form a sequence, a continuous chain of lyrical romance. His _Fredman's
Epistles_ are a sort of epic cycle of lyrics. This is a form often
adopted by Swedish poets. We find it in Tegnér's _Frithiof's Saga_,
in Runeberg's _Sayings of Sergeant Stal_, and in the works of other
poets. It is a question, however, whether even by these Master
Singers, in their more elaborate conceptions and genial flights of
poetry, Bellman has ever been surpassed. In lyric power and vivid
realism, his popular ditties are unrivaled.

The next to incarnate the genius of the Scandinavian race was Tegnér.
His love of brave deeds and reckless adventure and his exaltation of
the man of action above the man of thought are typical. His heroes,
fair-haired and blue-eyed, stalwart and vigorous, relying on strength
and longing for adventure, tender-hearted and contemplative when not
aroused to violent action and bent on deeds of valor, personify the
national ideal. His whole vision of life is Scandinavian, bright and
vivid, with a tinge of melancholy. Tegnér was, with Geijer and Ling,
the first to adopt national subjects, to use the Scandinavian myths
and folk-lore in their poetry, in opposition to the classical themes
and the Hellenic mythology, until then exclusively in vogue in the
poetical field.

Geijer was a romantic by nature, in politics as well as in literature,
but he was above all an ardent Scandinavian, opposed to exotics,
and passionately devoted to the great traditions of the past, a
hero-worshiper, an enthusiast, and a _Goth_. The Goths were members of
a society formed to revive the old national manners and customs, the
freedom of the age of the Vikings, and the ardor of the heroes
of Walhalla. Their organ was the _Idun_, an exclusively literary
publication. In a letter written by Geijer from Stockholm to his