Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 15 — Key Ideas to Explore

Fain were I now with thee; But waters twain are flowing, Dear love, twixt thee and me![31]

[31] Boehme, with music, page 94.

Even more of a favorite is the song which represents two girls in the harvest-field, one happy in her love, the other deserted; the noise of the sickle makes a sort of chorus. Uhland placed with the two stanzas of the song a third stanza which really belongs to another tune; the latter, however, may serve to introduce the situation:--

I heard a sickle rustling, Ay, rustling through the corn: I heard a maiden sobbing Because her love was lorn.

"Oh let the sickle rustle! I care not how it go; For I have found a lover, A lover, Where clover and violets blow."

"And hast thou found a lover Where clover and violets blow? I stand here, ah, so lonely, So lonely, And all my heart is woe!"

Two songs may follow, one from France, one from Scotland, bewailing the death of lover or husband. 'The Lowlands of Holland' was published by Herd in his 'Scottish Songs.'[32] A clumsy attempt was made to fix the authorship upon a certain young widow; but the song belies any such origin. It has the marks of tradition:--

My love has built a bonny ship, and set her on the sea, With sevenscore good mariners to bear her company; There's threescore is sunk, and threescore dead at sea, And the Lowlands of Holland has twin'd[33] my love and me.

My love he built another ship, and set her on the main, And nane but twenty mariners for to bring her hame, But the weary wind began to rise, and the sea began to rout; My love then and his bonny ship turned withershins[34] about.

There shall neither coif come on my head nor comb come in my hair; There shall neither coal nor candle-light come in my bower mair; Nor will I love another one until the day I die, For I never loved a love but one, and he's drowned in the sea.

"O haud your tongue, my daughter dear, be still and be content; There are mair lads in Galloway, ye neen nae sair lament." O there is none in Gallow, there's none at a' for me; For I never loved a love but one, and he's drowned in the sea.

[32] Quoted by Child, 'Ballads,' iv. 318.

[33] Separated, divided.

[34] An equivalent to upside down, "in the wrong direction."

The French song[35] has a more tender note:--

Low, low he lies who holds my heart, The sea is rolling fair above; Go, little bird, and tell him this,-- Go, little bird, and fear no harm,-- Say I am still his faithful love, Say that to him I stretch my arms.

[35] See Tiersot, 'La Chanson Populaire,' p. 103, with the music. The final verses, simple as they are, are not rendered even remotely well. They run:--

Que je suis sa fidele amie, Et que vers lui je tends les bras.

Another song, widely scattered in varying versions throughout France, is of the forsaken and too trustful maid,--'En revenant des Noces.' The narrative in this, as in the Scottish song, makes it approach the ballad.

Back from the wedding-feast, All weary by the way,

I rested by a fount And watched the waters' play;

And at the fount I bathed, So clear the waters' play;

And with a leaf of oak I wiped the drops away.

Upon the highest branch Loud sang the nightingale.

Sing, nightingale, oh sing, Thou hast a heart so gay!

Not gay, this heart of mine: My love has gone away,

Because I gave my rose Too soon, too soon away.

Ah, would to God that rose Yet on the rosebush lay,--

Would that the rosebush, even, Unplanted yet might stay,--

Would that my lover Pierre My favor had to pray![36]

[36] Tiersot, p. 90. In many versions there is further complication with king and queen and the lover. This song is extremely popular in Canada.

The corresponding Scottish song, beautiful enough for any land or age, is the well-known 'Waly, Waly':--

Oh waly, waly, up the bank, And waly, waly, down the brae, And waly, waly, yon burn-side, Where I and my love wont to gae.

I lean'd my back unto an aik, I thought it was a trusty tree; But first it bowed and syne it brak, Sae my true-love did lightly[37] me.

Oh waly, waly, but love be bonny A little time, while it is new; But when 'tis auld it waxeth cauld, And fades away like morning dew.

Oh wherefore should I busk my head? Or wherefore should I kame my hair? For my true-love has me forsook, And says he'll never love me mair.

Now Arthur's Seat shall be my bed, The sheets shall ne'er be fyled by me; Saint Anton's well shall be my drink, Since my true-love has forsaken me.

Martinmas wind, when wilt thou blaw And shake the green leaves off the tree? O gentle Death, when wilt thou come? For of my life I am weary.

'Tis not the frost that freezes fell, Nor blawing snaw's inclemency; 'Tis not sic cauld that makes me cry, But my love's heart grown cauld to me.

