CHRISTMAS MORN IN SWEDEN.

I HAD fallen asleep at last on that Christmas night. awoke the white clear light that had filled my room

When I was gone.

I knew the morning had begun, and started up to light the lamp; it was already half past five o'clock. My Swede was to come at six to take me, as he said, to see the churches. I was ready then.

Thoughts, that can travel swifter even than electric telegraphs, had already gone to a dear and distant land; had already been breathed still further-to heaven-from whence a blessing might be sent where I could only send a thought.

Then there was the slipshod sound of goloshes coming up the long stone stairs. Men never go without goloshes here, as much from fear of dirtying floors within doors as from fear of cold without them. A fine young English officer caused my hostess to shake her head by entering my rooms without having a pair of goloshes at the door.

"Ah, these English!" said she, "what a droll people they are! They go without goloshes."

However in the present case the goloshes were duly stepped out of in the little shut-up hall, or corridor; and then as I was in an inner room and could not be seen from the outer one, a voice spoke out there and said

"I told my brother, madame, yesterday, that he must say to you what they always say in England at Christmas time, that is, My compliments of the season to you!' but I forgot to say it to you myself when I was with you on Christmas-eve. I hope you will pardon me, madame."

"Oh, it is time enough to say it. Christmas-day, not Christmas-eve, is our great festival," I answered from the other room.

"Is it so? oh," said the punctilious Swede, quite relieved, "then I will say it now, if you will allow me." So the tall figure drew itself up, and making and making a very low bow to the door, said, "My compliments of the season to you, madame."

And I came to the door, and making an equally low courtesy, said as formally, "My compliments of the season to the Royal Secretary;" for that was the good man's office, and it is by the title or office, and not the name, that Swedes must be addressed.

Being then quite convinced that we had maintained the English fashions, he offered his arm to conduct me out on the icy staircase, and bitterly-chilling passage.

It was now much darker than at night. We went over the frozen streets; the firm snow, that lay an immense depth upon them, crackled crisply beneath our tread. Many figures were moving through them; ladies with women-servants carrying lanterns were hurrying to church; it is one of the rules of Swedish propriety that a lady cannot or should not, walk out after nightfall without a lantern: if the streets were in a glare of light—if the moon shone clearer than the sun at noonday now often does-if the Northern Lights shoot their gloriously coloured radiancy along the elevated horizon, this symbol of female respectability must precede a lady's steps, casting its bewildering glare upon your eyes. I made the royal secretary a substitute for the lantern, and thus enjoyed the scene without suffering its inconvenience; for even the streaming light of these lanterns on the snow and ice is a charm, the more to a stranger like myself.

All the Stockholmers seemed to be astir. Wolf- and dog-skin clad coachmen were waiting, half-frozen, beside their carriages; but most persons were on foot; scarcely a sledge was yet in motion, nor was the musical tingle of their bells yet heard. A flood of light guided us to the first church. There was no gas, and therefore the aspect was the more curious. That immense church was literally studded with candles, common tallow candles, which flared and glared in the cutting air.

Sweden, being an exclusively Protestant country, the churches more nearly resemble ours than other churches on the Continent do. But the pillars of this church were wreathed with candles, the galleries bore a double line of them: the brilliant altar with its fine picture and enormous candlestick, as well as the gilt and decorated pulpit, shone in candle-light. I think I counted more then twenty before the altar: in fact, the whole church was dressed with lighted candles, just as ours are at Christmas with holly and ivy.

But if the profusion of candles was extraordinary, that of human beings was more so. An entrance within the church was difficult when we arrived, and before many minutes passed, I could see, far down the street and around the door, a mass of people either trying to move on or standing quietly anxious at the porch.

Finding it scarcely possible even to stand in this large church, which, on common occasions is rather empty and very dark, we left it, and went to one still larger, that commonly called Stor Kylran, or the Great Church. Here the brilliancy was still greater, the crowd scarcely less. An enormous candlestick of seven branches was all lighted up: it was, in former times, an offering from one of the queens in gratitude for her royal husband's escape from the Danes. The people who, on this Christmas morn, when the cold was really almost terrible in its strength thronged thus to the churches, were chiefly of the lower, middle, or working classes: the great people are not so much to be seen in the ice-cold churches. There was, however, on this occasion one noble and beautiful example of the contrary. In a great, conspicuous pew with a gilt crown in front, sat the second, and best-loved, prince of Sweden, the amiable and talented son of King Oscar I., Prince Gustaf, whose purely artistic head, and, what might really be called spiritual countenance, always seemed to predict an early death. A prediction too soon fulfilled; for, not long after I saw him there, a nearly sudden death caused the first break in that happy family of which he was the pride and charm. He died at Christiania. This was his last Jul-otta'-the last time he joined in morning-song on Christmas-day on earth. May we not hope that he may join the song of the redeemed in heaven!

