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 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 STUDIES 
 
 IN 
 
 MUSICAL HISTORY 
 
 BY 
 
 I 
 
 LOUIS S. DAVIS 
 
 NEW YORK & LONDON 
 
 G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
 HL\>e Ztmdterbocfccr 
 1887
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1887 
 BY LOUIS S. DAVIS 
 
 Press of 
 G. P. Putnam's Sons.
 
 Music 
 Library 
 
 Wo 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IN presenting this little book to the public, I am 
 actuated by the belief that it treats of subjects and 
 periods of musical history with which the general 
 reader is far from familiar. The voluminous charac- 
 ter of Dr. Burney's and Sir John Hawkins' histories 
 of music are well calculated to damp the zeal of the 
 most ardent disciple of the tone art, nor does a chron- 
 ological presentation of lives and facts offer any con- 
 crete view of the subject. Some men there are, 
 who through their vast power of individuality have 
 left their impress indelibly graven upon the art, and 
 these stand out like beacon lights along the path of 
 history ; but their names are few, and it is with 
 periods and institutions that we have to deal. Upon 
 him who, in the succession of the centuries, does not 
 observe the sequence of cause and effect, the lessons of 
 history are wasted, and its example thrown away. Say 
 not " Lo here, or lo there," but laying a firm grasp 
 upon the salient points, by a synthetic process arrive 
 at the inner comprehension of the whole. 
 
 He who narrates facts without deducing principles, 
 discovering analogies, or tracing causes, is no histo- 
 rian ; and while he may furnish ample data for the 
 use of others, he is at best only a compiler. The 
 Hi
 
 iv Introduction. 
 
 history of music furnishes no exception to the uni- 
 versal law, and the intention at least of this work is 
 to present facts in a philosophical and homogeneous 
 manner. Since it is to the Church that modern music 
 owes its existence, it is from the history of the Church 
 that much of this volume is drawn. Music is but one 
 of the effects of the great cause, the Christian Church, 
 and upon its rituals and institutions depended the 
 fate of the whole tone system. Whether we consider 
 the Mass of the Catholic Church, or the Choral of the 
 Church of Luther, we see that each has builded its 
 part well, laying a firm foundation for the universal 
 temple of spontaneous utterance, where all alike may 
 worship in catholicity of belief, which knows no law 
 but that of perfect harmony.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. . PAGE. 
 
 I. A STANDARD OF Music i 
 
 II. SPIRIT OF JEWISH Music 10 
 
 III. THE FIRST CHRISTIAN HYMN 18 
 
 IV. THE MASS 22 
 
 V. THE TRANSITION PERIOD 35 
 
 VI. CHORAL 45 
 
 VII. THE ORGAN 59 
 
 VIII. OUTLINE OF THE ORGAN 73 
 
 IX. USE AND INFLUENCE OF BELLS 84 
 
 X. COLOR AND THOUGHT IN Music 103 
 
 XL THE MODERN SONG 108 
 
 XII. TEACHERS AND TAUGHT 121 
 
 XIII. FOLK LORE 131 
 
 XIV. THE COMMON AND COMMONPLACE 152
 
 STUDIES IN MUSICAL 
 HISTORY. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A STANDARD OF MUSIC. 
 
 THROUGHOUT the vast fields of art or science there 
 is no department which possesses so remarkable a 
 combination for refining and instructing as that of 
 music. The word standard draws the clear-cut line 
 between the work of the conscientious student and 
 that of the time-server. In every department, whether 
 it be that of medicine, painting, law, literature, sculp- 
 ture or mathematics, a high standard of excellence is 
 demanded, and in most cases satisfactorily accorded. 
 Nowhere should this requisite obtain with the same 
 inexorable severity as in music. One great difficulty in 
 the way of a popular and correct conception of music, 
 is that we are not wont to regard it as we do anything 
 else, but put it aside with the feeling that it is so much 
 a part of another world from ours, that it would be 
 impossible ever to get en rapport with it. On the 
 contrary the tone realm is only one of the great parts 
 which make up the great whole in nature's intellectual 
 laboratory. A good composition has as clearly defined 
 
 I
 
 2 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 a plot as any work of fiction ; It is as logical in its 
 development as the profoundest treatise ; its rhythms 
 are as varied and rich in their meanings as the most 
 complex of modern poems. Its proportions must be 
 as perfect and its shading as delicate as the most 
 carefully designed work of the painter's art. Always, 
 however, with this exception, that while the painter, 
 sculptor, or author at best only reproduces objects 
 and characters from real life, the musician, from the 
 unseen, unknown, unseeable, unknowable, evolves com- 
 binations of sound for which there is no counterpart, 
 unless it be the unseeable and unknowable, which, 
 in a man's nature, is hidden inscrutably from himself. 
 
 I have spoken thus of the character and principles 
 of music in order the more clearly to demonstrate 
 the absolute necessity for a fixed standard in this, as 
 in any other department of art or science. If we 
 admit that one composition is superior to another, 
 we, by that admission, acknowledge the possibility 
 of an unlimited number of degrees of merit, and come 
 again to the original necessity a standard. 
 
 True, the composition of a high order is frequently, 
 in the popular vernacular, too scientific, too hard to 
 understand. There is a demand for something sim- 
 pler, not thereby meaning a fresh and childlike sim- 
 plicity such as is found in " Volklieder" but rather 
 a demand for a certain kind of maudlin sentimental- 
 ity, such as the popular ballad, at once the cause and 
 effect of such unwholesome and unpleasant emana- 
 tions. This, the result of an ignorance of music, 
 vaunted as though it were a virtue ; or a yet more 
 deplorable kind of ignorance, which supposes its pos-
 
 A Standard of Music. 3 
 
 sessor not only a musician, but a critic of no mean 
 capacity. Without doubt there is a distinct tendency 
 in a musical utterance to morality or to immorality, 
 as may be expressed in more familiar or definite 
 forms. Here, as elsewhere, the standard of right and 
 wrong must be fixed. And now we are confronted by 
 two questions which must have suggested themselves 
 from the start : What shall the standard be, and who 
 shall enforce it ? 
 
