Architecture cannot boast of any continuous chain of brilliant development. Since the days of Nicodemus Tessin there have been few great architects until in very recent times, when architecture has received a sudden impetus which has made its progress and results as remarkable, or almost more so, than that of the other arts. To Helgo Zettervall a number of elaborate national works of construction and restoration have been intrusted and, as a rule, carried through in a meritorious manner, although sometimes giving occasion for serious criticism. An important influence was exerted by Frederic William Scholander, more by his teaching than by his works. It is principally his pupils who in the last few decades have almost revolutionized the building methods and architectural aspect of the capital, and endowed Gothenburg and other towns with works of architectural distinction. Pre-eminent among modern architects are I. G. Clason, Gustavus Wickman, K. F. von Gegerfelt, Adrian Peterson, Hans Hedlund, Valfried Karlson, A. F. Anderberg, E. Lallerstedt. The Vasa, or Swedish Castle Renaissance, which with good effect has been reintroduced for monumental buildings, seems to lead architecture on to a wholesome national development, combining impressive outlines and solidity with elaboration and grace of interior decoration.
The foremost composers of orchestral music have been mentioned above. Sweden maintains her reputation as being the country of song through the compositions by Hedenblad, Kœrling, Svedbom, Sjœgren and Arlberg, while Sœderman has brought the form of the ballad, based on national folk music, to the highest development. The royal opera of Stockholm recently moved into new and elegant quarters erected on the site of the old opera house built by Gustavus III. It possesses, in Caroline Œstberg, Mathilde Linden, Arvid Œdman, C. F. Lundquist and J. Elmblad, dramatic singers of high rank, while Sweden, in Louise Pyk, Mathilde Grabow Taube and Solomon Smith, owns concert singers of great eminence. The international firmament of song has two Swedish stars of considerable magnitude in Sigrid Arnoldsson-Fischhoff, a colorature songstress, and Ellen Nordgren-Gullbrandson, a Wagner singer. The greatest actor is Emil Hillberg, a noble creator of Ibsen and Strindberg rôles, while the country recently lost its ablest comedian in the death of Knut Almlœf.
Sweden of to-day offers an attractive picture of a country in a high degree cultured and prosperous, but no country or period is entitled to reap only benefits or enjoy undisturbed happiness. No progress is obtained without struggle and relapses, and a good must give way for something better. Beneath a surface generally smiling and serene formidable religious and social forces are in motion. The Swedish state church is divided into two camps, which resemble a high and a low church, out of which the whole may come forward strengthened and rejunevated. The various sects are not all satisfied with the degree of liberty they enjoy. A shallow materialistic movement of anti-religious tendencies, which styled itself Utilitarian, caused some sensation in the latter eighties and early nineties, more through the somewhat too severe manner in which it was suppressed than through any of its own merits. There are agitators for a separation of state and church who are opposed by some of the stanchest friends of a constitutional monarchy. A separation of educational and church affairs seems desirable. The yeomen have regained the predominant position in political life which was theirs in the time of the ancient Teutonic communities, using their power in a way which is not always beneficial to the other classes or the state at large. The great class of country population, which has been in vain striving to rise to the privileged class of landowners, if even on the smallest scale, have emigrated in vast numbers. The emigration, which has given America at least 1,200,000 inhabitants of Swedish birth or parentage, is one of the most astounding phenomena of the century. It has, to a large extent, subsided, but may be revived if the pressure for social improvement is found of no avail. The workingmen are resolved to gain a representation and are striving to attain the introduction of general suffrage. The weapons they use are principally strikes, but may also turn to wholesale emigration. In 1893 the advocates of universal suffrage arranged for the election of a convention by popular vote, the first Folksriksdag, which addressed an appeal to the legal Riksdag, to consider an amendment for the extension of the suffrage. The liberals and radicals are interested in this agitation, and brought out their full vote to the Folksriksdag. The conservative party ignores the whole movement, probably not wisely. The towns are seeking an extended representation and bitterly oppose the curtailment of the rights already enjoyed, fearing the reactionary tendencies of the conservatives, who have their strength in the large agrarian population. Anarchism is something unknown in Sweden. The socialistic agitation, which is spreading among the classes without a political representation, is carried on without any great bitterness and entirely without lawless means.
Any practical or theoretical agitation for a republic there is none in Sweden, the population as a whole not finding salvation from the defects of government or society in any outward change of rule. Civil service is enforced to the letter, and the social pressure from above downward is of a nature caused by financial or educational supremacy only and would remain the same under republican rule. The Swedes are proud of their history and the long and unbroken chain of their political and social development. Their neighbors accuse them of having traces of the chauvinism of bygone days, but not altogether with justice. The national anthem of Sweden can be quoted in their justification. It speaks, in one instance, of the country as enthroned on memories of a glorious past when its name filled the world; but that name is the North, to whose grandeur and loveliness of nature the whole song is a panegyric. The name of Sweden is not even mentioned, a fact which does not point to a narrow or antiquated form of patriotism. There is in the nature of the Swedes a tendency to delight in the display of dignified luxury, which was known to Tacitus. The Swedes love to see the crown of one of the oldest states of Europe carried with dignity as an emblem of their ancient independence. The Swedish king has in reality less power than the President of the United States, but the Swedes have an inherited faculty of confidence and loyalty of which their king receives his full share. The Swedes become excellent citizens of a republic for that very reason: reverence for, and loyalty to, the institutions and historial development of the country in which they dwell. Among the Scandinavian nationalities, the Swede has been characterized as the nobleman or aristocrat, on account of his love of luxury and the joys of life, his dignity, diplomatic talent and lyrico-rhetoric temperament. It is true that his dignity seldom forsakes the Swede; when it does, something of the soldier of the Thirty Years’ War comes to the surface. To her diplomatic talent, more than to her glorious victories, Sweden owes her superiority in size, prosperity and political importance, as compared to her Scandinavian neighbors.
