School of Life.) By A. QUEDNOW. Stuttgart. I have here been enumerated, there are many of 1842. 12. Linchen, oder Erziehungsresultate. Result of Education.) By DR. SCHIFF. burg. 1841. Ham By F. 13. Der Kerkermeister. (The Gaoler.) 1841. which it would be most charitable to say no(The thing, and of which the only redeeming quality is their brevity. The German novelist is not bound, like his fellow-labourer in London, to the prescribed length of three volumes, but may make his story as short or as long as he will, limiting himself, at his pleasure, to two volumes, to one, or even sending his little narratives out to the world by six or eight at a time, when each is too diminutive to be ushered forth by itself. In the above list, there are but few tales that occupy more than one volume, and that volume is mostly a dwarf compared to the bulky tomes issued in such quick succession from the factories of Marlborough-street or Burlingtonstreet. 15. Myosotis. By AMELIA VON SCHOPPE, geborne Weise. Leipzig. 1841. 16. Die Verwandten in Copenhagen. (Our Relations in Copenhagen.) By PENSOROSO. 3 vols. Leipzig. 1841. 17. Ibrahim Pascha. An Historical Picture of the Seventeenth Century. By GEORGE. Leipzig. 1841. 18. Die Marquise de Noverre. By M. DOERING. Leipzig. 1842. 19. Novellen. (Tales.) By JULIUS SEIDLITZ. Leipzig. 1842. 20. Hygea und Eros. Ein Cyklus interressanter Badegeschichten von BOHEMUS. 3 vols. Leipzig. 1842. 21. Mein Wanderbuch. (My Roadbook.) By C. HERLOSSOHN. 2 vols. Leipzig. 1842. 22. Grenzer, Narren, und Lootsen. (Borderers, Fools, and Pilots.) By ERNST WILLCOMM. 2 vols. Leipzig. 1842. 23. Erzstufen für 1842. (A Collection of 2 25. Die drei Schwestern. (The Three Sisters.) (Sketches of High Life.) Vol. I. Breslau. 1842. 28. Abendfahrten auf den Lagunen. (Evening Excursions on the Lagoons.) An Historical Novel, from the papers of a celebrated Cantatrice, by GEORG LOTZ. 3 vols. Hamburg. 1842. 29. Das Tyroler Bauernspiel. (The Peasant 30. Vier und zwanzig Stunden. (Twenty-four 31. Die Juden und die Kreuzfahrer in England, The Baron von Eichendorff's Scamp is but a half-and-half vagabond. The German word Taugenichts is far too severe for him, for the fellow is good for something; he can play the fiddle, and not only earn his own livelihood, but afford good entertainment to the Baron's readers. Eichendorff was hardly the man to paint a scamp; for the worst scamp, in passing through his hands, had certainly been converted into something upon which, though we might not esteem it, we should be sure to look indulgently. Eichendorff has long been an active contributor to the light literature of his country; and all his works, whether in verse or prose, preserve the same good-humoured, easy-going character that has recommended him to the kindness and indulgence of idle and uncritical readers. The Baron wants vigour, and many things beside; but he has a certain grace and humorous badinage, which appear nowhere to more advantage than in his smaller poems, of which a collection was published at Berlin in 1837. The tale now before us is neatly told; but, if we mistake not, has been printed before, and that nearly twenty years ago. The present edition has nothing new about it, we believe, but the clever illustra tions from the pencil of Schrödter, of Düsseldorf. Sternberg's Missionary' is a Moravian, who wanders forth on his mission of love to the new world. The scene opens immediately after the death of Zinzendorf, the founder of the sect, who at his death bequeathed his spiritual authority over his disciples to his daughter Sarah. At least the elders of the sect had not been able to Leip-gather more than that, from the feeble and imperfectly articulated words of the dying man. Zinzendorf, however, had left three daughters, each named Sarah, and the difficulty was, to know which of them the father had intended for his successor. The elders, after much deliberation, decided in favour of the youngest, a widow residing in Paris, who made her appearance among the plain and unsophisticated flock of Zinzendorf, with a splendid equipage, and a host of servants. The embarrassments of the lady herself in so unsuitable a situation, and still more the embarrassments of the flock, have been woven by the author into an interesting narra tive, well worthy of the repute he had before acquired. 32. Don Carlos, Prätendent von Spanien. 34. Gesammelte Novellen (The Collected Tales) Sternberg has now been about ten years beANONG the tales and novels of which the titles fore the German public as a novelist. His first work was Fortunat, a fairy tale, which has been | fraud precisely similar has been played by anorapidly followed by a multitude of tales, none ther German bookseller with August Lewald's of which can be said to betray any marks of the Seydelmann und das deutsche Schauspiel, which haste with which they must have been prepared has just been brought out as a new book, under for the press. His Die Zerrissenen had a great the title of Seydelmann, ein Erinnerungsbuch success, and the word itself became a password für seine Freunde. in familiar conversation throughout Germany. Amalia von Schoppe's novels already fill from His Lessing has likewise enjoyed popularity, 120 to 130 volumes, though the lady has scarcenotwithstanding