It was a strange sight to see such numbers of persons thus thronging to church at six o'clock on a northern winter morning, especially when it is clear that the natives fear the cold more, and take greater precautions against it than foreigners do. But what most surprised me was to see the multitude of children, chiefly from six to ten years old, who were so zealously brought to this morning-song. Many of these were carried carefully through the streets, and lifted over the closely-packed throng into the churches. A man might be seen holding up in his arms a good stout, sturdy, little Swede, to give him a chance of seeing as well as hearing. Mothers were anxiously guiding in little girls with heads swathed in cotton or silk handkerchiefs: young lads conducted their juniors, and motherly little sisters with airs of maternal authority, pertinaciously, but very quietly, worked a passage for younger ones. The most perfect silence, the completest decorum prevailed-no rudeness, pushing, or excitement, but a quiet perseverance. When we left this great church I remarked to my friend that not many English parents would like

their little ones to be thus brought out to early prayers at such a season, even in our milder clime.

He informed me in reply of the cause that exists in Sweden for this attendance of children at the Christmas morning-song, or, as the term for this early service is in Swedish, Jul-otta.' It will be perhaps more agreeable to readers if I relate all this in the form of a dialogue as it passed between us while we walked along.

SWEDE." I will explain to you willingly, madame, our customs, as I wish much that my country should be made known to England by persons who have made themselves acquainted with it. The people whom you now see crowding to the churches with their children come in great part from the country parts around the capital; and the working-classes of Sweden are always anxious to bring their little children to this Jul-otta,' because it is a tradition among them that children who have attended this first service of Christmas morning will learn to read without difficulty."

B. "That is truly a sort of superstitious belief that seems to be productive of a good effect. But are the Swedes, then, so anxious that their children should learn to read ?"

SWEDE."That does not depend on themselves; they are obliged to have them taught to read, and even to write, in order that they should be confirmed; for all persons are obliged to be confirmed. Without a certificate of confirmation one can hardly get a place, or be apprenticed to a trade, and unless confirmed, persons cannot even be married.”

B.—Then, indeed, I see the necessity of learning to read in Sweden, for without reading there is no confirmation, and without confirmation there is no matrimony."

SWEDE "Just so, madame; and there is indeed no respectability. The clergy are responsible for seeing that their people are duly instructed and confirmed; so that on the trial of a prisoner, if he be found ignorant, the pastor of his parish is written to by the judge to know why that poor creature has been neglected, and the clergyman, or priest as we say here, must

answer."

B.-"That is good. But if the clergy take that charge, why are the parents so anxious that the children should read quickly?"

SWEDE. "I will tell you that also. Our parishes are very large, often thirty or forty English miles from end to end. The

schools, too, are far apart, as well as the churches. Many parents can never send their children to them, and must teach them themselves at home. You see, therefore, it is of consequence to them that they should learn easily. When they are to be confirmed, they must go to their priest and receive instruction for six months; this is called by them reading before the priest, and is the most important and interesting time of the lives of our young people. We had not confirmation in our Lutheran church until a late period, when one of our chaplains in London saw the rite administered there, and was the means of having it adopted here.

B.-"This concourse of people at morning prayer in such intense cold and great darkness as this would scarcely be believed in England, especially as this is not only a Protestant land, but one where you know they do not go to church generally nearly as much as we do."

SWEDE.-"That is quite true. Our churches are too cold, they are never warmed, and in our winters it is thought dangerous to stay in them so long as our service lasts. But the eagerness you observe in hastening to them on Christmas morn is nothing in Stockholm to what you would see in the country. What do you say to persons sledging twenty English miles to this first service, and back on Christmas morn? Yet I have myself come that distance to 'Otte-song' and back again."

B." What is 'Otte-song?""

SWEDE."Otte' means the first part of the morning, from three to six o'clock, and 'otte-song' is the same as your morning-song. We have this every morning in our parish churches in Stockholm; but when we speak of this service on Christmas morn, it is usual to call it 'Jul-otta:' and in all Churches throughout the country the people are eager to get to this first service, so that they even set out for the journeys to them at midnight. The return home is often a dangerous business; for there is a race, chiefly among the young men; who dash along in sledges blowing horns, and trying each to get home first, because there is a tradition that whoever comes home first from the 'Jul-otta' shall have his harvest in first next season; and they also believe that, if he should be unmarried, he will be the first to get a wife. I went once with a friend who was quite a thoughtless fellow, and I assure you he kept me in much fear; for he wanted, I knew, to be married, and he had brought a horn, and blew it all along the road to clear the way; we started