THE NEIGHBOURS.

IT has often been a matter of wonderment why the French, a mer- curial people, and other Continental nations with more vivacity of temperament than we possess, should have been content in their dramas with long addresses of sentiment, and in their literature with roundabout reflections; while a practical and reflective people like the English should require in their plays a continuous action, in their fictions a stirring story and rapid narrative, and even in their philosophy a directness of conclusion leading at once to some definite, end. It is our practical character, however, which induces thisappa. rent discrepancy. Accustomed in thought and action to tend directly , "to the point," we cannot bear fine words which have no immediate purpose; whereas nations with less industrious habits, and little business to attend to, are more tolerant of the u longwindedness" which is our abhorrence, and perhaps from their listless lives are more readily entertained. A people who will waste an hour in waiting patiently for a stage-coach, and amuse themselves with any thing that offers, are likely to submit with equal patience to elaborate descriptions and disquisitions, if possessing literary merit. Hence, whilst the general run of our dramas and fictions abound in crowded and improbable incident and exaggerated character, many foreign tales are commonplace in their story, and aim at effect by slow and minute touches in working up their details, like GERARD Douw over his broom.

Of this character is The Neighbours of FREDERIKA BREMER.

Apart from a romantic personage in Mr. Bruno, the novel is truly " a story of every-day life." Lars Anders, a Swedish physi- cian, verging upon fifty, addicted to smoking and other peculiari- ties, marries a patient, approaching thirty, whose family has been reduced by misfortune. The Doctor carries his wife home to a country-house ; and a good deal of the book consists in her de- scriptions of Swedish country-life, and of the characters and do- mestic management of her " neighbours," written in letters to a friend. As a picture of manners in an educated and even accom- plished but a primitive state of society, the work is exceedingly curious,—just the sort of life, allowing for national differences, which the wife of an English country-gentleman, or as he would now be called a gentleman-farmer, might have described a hundred years ago, when it was the custom of the ladies to keep the keys and give a personal superintendence to household doings, when

the servants were considered more a part of the family, and society had more toleration for the " humours" of its members. The exe- cution of The Neighbours, too, is very felicitous ; minute in its touches, painstaking with its details, and yet not so literal as life- like in its effects ; resembling in this respect the carefully-laboured pictures of the Flemish school. Whether it is a kind of life which will interest many English story-readers in the present age, is another question.

There is, however, a sort of romance interwoven with the pic- tures of manners ; though even there interest is attempted by development of character rather than by rapid narrative or striking incident. So far as we can judge, of Swedish life, this portion has not much of probability ; but it is curious as indicating Swedish notions of romance and its heroes. Mr. Bruno may be described as a compound of the scamp and the Byronic hero ; the Corsair and Lam (Bramv is a good deal read in the North) having furnished the more sentimental features of his character, whilst the lower portions seem to indicate the propensities of a Swedish rake. Mr. Bruno commences his career by stealing money. Not hav- ing, as he deems, a sufficient allowance, he makes it up by what " the wise" in Ancient Pistol's time called " conveying." He begins with trifling sums; but, emboldened by success and pressed by his necessities, he steals so large an amount from his mother's housekeeper, that a search of trunks and detection follow, accom- panied by a parent's curse and the hero's elopement. This is before the story opens : when Mr. Bruno appears upon the scene, he has come back, like Lara, from a far country—mysterious, Moody, wealthy, but remorse-struck ; to be reconciled to his mo- ther, and to fall in love with Serena, an amiable, dove-like, little Swedish maiden. Bruno, however, has been followed by a dark- eyed victim; who attempts Serena's life, and that failing, stabs herself. Scenes of deathbed remorse and repentance follow; and when Hagar dies, Serena and Bruno are married.

This seems clearly imitative; though indicating the truth of what Mr. LAING declares, that Sweden is not the most straitlaced country in Europe. The early exploits of Bruno are native; and it speaks forcibly of the scarcity of cash in Scandinavia, when a hero, intended to be deeply interesting, is represented as com- mencing his career by robbing the till. To modern English eyes, the criminality of such an offence is lost in its degradation : but we know not whether a century and a half ago it would have been regarded in precisely the same light. It would indeed have been considered as an unpardonable " wildness," and the perpetrator would scarcely have been chosen as a hero of romance; but such a sense of meanness might not have attached to it then as now. Such are the results of the march of reason and the increase of capital! It is possible that to Swedish eyes abstracting from mamma's strong-box is equivalent to a post-obit in Britain. If these remarks have not induced the reader to conclude that in The Neighbours he will meet with something very different from any thing to be found in English novels of the present day, a lbw extracts must carry conviction. The following is Franziska Werner's picture of her husband, Lars Anders; which there is no doubt, from the Swedish popularity of the authoress, is considered good Scandinavian taste.

A SWEDISH HUSBAND PAINTED BY HIS WIFE.

Now to your questions, which I will endeavour to answer fully ; and first of all for my husband—for my own Bear : here then you shall have his portrait. Of a middle size, but proportionably, not disagreeably, stout and broad ; a handsome, well-curled peruke, made by the Creator's own hand ; large coun- tenance, couleur de rose ; small, clear gray eyes, with a certain penetrating glance, under large, bushy, yellow-gray eyebrows; the nose good, though some- what thick ; the mouth large, with good teeth—but brown, alas! from tobacco- smoking; large hands, but well made and well kept ; large feet, the gait like a bear : but this gives no idea of his exterior, if you do not take into account an expression of open-hearted goodness and cheerfulness, which inspires a joyful confidence in the beholder. This speaks when the mouth is silent, as is most frequently the case: the forehead is serene, and the bearing of the head such as reminds one of an astronomer ; the voice is a deep bass, which is not at all amiss in singing. Here then you have his exterior. His inward self, best. Maria, I have not yet myself studied. Betrothed to him only within, two months, wife since fourteen days, I have not had great opportunity to become acquainted with a man who is generally silent, and whom I have not known more than half a year. But I trust and hope all for good.