its constant violation of locally been more than fifteen years before the pub-. and historical truth. His Molière, intended as a lic; and though she is a woman of talent, it is companion to Lessing, was, comparatively not surprising that her works should be hastily speaking, a failure. But in all his works we planned and very imperfectly finished. The find good taste and a fertility of invention, while collection of tales published under the title of his dialogues are full of spirit, and often the hap-Myosotis,' bears the usual characteristics of piest aphorisms are put into the mouths of his characters. It is in his shorter tales, however, that Sternberg is most happy; when he has attempted to expand his subject into a novel of several volumes, he has seldom been equally successful. The Family of Treuenfels is from the pen of an author who after a long interval comes again before the public, but with a work by no means calculated to support his former reputation. Something better might have been expected from one to whom we owe the Old Man of Fronteja, and Kurt der Jägerburche. Lubojatzky's Historical Novel is a striking and well-drawn picture of the state of society in Paris before the revolution of 1830. The conclusion of the work is yet to come; and though there can be little of suspense as to the winding up of a tale founded on events of such recent date, we must condemn this piecemeal system of publication. Who will not have forgotten the incidents of the first two volumes when the third appears ? Xenia is from a well-known pen, but will not add to the reputation of the authoress. Sartori is only an assumed name; the lady's real name is Neumann. The School of Life, by Quednow, appears to be the coup d'essai of a young author, who possesses information and good perceptive power, but after making an excellent plot, has spoiled it in the working out. There is much that is really promising in this little tale. Blood, murder, robbery, incest, perjury, seduction, madness, blasphemy, and bombast, are mingled in edifying confusion to make up Wangenheim's Gaoler, a concatenation of horrors suited to the morbid taste of a certain class of readers, but utterly revolting to common sense and good feeling. Dr. Schiff's novel of Linchen deserves notice only on account of the dishonest manner in which the author and the public have been dealt with by the publisher. Dr. Schiff some years ago published a tale under the title of Lie Ohrfeige. The thing had no more success than it deserved, but the copyright having passed in due time into the hands of another bookseller, a new titlepage was printed, and the old tale put forward under the new title of Linchen. The author published a declaration in the newspapers, with a view to exonerate himself from all participation in so gross a fraud; but the speculating man of trade came forth with a rejoinder, in which he insinuated that the author had been a consenting party to the trick. A VOL. XXX. 36 Amalia's former writings. Her historical tales show extensive reading, and just enough power to make us regret that so little pains should be expended on them. Among her writings none is calculated to excite more interest than the Erinnerungen aus meinem Leben, published in 1838, in which there is no doubt, her own history is represented under that of Clementine. If so, she presents herself to the public as a woman of no ordinary character, intelligent, but unimpassioned, of a frank and energetic disposition, and devoid of prudery and false sentiment. A son of Amalia von Schoppe, we perceive, has lately come before the public as a translator from the French. Mein Wanderbuch is a lively story enough, with some good pictures of modern manners. Willkomm is a favourite, and deservedly. He is most successful where a bold landscape forms the background to his pictures. His borderers, on the present occasion, are the mountaineers between Bohemia and Lusatia; his pilots are the denizens of the island rock, Heligoland. Ida Frick's writings, so far as literary worth goes, cannot be ranked above the commonplace, but it is impossible not to sympathize with her evident wish to raise her own sex by an improved system of education. She is an advocate for female emancipation, but her object is not a subversion of existing social relations. She envies her male friends the greater freedom they enjoy, but does so only because she sees in that freedom the means of obtaining greater knowledge, and a more vigorous development of mind. This longing to overbound the limits prescribed to the sphere of woman, is in our authoress free from all frivolity, and seems to be the result of a feeling that has manifested itself only at a mature period of life. In the collection of tales here presented to us, there is little either to praise or condemn. The Bandomire is an excellent subject well treated; the story is full of happy situations, and the interest admirably sustained to the last. The provincial history of Courland, where the scene is laid, is turned to good account, but more skill might have been shown in blending the fictitious with the historical portion of the novel. Laube, the author, is one of the writers of Young Germany.' He has had the honour of being thrown into prison; and, as all his works