the life and cultural history of Western Norway, The Norwegian National Museum in Christiania, founded 1894, similar, but more general in character, The Industrial Arts. Museum,[10] and the various archives of the Kingdom.

As to the Norwegian language I shall merely speak of its highly analytic character, in which respect it has for a long time been developing in the same direction as English, though of course, absolutely independently. Being closely cognate with English, a large part of the vocabulary of the two is of the same stock. Further, its sound system is fundamentally similar. These three considerations, especially perhaps the first, will make clear to us the reason why the Norwegian so readily learns to use the English language, and if he learns it in youth, even to the point of mastery. This is of the greatest importance, for language is in modern times the real badge of nationality. A correct use of the English language is the first and chief stamp of American nationality, the key without which the foreigner cannot enter into the spirit of American life and institutions.

Norwegian literature I cannot either discuss here. The great movements it represents in recent times are fairly well known; its significance and its broad influence are beginning to be understood. The genius of Norwegian literature is morality and truth. It expresses herein the high ethical sense of the nation, which is pagan-racial, but which is also Christian-Lutheran, a church which in its preëminent spirituality is the typical Teutonic church.

CHAPTER II
Emigration from Norway.

Emigration from Norway has in large part been transatlantic. Norway has lost by American emigration a comparatively larger portion of her population than any other country in Europe, with the exception of Ireland. The great majority of the emigrants have gone to the northwestern states and found there their future homes. In Northern Illinois, in Wisconsin and Minnesota, in Northern and Western Iowa, in North and South Dakota, they form a very large proportion of the population. Emigration to European countries has been directed chiefly to Sweden and Denmark, though not few have settled in England and Germany and some in Holland. Between 1871 and 1875 about fifteen hundred persons emigrated from Norway to Australia; the number that have gone there since that has been much smaller. These have settled chiefly in South Australia, Victoria and New Zealand. In recent years some have settled in the Argentine Republic in South America. Norwegians are found in considerable numbers in Western Canada, but the majority of these have emigrated from the Norwegian communities in the western states, especially Minnesota and North Dakota.

Norwegian emigration to the United States took the sailing of Norden and Den Norske Klippe in 1836. In 1843 it began to assume larger proportions; in that year sixteen hundred immigrants from Norway settled in the United States. During 1866–1870, a period of financial depression in Norway, there left, on an average, about fifteen thousand a year. The rate fell in the seventies, rose again in the eighties, the figure for 1882 being 29,101 persons, while it averaged over eighteen thousand per annum also for the next decade. In 1898 it was not quite five thousand, then again it rose steadily, reaching 24,461 in 1903.

The Norwegian emigration has been mostly from rural districts, day-laborers, artisans, farmers, seamen, but also those representing other pursuits. Not a few with professional or technical education have settled in America; we find them in the medical profession,[11] in the ministry,[12] in journalism, in the faculties of our colleges. All the age-classes are represented among immigrants from Norway, but by far the largest number of both men and women have come during the ages of twenty to thirty-five, and particularly the first half of these series of years.

This great emigration of the Norwegian race during the nineteenth century has, of course, very materially retarded the growth of the population in Norway, especially in the period from 1865 to 1890. The increase between 1815 and 1835 was as high as 1.34 per cent annually. From 1835 to 1865 it was 1.18 per cent, but during 1865–1890 it fell to 0.65 per cent. Since 1890 the increase has been considerable again. But during 1866–1903 the total emigration from Norway to the United States alone aggregated five hundred and twenty-four thousand. To this number should be added the children of these if we are to have a proper basis of estimation for the increase of the race in the last half century. This increase thus has been 1.40 per cent annually, that is, the race has doubled itself in fifty years. We may compare with France, where the increase has been 0.23 per cent, Russia,[13] where it has been 1.35, in Servia, where it has been 2.00 per cent, this being the highest in Europe. The increase in Sweden and Denmark is about the same as in Norway—reckoning the racial increase.

It will be of interest here to consider briefly the immigration from the Scandinavian countries as a whole.

During the years 1820–1830 not more than 283 emigrated from the Scandinavian countries to the United States. In the following decade the number only slightly exceeded two thousand. Since 1850 our statistics regarding the foreign born population are more complete. In that year we find there were a little over eighteen thousand persons in the country of Scandinavian birth. In 1880 this number had reached 440,262; while the unprecedented exodus of 1882 and the following years had by 1890 brought the number up to 933,249. Thus the immigrant population from these countries, which in 1850 was less than one per cent, had in 1890 reached ten per cent of the whole foreign element. The following table will show the proportion contributed by the countries designated for each decade since 1850:

Table I