e; as also the efforts made by Vuk to establish a new alphabetical
system. It can hardly be doubted that these efforts; the interest they
excited; and, above all, the claims preferred by some eminent scholars
connected with them; roused the jealousy and just ambition of the
Illyrico-Servians. They were far from being willing to give up the
name of _Illyrians_ for that of _Servians_; they felt themselves a
part of a great whole, but they wanted to be acknowledged as the
_principal_ part. In order to become strong, they had above all to
unite, A gentleman of uncommon energy and intelligence at Agram, Dr.
Ludovic Gaj, the editor of a Croatian periodical, took the matter in
hand. He prepared a new system of orthography for all the
Illyrico-Servian dialects, founded on the Bohemian model, and greatly
approved by the Bohemian scholars. He himself established a printing
office in order to carry out his plan. At the same time he enlarged
his paper, which now became "The Illyrian National Gazette;" and
contrived to secure patrons of name and influence. Schaffarik declared
himself decidedly in his favour. How far he has succeeded, and how far
in general the few Illyrico-Servian literati have been able to keep up
their budding literature during the recent tempests of the times, we
are unable to say. We may say truly that we have wished for Dr. Gaj's
system of union the very best success; and have expressed above, how
desirable we deem it in every respect.[26]

_Literature of the Catholic Slavonians_.

The Slavonians of the Greek Church make use of the Cyrillic letters;
and their productions belong therefore to that division of Servian
literature.[27] We have seen above, that the catholic Slavonians also
neither speak nor write a different dialect; but that only their mode
of writing, the strange combination according to which they express
the sounds of the same language, separates them from the Dalmatian
Servians.[28] To enter into the details of these varieties would be of
little interest for our readers.

The light of the Reformation penetrated at an early day into Slavonia,
and gave birth to a kind of limited theological or ecclesiastical
national literature. But the catholic clergy soon succeeded in
extinguishing it; and in the same proportion, the Latin language
continued to supersede the dialect of the people. In more modern days,
the Latin has been preferred by nearly all catholic Slavonic writers;
and their own literatu