music of the heart. Here it was that I heard for the first time the word poet spoken, and that with so much reverence, as proved it to be something sacred. It is true that my father had read Holberg's play to me; but here it was not of these that they spoke, but of verses and poetry.

Among Holberg's many works the following are the most prominent: Peder Paars, a great comical heroic poem, containing sharp attacks on many of the follies of his time; about thirty comedies in Moliere's style, and a large number of historical works. Holberg, who was ennobled in 1747, died in January, 1754, and was buried in Sorö Church.

On Sundays, he made me perspective glasses, theatres, and pictures which could be changed; he read to me from Holberg's plays and the Arabian Tales; it was only in such moments as these that I can remember to have seen him really cheerful, for he never felt himself happy in his life and as a handicrafts-man.

Before the people on Holberg's farm had come in to breakfast, Rolf was snug in bed, with a large pitcher of whey by the bedside, to quench his still insatiable thirst. No one but the Holbergs knew of his being there; and he got away unseen in the afternoon, rested, shaven, and dressed, so as to look more like himself, though still haggard.

Many of the figures in Moliere's and Holberg's comedies, and in the innumerable farces written in imitation of them in the eighteenth century, now appear to us clumsy, extravagant caricatures.

"Das Donauweibchen" was the favorite piece of the whole city; there, however, I saw, for the first time, Holberg's Village Politicians treated as an opera.

It fell, I thought, on the slope by Flensborg Fiord, where the Danish flag waves over Schleppegrell's, Læssöe's, and their comrades' graves. One fell in the centre of the country near Sorö. It was a banquet for Holberg's grave a thank offering of years from many a thank offering for his splendid comedies! It is a glorious and gratifying fancy that a falling star could illumine our graves.

Strangely enough, in the grand surroundings, too much of the Northern pettiness came to the surface in them. One was continually tempted to call out to the ladies, in Holberg's words: "Hold your peace, you good women!" and to the men: "Go away, you rapscallions, and make up your quarrels!"

"Yes, that it has," said she, and then, just as she was going to tell him a great many pretty stories from Holberg's comedies, and about Waldemar and Absalom, she suddenly shrunk up together, and wagged her head as if she were a frog about to spring. "Croak," she cried; "it is always wet, and as quiet as death in Soroe." Then little Tuk saw she was changed into a frog.

Off with his black coat and clap on a red, and let the corporal teach him. He is a learned fellow, but, doubtless, stupid at drill." "That last," said Hardy, "is a reference to Holberg's play of 'Erasmus Montanus." "Yes," said Pastor Lindal; "and it amused the country. But they got hold of another idea, and tore it to shreds: they said if the flock goes to war, the shepherd should not be absent.