were prohibited, they had for several years to be published anonymously; but Laube has outlived the days of persecution, his former offences are forgotten, and he is now known, less as a political demagogue, than as one of the best tale-writers of his time. Among his most suc- | performance of a never-ceasing task, she does not fail to make her house as attractive as her means allow, to those who by visiting her husband, relieve in some measure the monotony of his life. Lotz's writings, as we have said, do not rise above mediocrity, but who could have the heart to judge otherwise than indulgently, of what has been written under circumstances apparently so adverse to literary composition? cessful works are: Das junge Europa, Die Schauspielerinn, Moderne Charakteristiken, and his Görres und Athanasius, a pamphlet on the religious disputes raised by the collision between the King of Prussia and the Archbishop of Cologne. Das Schloss Loevestein is a translation from the Dutch. The novel appeared in Holland in 1839, and its great success there has caused several translations to appear simultaneously in Germany. The work is unquestionably one of very high merit, but there is no probability that it will ever excite anywhere else the interest which has been manifested for it in Holland. The authoress of Sketches of High Life and of Schloss Goczyn may be reckoned among the best living lady writers of Germany. This first volume of a new series comprises the history of a young authoress, who is introduced to us under the name of Maria von Unruh. The scene is laid at the country-seat of a nobleman, where the young lady is expected as a visiter. A strong prejudice is awakened against her. Among some she is disliked merely because she writes; others are determined to keep aloof from her because they expect to find her supercilious and vain. Among those most prejudiced is the young Count of Solms. Maria appears, and her gentle and unaffected manners win for her every heart. The young Count becomes her warm admirer, offers her his hand, is accepted, and then seeks to extort from her a promise not again to write. Maria feels the demand as an insult, refuses to unite her fate with one who thus intimates a condemnation of her former career, and is soon convinced that what she had taken in herself for love, was merely admiration of the Count's personal advantages and agreeable manners. The Count travels away to digest his mortification, and the young lady is soon taught to distinguish between real affection and a passing caprice. Several secondary characters are grouped around the principal personages, and the whole forms an extremely pretty tale. The works of Georg Lotz are certainly common-place, but the wonder is that a man who throughout the greater part of his life has been blind and deprived of the use of all his limbs, should not only hold his place among the fertile novelists of the day, but should for several years past have edited a periodical, a great part of which is entirely of his own composition. The constant occupation in which his mind is thus kept, has prevented him from sinking into despondency, and strangers who visit him are astonished at the cheerful and lively conversation of one, who, unable to stir from his chair without assistance, and unblessed with the light of heaven, continues, nevertheless, by his mental exertions, to maintain himself and his family in honourable comfort. It has been the fortune of Lotz to find in his wife, a woman who, since he was overtaken by affliction, has softened the bitter cup by the most unremitting devotion. His amanuensis and his nurse alternately, she passes nearly every moment of the day by his side, and though she declines every invitation that would for a moment remove her from the The Tyroler Bauernspeil is a work of merit by an anonymous author, who evidently knows the Tyrol well. Andreas Hofer, and the other heroes of the Tyrolese war, are sketched with a bold and animated pencil, and the local dialect and picturesque scenery are turned to good account. Deutsche Dichter des Gegenwart. (German AMONG the difficulties which offer themselves to the student of a foreign literature, none are greater than that of knowing what is actually going on at the present time, and the opinion which is entertained of modern poets in their own country. M. Nodnagel's book, if continued in the manner in which it is begun (for it is published in numbers) will be found even more useful in England than in his own country. He gives a biography of the German poets of the day, with specimens of their works illustrated with copious notes, and a resumé of all the critiques upon them, pro and con, which have appeared in the various periodicals. Thus, with a very little trouble, is the reader put into the possession of a quantity of information, which, without such assistance, it would be impossible to obtain. The first number treats of Freiligrath and Eidendorff, and a notice of the most celebrated living poets is promised. Die Deutschen und Franzosen, nach dem Geiste ihrer Sprachen und Spruchwörter. (The Germans and French, according to the Spirit of their Languages and Proverbs.) By J. VENEDEY. Heidelberg: Winter. 