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498 _____ THE LEADER. ps T o. 374, Satur...
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BALLADS: OLD AND NEW. Ancient Poems, Bal...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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New Novels. Barchestcr Towers. By Anthon...
Stories ' In fact , certain relatives congregate at Seaton Court a variously cabled ' pile , and under certain lime-trees narrate the following histories : — ' The Sisters , ' < Lucy Dawson , ' 'The Grange , ' ' Sceur Marguerite , and * Limenian Life . ' These are tender , touching stones , with a tinge ot real life and are told in a way to interest the emotional reader .
498 _____ The Leader. Ps T O. 374, Satur...
498 _____ THE LEADER . ps o . 374 , Saturday .
Ballads: Old And New. Ancient Poems, Bal...
BALLADS : OLD AND NEW . Ancient Poems , Ballads , and Songs of the Peasantry of England . Taken down from Oral Recitation , and Transcribed from Private Manuscripts , Rare Broadsides , and Scarce Publications . Edited by Robert Bell . ( Parker and Son ) — When Mr Bell first announced his " Annotated Edition of the English Poets " he ' said that the collection would include " those stores of Lyrical . and Ballad Poetry in which our literature is richer than that of any other ¦ country , and which , independently of their poetical claims , are peculiarly interesting as illustrations of historical events and national customs . In fulfilnieoat of this promise , we have already h * d a volume of "Early Ballads ;" And the work before us still further carries out the design .
From a not very clear Introduction , it would seem ^ that the volume in question is a reprint ( with considerable additions , subtractions , and emendations ) of Mr . James Henry Dixon's book bearing the same title , and published by the Percy Society in 1846 ; though whether the annotations in the present work are to be ascribed to Mr . Bell ' s pen , or to Mr . Dixon ' s , is left in doubt . But , however this may be , we have to thank the former gentleman for including in his series a very interesting and pleasant collection of the Poetry of the People . ,. „ ., The value of these songs and ballads lies emphatically in the circumstance of their origin being ( with a few exceptions ) from the hearts of the people themselves , and not from the brains , however ingenious or ennobled , of professed literary men . They are real growths of the national life—as much « o as the oaks that shadow our forests , or carry our thunders out to sea ; genuine productions of the soil , like the blackthorn in the hedges , or the furf that brig htens our fields with perennial verdure . In these snatches of robust and vigorous song we see the heart of our old Saxon England laid
bare see it in all its native joviality and strength , its love of adventure , its muscular will , its tendency to alternate between rugged work and boisterous merriment , its stalwart self-reliance , and its broad substratum of conscience underlying its very prejudices . To read this collection is to feel an enlarged respect for our countrymen—to behold some of the unsquared rubble which lias built up our national greatness . Energy exhaustless , humour fantastic ^ and warmly-tinted , a genial good-nature and quick generosity of sentiment for which we have not generally obtained credit , and a profuse outpouring of animal spirits , commonly supposed to be the exclusive attribute of more southern lands , are among the prominent qualities which we find in these Poems of the Peasantry . And we rejoice to perceive that many of the son » s are yet sung in roadside alehouses and in chimney-corners of old farms . Educate the brain as much as you will ; but it is certain that no amount of culture should set aside the utterance of the affections , or
supersede the native impulses of the heart . Lord Robert Cecil observed at a public meeting the other day that the genuine English peasant—more especially he of Sussex—has not his equal ibr dull , brutish stupidity in all the world . We fear there is but too much warrant for the assertion ; yet it could hardly have been so always . The volume before us disproves it . Here are scores of songs—and they are only & selection—issuing out of the familiar daily life of the peasantry , and throbbing with that bright , though rough , vivacity which is in itself half an education . How is it that the character of the people has changed ?—for ,
. although some of these lyrics are still occasionally sung , they are no longer produced . We think an answer is implied in the fact that there are no songs of the Puritan party among the productions of the Commonwealth era . The Roundheads only " sang psalms to hornpipes . " We desire to speak of those men with respect , as they were noble politicians , and have left us a legacy of freedom ; but they and their religious successors , the Methodists , Lave done much to destroy the old genial life of England . While they forbade mirth , they did not advance education ; and the result has been that the English labourer has been reduced to the level of the Styrian boor .
It is on record that in former times a knowledge of music , and the ability to sinf it , even when it presented learned difficulties , were common in England ; ° and we see evidences of the fact in these national songa . Their lyrical instinct is indeed wonderful . The measures start out upon you with the sudden impulsiveness of birds , or like an air unexpectedly struck up beneath your window by a travelling organ . They may almost be said to sing their own tunes—to suggest their own music . For instance , what a quick and vital spurt of melody is this , supposed to be sung by a young girl in the pride of her youth and beauty IThere was an old man came over tho Lea—Ha-lik-lta-hk 1 but / won't have he ! He came over tho Leo , A-courting to ino , With his grey board newly shaven . JListen also to this lively catch of the days of Charles II : — Now , since we ' re met , lot ' s merry , merry be , In spite of all our foes ; And ho that will not merry bo , Well pull him by tho noso . Cho . Lot him bo merry , merry there , While wo ' ro all morry , merry hero , For who can know whoro ho a hull go , To bo merry another year V Ho that will not morry , merry bo , With his sweetheart by his side , Lot him be laid in tho cold churchyard , With a head-Btono for his bride . Lot him , & e .