 First, as to the standard. Adhering to the princi- 
 pal parallels in substance and degree in all depart- 
 ments of thought, I find nothing which more fully 
 illustrates the world of music than the world of litera- 
 ture. Only a few examples may be cited, but they 
 are so mutually reciprocal in their plan and mode of 
 thought, their orbit is so essentially one, that the most 
 incredulous must admit that I am advancing some- 
 thing more than an hypothesis. In a certain sense 
 all literature is true, and in the same sense all music 
 is true. But there are some truths to which we attach 
 greater importance than to others. There are some 
 truths which it is not only idle to discuss, but which 
 it is best not to discuss at all. Among great thoughts, 
 what is there more similar than a Bach fugue and 
 an essay by Mill. In both cases we begin with the 
 subject, then its developments and train of inductions 
 and corollaries, its culmination and triumphant con- 
 clusion. Who tells best the lives of such men as 
 " William the Silent " ? Beethoven, in his " Symphony 
 Heroical," or Motley, in his " History of the Dutch 
 Republic " ? 
 
 It would be difficult, if not impossible, to find in all
 
 4 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the German schools of philosophy a transcendental 
 mysticism more profound than that which pervades 
 and saturates every page of Robert Schumann, 
 Dramas there are in Chopin, crowding a whole life's 
 story into an interval not greater than fifteen minutes. 
 As in literature some history becomes romance, and 
 some romance history, we know not where to draw 
 the line, so in true life, the intellectual is so clouded 
 with the keenest and most subtle appreciation of the 
 beautiful, that we draw the line nowhere, saying this 
 is such and such, but rather leave that to the senti- 
 ment and interpretation of the artist. It will thus be 
 seen that a good standard of music neither limits the 
 field of taste nor the mood of the individual, rejecting 
 only that which is condemned by the unerring laws 
 of harmony as laid down by our greatest musical 
 authorities. It now remains to find an agency power- 
 ful enough and sufficiently omnipresent to make musi- 
 cians in every village and home in the land. 
 
 The worst feature of the case is that before supply 
 we must create a demand, and this on a scale com- 
 mensurate with the vastness of an American popula- 
 tion. If the United States Government had the power 
 and the will to attempt such a creation, no effort on 
 its part, no matter how strenuous, would avail except in 
 isolated instances. But the Central Government has 
 neither the will nor the power to inculcate art, and it 
 is not to it that we can look. Conservatories founded 
 by individuals must, through their incapacity to reach 
 the mass, fail to make ours a music-loving people. 
 America for her musical instruction must look to the 
 greatest and most universal educator that the world
 
 A Standard of Music. 5 
 
 will ever possess the Christian Church. She, who 
 for upwards of two thousand years has been the guide 
 and schoolmaster of Europe, is the only power which 
 could make this or any other a music-loving people. 
 The larger number of our greatest musicians and com- 
 posers have come to us from the Old World, through 
 the doors of the sanctuary. 
 
 Two hundred years ago, two great and typical men 
 were born into the world, and those two men were 
 called John Sebastian Bach and George Frederick 
 Handel. What the Church did for them they tried to 
 pay back to the Church. How well they met their ob- 
 ligation the Church knows better than any one else. 
 Indeed, there is no branch of education which has so 
 faithfully, and in so spiritual a manner, endeavored to 
 recompense their mother and teacher, the Church, as 
 that of music. So, admitting that the Church has been 
 the greatest patron and benefactor of musicians, we 
 must also admit that the musician has been the great- 
 est beautifier of her rites and services, giving her a 
 high spiritual standard of music, which in this country, 
 however, is but little known. I believe that no one 
 will dispute that whatever is intended for a sacred 
 purpose cannot be of too sacred or elevated a charac- 
 ter. If music is essential in a church, it should be of 
 as pure and devotional a character as possible. But 
 in the majority of churches it is so tawdry, frivolous and 
 commonplace that to be a Christian and a musician 
 rather partakes of the nature of a paradox. The dig- 
 nified and intelligent calling of the musician, the sacred 
 and responsive position of the organist, are unrecog- 
 nized by the public at large. There is a remedy, but
 
 6 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 to get at it we must go to the fountain-head. How 
 shall a minister know if his church has a good stand- 
 ard of music unless he has been instructed in music ? 
 In suggesting this, I do not propose a course of coun- 
 terpoint and fugue for the theologue, but a theoretical 
 course which shall enable him to distinguish good from 
 bad in music as in theology, and to know a sound mu- 
 sician as readily as he would a sound theologian. 
 Another point now presents itself, the musician's pay. 
 In this country, where we hire music-teachers as we 
 do serving-girls, and organists as we do blacksmiths, 
 these callings receive pay proportionate to the respect in 
 which they are held. A competent minister commands 
 a proportionately good salary, and a good musician 
 should be recompensed according to his competency. 
 If a congregation gets good preaching, or good playing 
 for a trifle, they have, through the necessity of the in- 
 dividual, gotten that for which they have not made an 
 honest equivalent. The minister who permits his or- 
 ganist to receive only a pittance is aware of one of 
 two things either, that the organist is worth only a pit- 
 tance, or that he and his congregation are what in any 
 other calling would be denominated " beating down," 
 and that, for the best of reasons, because they can. The 
 brain-work of the educated musician is as great as that 
 of a minister, and his physical labors are greater. The 
 Protestant Church in this country is degrading rather 
 than elevating the standard of music. First, through 
 the musical ignorance of her ministers ; and second, 
 the trifling inducement which it offers for good music. 
 The rule of values which holds good in all else, does
 
 A Standard of Music. 7 
 
 not hold here. In most cases an organist is not chosen 
 by virtue of any talent or education he may possess, 
 but by reason of being a member of a particular church 
 or because he is in needy circumstances. This last is 
 most frequently the case, and is the clearest indication 
 of the slight respect in which music and musicians are 
 held, when an organ becomes nothing more than the 
 means of an act of charity to one individual. Minis- 
 ters are never employed as a matter of charity ; why 
 should organists be ? 
 