1842. THIS is a very smart and ingenious little work, though we are at a loss to decide whether the author is propounding a serious theory, or whe ther he is attempting an elaborate sport. The view he maintains is, that the language of a nation being its heart, and the proverbs being the veins to carry the blood into all parts of its body, it is in these that the true essence of the people is to be sought in less metaphorical terms, that the peculiarities of a nation are immediately represented by those of the language and popular sayings, and that therefore these may be consulted as the true index of national character. The theory is followed out with much acuteness, first through the language, and then through the proverbs, of the Germans and the French. Thus, the French are shown to be less meta physical than the Germans, by the fact that they have no neuter gender. They could only grasp at the more material division into male and female, and not conceive that a spiritual glance, like that of the Germans, might distinguish a third category. When the vicissitudes of weather occur, the Frenchman is obliged to say, Il tonne, il neige, the pronoun il' meaning 'he'; while the Germans and English are enabled to throw a veil over the mystical cause of these events, by saying, Es donnert, es schneit,' It thunders, it snows. The grammatical forms of the French verbs reveal new truths to M. Venedey. Such niceties as the distinction between J'avais reçu' and 'J'eus reçu' are unknown to the English, Germans, and ancient Romans, but belong to the French, Spaniards, and modern Italians. This shows a strong resolution in the latter nations to bind the past to the present as long as they can: these subdivisions of the past being so many cords, that it may not be let slip. On the contrary, the French language is poor in its future forms, and the Frenchman, if he entertains a conditional wish, must use a present or past phraseology, and say, Si j'ai,' or "Si j'avais," while the German has a conditional future accurately expressed, namely, Wenn ich diess haben werde.' From this peculiar attachment both of the past and the future to the present, we gather the principle of French life: immediate enjoyment. The past is divided to connect it to the present, and the future is hastily anticipated. This is a pretty good specimen of the author's method of reasoning, a method which he pursues at some length in treating of the national proverbs. By thus pointing out the great difference of the two nations, he does not mean to fan the flame of mutual hostility, but, on the contrary, to bind them in friendly union, by showing that one possesses what the other wants. The book, even if in earnest, is a fanciful one; but, as it is well managed, and written in a lively, Young Germany' kind of style, it will well repay an evening's perusal. 6 TABLES OF FOREIGN LITERATURE. If the recentness of Russian Literature, and the difficulty of acquiring the language, have occa sioned it to be passed almost unnoticed by those who profess to give the history of European lite rature generally, the same reasons can be only in part assigned as the cause of like neglect with regard to that of Poland. What has been called the golden age' of Polish Literature, was the sixteenth century. The language had then been developed, fixed, and polished; and, so far, the Polish writers of that period were on a par with the contemporary English ones of our own Eliza bethan age. Unknown, too, as their vernacular productions were to other countries, the elegant Latinity of its scholars vindicates Poland from the reproach of unlettered barbarism. The name of Sarbiewski, familiar to almost every student, fully rivals those of Vida, and other illustrious writers of 'Leo's golden days.' The Polish language itself has of late years had a fulness and power infused into it, which it did not before possess; and casting off the trammels of French models, and of the correct but tame and frigid school of classical imitation, the literature is now displaying great energy, and no little activity. Mickiewicz is confessedly a master spirit; not only a great Polish, but a great European poet: one whose celebrity has extended afar, and will remain permanent. The present Table is by no means so complete as could be wished. It contains but few dates of births, and some of those of deaths, indicated by an * prefixed, are to be considered doubtful. Copious as it is in regard to names, Juszynki's "Dykcyonarz Poetow Polskich' has proved of little assistance to the compiler, for it is more of a bibliographical than a biographical work: besides which, although published in 1820, it does not come down to that period by about a century. In like manner Bentkowsky's 'Historia' is far more of a systematized bibliography, than of a history. Neither do Krasicki's brief notices of Polish writers, or similar articles in the Mala Encyklopedya Polska,' furnish many dates; and unlike the Conversations-Lexicon,' the 'Encyklopedya' gives no account whatever of living writers, relative to whom information would be most welcome. Wiszniewski's History of Polish Literature' will be most interesting and valuable should it be continued as it has begun. At present it is no more than a beginning, and upon such a scale that many years must elapse before it can be completed. |