Their sole object had come to be a jealous
exclusion of all the higher forms of culture. The English were merely
taking what the Boers themselves had stolen from an earlier race; the
Boers had pitilessly hunted their precursors out of house and home, and
now they were tasting the same cup themselves. These were considerations
which had not occurred to generous sentimentalists in Norway, and
Ibsen's defence of England, which he supported in further communications
with irony and courage, made a great sensation, and threw cold water on
the pro-Boer sentimentalists. In Holland, where Ibsen had a wide public,
this want of sympathy for Dutch prejudice raised a good deal of
resentment, and Ibsen's statements were replied to by the fiery young
journalist, Cornelius Karel Elout, who even published a book on the
subject. Ibsen took dignified notice of Elout's attacks (December 9,
1900), repeating his defence of English policy, and this was the latest
of his public appearances.
He took an interest, however, in the preparation of the great edition of
his _Collected Works_, which appeared in Copenhagen in 1901 and 1902, in
ten volumes.
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