 Charity is a noble action, but a charity which denies 
 a rightful salary to a legitimate musician to give a 
 pittance to an incompetent person is an economical 
 perversion of the eleemosynary spirit, a degradation of 
 music, and an offence against the Church. I have 
 heard these cheap organists improvise during the ser- 
 vice such doggerel, as in more musical communities 
 would have been considered rather bad for a hand- 
 organ. There is a retributive justice in the fact that 
 it is the nature of men to give the last word an undue 
 importance. I have known the effect of the most elo- 
 quent and solemn preaching neutralized, if not dissi- 
 pated, by the slap-dash jig which let the congregation 
 out of church, and spoke of anything but the just 
 finished sermon. The position of organist is a very 
 responsible one. He should be en rapport with the 
 minister he should have the capacity to re-echo his 
 words. His position confers a great, but unrealized 
 power, for good or evil, and this consideration makes 
 the responsibility of selecting an organist a very grave 
 one. 
 
 Before closing, I wish, in order to prevent any mis-
 
 8 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 apprehension of the object of this paper, to indicate 
 some of the offences of the average cheap organist 
 and repeat my suggestion of a remedy. The head and 
 front of their offences against God and man is the 
 ridiculous and monstrous practice of improvising on all 
 occasions. Four-fifths of these persons could not make 
 a practical application of a rule in musical theory. 
 Three-fourths could not name the simplest rule, and 
 two-thirds never heard there were any rules ; and yet 
 they improvise. The reason for this abnormal ten- 
 dency lies in the fact that very few of those who play 
 on organs are acquainted with or capable of playing 
 legitimate organ-music. To play organ-music requires 
 that both feet shall be used with equal dexterity, and as 
 legato on the pedal-board as both hands on the key- 
 board. It would not be unnatural to suppose from the 
 staccato pedalling, that these organists had at one time 
 been engaged in a great war, and had each had a 
 right foot shot off, but that the same right foot is kept 
 see-sawing on the pedal which opens and closes the 
 swell-box of the instrument, the object of the swell 
 being to increase or diminish sound at the exact pas- 
 sage where each would be most effective. But the see- 
 saw with the swell-pedal becomes a habit with the one- 
 footed organist, ceasing to produce any effect but that 
 of monotony. What opinion can we have of an indi- 
 vidual who, having the whole world of the greatest or- 
 gan-music to choose from, prefers to enthrall his audi- 
 ence with his own inspired drivellings ? 
 
 There is in proportion to the number of performers, 
 more good music written for the organ than for any in- 
 strument in the world. Suppose that any person of 
 ordinary musical talent should call together an audi-
 
 A Standard of Music. 9 
 
 ence and improvise for their delectation on the piano,, 
 violin or any other instrument, how long would it be 
 tolerated ? Yet in the performance of the most sacred 
 office of music, this impertinence goes unchallenged. 
 How many organists could plead guilty of knowing 
 even the names of such men as Best, Schneider and 
 Ritter ? If the manner of considering could in any 
 degree express the real value and importance of the 
 matter considered, it would not fail to lead to salutary 
 results. 
 
 To sum it up in a few words, music is an intellectual, 
 refining and humanizing influence. A standard is just 
 as much needed in music as in any other department 
 of thought and feeling. There can be but 0<?standard, 
 and this founded upon authorities of so high an order 
 as to preclude any question of reliability. The only 
 power which could fix such a standard is the Church. 
 This can be done by making a theoretical course in 
 music a part of a theological course, which must create 
 a demand for good organists ; and as the organist, "by 
 reason of his selection of an instrument, is of necessity 
 a better theorist than any other musician, he will be 
 able to impart a fuller knowledge of his art than is 
 now customary. 
 
 From the Church would go forth in this country, as 
 in other lands, a high musical culture, which would 
 return to her an hundred fold, giving her a new life in 
 the birth of congregational singing, and giving her 
 anthems the dignity and holiness which they have in 
 the Old World. Here is nothing impracticable ; and 
 while such an organism would necessarily take years to 
 ripen to maturity, its result would be certain, and its 
 effect durable and glorious.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 SPIRIT OF JEWISH MUSIC. 
 
 IT is not at all remarkable that music of some kind 
 should have been known in ages almost pre-historic ; 
 for, as a tone is, after all, only a prolongation of sound 
 on any one degree of the chromatic scale, the human 
 race could not have been very old before some individ- 
 ual made this discovery by bloyving through a tube. 
 Whether the tube was the throat or a piece of bamboo 
 the difference was only in the timbre. The wonder, 
 therefore, is not that music should have been discov- 
 ered, but that the human race should for four thousand 
 years have lived with the knowledge that there was a 
 tone-world without the ability to enter it. There are, 
 of course, sufficient reasons for this crystallizing, chief 
 of which is the lack of mechanical appliances which, 
 in our day, have made of such instruments as the 
 piano and organ a marvel of ingenuity, power and 
 sweetness. Still less a matter of wonder does it be- 
 come when we remember that the knowledge of 
 steam and electricity as active and tremendous forces 
 were realized long before any glimmering intimation 
 of the science of music ; and yet it remained for Han- 
 del to write his Messiah while the forces which now 
 shake the world still slept, nothing more than a per- 
 
 10
 
 Spirit of Jewish Music. u 
 
 ception, a realization which had existed from the ear- 
 liest breath of the race. 
 
