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 German yurists and Poets.

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GERMAN JURISTS AND POETS. II. By Arthur Hermann.

NOT all poets known and beloved in their own country attain international fame. To such belongs Fritz Renter, the genial dialect poet. Born in 1810 at Stavenhagen in the Grand Duchy of MecklenburgScliwerin, he studied law in the university of Rostock, after having finished his college ( Gymnasium) education. He pursued the study, much against his own wish, in Jena. In 1833, when the so-called Dcmagogen-Verfolgung (persecution of demagogues) was inaugurated in Prussia, he was apprehended, and after a preliminary examination {Untersuehung) of one year's duration, sentenced to be decapitated, which sentence was changed into confinement in a fortress (Festungsstrafc) for thirty years. His government, Mecklenburg, incessantly demanded his ex tradition, but he was retained in Prussian fortresses, particularly in Graudenz, for some years. In 1840, when general amnesty was granted by the new ascending monarch, he was released, when he took to farming. Having failed in this new vocation, he set up as a teacher in Treptow, and published here a series of dialect poems under the title "Lauschen und Riemels." These poems are known among Germans the world over. Those who had no acquaintance with the Vorpommerschen Dialect went to work to learn it, solely for the purpose of enjoying those homely pastoral verses. In simplicity, naturalness, and healthy hu mor these productions have no equal. The dialect is not the object, but merely the vehicle to convey the matchless pictures of the humble life of the northern peasant. Whether he has borrowed some of his ludicrous episodes from Dickens and Oliver Goldsmith I do not know. His writings certainly resemble both famous English |

authors. The adventure of Moses Primrose, who sold his father's cow for twenty-four dozen of eye-glasses,1 for instance, is elabo rately told in a poem entitled " Der Jahrmarkt" (The Fair). Fritz Router has published ten volumes of prose writings, depicting with rare felicity the rural life of that part of the lower countries where he was reared. It is not difficult for anyone conversant with English and German to learn the dialect in a few weeks. Carl Lebrecht Immermann, a very fertile poet and writer of dramas, was born in 1796 in Magdeburg. He studied law in Halle in 181 3, but interrupted his studies, entering the Prussian army to fight Napoleon. In 1823 he was criminal judge in Magdeburg, and in 1827 a judge in Diisseldorf. At that time he created a great deal of sensa tion by living with the countess of Ahlefeldt, the divorced wife of von Liitzow, the famous originator of the Liitzow s Freicorps, a volunteer band of enthusiastic German youths (among them the poet Theodor Korner) who pledged themselves to con quer or die in the struggle against Napoleon. Among Immermann's productions the story of Miinchhausen is the most popular. His dramas are said to have something of the grandeur of Shakespeare, of whose works he was a devout and deep student. He died in 1840, when busy with the preparation of his "Memorabilia." Gottfried August Burger, one of the most popular poets, was born in 1747 in Molmerswende, a small town near the Harz. His father was a preacher. In 1764 he studied jurisprudence in Halle. His family life was almost as remarkable as that of Goethe. In 1774 he married Dorothea Leonhardt, 1 0. Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield.