reddendo; but held, as it has been proudly expressed, by the right by which the crown itself is held. Udal land is possessed, consequently, without charter, and is subject to none of the burdens and casualties affecting land held by feudal tenure direct from the sovereign, or from his superior vassal."

The effects of this arrangement are perceptible in the character of the Norwegian peasantry, and are proofs of its wisdom and benificence.

"There is no circumstance in the condition of the people of this country which strikes the observer more than the great equality of all classes, not only in houses, furniture, diet, and the enjoyment of the necessaries and comforts of life, but in manners, habits and character: they all approach much more nearly to one standard than in any other country; and the standard is far from being a low one as to character, manners and habits. In these the educated and cultivated class are, to English feelings at least, far above the higher classes in other foreign countries. They seem to have more affinity to those of our own countrymen; but the lower classes appear to have made a nearer approach to the higher than in other countries. This is probably owing to the diffusion of property going on perpetually through all the ranks of society, and carrying down with it to the lower strata its humanising influences upon the character, the civilization, the self-respect, the moral restraint, the independence of spirit, and the amiable manners and consideration for others in domestic intercourse even among the lowest of the people, which, in other countries are found only among the classes in easy circumstances. The cause seems to be that between the distribution and general dissemination of property by their peculiar law of succession, and the general simplicity of the way of living, a greater proportion of the people really are in easy circumstances than in any other country in Europe. The alternate descent and ascent of property through the whole mass of society, like heat applied to the fluid in a caldron, has brought the whole to a nearly equal temperature. All have the ideas, habits and character of people possessed of independent property, which they are living upon without any care about increasing it, and free from the anxiety and fever of money-making, or money-losing."

The author gives this brief and sensible explanation of the fact.

"Reading and writing are but means of education, not even efficacious in all states of society. A man may read and write, and yet have a totally uneducated mind. He who possesses property, whether he can read and write or not, has an educated mind; he has forethought, caution, and reflection, guiding every action; he knows the value of self-restraint, and is in the constant habitual practice of it." The same fact is not without influence on the manners of the people.

"The good manners of the people to each other are very striking, and extend lower among the ranks of society in the community than in other countries. There seem none so uncultivated or rude, as not to know and observe among themselves the forms of politeness. The brutality, and rough way of talking to and living with each other, characteristic of our lower classes, are not found here. It is going too far for a stranger to say there is no vulgarity; this being partly relative to conventional usages, of which he can know but little; but there is evidently an uncommon equality of manners among all ranks; and the general standard is not low. People have not two sets of manners, as we see in England, among persons even far above the middle class : one set for home use-rude, selfish and frequently surly; and another set for company-stiff, constrained, too formally polite, and evidently not habitual. The manners here are habitually good, even among the lower ranks. It is possible that the general diffusion of property (the very laborers in husbandry possessing usually life rents of their land) may have carried down with it the feelings, and self-respect, and consideration for others that we expect for ourselves, which prevail among the classes possessing property, although of a larger extent in other countries, and which constitute politeness. It may also be ascribed to the naturally mild and amiable character of this people; and, perhaps, also to their having retained in their secluded glens many usages and forms of politeness which once prevailed generally in the good society of ancient Europe, but have been properly discarded as unnecessary restraints upon the intercourse of the educated and refined classes of modern society;

although, when these forms and usages are, by the spirit of imitation, banished from the secondary classes also, among whom there is sometimes a want of the refinement and cultivation that render them unnecessary, the improvement is not always happy.

"Tak for sidste' is another exploded form of politeness, still universal here. It means, thanks for the pleasure I had from your company the last time we met.' It is a compliment of recognition, which it would be extremely rude to neglect. The common people give, tak for sidste, to the Swedish peasants of Jemteland, who have come across the Fjelde, and whom they have certainly not seen since the preceding year's snow; and then possibly only in taking a dram together. A laborer never passes another at work, or at his meal, without a complimentary expression, wishing him luck in his labor, or good from his meal. In addition to these, perhaps not altogether useless, forms, there are the ordinary inquiries after friends at home, and compliments and remembrances sent and received, in due abundance."