 With regard to ecclesiastical music, or indeed music 
 of any kind, the first authentic information of which 
 we are possessed comes to us from the land of the 
 Pharaohs. On the banks of the Nile, history has carved 
 in characters of stone the achievement of this early 
 civilization, giving ample record of the respect in which 
 music was held, and the importance attached to its 
 performance in all religious rites. Barbaric as must 
 have been its character, not only on account of the 
 primitive nature of the instruments, the thin, discon- 
 nected harmonies, the poverty and attenuation of mel- 
 ody, there is that seeking for the ethereal, that feeling 
 for the beyond, which gave to tone-history a beginning 
 that, through all the ages of waiting, held fast the 
 promise of its immortality when its laws should be 
 comprehended, and the union of tone and spirit be- 
 come forever one and indivisible. 
 
 When Verdi wrote that superlative anachronism, 
 the opera " Aida," he unconsciously performed an act 
 of poetic justice. The scenery, the costumes, the in- 
 struments, yea, even the tombs, are all there with the 
 studied exactness of detail, harmony and chronology, 
 which reveal the hand of the archaeologist wherever the 
 curtain rises. Suppose that, instead of the voluptuous, 
 almost lurid splendor of the music, we would substi- 
 tute the ancient Egyptian mode of clothing thought in 
 tone, how inexpressibly flat and meaningless it would 
 then appear. Yet the fruit which Verdi plucked sprang 
 from the seed planted on Egyptian soil four thousand 
 years ago, and amid the tombs and temples, the groves
 
 12 Sttidies in Musical History. 
 
 and palaces of the land of the Nile, we hear the evolu- 
 tionized echo of the tone-life of pre-historic man. 
 
 Under the religious despotism of Egypt ecclesias- 
 tical music arrogated to itself and maintained an im- 
 portance which has left its traces on the manners of 
 the people of that country to-day. Where the temples 
 of Luxor and Carnac rise in pyramidal majesty, amid 
 the pomp and splendor of Thebes, sang the mighty 
 army of the priesthood. No organ there -to shake the 
 vast halls and open courts with the thunder of its 
 double diapason, or weave its colossal harmonies in 
 sympathetic utterance with the surrounding immensity, 
 but a voice which spoke of a faith as supreme and gi- 
 gantic as the autocracy under which it governed a na- 
 tion of slaves. 
 
 And these slaves, 
 
 Here, amid scenes of grandeur, which to-day, with the 
 everlasting solitude brooding among its sphynxes and 
 its columns, with its ritual forever departed, amid its 
 stones standing stripped of their wealth of gold and 
 ivory, precious wood and precious stones, appals the 
 modern traveller with the sense of its sublimity and of 
 his littleness here at the summit of Egyptian power, 
 and in the midst of a ceremonial conducted nowhere 
 else, since man drew breath, on so vast a scale, lived 
 and listened to the hymn of religion and of despotism, 
 a nation at once slave and alien. The Jew might look 
 and listen, but he looked for a deliverer and he lis- 
 tened for his voice. In the choral thunder of the 
 Egyptian priesthood he heard only the prayer of idola- 
 try and the voice which governed him by the power of
 
 Spirit of Jewish Music. 13 
 
 the lash. In despite of four centuries of slavery, the 
 polytheism of the land of his adoption had taken but 
 little hold on the heart which cherished the remem- 
 brance of the God of Abraham. The unifying power 
 of the Pharaohs stopped short when it encountered the 
 unit of Goshen. Here, as in subsequent ages, they 
 might murder his children and hold him and his people 
 as the property of the Government, but behold the 
 limit. 
 
 Few as were the traditions possessed by the Jews at 
 this time they, nevertheless, sufficed to maintain them 
 an unbroken phalanx against every disintegrating ex- 
 ternal agency. But with that remarkable race-capacity 
 for discriminating, and the no less remarkable ability 
 to assimilate, it was not strange that, rejecting the do- 
 minion of Egypt, they should have retained for their 
 civil and religious code a compilation largely based 
 on the law of their taskmasters. Thus it was that mu- 
 sic also became incorporated into their ritual, never to 
 depart from it while Israel should be Israel. On the 
 banks of the sacred river, beneath the shadow of the 
 pyramid, within the precinct of the walls where the 
 names of Isis and Osiris were uttered with reverent 
 and bated breath, and in the lowly dwelling of the 
 slave, Israel had sung his lamentations and songs of 
 bondage. But the hut and the temple were alike to 
 disappear to give place to the arch of heaven, and the 
 hymns of bondage to be substituted by anthems of 
 freedom and victory. 
 
 And now begins one of the most remarkable and 
 sublime successions of composers of religious psal- 
 mody whose history was ever recorded by the pen of
 
 14 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 man. From the day of the Exodus until the close 
 of the Old Testament history there passes before 
 us in an almost unbroken procession, judges, kings, 
 prophets and priests, who were in the loftiest, broad- 
 est and profoundest sense the greatest of poets to 
 which the race has ever given birth. From this day 
 Jewish psalmody, with its concrete immensities of 
 thought, was to be the foundation of all ecclesiastical 
 music. By the law of repetition we find men of the 
 nineteenth century deriving strength from the hymns 
 which, more than three thousand years ago, gave in- 
 spiration and endurance to the Jewish people in their 
 life-and-death struggle. 
 
 Under the theocracy founded by Moses, ecclesiasti- 
 cal music was a term synonymous with national music. 
 Of all influences to which humanity is susceptible, those 
 of religion and patriotism are, I think, the most power- 
 ful and enduring. Moses was perhaps the only man at 
 that epoch who could gauge the dynamics rendered 
 possible by such an union. Filled with assurance that 
 the God of Battles was with him, and nerved and stim- 
 ulated by the thought that the eye, not of his General, 
 but of his General's General, was upon him, the de- 
 fence of his home and the honor of his God were so 
 blended into one, that, to the Jew, a victory over an 
 army of idolaters was as much a religious rite as the 
 ritual of the tabernacle. Thus it was that every pa- 
 triot was a religionist, and every true religionist was a 
 devout patriot. As in the case of the galvanic battery, 
 the closing of the circuit between the positive and neg- 
 ative poles makes known the presence of the electric 
 current, so it was that the completion of the circuit of
 
 Spirit of Jewish Music. 15 
 
 positive and negative religion and patriotism, through 
 its very intensity, produced a current of thought whose 
 vibrations shall continue to be felt when perhaps the 
 name of the people from whom it sprung will have 
 passed into oblivion. The text remains, but the music 
 was oral, as in the case of all preceding and most of 
 the following music in every land. 
 
