their birth-place in the Italian states of this empire, are highly cultivated in the capital, the operatic and sacred music of which is ably sustained by native artists, and the melody and power of Lutzer and Staudegel will be long remembered by those of their hearers who have a heart that can be charmed by music and song.

The German and Bohemian people, who by nature possess so much of the genius of music, soon improved their own talents in that line by adopting much of the style and manner of their Italian neighbours; Prague and Vienna have lately become rallying points for all the good musicians and singers on the Continent; and the reputation which Mozart and Haydn, (both of whom were Austrians,) and Gluck and Beethover, acquired for the capital of southern Germany, is still sustained by able artists and composers.*

"The Viennese possess much taste for the drama in all its branches; the theatres, though numerous, are always well attended, and that of the Burg is one of the best conducted on the Continent. The pieces acted there are always of the chastest character, and the talent of its actors-among whom are Löwe and Madame Rettich-is universally acknowledged."

The remainder of Dr. Wilde's fifth chapter on the Present state of Science in Vienna is extremely interesting, and in order to give our readers some idea of Dr. Wilde's diligence in collecting information, we willingly lay before them his remarks upon Austrian literature

"The literature of Austria, in quality as well as quantity, appears to have degenerated during the last fifty years, for, from 1733 to 1790, the period when it flourished most, there were in one year in Vienna upwards of four hundred authors. It is stated by Springer, that the authors of Austria amount in the present day to two thousand five hundred. The severity of the censorship is no doubt one of the chief causes at present acting so injuriously upon all literary labour, literary speculation, and the general spread of knowledge. Natural history, geography, mathematics, law, and the physical, technical, and medical sciences, compose the chief part of the present home literature of Austria. Philology also has been long cultivated with success, and the oriental languages in par

ticular have received in this country special attention, while dramatic works and lyrical poetry are, when unconnected with politics or religion, rather encou raged by the state, and are well suited to the genius of this imaginative people. The Austrian literature, as may be supposed, consists of the several languages and nations of this great empire, and likewise numbers among its productions, works in several of the oriental languages, particularly the Armenian. These latter, which consist partly of translations and partly of original productions, emanate from the Mechitaristen or Armenian Catholics, in the cloister of St. Lazarus, near Venice; they are for the most part composed of works of instruction and devotion, and supply those of the Armenian creed throughout the Ottoman empire generally. The Wallachian people, upon the borders of Hungary and Transylvania, although they cannot be said to be possessed of a special literature, have their school-books, and also some religious works printed in their own tongue. Within the last few years, several new works have been printed in Latin, Romaic, and Hebrew; but the proper national literature of Austria consists of those works published in the German, Italian, Sclavonian, and Hungarian languages, and very lately, some few books have appeared in the original Bohemian tongue. The German press is most actively employed in the capital, and the country below the Enns, and least so in the Tyrol, Carynthia, and Carniola. Hungary has lately sent forth many valuable publications, chiefly on scientific subjects, in the Sclavonian language; but the upper portion of that country seems latterly to have preferred the German literature to its own. Its literature is said to have arisen during the second half of the last century, in the numerous songs and airs which well suited the chivalrous and enterprising spirit of the Magyars; and it has grown so rapidly since that period, that in the space of nine years, from 1817 to 1825 inclusive, there appeared three hundred and ten articles in Hungarian, two hundred and fifty-nine in Latin, one hundred and twenty-seven in German, and eleven in the Sclavonian tongue, in that country.

"Venice and Milan are the centres of Italian literature, which is at present characterized by the predominance of works on language, mathematics, na

tural philosophy, and the natural sciences generally; not because I believe those subjects to be more congenial to the tastes and manners of that people, but because they are the only ones they can treat with safety.

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The Hungarian language, now the language of its senate and its official details, is daily becoming more known, more valued, and more cultivatedpoetry, and dramatic and theological writings are at present its chief subjects.

