PATRIOTIC SONGS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 282, 22 August 1908, Page 12

PATRIOTIC SONGS.

This (said the "Glasgow Horald" on July 4) is American Independence Day—a fact of which somo of us may have required an almanac to remind us, but whioh in Amorica would have been forced upon our dormant attention by means of "loud calls or noises, whother by tho voice or by horns, bolls," or the innnito variety of diabolical contrivances with which Yankee iuventivoness might fill up tlla category of' "other instruments." what would probably first disongage itself from tho reverberations of cannon and the' yells of wounded but undismayed citizens would bo tho strains of tho brass band of "Robert S. Marks Post," wrestling manfully with tho hysterical cadenzas of "Tho Star Spangled Banner," a characteristic reminiscence of the onii-British feeling of 1812; or a choir of school children, like gulls in a storm, might bo heard screaming those vaguo but inspiring lines from "Hail, Columbia I" which, as tho schoolmarm may lave explained to her class,, do not refer to the Monroe Doctrine or tno Trust system, but to the gift, principle, or deity—according lis the linos may be interpreted—of Independence— Ba ever grateful for the prize, And lot its altar roach the skies— apparently for tho solo convenience of citizens ascended up on high, and for tho relief of citizens .'still in the flesh from any sacrificial obligations. Tho "Jack Brags" and "Yankee Doodles" of the Revolutionary period, whose_ decided expression of popular feeling so impressed the more-enlightened of English statesmen, have long fallen' out of favour. We do not weep their loss; and wo unfeignedly rejoice that national tranquillity has deprived of their tragic import the inspiriting songs that quickened the flagging .footsteps of Sherman's soldiers in their march to the sea. Yet we . may be. pardoned for harbouring an illogical regret that circumstances should havo compelled a redescent from tho apocalyptio raptures of "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord," to tho thin and mouldy fustian of "Hail, Columbia I" Mysticism, in some form or another, is the basic element of all lyric poetry. It was on the wings of religion that tho feeble (American muse rose to the height of the great argument of oivil war, towards which the lithe muse; of Franco strained, with pa thotio. ineffectiveness, on tho croaking stilts of doctrinairism. " Centuries of hureaucratio and pleasure-loving despotism had contracted both'the spirit and the scopo of French poetry. .. Within ' its own littlo charmed circle it had attained a grace and perfection that wero the admiration and despair of the whole outside world. But tho doves and mocking-birds that had coood so sweetly' and twittered so amid the scented groves, of the.Cythcrean islo were swept like withered leaves across tho windy plains of Troy, where the "croaking eagles" of tho Torror "bellowed for revpnge" in rhymed philippics and strophic' ciceronics. No new jbottlos were at hand to receive the new, sour wine of revolution. Of its quality we may judgo from the wersh drop or two that still gurgles, at least when a French assemblage sings tho song, in the Gideon's trump of the "Marseillaise" melody. The fow good war-songs of tho Napoleonic period express the nostalgia of the conquerors rather than the glory of conquest; and tho harps of the song-writors hung dolefully upon tho willows during tho dark days of '7J.. But we need not-, turn any moro pages of a blank catalogue. "Die ' Zwei (Jrenadiere," inspired by lovo of Franco and by tho pootie spirit of his own detested fatherland, is ■also the one patriotic song of Heine. .But the patriotic muse of Germany could afford to lend Heine to France, and evon to dispense with tho 1 services of that arrogant cosmopolite, Goethe. "To him that hath shall bo given"; as if Luther's "Ein Fost-o Burg" wore not enough to fill tho lustiest lungs of patriotism, the poets of 1813, Arndt, Wilhelm Muller, and Korner, added both minor and major chords to a patriotic chorus that in later sonigs tends almost to an over-fortissimo of national sentiment. But it is the humanitarian, not tho artistic ear, thiit feels the chorus a thought too loud. So long as tho passion of nationalism exists among European peoples, 'the patriotio songs of Germany will remain "the,dread and envy of them all." Britain, however,-may humbly claim o second place to Germany in patriotic song, though at an almost unreckonable distance bolo'.v her. Tho thought of Drayton's "Agincourt" may keep us from blushing too deeply when wo articulate the idiotic doggerel of " God Save the King;" Tho runs and flourishes of "Rulo, Britannia" do not stir the,.' blood like the bugle-like intervals of the "Marseillaise" on tho other hand, ,the descent from_ the,music to the words is much less steep in tho English than in the French song. We oan only regret that another Dr. Arne did not . arise to do justice to Campbell's two great ballads, and that Mr Kipling's best patriotic verses are written -in a form unsuitable for a composer, who, however,' could make more of them than of Tennyson's unspeakable "Riflemen, form!" Our great poets, by the way, have been singularly unfortunate in their patriotic ventures: even' Burns's "Scots Wha Hae," which we considor at any rate a superb piece of, metrical rhetoric, has been scoffed at unmercifully hy certain critics, Henley among themi But a distinct- and unquestioned success has been scored, in our own day, by Mr. Henry Newbolt, whoso Devon songs are not only excellent in themsolvos, but have had the singular good fortune to bo set to music by one of tho fow British composers in whom, scientific knowledgo has not extinguished, but has served to strengthen, tho native qualities of imaginative sympathy and melodic vigour.