the pulpit; and a good deal of State and family transactions are then made known; royal proclamations and acts of parliament read, marriages and deaths announced-and auctions, &c., also; together with a vast variety of matters, curious enough to hear in the country parish churches.

The following forms for death and marriage are given me by the Adjunct. I copy his words,

or his translation :

"A new remembrance of our mortality is given us this day, when, to this Christian congregation, is announced that the Highest hath pleased, according to His all-wise council, to call from the world A. B., after a life" and here follows the whole of a tombstone memorial, setting forth all that people wish to say, or to have said for them. "In submission to God's pleasure, we reverence His disposal, and desire grace to consider the departure that awaits us, that, when death shall call us, we may be prepared for a blissful decease."

The following is the form he gave me of publishing banns :

"A Christian matrimonial conjunction is publicated to this congregation between A. B. &c. ; and to them we wish good luck and benediction,

and happiness from God, who instituted matrimony."

There is no escape from this by means of any license. It must be very agreeable to have "a matrimonial conjunction publicated" three times in this way, and followed by a Bridal exhibition such as I described before. It might be worth making the conjunction for sake of the concomitants.

I am sure you will be very angry with me for jumping thus from grave to gay; from sacred things, to-I was going to say things profanebut holy matrimony is not a profanity, though people do sometimes make it very ridiculous.

I will only return to my former subject, to take one more extract from my Adjunct.

"When the Lord's Supper is not celebrated, and all is ended in the pulpit-(no trifling matter in Swedish Church Service)-a psalm or verse is sung; after which the Priest, turning to the people, says The Lord be with you.'

"When the Priest says this, there shall be no response; but when he sings it, the people shall answer, 'With thee also be the Lord.'

"Then the Priest shall say the Collect for the day. And then if he sings

"Let us thank and praise the Lord;

"Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!'

VOL. II.

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"The people sing in answer

"To the Lord be thanks and praise;

"Or the Priest reads-(which is the common

use, says the Adjunct)———

"Let us thank and praise the Lord.' "And answers himself

"To the Lord be thanks and praise.''

The reason for this distinction on the part of the people, making them repeat the responses when sung, which one might think few could do well, and be silent when they were said, when all could answer with lip as well as heart, appears to me most extraordinary.

The service concludes by the Priest saying"Bow down your hearts unto God, and receive the blessing:" which is given in the form of that of Moses-"The Lord bless thee and keep thee;" the people, it is to be hoped, bowing the heart, but certainly not the knee; for though they always bend the head at the name of Jesus, they sit still, and sit always, as stiff as any descendants of the Covenanters can do. Yet, never were two people much more unlike, except in this one respect, of an uncommon prejudice in favour of their own religion-because it is their own.

I am sure the Swedes will be very angry, if

they know I do not like their Psalm-bok; and I know if I say anything against it or anything else that is Swedish, they will say, "She knows nothing at all about it." But I cannot even get off with this gentle reproof, since my Adjunct has been helping me to discover its beauties, which he of course knows. The fact is there will be, most probably, another alteration in this form of service, which has been already altered so often, that I believe the last compilation is not much more than forty years of age; not so much I think.

The three offices of the Church are Morning Song, High Mass, and Even Song. The vestments worn by the Priests upon officiating at the altar, sometimes contrast strikingly with their appearance at other times.* The Alb, or Surplice, called in Swedish the Mass-shirt, is often trimmed (I speak of the fine churches of the capital) with lace or embroidery; the rich Cope of crimson velvet bears a broad gold cross from top to bottom; and every part of the dress is as rich, and indeed richer, in the National Lutheran Churches, than it is in the Queen's Roman Catholic

* And strangely enough, too, at the same moment. I have seen at Holy Communion, one priest attired as above; and another, who has preached, wearing the black gown.

Chapel. Yet in winter, in one of the largest churches of Stockholm, I saw the Priest in the pulpit wearing only a plain large great coat. I was told he could not get any other robing over it, although the black gown is considered the most important dress; and indeed, in the intense cold of the churches, it was necessary to make himself rather bulky.

The service called High Mass is that which I most like to attend; and I generally come away just when most Swedes like to come in-at sermon time. There is a rather impressive moment at that time too; it is when the priest says 66 secretly" the Lord's Prayer, while the congregation sit in deep stillness, and he prays to himself, with his face to the altar.

The Swedish version of the commandments is the same as the Roman Catholic; that is to say, regarding the Second Commandment, which we generally say, the latter Church took away in order to be at liberty to worship graven images; but the Swedes have no fancy for graven images, and yet have done the same thing.

The Fourth Commandment also is much shorter, and counted as the Third. "Remember to hallow the rest-day,”—and the explanation of its meaning given in the Catechism is-"We should