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GERMAN ALMANACKS FOR 1861.

AFTER the troubled year we have passed through, and that growing though most pernicious habit of swallowing Mr. Reuter's telegrams as accompaniment to the matutinal rasher, it is quite refreshing to fall back on the calm tranquillity of the German Almanacks. Their editors, it seems to us, must live in remote nooks of the world, far from turmoil and novelty, in a spot where newspapers are forbidden under heavy penalties, and no book is read which is less than one hundred years old. Equally refreshing is it to think of the mental condition of the purchasers of these almanacks. As they buy no other book in the course of the year, it might be fairly assumed that they would demand something new at any rate, and expect some information not familiar to them on every page. "Treuwendt's Volkskalendar," however, which has been in existence for seventeen years, and enjoys a very extensive circulation, still produces in 1861 the same peasant rules about the weather which appeared for the first time in 1844. Yet, if any faith is to be placed in statistics, Germans are the best educated people in Europe: everybody knows how to read and write, more or less, and hence we are the more amazed to find them following the same dull round of weather prophecies year after year.

It is somewhat difficult to supply our readers with any exact idea of these almanacks: they are all cast, as it were, in the same mould: there are the same insipid stories, the same bits of science made easy, the perusal of which leads you into a denser fog than you wandered in before, and the same number of muddy lithographs and worn-out copper etchings, for which our artists, by the way, usually supply the materials. "Nieritz's Almanack," for instance, is distinguished by comic sketches, or picture jokes, as the good Germans call them, and they are nearly all borrowed from Punch. Even when the wit is home-baked, the faces are taken from our facetious contemporary. As for originality, the Germans gave that up long ago. We presume that the authors fought so long and so vainly for a German fleet, that they have resolved to become pirates to a man. There is one item, by the way, never wanting in German almanacks: if the population of Reuss-Kreutz-Schleitz, for instance, can support a calendar, the first pages are surely devoted to a talk of regents, in which Henry LXXVII., by the grace of God, has three-quarters of a page, the Queen of Great Britain two lines and a half, one whole of which is devoted to the fact that her august consort belongs to the family of Saxe-CobourgGotha. In Saxe-Cobourg almanacks we need scarcely say that he stands out in large capitals, while Victoria figures in small type. Another euphemism connected with crowned or rather discrowned heads we may allude to before proceeding to our subject-matter. Although it is a perfectly recognised fact that the regents of Tuscany, Parma, and Modena have been relieved of their functions-even Germany must be acquainted with this truth by this time-their names are retained in the regents' table, but enclosed in brackets. Perhaps, though, the compilers are not in the confidence of Louis Napoleon, and it is on the cards that those powerful rulers may yet mount once again the throne of their

ancestors.

The first almanack we turn to is Auerbach's, for the name of that old man eloquent has a pleasant sound to English ears; but, alas! other people sometimes nod besides Homer. We do not say that the stories are bad in themselves, but they belong to a bad sort; it is too late in the day to be preaching to Germans obedience to the constituted authorities, by drawing examples from the last century. As a rule, the Germans of to-day only live for money: they trouble themselves in no way about the past, and all thoughts of national glory are swallowed up in gold-hunting. Still, this is a more satisfactory state of things than that absurd hectoring into which they periodically fall against France; they sing songs full of ardent patriotism, and quietly look on while Austria is being despoiled of her hereditary Lombardy. The Germans cannot, or will not, see that Louis Napoleon is paving the way for their destruction, by sowing dissension among them; he has separated the two great German powers, and, when the time comes, Austria will stand aloof and see Prussia crushed, just as that power, in its insane jealousy, rubbed its hands during the Italian war. But Auerbach is intensely patriotic as far as words go, and in his story, "Two Fire Riders," sings a pæan of Augustus of Weimar and Goethe, because they rode out to a little village and assisted in putting out a fire. The next story, "The Flag of the Seven Upright Men," is clever and sarcastic; for it attacks that old-world prejudice so prevalent among the Germans, that wisdom can only come with years, and that if a man be a cobbler, his children and children's children must follow the same calling. At the same time the story is interesting, because it gives a very picturesque account of the Tir National in Switzerland. One custom our volunteers have not yet introduced will be seen in the following quotation :

Exactly at twelve the company of several thousand persons, who changed each day, sat down at the covered board. Countrymen and townsmen, men and women, old and young, learned and unlearned, all sat merrily together and waited for the soup, while uncorking the wine-bottles and cutting up their bread. Nowhere was a mocking face, nowhere a criticising, dissatisfied, or quarrelsome mouth, nowhere a cry of shrill laughter, but the regular humming of a happy marriage feast, or the soothing murmur of a laughing lake, spread everywhere around. Here a long table full of riflemen; there a blooming double row of country girls; at a third table, a party of students from every canton who had passed their examination at length; at a fourth, the popula tion of a whole village. But these sitters formed but one-half of the assembly; an uninterrupted flood of people, equally numerous, poured through the passages, and regarded the guests at their pleasant labour. There were the cautious and saving people, who had reckoned the thing up, and had filled themselves for less money elsewhere; next, the high and mighty, who did not trust the cooks, and to whom the forks were suspicious; and, lastly, the poor and the children, who looked on as involuntary spectators. But the former made no remarks, and the latter displayed neither torn clothes nor angry glances; but the cautious persons pitied the spendthrifts, and the gentleman, who thought green-peas in July too ridiculous, walked along as good-temperedly as the poor man, to whom they

were a nosegay.

