A TRAVELLED TUNE

Evening Star, Issue 19062, 3 October 1925, Page 10

A TRAVELLED TUNE

A now chapter was added to the history of a famous song when guests at the banquet at Monte Video replied to the Prince of Wales’s speech in Spanish by singing “ He’s a jolly good fellow,” says the ‘ Manchester Guardian.’ Tradition says that the Crusaders learnt it from the Arabs in Palestine. Surviving, in various forms, sprang into great popularity in France in 1566 by being fitted to a lament for the Due de Guise. A century and a-half later a French officer, on the eve of the Battle of Malplaquet, wrote a satirical poem on the English commander, and wedded it to the old tune “ Mabrook s’en va t’en guerre,” sung throughout the length and' breadth of France, was remembered and hummed by the peasant woman who nursed the little son of Marie Antoinette. The Queen board her, and sang the song herself. Beaumarchais caught it up, introduced it into his ‘ Marriage of Figaro ’ in 1784, and so broadcast it over Europe. Beethoven used it in his ‘ Battle Symphony ’ as symbolical of the French army. It came to England—and the English folk found that they had known it for a long time to the classic words which greeted the Prince at Monte Video. The Arabs,_ they say, still sing it, and it is the favorite air of the people of Hawaii!