3 6o Norway and the Norwegians 



after (1814), that a genuine Norse literature once more 

 arose. It is usual to date the beginninn; of it from 

 the appearance of the patriotic effusions, pamphlets, 

 and poems which celebrated the proclamation of a 

 separate constitution for Norway. The poetry, espe- 

 cially, which this event called forth, was voluminous 

 in quantity; but of a quality which left much to be 

 desired. The date of the proclamation of the Norse 

 Constitution was the 17th of May 1814. AVherefore 

 this class of poetry went by the name of 17th of May 

 poetry (' Syttendemai Poesi'). The authors were called 

 ' Syttendemai ' poets. 



This literature attained its zenith in the writings 

 of a poet of much higher inspiration than the others, 

 Peter Wergeland by name, the father, as he is 

 generally reckoned, of modern Norse poetry. Werge- 

 land's writing is distinguished by the sort of graceful 

 and facile optimism which is most popular with the 

 half educated ; and the reading class in Norway was 

 then — nay, it still is — composed mainly of the half 

 educated. To compare AVergeland to Longfellow will 

 perhaps give the English reader the best notion of 

 what I mean by the facile and graceful, but it must 

 be also added rather cheap and conventional poetry of 

 this author. The best known of Wergeland's poems is 

 ' Den Engilske Lods,' ' The English Pilot.' It gives a 

 series of travel-pictures very largely of English coast 

 scenery in graceful and agreeable verse. 



Welhaven is the writer next in importance after 

 Wergeland, of whom he was the contemporary, and 

 to whom he presents in many points an almost 

 exact antithesis. Welhaven has little sympathy with 