Another most interesting tale is, how the first lightning-conductor was put up in Wittenberg, in spite of the opposition of the priests and the bigoted people. The opening passage of the story will serve to show our readers the way in which information is imparted to the lower classes of Germany:

It was in 1769, just at the time when the church was rebuilt which had been burned down in the Seven Years' War, during the bombardment by the imperial army. At that time there must have been all sorts of things in the air, which boiled up presently in the revolution, in Napoleon, and in the war of liberation, and are not yet thoroughly cooked. At that time an American-whoso does not know him must not lose a day in forming his acquaintance-Benjamin Franklin, then, made the discovery that lightning can be caught like a fish in a line. At the present day, of course, that is no longer a miracle, for we have survived much more. Out there at the Elster Thor, by the oak where Doctor Luther once burnt the Pope's bull, the steam-coach now puffs, and snorts, and drags after it as many people as live in a small town, and now we have so caught the lightning that it must speak for us over lands and through seas. At that time the whole world, however, laughed at Franklin's discovery-that is, not the whole world, but the greater part of it, or, what is the same thing, the stupider part.

The best paper in "Auerbach's Almanack" is the history of a village. We recommend it to the admirers of the feudal system, which has been allowed to die out in this country, but it will be hardly imagined that so late as 1825, a German village paid more than a thousand pounds to the lord of the manor to buy up the corvées. No wonder that the Germans regarded so stoically the progress of the first Napoleon, for, in spite of the plunder his troops committed, they swept away all feudal distinctions, and allowed no one to oppress the villagers but themselves. The paper we refer to is really worth studying as an historical sketch: it is wonderful to read of peasants during this century obliged to defend their lord's castle, and to bring an action because the stipulated quantity of breadand-cheese was not handed to them. For dinner the peasants were to receive a share of what was cooking in the castle kitchen for the servants, but a contemporary narrates it as a curious fact, that they were never summoned to duty on the days when meat and dumplings were provided.

The "Spinnstube," edited by the old and favourite writer Otto von Horn, is the most satisfactory specimen of all the German almanacks. It is written essentially for peasants, in simple, homely language, and the stories it contains, which all breathe a fervent religious feeling, are supposed to be told at night in the spinning-room. In the remoter German villages, it is the custom for the girls to assemble on the long winter evenings at each other's house in turn, and the scene, as we have witnessed it in the Black Forest, is most picturesque. We will not positively assert that all is so idyllic as the almanack writer makes it out; indeed, many sad tales are whispered about the homeward journey all in the dark, and the necessity of having a protector of the other sex. Still, this does not detract from the merit of the almanack, which has originated from the custom, and it fully deserves its circulation of one hundred and thirty thousand annual copies. We are glad to find one paper devoted to the late Duchess of Orleans, and an affecting instance is narrated how she climbed up the huge tiled stove in a châlet at Glarus to visit a sick man, because there were no stairs. The news of her death was received in Switzerland with great lamentation, and when the peasants learned that she had gone without any parting struggle to join the God and Lord she had faithfully carried in her heart, they said they were not surprised at it, for she deserved such a death through her conduct to the poor. Amen! say we. But the stories in the "Spinnstube" are all worth reading

by those who wish to appreciate the character of the German peasantry. In that respect, Von Horn is even a more faithful guide than Auerbach, who is too fond of throwing a sentimental nimbus round his characters, while the former leaves his plain unvarnished story to make its own impression.

The most pretentious of the German almanacks is that edited by Gustav Nieritz, a rather successful writer of children's stories, and which is now in its eleventh year. We can hardly give it any particular character it is very moral and very harmless, but at the same time preternaturally slow. The best story in it is by the editor, and called "The Minister and the Painter." The scene is laid in the time of Brühl, the Saxon minister of finance, and the following extract will show how matters were managed in those days:

Brühl's guests consisted of the highest nobles, who were not ashamed to court the favour of the all-powerful minister. The new and splendid porcelain service was on the table this day, and for the first time, and greatly admired by all the guests. The table almost broke down under the weight of the eighty dishes placed upon it, while at the court festivals only twenty-four graced the board. The noble host was amiability itself, and the company in the best spirits. In the street, however, the mob were racking their brains to discover why, on this day, they were prevented entering as usual the yard in front of Brühl's house, but soon discovered the reason. The table was at length cleared, and Brühl's guests had gone from the dining-room to the adjacent apartments. Suddenly there was heard in the street a deafening clashing, like that the Israelite hero Gideon produced by breaking the three hundred pitchers when he made the night attack upon the Midianites. The guests hurried to the windows in amazement, and looked out. "Count-excellency," they shouted, "your servants-the splendid service of china- "Yes," Brühl said, with a pleasant smile," the service you have praised must never be used again, after my guests did it the high honour of dining on it."

