The New International Encyclopædia/Sealsfield, Charles

SEALS'FIELD, Charles. The name assumed by Karl Postl (1793-1864), an Austrian novelist and traveler in the United States, Mexico, and Central America, in early life secretary of a religious Order in Prague, and ordained priest. He fled in 1822 to the United States, where he traveled extensively, mainly in the Southwest. For a short time (1829-30) he was editorially connected with the Courrier des Etats-Unis. He afterwards resided mainly in Switzerland. In 1828 he published Tokeah, or The Wild Rose, and later some remarkable descriptive novels: Der Legitime und die Republikaner (1833, a rewriting of Tokeah); Der Virey und die Aristokraten (1834, rewritten as Morton, 1846); Das Kajütenbuch (1840); and the social studies Lebensbilder aus beiden Hemisphären (1835-37), Deutsch-amerikanische Wahlverwandtschaften (1835-37), and Süden und Norden (1842-43).