 It is believed that many of the melodies now in use 
 in the Jewish ritual have an origin pre-dating the 
 Christian era by some centuries. But as for this claim 
 there is no verification ; it must always remain an open 
 question. Nor have we, as in later periods, the means 
 of estimating the growth and development of ancient 
 Jewish music, either as an art or an auxiliary to eccle- 
 siasticism. There is indeed a comparative method by 
 which may be guessed the character of Jewish music 
 at the time of the Christian era ; but this process would 
 only show that melodies now in use are either of a 
 comparatively recent date or have been so chromat- 
 ically altered as to render them past recognition save 
 by the student of the old Greek modes. The differ- 
 ence in these modes, or scales as they are now called, 
 lay, of course, in their succession of tones. They had 
 not, as we have, major and minor scales, but differed 
 from us in having one to suffice for both. Thus the 
 Dorian mode, corresponding to our key of D (of which 
 the Phrygian and Lydian, with all their derived keys, 
 were but transpositions, as in the case of the modern 
 scale), differed from our scale of D in that its third, 
 sixth and seventh were made minor. With this expla- 
 nation I trust I shall be more fully understood when I 
 repeat that, although there may exist Jewish melodies
 
 1 6 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 to-day which were written prior to the Christian era, 
 their identity is so veiled or lost by chromatic altera- 
 tions as to be almost unrecognizable. 
 
 These primitive modes continued during some cent- 
 uries of Christian music, and, indeed, are still found 
 in the old Gregorian chants and German chorals. 
 That there were many instruments, and many kinds of 
 instruments, is a fact patent to the most casual reader 
 of either sacred or profane history, but their compass 
 and scope was limited, and they, if not from choice, 
 from necessity were subordinated to music of the voice. 
 As from the storehouse of Egyptian wisdom the Greek 
 and the Jew had alike derived all that was known of 
 music, so in a later period was Christianity to build on 
 their work, and to fashion its hymns and chants upon 
 the harmonies and melodies which lineally descended 
 from the music of the Pharaohs. While Christianity, 
 in its musical heritage, owes no more to the Jew than 
 to the Greek, so far as real tone-knowledge is con- 
 cerned, inasmuch as it first had being on Jewish soil* 
 incorporating the Old Testament belief with the New, 
 we may readily believe that where Jewish theology ex- 
 pounded the doctrines of the Christian, Jewish music 
 would early be adopted as his psalmody. 
 
 There remains a noble, but as yet unwritten chapter, 
 which shall one day place music before the world as 
 one of the great factors which go to make up history. 
 Mighty weapons are the battle-hymns of Jew and 
 Christian, Catholic and Protestant. You can hear 
 them through all the ages that have been, clear and 
 strong, forever welling up from the heart of the na- 
 tions. And whether these be hymns of peace or
 
 Spirit of Jewish Music. 17 
 
 hymns of war, songs of grief or gladness, they are in- 
 sensibly and imperceptibly fashioning the history of the 
 race. This is, to my thinking, a field of speculation 
 which to a careful student might yield a rich harvest. 
 So far as I know, it is a subject which has never been 
 directly discussed, but the time will come when we 
 shall realize the great historic importance of ecclesias- 
 tical music. .
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE FIRST CHRISTIAN HYMN. 
 
 " And when they had sung an hymn they went out unto the 
 Mount of Olives." 
 
 TWELVE men are sitting at a table ; they have just 
 engaged in a rite of the significance of which most of 
 them are unaware. These men are willing but uncon- 
 scious actors in the great drama just about to com- 
 mence. These are not, as they once were, rude, igno- 
 rant fishermen and artisans, drawn from the Jewish 
 peasant life. Three years ago they were such, but 
 with such a teacher and such an example they had 
 learned to grapple with the problems of here and 
 hereafter, and to love all humanity as their neighbor, 
 and their neighbor as themselves. As their subse- 
 quent history proved, three years had made them 
 thinkers and logicians. To-day they have signed 
 their faith in the blood of the grape; hereafter they 
 shall seal that faith in a redder and a warmer libation. 
 Reverent, yet bewildered, they sit about the table in 
 that upper chamber. They do not know it, but they 
 have just been partakers in the most potential rite 
 ever celebrated. There was still a veil between them 
 and the Master. They must have been seated a long 
 time, for the night has come down, and outside they 
 can hear the shouts and songs of the rejoicing people, 
 
 18
 
 The First Christian Hymn. 19 
 
 gathered in Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. 
 It was a large room where they sat, and through the 
 open windows (for it was the warm Judean spring time) 
 they could see the blazing fires around which the 
 people gathered in preparation for the feast. Their 
 feast is over, and they have been sitting perplexed, 
 grieved and wondering, while they listened for the last 
 time to the words of their beloved Teacher, Master and 
 Friend. And now they have eaten the bread and 
 drunk the wine. 
 