Here is a bit of robust politics and overflowing animal spirits . "We tal it from a Harvest Home Song : — • ice We cheated the parson , we'll cheat him again ; For why should the vicar have one in ten ? One in ten ! one in ten ! For why should the vicar have ono in ten ? For why should the vicar have one in ten ? For staying while dinner is cold and hot , And pudding and dumpling ' s burnt to pot ; Burnt to pot ! burnt to pot ! Till pudding and dumpling ' s burnt to pot , Burnt to pot ! burnt to pot ! There is a world of popular feeling in that reiterated question , " Why should the vicar have one in ten ? " and in the chuckle with which the singers recal the fact that they have cheated the reverend gentleman , and affirm that they mean to do it again . As an instance of utter abandonment to lyrical feeling , even to the coining of gibberish , in order that the heavy trotting of a rough country horse may be represented in the metre , we quote the following : — Last New-Year ' s day , as I ' ve heerd say , Young Richard he mounted his dapple grey , And he trotted along to Taunton Dean , To court the parson ' s daughter , Jean . Dumble dum deary , durable dum deary , Dumble dum deary , dumble dum dee . The varieties of measure are as remarkable for their number as their beauty . Sometimes the rhymes will be iterated and interweaved with marvellous prodigality ; as in this stanza from a poem about the plough : — . A country life is sweet ! In moderate cold and heat , To walk in the air , how pleasant and fair ! In every field of -wheat , The fairest of flowers adorning the bowers , And every meadow ' s brow ; To that I say , no courtier may Compare with they who clothe in grey , And follow the useful plow . This species of stanza appears to have been a favourite ; for there is a poem in Mr . Bell ' s collection , called '" ' The Farmer ' s Son , " and two or three versions of a song in honour of the niilking-pail , which exhibit the same construction . For a similar exuberance of rhyming , and for a charming buoyancy of feeling and play of verse , we must refer to "The Rural Dance about the May-Pole "—a true pastoral , neither coarse nor conventionally ideal . Considerations of space forbid our reproducing it here . The spirit of mirth sometimes becomes so fast and fui-ious that it boils over into a kind of Bacchanal orgie . In the song , "Joan's Ale was Xew , ' which is supposed to contain an allusion to Oliver Cromwell and his wife , six jovial tradesmen sit down to drinking , and are joined by various mechanics and others : — The next that came in was a ragman , With his rag-bag over his shoulder ; Sure no one could , be bolder Among the jovial crew . They sat and called for pots and glasses , Till they were all drunk as asses , And burnt the old ragman ' s bag to ashes , While Joan ' s ale was new . The excess of animal spirits ia so great that beggary itself becomes something jolly and seductive—the true primal state of liberty : — There was a jo-vial beggar , He had a wooden leg , Lame from his cradle , And forced for to beg . And a begging we will go , wo'll go , we'll go ; And a begging we will go ! I fear no plots against me , I live in ojien coll ; Then who would be a king When beggars live so well ? And a begging wo will go , we'll go , we'll go ; And a begging we will go ! To be able to drink lustily was one of tho virtues of our ancestors . Iney carried that virtue too far , no doubt ; but the excesses of robusL men , w u neglected none of the manly exorcises , and who at any rate drank unauiuterated liquors , were something very different from the dull , sottish doo * m of the modrn town dweller , exhausted by in-door work and a lotm « i "" sphere , and seeking a virulent stimulus in poisoned beer and gin . , , The songs in the collection before us arc from all parts ot J ' . nyianu i the north to the south , from tho east to tho west . They vary in w degree with the soil from which they spring . Those from tho ¦ . » o »»> jr parts of tho island have , wo think , more of rough joviality ; these n ol » , North Countrie "—the old home of romance and minstrelsy—w e ' » ffuished , in many instances , by something of the Troubadour giaw amorousness . Tho southern lovers arc a little boorish in their woom * , so those of the north . i . „ ,., 11 v worth A few of the ballads in this collection wore , perhaps , nm U ) j printing ; but , on the whole , the book i . s a delig htful addition to the i »» J shelves , and we beg to thank Mr . Bell for this half-crown s worth oi shine . . , . ii . irls :- — With these lyrics of a past age we link a volume ol modern D > J ' Sonas of the CaoaUer * and Roundlmuh , Jacobite Jhdlads , fo ' $ X \» h v ^ i W . Thornbury , Author of" Shnkspcro ' a England / & c With 1 ^ aU by H . S . Marks . ( Hurst and Blaclcctt . )_ On turning the title-l > . ^ . work , we find the following dedication ;— "To- Douglas . 1 on-old , tt o j / u ^^ Satirist , and Novelist , these Versos are Dedicated by the An in »• ^ ono who ia struggling , and hopes to win , to ono who has struggle ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 23, 1857, page 18, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_23051857/page/18/
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