like to apply so hard a name to the latter; but practically and honestly, we see no difference between them.*

This evil, and its causes, are fast disappearing. The Normal schools are acting both as preventive and curative. We believe no institution in this land is doing more good for the people, and especially the poor. We have our army and our navy to defend us from the enemy without, and our police to preserve us within. We have our bank commissioners to see that the banks send no spurious money into circulation. How much more do we need institutions like these, to guard us from incompetent and spurious teachers, who would not only devour our substance, but deprive the poor of their sole inheritance?

The burden of Mr. Mann's report is devoted to the discussion of the proper selection of studies to be pursued in schools. There is a common routine; reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, and grammar, These the law requires to be taught, and all attend to them. But these are not the sum of the matters to be learned by the young. They are mainly disciplinary, and preparatory to others, which are to succeed them, and to have a more immediate bearing upon the circumstances and the welfare of life. It is important to determine what other subjects shall be taught in schools. Undoubtedly all will agree as to the great object of education, that children should learn those things, which will contribute most to their usefulness and happiness, and make them the best men and citizens. Still the question is open; What branches of knowledge will most certainly tend to produce these results? Upon the right and the wrong determination of this question, in regard to the child, may depend the character of the man, and his weal or woe through life. And yet Mr. Mann says that, "in the twelve hundred reports, which have now been submitted, there is not one, in which the relative importance of the higher branches has been discussed. Their introduction has been left to chance. Teachers, who have not been educated in the whole circle of studies, and never considered in what order they should be arranged, or in what degrees apportioned, almost invariably have some favorite study, some pet branch, in which they themselves excel, and in which the pupils, under

* We once saw a letter from one committee to a similar board in another town, asking, "Whether a letter recommendatory, brought by a teacher from the former, was written honestly and from the facts, or merely in kindness to the teacher."

their especial care and influence, will be likely to excel, and which is therefore pursued, to the exclusion of others, however superior in importance." - p. 53.

Sometimes the slightest accident will determine one study to be adopted and another to be rejected. The possession of a book in the family, or the facility of borrowing it of a friend, or even the difference of cost between the text book of one science and another, or a few cents saved, has made one an astronomer and not a chemist. Now and then, the price has forever barred the whole range of science from the child's mind. Some are ambitious of learning things large and distant, to the neglect of those humbler and nearer. Some are thoroughly instructed in matters, which are seldom used and never needed, to the exclusion of the practical subjects of every-day utility. We have met with some in this enlightened city, who were familiar, by book, with the scenery, topography, productions, and conditions of the people in Middlesex, Norfolk, Essex, and Worcestershire in England, while they were as ignorant of these things in the same counties in Massachusetts, as they could be of the people in the moon; and what is worse, they thought these affairs of home not worthy of the attention of well educated ladies.

Mr. Mann ascertained the numbers of pupils in the public schools of Massachusetts, who were studying the higher branches, during the last year.

"In some of the public schools, other branches, such as botany, chemistry, natural history, astronomy, intellectual philosophy, and the French language are attended to."

- p. 55.

In this list, it is manifest that neither the ideas of utility nor the hope of pleasure could generally have governed the selection. Some of the studies have reference to this world, some to another, and some to none at all. All desire to investigate the things, that are and may be about them, and be thereby prepared for the circumstances of life. They study language for communication, arithmetic for calculation, geography for

business, travel, and reading, and chemistry and natural philosophy to aid them in their daily operations. So far all is very well. But those things, which they must use before language, or business, those which they ever have about them, without which they can neither move nor have any being, those circumstances amidst which they ever exist, and which must be to them life or death, according to the manner in which they use them, their own frames, the laws of their existence, the relations of these to other matters, these things were studied by only four hundred and sixteen, in the State, while more than twice that number were studying Latin, the language of the dead. But human physiology was among the lowest in this catalogue.

Of the great importance of this last named topic we shall take occasion to speak at another time.

