1829. J [ 145 ] 



A CHAPTER FROM THE MEMOIRS OF THE LATE MR. HERMAXN 

 ALSAGER, STUDENT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF STOCKHOLM. 



I HAVE thus brought down my narrative to the last year of my resi- 

 dence at the University. Hitherto what I have related has merely been 

 in sketch — for what more does the record of tasteless and puerile debau- 

 chery deserve ? — but graver matters now remain to be detailed. During 

 the vacation of the preceding year, which, after the fashion of most uni- 

 versity students I had spent in travelling, I had accidently fallen in with 

 a student of my own rank and standing, who accompanied me during 

 part of my rambles among the picturesque, but seldom-trodden wilds of 

 the Dofrafeld mountains. This collegian — whose name, for obvious pur- 

 poses, I sliall disguise under the fictitious appellation of Herwaldsen — 

 was about 26 years of age ; effeminate rather, and inclining to embon- 

 point in person ; easy and graceful in address ; soft in speech and 

 manner ; devoted to literature and the Fine Arts ; a first-rate linguist ; 

 and, above all, a complete man of the world, though without the cold- 

 ness, distrust, and heartlessness which an acquaintance with mankind 

 rarely fails to engender. I have said that Herwaldsen was effeminate ; I 

 should observe, however, that though passionately fond of woman, he 

 had about him a strong redeeming dash of boldness and enterprise. In 

 after years he might have sunk into a mere Epicurean ; but, at this 

 period, liis mind was too active, his ambition too stirring, to allow him — 

 though his finances were already sufficiently ample — to rest satisfied with 

 his present condition. He aimed at literary distinction, not in mathe- 

 matics or the abstract sciences — those enviable, high-toned pursuits, 

 whose chief objects are, first to prove, and secondly to disprove, that two 

 and three make six — but in the more social and comprehensive arena of 

 the Belles Lettres. Among modern authors, he chiefly admired Rousseau, 

 whose voluptuous sensibility and nice apprehension of the beautiful in 

 nature — I was going to add, in art — together with those striking creative 

 powers by wliich he imparted reality to fiction, and steeped inanimate 

 objects in the living splendours of a rich, sensitive, and prurient fancy, 

 seemed, in Herwaldsen's eyes, to constitute the very perfection of intel- 

 lect. 



It may be conceived, from this sketch of his character, what an attrac- 

 tive ti'avelling companion he must have made. Most literary men are 

 pedants, with but usually one topic of conversation, into which, as into 

 a vortex, all other subjects merge. Books are their IMaelstrom : into 

 tliis they plunge their friends, with this they create their solitude. Over 

 the narrow seas "of learning, they can skim lightly and in perfect safety ; 

 but, on the vast ocean of general information, they have neitlier skill, 

 rudder, nor compass whereby to guide their course. Herwaldsen, on the 

 contrary, was unlimited in the range of his conversation. Whatever 

 tended to improve or enlarge the mind, was with him a matter of interest. 

 He could laugh with Voltaire, weep with Rousseau, philosophize with 

 Rocliefoucault, be simple with Fontaine, eloquent and impressive with 

 Ulasillon, extravagant but profound with Rabelais, a special pleader with 

 Montesquieu, a determined egotist with IMontaigne. Such was Hei-- 

 waldsen, in the year 1818. What is he now, in the year 1828 ? Now, 

 when But I will not antici|)ate. 



On taking leave of him at Oarlstadt, previous to my departure for 



M.M. New Serks.—Yoh.VWl. No. 44. U 



