The students and graduates, who had been
sitting in the room in lively converse, were struck dumb, awed by the
presence of the great man; after the lapse of a few minutes, one would
get up and say good-bye; immediately afterwards the next would remember
that he was engaged elsewhere just at that particular time; a moment
later the third would slip noiselessly out of the room, and it would be
empty.
There was one, however, who, under such circumstances, found it simply
impossible to go. I stayed, even if I had just been thinking of taking
my leave.
Under the autocracy, Orla Lehmann had been the lyrical figure of
Politics; he had voiced the popular hopes and the beauty of the people's
will, much more than the political poets did. They wrote poetry; his
nature was living poetry. The swing of his eloquence, which so soon grew
out of date, was the very swing of youth in men's souls then. At the
time I first knew him, he had long left the period of his greatness
behind him, but he was still a handsome, well set-up man, and, at 58
years of age, had lost nothing of his intellectual vivacity. He had lost
his teeth and spoke indistinctly, but he was fond of telling tales and
told them well, and his enemies declared that as soon as a witty thought
struck him, he took a cab and drove round from house to house to relate
it.
Pages:
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327