The history and present state of Norway give ample proof that other things besides books and schools have much to do with the culture of a people. Beside the educating influences in the frame of government and the usages of social life, the periodical press exercises much sway there as elsewhere. Mr Laing says,

"The state of the periodical press in a country gives a true measure of the social condition of the people, of their intelligence, their ripeness for constitutional privileges, and even of their domestic comforts. The newspapers, since I came here, have been my principal and most instructive reading. In Norway there are upwards of twenty; but some only give the advertisements and official notices of the province or town in which they appear; even these are not without interest to a stranger. It is curious to see what is to be sold or bought, and all the various transactions announced in an advertising newspaper. Of those which give also the foreign and domestic news, the most extensive circulation appears enjoyed by a daily paper called the Morgen Blad, published in Christiania. The cost of a daily paper sent by post is seven dollars, or about 28s. sterling yearly. There is no duty on newspapers; and as there are six or seven published in Christiania alone, this price is probably as

low as competition can make it. In paper and type, this journal is superior to any French or German one that I have seen; and its articles of foreign news, and its editorial paragraphs, are often written with great ability. From the importance attached in all these newspapers to little local affairs, it is evident that the mass of the people, not merely an educated few, are the consumers. There being no tax on advertisements, the most trifling matter is announced, and a publisher appears to have a kind of brokerage trade at his counting-house, and to be empowered to sell or buy for parties, or at least to bring buyers and sellers together.

I have seen it advertised, with a reference to the editor's counting-house, that there was a turkey cock to be sold, a cow in calf wanted, and such trifles as show, that the class to whom they are no trifles, read and have the benefit of newspapers.

Public

The most entire freedom of discussion exists. men and measures are handled freely, but I cannot say injuriously or indecorously. The Norwegian newspapers, and especially their numerous correspondents, are much occupied with objects of local interest, and keep a watchful eye over the conduct of men in office, from the lensman of a parish to a minister of state. No neglect or abuse passes unseen and unnoticed; and if the accusation even of an anonymous correspondent, appears well founded, the highest functionary feels himself morally obliged to bend to public opinion, and explain the transaction. If he is unjustly or unreasonably blamed, he finds pens drawn in his defence without trouble to himself. The public functionaries have been made to feel that they are the servants, not the masters, of the public.

"The temperate but firm spirit with which these controversies are carried on, the absence of any outrage on the private feelings of public men, even when their public conduct is attacked or exposed, do honor to the good taste and good sense of the nation, and prove that a press as free as that of the United States may exist without scurrility or brutal violation of the sanctity of private life. Such newspapers as the American people read would not find editors or readers in this country. The people are advanced beyond that state, in which nothing is intelligible to them that is not mixed up with party and personal feelings. This sound

state of the public mind, and of the press, may be ascribed in a great measure to the influence of the leading newspa

pers.

"Besides newspapers, there are a considerable number of periodical and occasional works published. There is a Penny Magazine in great circulation; the matter, and even the plates, I believe, taken, or borrowed, from its English namesake; and there is another weekly magazine upon the same cheap plan. There are several monthly journals on literary, antiquarian, agricultural, and military subjects; and in almost every newspaper there is the announcement of some new work or translation. This gives a favorable impression of the advance of the mind in this country. The literature that can be strictly called Norwegian, may not as yet be of a very high class, compared to the standard works of other countries; but there are attempts which at last may reach excellence, and literature is but young in Norway."

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Of their literature he gives no high promise.

"From the end of the twelfth century, when Snorro Sturleson flourished-and he was a native of Icelanddown to the present day, Norwegian literarure is almost a blank. Holberg, a native of Norway, produced about the beginning of last century, a great many clever dramatic pieces. His Erasmus Montanus, Henry and Pernille, and many others of his comedies, would probably act well on our stage. His World below Ground has long been a favorite book with English schoolboys. His Peder Paars is a comic poem,-the adventures of a shopkeeper on his voyage to Calenburgh to see his feste moe or betrothed sweetheart; and is as witty as an ingenious parody of Homer or Virgil with all the machinery of gods and goddesses humorously applied, can be. In the lower departments of literature, such as the antiquarian and statistical, there have been writers of merit. It is evident, however, that no great literary effort has ever been made in Norway. It is possible that the state of society is not favorable to great mental exertion. There is nothing to be gained by it; and intellectual labor seems to follow the same law as bodily labor-where people are very much at their ease, not urged by want nor by ambition, they will make no violent exertion. They will neither build pyramids nor write Iliads."