Meanwhile, his mission to write novels of peasant life became even clearer to Björnson, and after publishing anonymously a few shorter stories, by way of experiment, he gave the public, in 1857, his "Synnöve Solbakken." This literary _débût_ was a victory, and the reception of the little volume in Denmark, whose verdict is usually the decisive one for the poetic creations of Norway, especially tended to make it a decided triumph. The fresh originality, the novelty of the materials, and the manner in which they were handled, does not sufficiently explain this success. It was the result of the remarkable harmony of the book, with all that was desired and demanded of a poetic work by a portion of the reading world of the day. The national liberal party of that time (the party name was first adopted in Germany at a later period) absolutely determined the literary taste; it demanded something of a primeval Northern, vigorously national, ancient Scandinavian character, and at the same time,--an element which seemed curiously at variance with this,--Christian ethics, combined with an innocent idyllic tone, a poetry which banished Titanic defiance and modern passion with equal severity from its sphere. In the eyes of the national liberal party, passion was unpoetic and melancholy was affectation; the party of intelligence, as it is modestly called and still calls itself, deemed everything European suspicious, and believed that the far North alone had preserved that moral purity and freshness which was to regenerate the decaying civilization of Europe, and as for modern ideas, in the strictest sense of the words, they simply had no existence for the blissful ignorance of this party. Björnson's stories of peasant life, without considering their great and true merits, almost seemed like the fulfilment of the party programme. The circumstances of the poet's youth, and his early reading had led him to regard peasant life in the light of the old Norse sagas; while he had gained through his familiarity with the life and thought of the peasants, on the other hand, a comprehension of the ancient sagas. His first long story, as well as many of his very short ones (as "The Father," "The Eagle's Nest," etc.), produced a revival of the old saga style, while the materials, in conformity with the wishes of the people, were popular, without being characterized by sharply pronounced realism. In Germany Teutonists alone are familiar with the Icelandic sagas; in the Scandinavian countries, these in many respects admirable and almost always interesting narratives, have not only been popular since the revival of the national sentiment, but have been surrounded by a certain halo of glory, as venerable monuments of a great past. Beyond all else their style has been held in high esteem. And this style, calm, epic in nature, always presenting a clear picture that in the antique time sprang into existence as the form suitable for the