 " And they sang an hymn." In all history I know 
 of few sentences which convey more than this. It is 
 the adoption and endorsement by the Christian Church 
 of psalmody, and through it of ecclesiastical music. 
 Doubtless that hymn was sung by all the Christian 
 Church, and it is not improbable that that very melody 
 still lingers in the form of some old Gregorian chant, 
 its identity forever buried and lost. What would the 
 Church not give to sing the, at once, communion and 
 crucifixion hymn its Master and Founder Himself 
 sung ? Sing it now, Apostles, as you sit about the 
 Master, with the blood of the grape upon your lips. 
 But the day will come, when, amid the flames of 
 martyrdom, or the agonies of crucifixion, that hymn 
 will rise, consecrated by a deeper meaning, and a 
 memory which can never perish. Simon Bar-Jona, 
 thou shalt sing that hymn, the memory of thy denial, 
 repentance and forgiveness ever before thee, as they 
 carry thee to thy crucifixion in the Eternal City. 
 Andrew, thou shalt sing that hymn in the day that 
 they raise thee on the cross, which shall ever be known 
 by thy name. Beloved disciple, in years to come,
 
 2O Studies in Musical History. 
 
 amid the lonely exile of Patmos, with the vision of a 
 new heaven and a new earth stretching out before 
 thee, the girdling ocean shall hear thy poor, old, 
 quavering voice, singing this communion hymn in 
 loving retrospection. Look, James, thou just man, on 
 the people who keep the Passover to-night, for one 
 day, with this hymn in thine heart, they will stone thee 
 to death in this very city. Bartholomew, fifteen hun- 
 dred and thirty-nine years hence, in the year 1572, 
 30,000 innocent men and women shall lay down their 
 lives in thy name ; but this posthumous crime shalt 
 not be laid to thy door, and thou shalt bear thy gospel, 
 thy hymn and thy cross to the far off land of India. 
 The man Judas, who solved the great problem by fulfill- 
 ing the Scripture, was not there ; had he been, that 
 memory might also have gone with him to a death 
 of glorious martyrdom, in years to come. 
 
 What a fathomless profundity there is to a chorus 
 of men ! How like the ocean ! How earnestly and 
 how devoutly do they sing this first recorded Christian 
 hymn ! How their voices blend and swell out on the 
 warm fragrant air of the spring night. In Ephesus, in 
 Smyrna, in Pergamos, in Thyatira, in Sardis, in Philadel- 
 phia, in Laodicea, the echo of those voices will be heard. 
 And it will be sung alike in the dungeon and in the 
 catacombs. And wherever this hymn is sung the 
 Apostles will say : " In the very hour that made us a 
 unit in faith, He sang his farewell hymn." Every 
 memory of the past fades into nothing in the light of 
 the intense reality of the present. 
 
 This hymn is consecrated, and by its consecrating 
 power, all hymns are made consecrated. Put out the
 
 The First Christian Ifymn. 21 
 
 light and add to the gloom of your souls the darkness 
 and gloom of the silent Gethsemane. But the hymn 
 has only paused, and when it comes again upon your 
 lips the night will have passed away, you will sing it in 
 the blazing glory of the noonday sun. 
 
 A NOTE. " There is some ground for believing that this may 
 have been the series of Psalms called Hallel (cxiii. to cxviii. of the 
 Authorized Version), which was used in the Second Temple at all 
 great festivals, and consequently at that of the Passover ; and it 
 has been supposed though the circumstance does not admit of 
 proof that the melody to which the most characteristic of these 
 Psalms, In exitu Israel, was originally sung, is the germ of that 
 with which it has been associated in the Christian Church, from 
 time immemorial the Tonus Peregrinus." PURVIS' " Diction- 
 ary of Music."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE MASS. 
 
 No matter how involved in mystery and obscurity, 
 the contemplation of any long period is always im- 
 pressive. Music as an art does not address itself to 
 the average historian as does painting, sculpture and 
 the like. 
 
 Of the early history of Christian music there was 
 but little to be said, and of that little but a small por- 
 tion has come down to us. Hymn-singing as prac- 
 tised by Christ and His disciples was, as was the cus- 
 tom among the Jews, confined to chanting the Psalms 
 of David. Tradition is silent as to how long this cus- 
 tom continued, but with the new faith there arose the 
 necessity for distinctive Christian psalmody. 
 
 While among all nations the recognition of rhythm 
 is the rudimentary form of music, in spite of the slight 
 knowledge of melody possessed by the early Church, 
 rhythm was excluded from all sacred music. Added 
 to this arbitrary and unnatural practice was the use of 
 the old modes, which, rugged and impressive, convey 
 a sense of austerity and gloom which left its traces and 
 bore its fruit in after centuries. Until recently, music, 
 as understood in the modern sense, had no existence. 
 Harmony was unknown, counterpoint was undreamed 
 of. The compass of every scale or mode was very 
 22
 
 The Mass. 23 
 
 small, rarely exceeding two octaves. The variety of 
 instruments was few and their capabilities slight. The 
 knowledge of all these things was wrapped in the un- 
 born centuries, and while it waited all Christendom was 
 lulled by the monotony and awed by the severe sim- 
 plicity of the chant soon to be known as the Gregorian. 
 It is indeed a tall tree which for centuries reaches 
 upward without even branching ; but the taller the 
 tree, the nearer the sun. What a long time to wait, 
 what a long way to go ; but through the dense growth 
 of ignorance and depravity this slender shoot held its 
 own, feeling for the light and only finding it with the 
 dawn of the Renaissance. 
 
 There are two men to whom, musically speaking, 
 the world can never pay its debt of gratitude , and of 
 these two, differing so essentially as they do, the 
 most remarkable fact is that their greatest work was not 
 that of music, nor was music made a specialty with 
 either, nor is the difference in their theology greater 
 than the times in which they lived. When Gregory 
 ascended the pontifical chair civilized Europe was 
 reeling under the repeated blows of barbarian inva- 
 sion, and was preparing, not metaphorically but liter- 
 ally, for its plunge into the Dark Ages ; and through all 
 that Jtime the chant that forever bears his name went 
 on, its ceaseless murmur growing with each successive 
 century, and wherever its voice was heard there was 
 also the uplifted cross and the gorgeous ceremonial of 
 the Mass. Near a thousand years elapsed between 
 the days of Gregory and those of Martin Luther. 
 Throughout all that period the people learned slowly, 
 and by imperceptible degrees, as much by hereditary
 
 24 Studies in Musical Histofy. 
 
 transmission as by individual absorption, acquiring 
 not a musical education but a musical sense which in 
 due season was to bear fruit, and in Luther's German 
 choral take the highest musical step ever accomplished 
 by the body of the people. 
 
