Various - Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 60, No. 374, December, 1846

Another allegorical saga is the narrative of the share taken by the man in the moon in the matter of the daily ebbing and flowing of the sea. His chief, or indeed only occupation, seems to be to pour water from a huge bucket. Being somewhat lazy, the old gentleman soon grows weary of the employment, and then he lies down to rest. Of course whilst he is napping, the water avails itself of the opportunity to return to its ordinary level.

The constellation of the Great Bear, or Charles's Wain, is, according to the Frieslanders, the chariot in which Elias and many other great prophets ascended into heaven. There being now-a-days no individual sufficiently pious for such a mode of transit, it has been put aside, with other heavenly curiosities, its only office being to carry the angels in their nocturnal excursions throughout the year. The angel who acts as driver for the night, fixes his eye steadily upon the centre point of the heavenly arch, (the polar star,) in order that the two stars of the shaft of the chariot may keep in a straight line with the celestial focus. The rising and setting of the sun is thus explained: – A host of beautiful nymphs receive the sun beneath the earth in the western hemisphere, and cutting it into a thousand parts, they make of it little air balloons, which they sportively throw at the heavenly youths, who keep guard at the eastern horizon of the earth. The gallant band, not to be outdone by their fair antagonists, mount a high ladder, and when night has veiled the earth in darkness, toss back the golden balls, which, careering rapidly through the vault of heaven, fall in glittering showers upon the heads of the celestial virgins of the west. The children of the sky, having thus diverted themselves through the night, they hasten at dawn of day to collect the scattered balls, and joining them into one huge mass, they bear it upon their shoulders, mid singing and dancing, to the eastern gates of heaven. The enchanting rosy light which hovers round the rising orb is the reflection of the virgins' lovely forms, who, beholding their charge safely launched upon its course, retire, and leave it, as we see it, to traverse the sky alone.

The following exquisite tradition connects itself with that brief season when, in the summer of the far north, the sun tarries night and day above the horizon. All-fader had two faithful servants, of the race of those who enjoyed eternal youth, and when the sun had done its first day's course, he called to him Demmarik , and said, "To thy watchful care, my daughter, I confide the setting sun that I have newly created; extinguish its light carefully, and guard the precious flame that no evil approach it." And the next morning, when the sun was again about to begin its course, he said to his servant Koite , "My son, to thy trusty hand I remit the charge of kindling the light of the sun I have created, and of leading it forth on its way." Faithfully did the children discharge the duties assigned to them. In the winter they carefully guarded the precious light, and laid it early to rest, and awakened it to life again only at a late hour; but, as the spring and summer advanced, they suffered the glorious flame to linger longer in the vault of heaven, and to rejoice the hearts of men by the brightness of its aspect. At length the time arrived when, in our northern world, the sun enjoys but brief rest. It must be up betimes in the morning to awaken the flowers and fruit to life and light, and it must cast its glowing beams across the mantle of night, and lose no time in idle slumber. Then it was that Demmarik , for the first time, met Koite face to face as she stood upon the western edge of heaven, and received from the hands of her brother-servant the orb of light. As the fading lamp passed from one to the other, their eyes met, and a gentle pressure of their hands sent a thrill of holy love through their hearts. No eye was there save that of the All-fader , who called his servants before him, and said, "Ye have done well; and as recompense, I permit ye to fulfil your respective charges conjointly as man and wife." Then, Demmarik and Koite , looking at each other, replied – "No, All-fader! disturb not our joy; let us remain everlastingly in our present bridal state; wedded joy cannot equal what we feel now as betrothed!" And the mighty All-fader granted their prayer, and from that time they have met but once in the year, when, during four weeks, they greet each other night after night; and then, as the lamp passes from one to the other, a pressure of the hand and a kiss calls forth a rosy blush on the fair cheek of Demmarik which sheds its mantling glow over all the heavens, Koite's heart the while thrilling with purest joy. And should they tarry too long, the gentle nightingales of the All-fader have but to warble Laisk tudrück, laisk tudrück! öpik! "Giddy ones, giddy ones! take heed!" to chide them forward on their duty.

With a lovelier vision, reader! we could not leave you dwelling upon the rugged but, to the heart's core, thoroughly poetic Frieslander. Let us leave the gentle Demmarik and devoted Koite to their chaste and heavenly mission, and with a bound leap into Denmark, whither Mr Kohl, in his forty-fourth volume of travels, summons us, and whither we must follow him, although the prosaic gentleman is somewhat of the earth, earthy, after the blessed imitations we have had, reader – you and we – of the eternal summer's day faintly embodied in the vision of that long bright day of the far north!