SWEDISH HOUSE-RULES: KINDNESS TO ANIMALS.

My first employment will be to arrange my house so that contentment and peace may dwell in it. I will endeavour to be a wise lawgiver in my small,

but not mean worli : and do you know what law I mean first of all to promul.. gate and enforce with the most rigorous exactnesas ? A law for the treatment of animals, thus—All domestic animals shall be kept with the utmost care, and treated in a friendly and kind manner. They shall live happily, and shall be killed in that mode which will make death least painful to them. No animal shall be tortured in the kitchen ; no fish shall be cleaned while alive, or be put alive into the kettle ; no bird shall while half dead be hung up on a nail; a stroke with the knife shall as soon as possible give them death, and free them from torture.

These, and several other commands, shall be contained in my laws. How much unnecessary cruelty is perpetrated every day because people never think of what they do; and how uncalled for, how unworthy is cruelty towards ani- mals ! Is it not enough that in the present arrangement of things they are sentenced during their lives to be subject to us, and after their deaths to serve us for food, without our embittering yet more this heavy lot ? We are com- pelled in many cases to act hostilely towards them, but there is no reason why we need become cruel enemies. How unspeakably less would they not suffer, if in all those circumstances in which they resemble mankind, in the weakness of their age, in the suffering of their sickness, and in death, we acted humanely towards them 1 There were laws in the old world which made mildness towards animals the holiest duty of man, whilst the violation of such laws was severely punished: and we, Maria, we who acknowledge a religion of love, shall we act worse towards the animal creation than the Heathen did ?

THE DOCTOR'S SENSE.

Yesterday afternoon we were at home, and rejoiced on that account. Lars Anders worked liked a regular joiner, and I read to him what I had written, about our visiting-days. It gave him pleasure: he laughed; and yet he blamed me at the same time for having spoken with so much severity of some persona, neither was he quite satisfied with the judgment I had passed on the Von P'e.

" You call them," said he, " a collection of unfortunate pretensions; and yet you have seen them only once. It is very difficult, my dear Fanny, to pass judgment on men after a long acquaintance, and quite impossible to do so after one visit. Beyond this, many persons under different circumstances exhibit such different sides of their character. I have seen people affected and ridicu- lous in society, whom I have admired by a sick-bed ; many, in one case wearisome and assuming, who in another have been discreet and agreeable. Others, again, have eccentricities at one time which they lose later in life; many turn their best side inward, and perform the noblest actions, whilst the world is laughing at the fool's cap which they seem to exhibit. It may be so with this family."

" Granted, granted, dear Bear," said I; " and I promise you that as soon as I become aware of the fair side, I'll paint it in my beet colours." " But were it not better till then," argued be, " to place the faults more in the shadow ? It is exactly by such over-hasty judgments that man injures his neighbour; for nobody reflects that one fault does not spoil the whole person."

AN EXPLOIT OF MR. BRUNO.

As we slowly wandered onward, we heard, at first dull, then more distinctly, a treading and stamping as of a wild horse which some one was endeavouring, but in vain, to master. I. for my part have no great fancy for unbroken horses; but Lars Anders, on the contrary, must have bo, for he hastened his steps towards the place from whence the noise proceedeu. We advanced to an open space, and there making halt, were fascinated, as it were, by the wild but fine spectacle.

The same man and the same horse which we had seen once before wandering together in such Idyllian peace, we here beheld again ; but now in violent contest. The man sat commandingly on the back of the horse, which he would compel to leap over a broad ditch. The beautiful creature trembled and backed. It threw itself to the left and to the right ; it pawed, it would not take the leap ; and the foam fell from its black and shining body. But, like an intrepid, de- spotic will, the man sat firm, admonishing, punishing, compelling.

The noble animal developed in this wild strife the whole beauty of his race. His eyes sparkled, his wide outspread nostrils seemed to dart forth fire, while he struck the earth with his hoofs, and with a hundred leaps sought to escape that one leap which he was urged to. The rider sat with unexampled skill, moved himself to the motions of the horse, and ever again was the refractory animal brought to the same spot. The same demand was made, and ever again began the same contest. Thus certainly for a whole hour did the two strive together. The horse then appeared weary, became still, but made no attempt to obey the will of his master. The blood ran down his spur-fretted sides ; the man dismounted, and threw the bridle loose; the horse stood quiet and looked at him ; he took something from his breast-pocket, held it to the forehead of the horse. " It is the third time we have striven," said he sullenly ; " farewell!"

There was a flash before the horse, a shot was fired, and he fell at the feet of his master. We saw it stretch forth its head when dying, as if for a caress ; we heard a dull groan, and then all was still.

My husband pressed my arm to him, with a violence which I had never seen before, struck his clenched fist to his brow, and drawing back, exclaimed to himself, " It is Bruno! Lord, my God ! yes, it is he ! "

These extracts render it needless to say any thing of a transla- tion which possesses all the ease and raciness of an original, yet never loses for a page or a paragraph its Swedish (or Germanic) character. The task seems to have been a labour of love.