Couple), which enjoyed an overwhelming success. Another story, Fiskerjenten (The Fisher-Girl), in 1868, was found less fresh and unaffected than his early stories, and he returned to his charming pristine manner in Brudeslaaten, 1873. Since that year he has published but one novel, Magnhild, 1877, and a slight study of Italian life, Kaptejn Mansana, 1879, neither quite worthy of his genius. All his other productions have been dramatic. Fired with emulation for Ibsen, he has written Sigurd Jorsalfar, in 1873, an historical saga-drama, and a series of satirical comedies,—En Fallit (A Bankruptcy), 1875, an admirable piece; Redaktören (The Editor), 1875; Kongen (The King), 1877, a political manifesto in four acts; Leonarda, 1879; Det ny System (The New System), 1879; En Handske (A Glove), 1883; and Over Ævne (Beyond his Reach), 1883,—the last a very singular study of epileptic hysteria as a factor in religious enthusiasm. Björnson is a republican of the most advanced order, and his views are pushed forward too crudely for artistic effect in several of his later works.
Two writers of novels who owe much to the example of Ibsen and Björnson are Jonas Lie (b. 1833) and Alexander Kielland (b. 1849). Lie was late in developing his talent, and has lost much time in wavering between the sentimental and the realistic schools of treatment. He has finally thrown in his cause with the latter in his last novel Livs-Slaven, 1883. His best books have been stories of seafaring life—Den Fremsynte (The Man with the Second Sight), 1870; Tremasteren Fremtiden (The Threemaster “Future”), 1872; Lodsen og hans Hustru (The Pilot and his Wife), 1874; and Rutland, 1880. His tales of town-life—Thomas Ross, 1878, and Adam Schröder, 1879—have less of the novelist s illusion. Kielland may prove to possess a stronger talent than Lie; his progress has been more rapid and steady, and he has a clearer idea of what he wishes to do. He began by being strongly influenced by Zola in his Garman og Worse, 1879, and his Arbeidsfolk (Working People), 1880. His latest works have shown steady improvement in style and a growing independence of French models. From this, the youngest of distinguished Norwegian writers, we may turn back to a few older names which close the list of novelists. Nicolai Ramm Ostgaard (1812-1873) to some extent preceded Björnson in his graceful romance En Fjeldbygd (A Mountain Parish), in 1852. Frithjof Foss, who wrote under the pseudonym of Israél Dehn (b. 1830), attracted notice by a series of no less than seven separate stories published between 1862 and 1864, but has been silent since. The two most important women-novelists have been Jacobine Camilla Collett (b. 1813), a cousin of the poet Wergeland, author of Amtmandens Döttre (The Governor's Daughters), 1855, an excellent novel, and many other volumes; and Anna Magdalene Thoresen (b. 1819), a Dane by birth, author of a series of novels.
The labours of Peter Christen Asbjörnsen (b. 1812), in conjunction with Bishop Moe, in the collection of the old Norse folk-tales, demand prominent recognition in any sketch of Norwegian literature. Before they were twenty years of age these friends began to write down the stories of the peasants. In 1838 Asbjörnsen first made public some of the results of his investigations in a little publication for children called Nor. Not until 1842 did the first authorized edition of the Norske Folkeeventyr see the light. It was followed in 1845 by Huldreeventyr, or stories about the fairies or sirens which haunt the mountain dairies, by Asbjörnsen alone. Of these a second series appeared in 1848, and in 1871 a new series was published again by Asbjornsen alone of the Folkeeventyr. It was from minstrels, boatmen, vagabonds, and paupers that the best stories were collected, and it is a significant fact that most of these professional reciters are now dead. Had Asbjörnsen and Moe neglected the duty of preserving the ancient legends, they would now, in all probability, be entirely lost. What has been done by Asbjörnsen for the peasant-stories has been done for the dialects in which they were composed by Ivar Aasen (b. 1813). Since 1850 he has received a pension from the state to enable him to study the peasant-patois, and his great dictionary, Norsk Ordbog, first printed in 1858, and his other linguistic publications have been the result. He is the creator of the artificial language, the “maal,” which Vinje, K. Jansen, and others have written in; and he has published in it a valuable collection of proverbs, 1851.