When we came in by Glasgow town, We were a comely sight to see; My love was clad in the black velvet, And I myself in cramasie.

But had I wist, before I kissed, That love had been sae ill to win, I'd locked my heart in a case of gold. And pinned it with a silver pin.

Oh, oh, if my young babe were born, And set upon the nurse's knee, And I myself were dead and gone, [And the green grass growing over me!]

[37] Lightly (a verb) is to treat with contempt, to undervalue. Compare the burden quoted by Chappell, p. 458, and very old:--

The bonny broome, the well-favored broome, The broome blooms faire on hill; What ailed my love to lightly me, And I working her will?

The same ballad touch overweighs even the lyric quality of the verses about Yarrow:--

"Willy's rare, and Willy's fair, And Willy's wondrous bonny, And Willy heght[38] to marry me Gin e'er he married ony.

"Oh came you by yon water-side? Pu'd you the rose or lily? Or came you by yon meadow green? Or saw you my sweet Willy?"

She sought him east, she sought him west, She sought him brade and narrow; Syne, in the clifting of a craig, She found him drowned in Yarrow.[39]

[39] Child's _Ballads_, vii. 179.

Returning to Germany and to pure lyric, we have a pretty bit which is attached to many different songs.

High up on yonder mountain A mill-wheel clatters round, And, night or day, naught else but love Within the mill is ground.

The mill has gone to ruin, And love has had its day; God bless thee now, my bonnie lass, I wander far away.[40]

But there is a more cheerful vein in this sort of song; and the mountain offers pleasanter views:--

Oh yonder on the mountain, There stands a lofty house, Where morning after morning, Yes, morning, Three maids go in and out.[41]

The first she is my sister, The second well is known, The third, I will not name her, No, name her, And she shall be my own!

[41] The rhyme in German leaves even more to be desired.

Finally, that pearl of German folk-song, 'Innsprueck.' The wanderer must leave the town and his sweetheart; but he swears to be true, and prays that his love be kept safe till his return:--

Innsprueck, I must forsake thee, My weary way betake me Unto a foreign shore, And all my joy hath vanished, And ne'er while I am banished Shall I behold it more.

I bear a load of sorrow, And comfort can I borrow, Dear love, from thee alone. Ah, let thy pity hover About thy weary lover When he is far from home.

My one true love! Forever Thine will I bide, and never Shall our dear vow be vain. Now must our Lord God ward thee, In peace and honor guard thee, Until I come again.

In leaving the subject of folk-song, it is necessary for the reader not only to consider anew the loose and unscientific way in which this term has been employed, but also to bear in mind that few of the above specimens can lay claim to the title in any rigid classification. Long ago, a German critic reminded zealous collectors of his day that when one has dipped a pailful of water from the brook, one has captured no brook; and that when one has written down a folk-song, it has ceased to be that eternally changing, momentary, spontaneous, dance-begotten thing which once flourished everywhere as communal poetry. Always in flux, if it stopped it ceased to be itself. Modern lyric is deliberately composed by some one, mainly to be sung by some one else; the old communal lyric was sung by the throng and was made in the singing. When festal excitement at some great communal rejoicing in the life of clan or tribe "fought its battles o'er again," the result was narrative communal song. A disguised and baffled survival of this most ancient narrative is the popular ballad. Still more disguised, still more baffled, is the purely lyrical survival of that old communal and festal song; and the best one can do is to present those few specimens found under conditions which preserve certain qualities of a vanished world of poetry.

It may be asked why the contemporary songs found among Indian tribes of our continent, or among remote islanders in low stages of culture, should not reproduce for us the old type of communal verse. The answer is simple. Tribes which have remained in low stages of culture do not necessarily retain all the characteristics of primitive life among races which had the germs of rapidly developing culture. That communal poetry which gave life to the later epic of Hellenic or of Germanic song must have differed materially, no matter in what stage of development, from the uninteresting and monotonous chants of the savage. Moreover, the specimens of savage verse which we know retain the characteristics of communal verse, while they lack its nobler and vital quality. The dance, the spontaneous production, repetition,--these are all marked characteristics of savage verse. But savage verse cannot serve as model for our ideas of primitive folk-song.

[Signature: F. B. Gummere]

The name of Samuel Foote suggests a whimsical, plump little man, with a round face, twinkling eyes, and one of the readiest wits of the eighteenth century. This contemporary of the elder Colman, Cumberland, Mrs. Cowley, and the great Garrick, knew many famous men and women, and they admired as well as feared his talents.