Should any adventurous youth sit down to Mr Kohl's volume on Denmark, and, half an hour afterwards, throw the book in sheer disgust and weariness out of the window, swearing never to look into it again, let him be advised to ring the bell, and to request Mary to bring it back again with the least possible delay. Having received it from the maid of all work's horny hand, let the said youth begin the book again, but, as he would a Hebrew Bible, at the other end. He may take our word for it there is good stuff there, in spite of the twaddle that encountered him erewhile at Hamburg. Mr Kohl has been won by aldermanic dinners in the chief city of the Hanseatic League, as Louis Philippe was touched by aldermanic eloquence and wit in the chief city of the world, and he babbles of mercantile operations and commercial enterprise, until the heart grows sick with fatigue, and is only made happy by the regrets which the author expresses – just one hour after the right time – respecting his inability to enlarge further upon the fruitful and noble theme of the monetary speculations of one of the richest and most disagreeable communities of Europe.

Before putting foot on Danish ground, Mr Kohl is careful to make a kind of solemn protest touching Germanic patriotism, lest, we presume, he should be suspected of taking a heretical view of the question at issue at the present moment between the Sleswig-Holstein provinces and the mother-country Denmark. It is not for us to enter into any political discussions here, concerning matters of internal government which are no more business of ours than of his Majesty Muda Hassim, of the island of Borneo; but we must confess our inability to understand why such a terrific storm of patriotic ardour has so suddenly burst forth in Germany, respecting provinces which, until recently, certainly up to the time when the late king gave his people the unasked-for boon of a constitution, were perfectly happy and contented under the Danish rule, to which they had been accustomed some five or six hundred years. 2 2 In the year 1660, the different estates of Denmark made a voluntary surrender of their rights into the hands of their sovereign, who became by that act absolute : it is a fact unparalleled in the history of any other country. Up to the year 1834, this unlimited power was exercised by the kings, who, it must be said to their honour, never abused it by seeking to oppress or enslave their subjects. In the year 1834, however, Frederic VI., of his own free will and choice, established a representative government. The gift was by no means conferred in consequence of any discontent exhibited under the hitherto restrictive system. The intentions of the monarch were highly praiseworthy; their wisdom is not so clear, as, under the new law, the kingdom is divided into four parts – 1. The Islands; 2. Sleswig; 3. Jutland; 4. Holstein; each having its own provincial assembly. The number of representatives for the whole country amounts to 1217. Each representative receives four rix-dollars a-day (a rix-dollar is 2s. 21⁄2d.) for his services, besides his travelling expenses. The communication between the sovereign and the assembly is through a royal commissioner, who is allowed to vote, but not to speak. – See Wheaton's History of Scandinavia . It is only since the assembly of the states was constituted, that the Sleswig Holsteiners have been seized with the Germanic furor – a malady not a little increased by the inflammatory harangues of needy demagogues, and the pedantic outpourings of a handful of professors stark-mad on the subject of German liberty. If there is one thing more absurd than another, upon this globe of absurdity, it is the cant of "nationality," "freedom," "fatherland," "brotherhood," &c. &c., which is dinned into your ears from one end of Germany to the other; but which, like all other cants, is nothing but so much wind and froth, utterly without reason, stamina, or foundation. We should like to ask any mustached and bearded youth of Heidelberg or Bonn, at any one sober moment of his existence, to point out to us any single spot where this boasted "nationality" is to be seen and scanned. Will the red-capped, long-haired Bursch tell us when and where we may behold that "vaterland" of which he is eternally dreaming, singing, and drinking? Why, is it not a fact that, to a Prussian, an Austrian or a Swabian is an alien? Does not a Saxe-Coburger, a Hessian, and any other subject of any small duchy or principality, insist, in his intense hatred of Prussia, that the Prussians are no Germans at all; that they have interests of their own, opposed to those of the true German people; and that they are as distinct as they are selfish? You cannot travel over the various countries and districts included under the name of Germany, without learning the thorough insulation of the component parts. The fact is forced upon you at every step. Mr Kohl himself belongs to none of the states mentioned. He is a native of Bremen – one of the cities of that proud Hanseatic League which certainly has never shown an enlarged or patriotic spirit with reference to this same universal "vaterland." Arrogant and lordly republics care little for abstractions. They have a keen instinct for their own material interests, but a small appreciation of the glorious ideal. We ask, again, where is this all pervading German patriotism?