"The Sclavonian literature, which is divided into the proper Bohemian, the Selavonian, and the Serbish and Windish tongues, has long been distinguished in Moravia, Bohemia, and the Czechen, and may date its most glancing period so far back as the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and it continued till the influence of Austria forced upon the people of these countries the German tongue. After a long pause, an endea vour has been recently made to re-establish the written language of Bohemia, but with little success; the public, and the upper circles in particular, had be come accustomed to their adopted language, and they possessed neither the energy nor the literary ability of the Hungarians to throw it off. In 1835, there were nine journals published in Prague in the mother tongue.

"The literature of Poland has likewise had a glorious era in the same period with the Bohemian; and a sufficiency remains from that time to exhibit its abundance, force, and beauty, in poetry, history, and theology. It can hardly now be expected that, bowed down, and broken in spirit as in fortune, Poland could still shine in literature; and, therefore, although translations from the French and German are numerous, her native works and authors are but few, yet these few still adhere to the original type, and their productions are chiefly of a poetical, religious, and historic nature.

"The Serbish literature is still in its infancy, for this tongue has only been elevated to a written language since the commencement of the eighteenth century. It is chiefly cultivated in Dalmatia and Ragusa. Several of the works of Hungary, particularly upon theological, historical, and philological subjects, are written in Latin, for there that language is still spoken, even by the lower orders, in the common usages of life.

"The following table exhibits in a clearer manner than words can express the character and present condition of Austrian literature; it is extracted from

"An examination of this table affords us no bad criterion of the taste of the Austrian people and the character of their literature, as sanctioned and patronized by the government. Heretofore we have been in the habit of judging of the Austrian literature by the number of the publications of that country spe cified in the Leipzig catalogue; this however is an unfair test, for in the list of German works, published at the Easter fair in the year 1835, of 3164 books mentioned therein, but 216 were Austrian; and in 1839, of 3127 works only 118 were Austrian. This arises from the little intercourse that subsists between the Austrian and the other German publishers-from many of the Austrian works being written in the Sclavonian, Hungarian, and Latin languages-from the fact of most Austrian works being expressly written for, and only applicable to, the condition of the inhabitants of that country-and from the strict censorship of the imperial dominions, rendering impossible the usual barter or interchange of literature, by which the booksellers of the other countries of Germany conduct their mercantile transactions. It is calculated that but a tenth part of the annual Austrian literature appears in the Leipzig catalogue. Compared with the other states of Europe, and with Germany in particular, it is evident, that when we subtract the mere school-books and other minor publications, the literature of

Southern Germany is by no means adequate to the population and the present state of civilization in that country; and the polyglot condition of this literature, reduces the number of works which are applicable to each nation or condition of the community to a much smaller number.

"It will be seen by referring to the foregoing table, that (independent of the school-books and almanacs) religious works are the most numerous; then follow those on medicine; after that, poetry and dramatic productions; and then historical and biographic works; the novel and romance literature, although apparently so numerous in these years, is not so in reality, for many of the works included in this number, were but new editions of former publications. Many of the poetic works, which were chiefly Italian, were of mere local interest; and much of the history and biography is of a popular and encyclopædic character.

"The relative proportion of works in the four different languages now in most general use in the Austrian states, stood thus in the years 1832 and 1833-Italian 2,221, German, 2,139, Latin 389, Bohemian 178; Hungarian literature was not at this time in a sufficient state of advancement to offer a fair compari son with the foregoing. In Italian literature, the greatest number of works are those published in the Lombardy states, which, even in the year 1824, possessed a native literature to the amount of 1,040,500 volumes ; in 1832, this kingdom published 913 and the Venetian state 862 works; and in 1836, Lombardy produced 788 and Venice 843 books.

"In the years 1832 and 1833, the works published in Austria (not including Italy) were 70 Polish, 91 Greek, 37 Windish and Serbish, 53 Hebrew, and 8 Armenian, exclusive of its own immediate literature; many of these, however, were but translations and new editions, the number of original works being about two-thirds of the whole.

.. Owing to the strict censorship, few foreign works are admitted into Austria;-in 1832, these amounted to 2,509, and in 1833, they numbered 2,791; among those of the former year were 67 historical, 63 poetical, 29 theological, and 14 legal and juridical. Of 5,300 foreign publications recently admitted into Austria, 3,578 were German,771 French, 657 Italian, 112 Polish, 75 English, 6 Greek, and 101 Latin.