Samuel Foote was born at Truro in 1720. He was a young boy when he first exhibited his powers of mimicry at his father's dinner-table. At that time he did not expect to earn his living by them, for he came of well-to-do people, and his mother, who was of aristocratic birth, inherited a comfortable fortune.

Throughout his school days at Worcester and his college days at Worcester College, Oxford, where he did not remain long enough to take a degree, and the idle days when he was supposed to be studying law at the Temple and was in reality frequenting coffee-houses and drawing-rooms as a young man of fashion, he was establishing a reputation for repartee, _bons mots_, and satiric imitation. So, when the wasteful youth had squandered all his money, he naturally turned to the stage as offering him the best opportunity. Like many another amateur addicted to a mistaken ambition, Foote first tried tragedy, and made his debut as Othello. But in this and in other tragedies he was a failure; so he soon took to writing comic plays with parts especially adapted to himself. 'The Diversions of the Morning' was the first of a long series, of which 'The Mayor of Garratt,' 'The Lame Lover,' 'The Nabob,' and 'The Minor,' are among the best known. As these were written from the actor's rather than from the dramatist's point of view, they often seem faulty in construction and crude in literary quality. They are farces rather than true comedies. But they abound in witty dialogue, and in a satire which illuminates contemporary vices and follies.

Foote seems to have been curiously lacking in conscience. He lived his life with a gayety which no poverty, misfortune, or physical suffering could long dampen. When he had money he spent it lavishly, and when the supply ran short he racked his clever brains to make a new hit. To accomplish this he was utterly unscrupulous, and never spared his friends or those to whom he was indebted, if he saw good material in their foibles. His victims smarted, but his ready tongue and personal geniality usually extricated him from consequent unpleasantness. Garrick, who aided him repeatedly, and who dreaded ridicule above all things, was his favorite butt, yet remained his friend. The irate members of the East India Company, who called upon him armed with stout cudgels to administer a castigation for an offensive libel in 'The Nabob,' were so speedily mollified that they laid their cudgels aside with their hats, and accepted his invitation to dinner.

To us, much of his charm has evaporated, for it lay in these very personalities which held well-known people up to ridicule with a precision which made it impossible for the originals to escape recognition. Even irascible Dr. Johnson, who wished to disapprove of him, admitted that there was no one like "that fellow Foote." So this "Aristophanes of the English stage" was mourned when he died at the age of fifty-seven, and a company of his friends and fellow-actors buried him one evening by the dim light of torches in a cloister of Westminster Abbey.

There is often a boisterous unreserve in the plays of Foote, as in other eighteenth-century drama, which revolts modern taste. As they consist of character study rather than incident, mere extracts are apt to appear incomplete and meaningless. Therefore it seems fairer to represent the famous wit not alone by formal citation, but also by some of his _bons mots_ extracted from the collection of William Cooke in his 'Memoirs of Samuel Foote' (2 vols. 1806).

From 'The Lame Lover'

_Serjeant_--So, Jack, anybody at chambers to-day?

_Jack_--Fieri Facias from Fetter Lane, about the bill to be filed by Kit Crape against Will Vizard this term.

_Serjeant_--Praying for an equal partition of plunder?

_Serjeant_--Strange world we live in, that even highwaymen can't be true to each other! [_Half aside to himself._] But we shall make Vizard refund; we'll show him what long hands the law has.

_Jack_--Facias says that in all the books he can't hit a precedent.

_Serjeant_--Then I'll make one myself; _Aut inveniam, aut faciam_, has been always my motto. The charge must be made for partnership profit, by bartering lead and gunpowder against money, watches, and rings, on Epping Forest, Hounslow Heath, and other parts of the kingdom.

_Jack_--He says if the court should get scent of the scheme, the parties would all stand committed.

_Serjeant_--Cowardly rascal! but however, the caution mayn't prove amiss. [_Aside._] I'll not put my own name to the bill.

_Jack_--The declaration, too, is delivered in the cause of Roger Rapp'em against Sir Solomon Simple.

_Serjeant_--What, the affair of the note?

_Serjeant_--Why, he is clear that his client never gave such a note.

_Jack_--Defendant never saw plaintiff since the hour he was born; but notwithstanding, they have three witnesses to prove a consideration and signing the note.

_Serjeant_--They have!

_Jack_--He is puzzled what plea to put in.

_Serjeant_--_Three_ witnesses ready, you say?