 Men are not naturally musical, and like a good 
 many lessons taught by the mediaeval Church, with- 
 out it the knowledge of music would, most probably, 
 be still in its infancy. In all that period of ghastly 
 gloom and grovelling ignorance, no matter how mis- 
 taken the policy of the Church, it was she who pre- 
 served the love of the beautiful in every department of 
 art. Ignorant folk like little children remember better 
 for pictorial illustrations. Through all Christendom 
 the love of the mild, gentle mother with the infant 
 Jesus in her arms appealed to the hearts of the people, 
 and from the thing symbolized they turned with adora- 
 tion to the symbol. Thus there went on an insensible 
 process of education, and a sense of all that is beauti- 
 ful in painting, sculpture and music grew in the hearts 
 of the people at large. Much has been said of that 
 unprecedented development of the knowledge and 
 culture known as the Renaissance, and but little of 
 the long planting and careful watering by the only 
 universal educator of all the Dark Ages. In the* case 
 of music the result was more marked than in any 
 other, for Greece and Rome had left their undying 
 models of beauty, and they, not their memory, are with 
 us even unto this day, but the music of the ancients 
 could not even be called elementary, and one great 
 work which the Roman Church all unconsciously 
 performed was the preparation of a rich soil whence
 
 The Mass. 25 
 
 should spring a new art and a universal language. 
 Without the Church there would have been no need 
 for the organ, as it was only required for sacred choral 
 music ; and without the organ the growth of harmony 
 must have been long delayed, and without harmony 
 there is no music. 
 
 The gradual growth and development of the ritual 
 known as the Mass is the subject embodying more 
 musical interest than any other work of the Middle 
 Ages. The result of this growth was an overwhelm- 
 ing pomp and splendor well calculated by its appeal 
 to every sense to both dazzle and enthrall. Through 
 necessity, the serfices of the early Church were con- 
 ducted without either bells or instruments. Of the 
 origin of the Mass there is great uncertainty, but I 
 quote from an accepted authority in the Catholic 
 Church, and without comment. " The opinion is sus- 
 tained by the ablest liturgical writers that it was St. 
 Peter, the prince of the Apostles and head of Christ's 
 Church, who said the first Mass, and this after the 
 descent of the Holy Ghost in the very same cenacle at 
 Jerusalem where the blessed eucharist was instituted, 
 and where our Lord uttered the words, ' Do this in 
 remembrance of me.' " The note says, " The cenacle 
 which stands upon Mt. Sion is to-day one of the 
 greatest objects of veneration in the Holy Land. It is 
 remarkable as being the supposed place where the 
 Last Supper was held ; where our Lord appeared to 
 his disciples after his glorious resurrection on Easter 
 morning ; where the sacrament of penance was first in- 
 stituted, and where our Lord was seen to converse for 
 the last time with his chosen band before he as-
 
 26 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 cended into heaven. It was in this blessed spot also 
 that St. James the Less, styled the brother of our Lord, 
 was consecrated first bishop of Jerusalem ; and a 
 pious tradition has it that it was here the beloved dis- 
 ciple said Mass in the presence of the blessed Virgin, 
 who, it is said, departed this life there." I have 
 quoted the above in full because the institution of the 
 Mass, no matter where or at what date, was a matter 
 of paramount importance, musically and otherwise. 
 
 The consideration of the Mass leads us into that of 
 a ritual as little known outside of the Catholic Church 
 as is the modern ritual of the Hebrews. While this 
 discussion involves nothing of the Mass but its music, 
 it yet necessitates distinctions and a presentation of 
 data having no direct musical bearing. Through 
 sanction, custom and tradition the rite of the Mass is 
 not, as is generally supposed, the same either in the 
 substance of its prayers and chants and in the order 
 of their succession. Besides the different rites of the 
 Eastern Church, there are in the Latin Church alone six 
 in number of such rites which come within the sanction 
 of the Church. They are the Carthusians, Carmelites, 
 Dominicans, Mozarabics and Ambrosians or Milanese. 
 Another erroneous general impression is that the lan- 
 guage in which the Mass is conducted is exclusively 
 Latin. While this is to a great extent correct, there is 
 a minority of churches where Latin is not used, and 
 where the ancient and obsolete vernacular is the ve- 
 hicle of rendition. These languages are Greek, 
 Syriac, Chaldaic, Sclavonic, Wallachian, Armenian, 
 Coptic, Ethiopic and Latin. It is of course of this last, 
 the Latin Mass, that I shall speak exclusively, and
 
 The Mass. 27 
 
 that, not as it may have existed in its stages of growth, 
 but as it stands to-day, elevated and adorned by the 
 hands of the world's greatest composers. 
 
 It would be an impossibility to enter into the spirit 
 of the music without being governed by the same 
 influences and the same underlying meaning of the 
 Mass proper which swayed the composer, as it would 
 be to comprehend its language without any knowledge 
 or translation. Like every great text, that of the Mass 
 has been Vandalized by hundreds of composers both 
 ignorant and shallow, but the mention of such names 
 as Mercadante, Mil lard, and the like of our own day 
 and generation is enough, and we are glad to leave 
 their consideration to the attention of their numerous 
 admirers. 
 
 The more we regard the difference in the periods 
 in which Gregory and Palestrina lived, the less are 
 we able to form an estimate as to the relative value 
 and merits of their ecclesiastical music. A loaf of 
 bread in a starving city is worth more than a barrel of 
 flour in the midst of plenty. Certain it is that without 
 a Gregory there could never have been a Palestrina, 
 and regarded in the faint and uncertain light of that 
 period Pope Gregory the Great must be considered 
 the father of modern ecclesiastical music. Before his 
 time, St. Ambrose instituted the chant still known by 
 his name ; but of these chants only one or two are still 
 in existence, and no matter what their merit, they 
 were either absorbed in the Gregorian or lost in the 
 process of the ages. One of the first acts of the 
 Church after it became dominant was the establish- 
 ment at Rome of a school of ecclesiastical music.
 
