NOVA ZEMBLA NOVEL. 



271 



vernor's instructions, or are appointed by him. The 

 members of the house of assembly are elected for the 

 term of seven years. Nova Scotia was discovered by 

 John Cabot, in 1497, and was probably the first land 

 discovered on the continent of/North America. It 

 was first settled by the French, and called Acadia. 

 In 1C21, it was granted by James I. to Sir W. Alex- 

 ander, and named Nova Scotia ; but, in 1632, by the 

 treaty of St Germains, it was restored to France. 

 Subsequently, it several times changed its masters, 

 and was the scene of many troubles and conflicts ; 

 and the country was not established in the quiet pos- 

 session of the British government until the capture of 

 Louisburg, in 1758. At the peace of 1763, the 

 boundaries of this colony were so defined as to in- 

 clude New Brunswick ; but a separation was after- 

 wards made, by whicli the present boundaries were 

 established. See Haliburton's Historical and Statis- 

 tical Account of Nova Scotia (Halifax, 18290 



NOVA ZEMBLA (Novaia Zemlia. i. e. new land); 

 the name of two large islands in the Northern ocean, 

 separated by Matotshnoi straits, and belonging to the 

 Russian government of Archangel; lat. 70 35' to 77 

 N.; Ion. 47 45' to 77 20' E.; square miles 94,400. 

 The Waigatz islands, to the south of Nova Zembla, are 

 separated from the continent by the strait of the same 

 name. The country is uninhabited, but is visited by 

 Russian hunters and fishermen, some of whom pass the 

 winter here. The reindeer, Arctic fox, ermine, and 

 white bear are the principal quadrupeds. Water 

 fowl, whales, seals, and various species offish abound. 

 Dwarf willows and some shrubs are found; moss and 

 a short grass cover the ground in some places; but a 

 great portion of the country consists of sterile rocks 

 or sands. In the southern part, the sun disappears 

 November 8, and does not rise again till the end of 

 January. The twilight, however, continues about a 

 fortnight, and the dreary horrors of these long nights 

 are somewhat relieved by the northern lights. (See 

 Aurora Boreal is.) In general, the snow begins to 

 fall in September, and lies till late in June, and in 

 many places all the year round. In 1807, a Russian 

 expedition was sent to examine a part of the coast, 

 where silver was said to have been found ; but no 

 traces of it could be discovered. In 1819 22, the 

 government caused the island to be explored. 



NOVEL (from the Italian novella, a tale, news; 

 though novella signifies, in Italian, something quite 

 different from the English novel, which is called, in 

 Italian, romanzo). The English nomenclature for 

 works of fiction is not very complete. The same 

 word tale must be used to designate the Italian 

 novella (German Novelle) and the Italian conto (Ger- 

 man Mahrcheri}. No department of works of imagi- 

 nation has been so much cultivated as the novel. 

 Their varieties are innumerable ; from that form in 

 which a series of historical occurrences is bound 

 together by a very slight web of fiction, to the mon- 

 strous products of a distorted imagination. The novel 

 is of a kindred character with the proper epic and 

 the narrative idyl. It begins to be cultivated when 

 the poetical age (par excellence) is passed, and man 

 becomes engrossed with reality, and disposed to sub- 

 stitute minute description of the multiplied relations 

 which have sprung up in society, in the room of the 

 creations of his own imagination. Hence slow and 

 accurate development becomes its character, prose 

 its necessary form ; and hence the possibility of im- 

 mense variety. As a work of art, however, it must 

 always form a harmonious whole, in the novel, 

 reflection prevails much more than in other poetical 

 productions, because, the language being prose, and 

 the whole form of the work comparatively unre- 

 strained, allow it, and the advanced period of society 

 to which it belongs requires it. " In the novel," 



says Goethe, in his IVilhelm Meister (third volume), 

 " sentiments and events are to be chiefly represented; 

 in the drama, character and actions. The hero of 

 the novel must be passive, at least, not in a high 

 degree active ; we expect of the dramatic hero ac- 

 tion. Grandison, Clarissa, Pamela, the Vicar of 

 Wakefield, Tom Jones, are, if not passive, yet re- 

 tarding persons. In the drama, every thing resists 

 the hero, and he overcomes the hinderances or suc- 

 cumbs." The field of the novel, however, is so great, 

 that it seems to us these limits will not be observed 

 in all cases. The intercourse of the different parts 

 of the civilized world has become so great and rapid, 

 and, consequently, their interest in each other so 

 lively, that a kind of novels has become popular, 

 belonging, like newspapers, to the peculiarities of our 

 time. In fact, they are near akin to newspapers, 

 being merely destined to give a superficial view of 

 the temporary condition of foreign countries, with 

 more connexion and minuteness than is practicable 

 in the daily gazettes. These novels appear, are 

 read, and are forgotten, like newspapers. 



As to historical novels,* in which this country has 

 so far outstripped every other nation (partly, per- 

 haps, because our history is kept continually before 

 us, from its connexion with the never-ending succes- 

 sion of constitutional questions), we are far from con- 

 demning them as an incongruous mixture of fiction 

 and fact. They serve to give some idea of past 

 events to people who would shrink from toilsome 

 research ; and, though this sort of knowledge is al- 

 together insufficient for the wants of a sober inquirer 

 into the past condition of men, it furnishes a better 

 occupation for the crowd of readers for entertainment 

 than mere works of fiction. It is the product of a 

 manly nation, and has become popular in an age 

 when people wish for something more substantial 

 than the billing of lovers. The Greeks, who de- 

 veloped with such astonishing rapidity almost every 

 branch of poetry, have left hardly any trace of the 

 novel. If we do not consider Xenophon's picture of 

 the education of a prince, in his Cyropadia, as a 

 novel, the first production of this sort in the Greek 

 language is the Milesian Tales, the product of a time 

 when the Greek character was extinct ; and to judge 

 from the pastoral piece of Longus, on the loves of 

 Daphnis and Chloe, we can hard conceive of any 

 thing more flat, and full of vulgar sensuality. (See 

 Heyne's Critique of the Greek Novels, in his German 

 translation of CAariton.) Still fewer traces of this 

 kind of composition are found with the Romans, who 

 stood far behind the Greeks in the fine arts and poe- 

 try. The time of chivalry produced many distin- 

 guished works of fiction, but they are not what we 

 now expect a novel to be. (See Troubadours.) The 

 masterpiece of Miguel Cervantes Don Quixote de 

 la Mancha which attacks the inflated romances of 

 chivalry with such exquisite irony of description, 

 forms the connecting link between them and the 

 modern novel. See Romances, 



The modern novel was not developed before the 

 eighteenth century, and to this country is due the 

 honour of having led the way. Samuel Richardson 

 appeared with his Pamela, followed by Clarissa, so 

 universally celebrated. In Grandison he strove to 

 reach the highest perfection, but fell below his for- 



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the 

 ig to 



* Towards the *nd of the seventeenth century and the be 

 ginning of the eighteenth, it was customary to relate, in th 

 form of a novel, the secret history of German courts, giving to 

 the persons names taken from ancient history. The volumi- 

 nous works of duke Anthony Ulrich of Brunswick, particu- 

 larly his Octavia, much diffused the taste for this kind of pro. 

 deletions. Of this species is also Fredegunda, published from a 

 Franch manuscript, at Berlin, in 1825. Fredejfunda is Sophia 

 Dorothea, wife to the electoral prince of Hanover, George 

 Louis; at a later period, George I. of Britain. In the novel 

 Octavia thin unfortunate princess is called Sulnne. 