"The periodical literature is very scanty; each of the fifteen principal cities publishes a newspaper, denomi

an Amtsblatt, or government gazette, which is solely occupied with all the new laws, regulations, and enactments. There are likewise fourteen other newspapers, the principal of which are the Austrian Observer (OesterreichischeBeobachter), established since 1810, and the Salzburg, Troppau, Presburg, and Agram papers, the Kaschaur Bothe and the Magyar Kurir; that, however, in the greatest circulation, is the Wiener Zeitung. There are six newspapers published in the capital, two of which, the Observer and the Wiener Zeitung, are so-called political. The chief foreign news, however, obtained by the Austrians, is contained in the Allgemeine Zeitung, or Augsburgh Gazette, which has, it is said, a separate edition printed for circulation in Austria when any thing appears in its pages that does not satisfy the conscience of the censor.

"Foreign newspapers were likewise admitted, in the following numbers and proportions, in 1833, German 252, French 116, English 20, Italian 35—in all, 423.

"This number has, however, been much curtailed since that period, for by the last official accounts (those for 1836) we find the number reduced to 205; the tone and character of which may be learned from the following statement :German-39 political, 52 literary and artistic, and 40 of a mixed nature; French-21 political, 2 literary and artistic, 36 mixed; English-4 political, and 1 literary; Italian-6 political ; and 2 in other foreign languages. The higher periodical literature consists of journals, (Jahrbücher,) magazines, and general communicators, (Mittheilungen,) to the number of seventy-six. One half of these belong to the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, which takes the lead in literary matters of all the other Austrian provinces : thus, we find, that of the 76 journals published in the entire of Italy, 32 belonged to Lombardy, 10 to Venice, 24 to Naples, and 10 to Sardinia. The characters of the 76 Austrian journals are, 2 theological, 3 legal, 7 medical, 2 astronomical, 13 for physics, agriculture, trade, and com. merce, 9 for history, statistics, and geography, 2 military, 2 for general literature, and 36 for art and mixed subjects. There are 2 literary, 2 medical, and 3 legal periodicals published in Vienna, besides the quarterly proceedings of the

agricultural and industrial societies. The Jahrbücher der Literatur, which commenced in 1818, is the chief Austrian journal of eminence, and the Medicinisch-Chirurgische-Zeitschrift, pub. lished at Innsbruck, is one of the oldest medical periodicals in Europe; it is now in its fifty-fourth year. The six papers which are principally read in the capital, have the following circulation :-Allgemeine-Zeitung 1999, Theater-Zeitung 965, Militär-Zeitchrift 523, Wiener ModeZeitchrift 490, Leipziger Moden 229, Journal de Francfort 87; besides this, there are the Humorist and the Oesterreichische Zuschauer, which have also got a considerable circulation.

There

is a private subscription reading-room in Vienna, the Casino, where foreigners will find some of the English newspapers and reviews the Times,' Morning Post,' and the Athenæum.'

At the present moment, when the subject of the medical charities of Ireland engrossess so much attention, it is extremely fortunate that Dr. Wilde has presented us with the fullest details respecting the Austrian Sanatory Institutions, for although the established habits of this country, and the nature of the British constitution, render the adoption of the entire

Austrian code impossible, yet there are many of their sanatory regulations which we might borrow with great benefit to ourselves, and we have no hesitation in asserting that on the important questions of the poor laws and medical police the legislature might derive many useful hints from our author's fifteenth chapter on the General and Medical Statistics of the Austrian empire.

We are now compelled by our limits to close our notice of this interesting work, in which, although the author's object was principally to record the existing condition of Austrian literary, scientific, and sanatory institutions, abundant matter will be found to interest and amuse the general reader. Hard names and statistical tables may at first blush deter him who reads merely for pleasure, but we promise that a nearer intimacy with the volume will suffice to dispel any idea of dullness, as it really is but another of the many instances before the world of how agreeable a book can be made on apparently the least amusing topics, by a clever man, particularly when that clever man is a clever physician.