however, that he was also inspired by the plays of Shakespeare, and the
songs of Ossian, which came to him in the translations of Wieland.[4]

[3. Rønning--_Rationalismens Tidsalder_. 11-95.]

[4. Ewald--_Levnet og meninger_. Ed. Bobe. Kbhn. 1911, p. 166.]

A few years later, when he had learned English and read Shakespeare
in the original, he wrote _Balders Død_ in blank verse and
naturalized Shakespeare's metre in Denmark.[5] At any rate, it
is not surprising that this unknown plodder far north in Trondhjem
had not progressed beyond Klopstock and Ewald. But the result of
turning Shakespeare's poetry into the journeyman prose of a foreign
language is necessarily bad. The translation before us amounts to a
paraphrase,--good, respectable Danish untouched by genius. Two
examples will illustrate this. The lines:

.... Now lies he there,
And none so poor to do him reverence.

[5. _Ibid._ II, 234-235.]

are rendered in the thoroughly matter-of-fact words, appropriate for a
letter or a newspaper "story":

.... Nu ligger han der,
endog den Usleste nægter ham Agtelse.

Again,