The principal historian of Norway has been Peter Andreas Munch (1810-1863), whose multifarious writings include a grammar of Old Norse, 1847; a collection of Norwegian laws until the year 1387, 1846-49; a study of Runic inscriptions, 1848; a history and description of Norway during the Middle Ages, 1849; and a history of the Norwegian people, in 8 vols., 1852-63; Jakob Aall (1773-1844) was associated with Munch in this work. Jakob Rudolf Keyser (1803-1864) performed services scarcely less important in printing and annotating the most important documents dealing with the mediæval history of Norway. Carl Richard Unger (b. 1817) has taken part in the same work and edited Morkinskinna in 1867. Sophus Bugge (b. 1833) is a leading philologist of a younger school, and Oluf Rygh (b. 1833) has contributed to the archæological part of history. The modern language of Norway found an admirable grammarian in Jakob Olaus Lökke (1829-1881). A careful historian and ethnographer was Ludvig Kristensen Daa (1809-1877). Ludvig Daae (b. 1834) has written the history of Christiania, and has traced the chronicles of Norway during the Danish possession. Bernt Moe (1814-1850) was a careful biographer of the heroes of Eidsvold. Eilert Lund Sundt (1817-1875) published some very curious and valuable works on the condition of the poorer classes in Norway. Professor J. A. Friis (b. 1821) has published the folk-lore of the Lapps in a series of very curious and valuable volumes.
In jurisprudence the principal Norwegian authorities are Anton Martin Schweigaard (1808-1870) and Frederik Stang (b. 1808). Peter Carl Lasson (1798-1873) and Ulrik Anton Motzfelt (d. 1865) were the lights of an earlier generation. In medical science, the great writer of the beginning of the century was Michael Skjelderup (1769-1852), who was succeeded by Frederik Hoist (b. 1791). Daniel Cornelius Danielsen (b. 1815) is a prominent dermatologist; but probably the most eminent of recent physiologists in Norway is Carl Wilhelm Boeck (b. 1808). The elder brother of the last-mentioned, Christian Peter Bianco Boeck (1798-1877), also demands recognition as a medical writer. Christopher Hansteen (1784-1873) was prominent in several branches of mathematical and chemical literature, and was professor of mathematics at the university for nearly sixty years. Michael Sars (b. 1805) has obtained a European reputation through his investigations in invertebrate zoology. He has been assisted by his son Georg Ossian Sars (b. 1837). Baltazar Michael Keilhau (1797-1858) and Theodor Kjerulf (b. 1825) have been the leading Norwegian geologists. Mathias Numsen Blytt (1789-1862) represents the section of botany. His Norges Flora, part of which was published in 1861, was left incomplete at his death. Niels Henrik Abel (1802-1829) was a mathematician of extraordinary promise; Ole Jakob Broch (b. 1818) must be mentioned in the same connexion. Marcus Jakob Monrad (b. 1816), an Hegelian, is the most prominent philosophical writer of modern Norway. Among theological writers may be mentioned Hans Nielsen Hauge (1771-1824), author of the sect which bears his name; Svend Borchman Hersleb (1784-1836); Stener Johannes Stenersen (1789-1835) ; Wilhelm Andreas Wexels (1797-1866), a writer of extraordinary popularity; and Carl Paul Caspari (b. 1814), the learned professor of theology in the university of Christiania.
No very recent compendium of Norwegian literature exists. La Norvége Littéraire, by Paul Botten-Hansen (1824-1869), is an admirable piece of bibliography so far as it reaches, but comes down no farther than 1866. Professor L. Dietrichson published in 1866 the first and only part of an Omrids af den Norske Poesis Historie (Outline of the History of Norwegian Poetry). J. B. Halvorsen is now publishing a Norsk Forfatter-Lexikon, 1814-1880 (Norwegian Dictionary of Authors); this promises to be a very valuable work, but has not as yet proceeded beyond the letter B. In English see the earlier chapters of Gosse's Northern Studies (1879; 2nd edition, 1882). (E. W. G.)
NORWEGIAN SEA. The sub-polar regions of the Atlantic lying between the Scandinavian peninsula and Greenland have been in recent years carefully investigated by Norwegian expeditions under Professors Mohn and Sars; and, as the sea immediately to the west of Norway has not hitherto been known by any distinctive name, Mohn has proposed the name of “Norwegian Sea,”—a suggestion which has been now generally adopted. The Norwegian Sea, therefore, includes the whole of the region between Greenland and Norway, a portion of which, to the north west of the island of Jan Mayen, is sometimes known as the Greenland Sea. The Norwegian Sea is a well-marked basin cut off from the Atlantic by submarine ridges connecting the north of Scotland, the Faroe Islands, Ice land, and Greenland. On the summit of these ridges there is an average depth of about 250 fathoms. Between Spitzbergen and Lapland there is a wide opening into the Barents Sea, where the depth is from 100 to 200 fathoms. Between Spitzbergen and Greenland a wide and deep opening extends into the frozen Arctic Ocean, with a depth of 2500 fathoms. The surrounding land is almost everywhere high, rugged, deeply indented with fjords, and skirted with outlying islands, which are mostly composed of stratified rocks and ancient geological formations. Jan Mayen, situated near the centre of the basin, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands are of volcanic origin.
The marked peculiarity of the Norwegian Sea is the striking contrast in the climate of its eastern and western portions. If we draw a line from the east side of Iceland to the south end of Spitzbergen we have, generally speaking,