_Serjeant_--Tell him Simple must acknowledge the note [_Jack starts_]; and bid him against the trial comes on, to procure _four_ persons at least to prove the payment at the Crown and Anchor, the 10th of December.

_Jack_--But then how comes the note to remain in plaintiff's possession?

_Serjeant_--Well put, Jack: but we have a _salvo_ for that; plaintiff happened not to have the note in his pocket, but promised to deliver it up when called thereunto by defendant.

_Jack_--That will do rarely.

_Serjeant_--Let the defense be a secret; for I see we have able people to deal with. But come, child, not to lose time, have you carefully conned those instructions I gave you?

_Serjeant_--Well, that we shall see. How many points are the great object of practice?

_Serjeant_--Which are they?

_Jack_--The first is to put a man into possession of what is his right.

_Serjeant_--The second?

_Jack_--Either to deprive a man of what is _really_ his right, or to keep him as long as possible _out_ of possession.

_Serjeant_--Good boy! To gain the last end, what are the best means to be used?

_Jack_--Various and many are the legal modes of delay.

_Serjeant_--Name them.

_Jack_--Injunctions, demurrers, sham pleas, writs of error, rejoinders, sur-rejoinders, rebutters, sur-rebutters, re-plications, exceptions, essoigns, and imparlance.

_Serjeant_ [_to himself_]--Fine instruments in the hands of a man who knows how to use them. But now, Jack, we come to the point: if an able advocate has his choice in a cause, which if he is in reputation he may readily have, which side should he choose, the right or the wrong?

_Jack_--A great lawyer's business is always to make choice of the wrong.

_Serjeant_--And prithee, why so?

_Jack_--Because a good cause can speak for itself, whilst a bad one demands an able counselor to give it a color.

_Serjeant_--Very well. But in what respects will this answer to the lawyer himself?

_Jack_--In a twofold way. Firstly, his fees will be large in proportion to the dirty work he is to do.

_Serjeant_--Secondly?

_Jack_--His reputation will rise, by obtaining the victory in a desperate cause.

_Serjeant_--Right, boy. Are you ready in the case of the cow?

_Jack_--Pretty well, I believe.

_Serjeant_--Give it, then.

_Jack_--First of April, anno seventeen hundred and blank, John a-Nokes was indicted by blank, before blank, in the county of blank, for stealing a cow, _contra pacem_, etc., and against the statute in that case provided and made, to prevent stealing of cattle.

_Jack_--Said Nokes was convicted upon the said statute.

_Serjeant_--What followed upon?

_Jack_--Motion in arrest of judgment, made by Counselor Puzzle. First, because the field from whence the cow was conveyed is laid in the indictment _as round_, but turned out upon proof to be _square_.

_Serjeant_--That's well. A valid objection.

_Jack_--Secondly, because in said indictment the color of the cow is called red; there being no such things _in rerum natura_ as red cows, no more than black lions, spread eagles, flying griffins, or blue boars.

_Serjeant_--Well put.

_Jack_--Thirdly, said Nokes has not offended against form of the statute; because stealing of _cattle_ is there provided against: whereas we are only convicted of stealing a _cow_. Now, though cattle may be cows, yet it does by no means follow that cows must be cattle.

_Serjeant_--Bravo, bravo! buss me, you rogue; you are your father's own son! go on and prosper. I am sorry, dear Jack, I must leave thee. If Providence but sends thee life and health, I prophesy thou wilt wrest as much land from the owners, and save as many thieves from the gallows, as any practitioner since the days of King Alfred.

_Jack_--I'll do my endeavor. [_Exit Serjeant._]

A MISFORTUNE IN ORTHOGRAPHY

From 'The Lame Lover'

SIR LUKE--A pox o' your law; you make me lose sight of my story. One morning a Welsh coach-maker came with his bill to my lord, whose name was unluckily Lloyd. My lord had the man up: "You are called, I think, Mr. Lloyd?"--"At your Lordship's service, my lord."--"What, Lloyd with an L?"--"It was with an L indeed, my lord."--"Because in your part of the world I have heard that Lloyd and Floyd were synonymous, the very same names."--"Very often indeed, my Lord."--"But you always spell yours with an L?"--"Always."--"That, Mr. Lloyd, is a little unlucky; for you must know I am now paying my debts alphabetically, and in four or five years you might have come in with an F; but I am afraid I can give you no hopes for your L. Ha, ha, ha!"

A CURE FOR BAD POETRY