The fundamental laws of the kingdom of Sweden are: 1. The constitution of June 6, 1809; 2. The amended regulations for the formation of the Riksdag of June 22, 1866; 3. The law of royal succession of September 26, 1810; and on the liberty of the press of July 16, 1812. According to these statutes, the king must be a member of the Lutheran church, and have sworn fealty to the laws of the land. His person is inviolable. He has the right to declare war and make peace after consulting the state council. He nominates to all higher appointments, both military and civil; concludes foreign treaties, and has a right to preside in the supreme court of justice. The princes of the blood royal are excluded from all civil employments. The king possesses legislative power in matters of political administration, but in all other respects that power is exercised by the Riksdag, in concert with the sovereign, and every new law must have the assent of the crown. The right of imposing taxes is vested in the Riksdag. The executive power is in the hands of the king, who acts under the advice of a cabinet or state council, the head of which is the minister of state. It consists of ten members, seven of whom are ministerial heads of departments and three without departments. All the members of the cabinet are responsible for the acts of the government.
Eric Gustavus Bostrœm is minister of state, holding office since 1891, after the protectionists had got into power and the compromise cabinets which followed were a thing of the past. The other ministers without departments, Baron A. L. E. Akerhielm and S. H. Wikblad, have remained in office since the days of compromise cabinets. The other members who have been in office from five to eight years are as follows: Count L. V. A. Douglas, minister of foreign affairs; P. S. L. Annerstedt, minister of justice; Baron A. E. Rappe, minister of war; J. C. E. Christerson, minister of marine; J. E. von Krusenstierna, minister of interior; Count H. Hansson Wachtmeister, minister of finance; G. F. Gilljam, minister of education and ecclesiastical affairs.
King Oscar II., in the jubilee year of 1897, which marked the completion of a quarter of a century of his reign, received innumerable proofs of the love of the two nations under his rule and of the high esteem in which he is held by the governments and citizens of foreign countries. The occasion was celebrated by a large and highly successful Scandinavian exposition at Stockholm in the summer, Russia, with Finland, also taking part, and by a series of festivities about September 21st, the date of his succession to the throne. King Oscar has always given sympathetic attention to the United States, especially to their citizens of Swedish birth. Several deputations from America called upon the king in the jubilee year. Among these was a male chorus of fifty-four members, belonging to the American Union of Swedish singers. The singers were invited to the royal castle and received and feasted by the aged monarch with cordial simplicity, in all royal splendor, without any of its pomp or ceremony. To the hearty songs of his unpretentious guests, King Oscar responded with one of the eloquent speeches for which he is so justly famous, assuring them that, although citizens of another land, they were still followed by the loving interest of their mother country and her monarch. When the singers intoned one of the songs by Prince Gustavus, the king joined them with his sonorous tenor voice, smilingly calling their attention to the fact that he had not forgotten his students’ songs. The anniversary of the seventieth birthday of Oscar II. was celebrated January 21, 1899, a slight gloom being cast over it on account of the temporary illness of the king. Oscar II. fully recovered after a few months of rest and recreation and bears every indication of attaining the same advanced age, with the same unimpaired activity, as his grandfather, which would mean another decade added to the era of undisturbed peace. Crown Prince Gustavus Adolphus, who is yet little known in Norway, enjoys great popularity in Sweden, where his harmonious, sagacious nature and resolute energy are highly respected.
The reign of Oscar II. in Sweden has been marked by reactionary movements in Church and State, but the king has been in such close contact with his people that they have recognized in him a sovereign who stands above the parties. The king has used the conservative elements of his country to strengthen her defences and to maintain the Union with Norway, which have been the great goals of his policy of peace. To sum up King Oscar’s standpoint in the Norwegian question, he is willing to grant Norway home rule in its fullest extent, but refuses to grant her separate control of foreign affairs, which he considers incompatible with the idea of the Union. In this standpoint King Oscar is backed by the convictions of the overwhelming majority of Swedes, who see in the dissolution of the Union a danger to Sweden, Norway, or both countries, of sharing the fate of unhappy Finland, which the civilized world is now deeply deploring. The danger which menaces the sons of Suomi has touched all Scandinavians to the quick, and it would seem that the new century shall witness a restoration of the Scandinavian policy. If the movement to bring this about meets with success, it is to be hoped that, from the start, it shall have rather the actual wants than the ideal rights of the independent Scandinavian states in view. From the point of view of citizens of the United States we cannot but sympathize with a movement which may establish a union of independent states into a realm of imperial government, less an emperor. Let there rather be two or three kings in the North, with one solid union government and a common and equal defence in case of war, than two or three foreign ministers with as many different policies and a divided and unequal defence.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The ancient name of this province, Viken, probably is the key to the disputed etymology of the word Viking.