E. J.

NOVELS OF FREDERIKA BREMER.*

EVERY work which seizes upon public favor is worthy of attention. The very fact of its popularity should excite an interest about it in the minds of the wise and good. They should read it, should investigate the cause of its popularity, should enquire into its probable effect on the community, and be prepared to throw the weight of their sentiments into the scales of public opinion. The world is not so bad as to reject the influence of their views, nor so good as to need them not. There is no case in which they are more bound to use their judgments for the benefit of the unwise, the impetuous, the unthinking, the susceptible, than in the scrutiny of the favorite reading of the day. Popular works do affect the feelings of individuals enough to color their lives, and they therefore affect the well being of society; and it is of no small interest to observe, whether the writings of a Bulwer carry all before them,

*The Neighbours; a story of Every-day Life: The H-Family: The President's Daughters; a Narrative of a Governess: The Home; or Family Cares and Family Joys: Strife and Peace; or Scenes in Norway. By FREDERIKA BREMER. Boston: J. Munroe & Co. 1843.

and undermine the popularity of works issuing from high and pure spirits, or whether the genius of a Bulwer stands quelled under the rebuke of Religion and Morality, and seeks universal acceptance by an apparent enlistment in their cause,

ance.

The decided favor, with which the productions of Frederika Bremer have been received among us, speaks well for the moral taste of the American community; and in saying this we have uttered one of the warmest commendations of the author. It is true that there are certain criticisms uttered as to the tendency of certain parts of these fascinating sketches. These criticisms seem to us just, and the very fact, that such are uttered, is a good symptom, and is an evidence that it is the general moral beauty of these sketches, which is giving them their strong hold upon all hearts, and that faults which incur such censure are the more obvious, because they are in such strange, glaring inconsistency with the grand tenor of the works, with what appears to us the healthy character of Miss Bremer's views of life. It is amusing to remember the expressions of disgust with which many threw down "The Neighbours," on its first appearPractised novel-readers found it so unlike their favorite works, those unacquainted with foreign literature were so annoyed by its foreign peculiarities, those little accustomed to translations were so disturbed by what appeared to them oddities of style, and many applied to it so unintelligently the same rules by which they would judge a book written by an English or American lady, that they pronounced a hasty and unfavorable verdict, and were not a little amazed to find it set aside so unceremoniously by the public. It is a recomendation of these tales, that they are not written by an author of one country, laying the scene in another, and attempting to paint it from description or cursory inspection. The circumstance, that they are written by a Swede, leads us to hope that they are correct as the Daguerreotype itself; that the pictures are the very transcripts of nature, engraved by the sunbeams of truth. So only can they have the high value of conveying to us fact, and giving us that for which all readers should thirst, knowledge.

In the same way we become reconciled to much that offends our attachment to our own conventionalisms, and notions of refinement. We meet here no more with heroines who live upon dewdrops, moonlight, and thin air, like the fair ones with whom we have long been familiar in our English poetry, and

romance.

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The ladies to whom Miss Bremer introduces us do not even sustain life, from choice, upon the lightest farinaceous edibles and cold water, like many gentle creatures of flesh and blood around us. They not only fare sumptuously, but solidly, every day; and eating seems to social life in the North not only a thing of necessity, but of much pleasurable importance; and there is no hiding this attention to creature-comforts. Nobody has learned to be ashamed of eating, nor of what is eaten; and Miss Bremer is not ashamed to describe all this as it is, whoever may cry, out upon her want of taste!" or, "out upon the half civilized people!" She tells us, in evident unconsciousness or carelessness, of the impression of many a dish upon the table, and many a custom of the consumers, at which we stand amazed. And what sense is there in our doing so? Might not a tale be written among us, faithfully sketching our every-day life, and sent into Sweden, there to awaken wonder, and perhaps laughter, among the thoughtless or narrowminded? It is not thus that national differences are to be regarded; they are fit subjects of intelligent curiosity, and the philanthropic philosopher_may_speculate upon them for good. And we hold that while Miss Bremer paints faithfully the customs of her brave, virtuous, and well instructed people, of whose history and position the world ought to know more than it does, we are not to come forward with a false refinement and illiberal fastidiousness, charging her with a coarse taste. Nor does it show cultivated, large minds, to suffer our contempt to be awakened by modes of living different from our own, even though we pronounce them behind the age. It may be that if the nations of the North retain an undue interest in the table, and, among their relics of primitive simplicity, use viands which we deem un palatable, they also hold fast some other and better things, which we, to our wo, have lost. It may be that Honesty, public and private, with ancient face and rude speech, yet lingers honored among her "Neighbours," and in her" Homes."

We do not feel disposed to conform to the good old practice of Reviewers, and sketch the plots of the five tales before us. Those who have read them need it not, and those who mean to read them will not thank us for such anticipation; and we suppose almost every one who peruses our page belongs to one or the other of these classes. What story is contained in "The Neighbours," is conveyed in a series of letters from Franciska,