The most original portion of "Nieritz's Almanack" is the chapter devoted to historical curiosities. One of them, taken from the diary of an unknown traveller in the seventeenth century, is certainly instructive. In describing Padua, he tells us that nearly all the streets are covered with arcades, which are certainly convenient, but they render the streets dark and narrow, and give occasion for the celebrated street murders called in Padua the "qui-va-li." It is a common fact, he goes on to say, that the students in that city have the privilege of murdering and breaking arms and legs, and the victim has not the slightest chance of help or justice. As soon as it grows evening they go about in bodies armed; they then conceal themselves behind the pillars in the arcades: if a person go past, one cries Qui va li ?' and another behind him directly Qui va là?' Thus the poor man can go neither backwards nor forwards, and there is no other resource-he must die between them, without knowing at whose hand. And these messieurs make quite an amusement of this. It often happens that these students kill perfect strangers, or sometimes one of themselves, only to maintain their fine privilege. It is true that this does not occur every day, for people are careful, and keep themselves shut up as much as possible; but few months pass without an accident of this sort occurring."

"Steffen's Almanack" is another possessing no special character, but affording amusing and instructive reading. The writers, as usual, fall

back on old times to illustrate, possibly because the modern history of their fatherland contains so little that deserves notice. According to the state in which the almanack is published is the locale of the scene to be described. Of the description of joke which pleases the German mind, we will supply one, and only one, specimen. A butcher meets a baker: says the former, "I have just been to your shop, and bought a loaf." "Where is it?" says the baker, all amazement. "Oh, it's so small that I have got it in my waistcoat pocket." And off he goes with a grin. Next day they meet again, and it is the baker's turn to chaff the other. "I've just been to your shop," says he, "and bought a sheep's head." "Where is it ?" says t'other. "In my cap," says the baker, also grinning. (For fear the reader should not see the joke, it is carefully italicised.) Here, though, is a more favourable specimen, in the shape of a fairy tale, from the same almanack:

There was once a poor woman, and she had no dearer wish than once, by accident or a miracle, to obtain a great deal of money, because she believed, that if she only had money, all sorrow and suffering would be as good as gone. The accident and the miracle did not happen for a long time, however, till the woman one day heard that on the slope of a hill there grew among other grass a weed, and if any one were so fortunate as to pluck it, the mountain would open, the plucker would walk into a large cave, at which seven men sat round a table, who would allow her to take away as much of their treasure as she could carry. From this moment the poor woman had nothing more pressing to do than to fetch hill-grass daily during the summer for her cow, because she hoped to pluck the miraculous weed among it. And so she did; one day the woman had again collected grass, carried the heavy basket on her head, and led her little daughter by the hand, when a large rock opened noiselessly before her like a well-oiled door, and allowed her to see into a cave, where seven old men with long beards were sitting round a table, and piles of gold and silver were heaped around them. The woman naturally soon took advantage of the opportunity, emptied her basket upon the ground and filled it with gold. When this was done, and she was going out again, one of the old men certainly said, "Woman, forget not the best thing!" but she did not listen, and went off. But she had scarce reached the entrance of the cave when the rock closed again, and shut in the woman's little daughter, who had remained behind playing with the gold. Then, the mother's grief and agony were great; she ran lamenting to the clergyman, and told him what had occurred. The latter said she must wait other seven years, till she could find her daughter again: after that period she must go again to the mountain at the same hour in which she lost the child, and wait for what might happen; but she had made a grand mistake in quite emptying her basket for the sake of her gold, because the miracle weed was among the grass she threw away. Now she remembered the old man's words, and learned to her sorrow that she had done wrong to consider wealth as the highest blessing. How slightly she now valued the gold she brought home, when she had to pay for it by the loss of her child! She thought further, and found that there were many blessings in the world which, if lost, reduce the value of gold to nothing-yes, even make it appear in an odious shape. He who gives for gold and property the loss of a dear child, beloved parents, his fatherland, a good conscience, his honour, &c., could not say that he has gained, for he has really and truly lost. This and many other things the poor rich woman had ample time to reflect on during the seven years, and, to her honour be it said, that, till the expiration of that time, she would not look at or handle the gold. At length the day came on which she hoped to find her child again. The woman hurried to the hill in the neighbourhood of the rock where her child was shut up and see there! from a distance she perceived the treasure of her heart, her child, sleeping in front of the rock; it was as young and blooming