and approximate rendering. For example,
the translator no doubt understood the lines:

The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones.

but he could hit upon nothing better than:

Det Onde man gjor _lever endnu efter os_;
det Gode begraves ofte tilligemed vore Been.

which is both inaccurate and infelicitous. For the line

He was my friend, faithful and just to me.

our author has:

Han var min Ven, trofast og _oprigtig_ mod mig!

Again:

Has he, Masters? I fear there will come a worse in his place.

Translation:

Mener I det, godt Folk?--etc.

Despite these faults--and many others could be cited,--it is perfectly
clear that this unknown student of Shakespeare understood his original
and endeavored to reproduce it correctly in good Danish. His very
blunders showed that he tried not to be slavish, and his style, while
not remarkable, is easy and fluent. Apparently, however, his work
attracted no attention. His name is unknown, as are his sources, and
there is not, with one exception, a single reference to him in the later
Shakespeare literature of Denmark and Norway. Not even Rahbek, who was
remarkably well informed in this field, mentions him. Only Foersom,[6]
who let nothing referring to Shakespeare escape him, speaks (in the
notes to Part I of his translation) of a part of Act III of _Julius
Caesar_ in _Trondhjems Allehaande_. That is all. It it not too much to
emphasize, therefore, that we have here the first Danish version of any
part of _Julius Caesar_ as well as the first Norwegian translation of
any part of Shakespeare into what was then the common literary language
of Denmark and Norway.[7]

[6. _William Shakespeares Tragiske Vaerker--Forste Deel._ Khbn.
1807. Notes at the back of the volume.]

[7. By way of background, a bare enumeration of the early Danish
translations of Shakespeare is here given.

1777. _Hamlet_. Translated by Johannes Boye.

1790. _Macbeth_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.
_Othello_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.
_All's Well that Ends Well_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.

1792. _King Lear_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.
_Cymbeline_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.
_The Merchant of Venice_. Translated by Nils Rosenfeldt.

1794. _King Lear_. Nahum Tate's stage version. Translated by Hans
Wilhelm Riber.

1796. _Two Speeches._--To be or not to be--_(Hamle