 28 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 What and how much that school taught will never be 
 known. As there was no system of notation, figures 
 alone were used and these were subjected to laws of 
 tone-inflection, the knowledge of which has long 
 perished. Pope Gregory conferred a great benefit 
 on music by applying the same Roman letters to 
 denote all the replicates of the same sounds in differ- 
 ent octaves. Before his time, it appears the sounds in 
 the double octave or great system of the Greeks 
 had been denoted by fifteen Roman letters. Gregory 
 reduced them to seven, applying the same letters in 
 different forms to three octaves, and while in notation 
 they have been superseded by the line and space, 
 have yet given names to our modern scale. There is 
 a fascination in dwelling upon the manifold labors of 
 Pope Gregory, and in tracing their subsequent results 
 both direct and indirect. For three hundred years 
 after his death the school which he founded in Rome 
 flourished, doing honor to his name, bearing in every 
 land fruit in testimony of its founder's greatness. 
 
 The incomparable superiority of the music of the 
 Mass over all other liturgical music, such as that of 
 the Church of England, for example, resides in the 
 principle that music can only present one idea clearly 
 at one time, and as in the liturgical anthems of the 
 Protestant Church the only idea is to get over as many 
 words as possible in as short a space as possible, the 
 music generally means nothing, or else attempts to 
 mean so much that the average intellect becomes ex- 
 hausted in the struggle after an intelligent hearing. 
 Try and imagine a Haydn or a Mozart writing a 
 Gloria in Excelsis on one or two pages. In Haydn's
 
 The Mass. 29 
 
 first Mass in B flat the Gloria covers eighteen pages, 
 Novello's edition ; and in his third Mass in D the 
 Gloria covers sixteen pages, and the English translation 
 in use in the Episcopal Church is an exact counterpart of 
 that sung in the Mass. If churches will have liturgical 
 services and they cannot afford time for the musical 
 development of the text, then, rather than use the 
 unutterable bosh with which most of our church ser- 
 vices are disgraced, better sing nothing but the plain, 
 quiet old chants, and in their dignity express the rev- 
 erence so seldom found in the so-called anthem used 
 in the Protestant liturgy. The same words which 
 when read or spoken many times in succession appear 
 not only meaningless, but foolish, when illustrated 
 with music assume a deeper meaning and a firmer grasp 
 on the imagination with every repetition of the phrase. 
 Thus it is that in Haydn's third Kyrie of eight pages 
 the great cry, " Lord have mercy upon us," " Christ 
 have mercy upon us " (following as it does that majes- 
 tic prelude which in. itself seems to lead Elijah-like up 
 to some lofty Carmel), bursts out with a spontaneity 
 and vehemence which gathers force and dramatic 
 energy as it proceeds. Twenty-seven times is it re- 
 peated, and with the last phrase we feel that we have 
 only now arrived at the full meaning and comprehen- 
 sion of the text. If the Protestant liturgist should 
 still object to " vain repetitions," let him call to mind 
 that in the Benedicite omnia opera Domini, sung in 
 the Episcopal Church every Sunday during Lent, the 
 words, " Bless ye the Lord ; praise Him and magnify 
 Him forever," are repeated thirty-one times, and then 
 ask himself what is the difference between a frequent
 
 30 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 repetition of the words " Kyrie eleison," or " Bless ye 
 the Lord ; praise Him and magnify Him forever." 
 
 The Mass is in substance the Oratorio of the 
 Messiah on a reduced scale. As in Handel's oratorio, 
 the Kyrie represents the waiting, fear and expectation^ 
 leaving behind it the feeling that the answer is not far 
 off. When miracle plays were common the Gloria in 
 Excelsis must have presented a far more vivid picture 
 than now ; for the people had seen the shepherds abid- 
 ing in the field, and the great light that " shined round 
 about them," and heard the burst of angel music pro- 
 claiming, " Glory to God in the highest, on earth 
 peace, good-will to men." But with Palestrina or 
 Haydn to interpret he must be poor indeed who can- 
 not see the picture and hear the voices. The Gloria is 
 generally written in three numbers, and both it and 
 the Credo for artistic purposes answer every requi- 
 site. In the case of both, the subjects are so arranged 
 that the second or middle movement presents an 
 antithesis to the first and third.- To this fortunate 
 accident is due some of the finest effects which the 
 Mass presents. Of the origin of the Gloria as a whole 
 there is no certainty, all that can be said being that 
 the anthem as it now stands was composed by some of 
 the Drs. of the Church. Of the origin of the Credo 
 there is certainty, it having been adopted by the 
 Council of Nicea, when it superseded the creed, known 
 as the Apostles' Creed. 
 
 There is a tradition which, from its quaintness, I 
 cannot refrain from quoting. At the end of the missal 
 of St. Columbanus, an Irish saint of the sixth century, 
 ther? is a very curious tract on the creed, which,
 
 The Mass. 31 
 
 among other things, assigns the portion composed by 
 each of the Twelve Apostles. The order is as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 " First, St. Peter : ' I believe in God the Father 
 Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth.' 
 
 " Second, St. John : ' And in Jesus Christ His only 
 Son, our Lord.' 
 
 " Third, St. James : ' Who was conceived by the Holy 
 Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.' 
 
 " Fourth, St. Andrew : ' Suffered under Pontius Pi- 
 late, was crucified, dead and buried.' 
 
 " Fifth, St. Philip : ' He descended into Hell.' 
 
 " Sixth, St. Thomas : ' The third day He rose again 
 from the dead.' 
 
 " Seventh, St. Bartholomew : ' He ascended into 
 heaven and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father 
 Almighty.' 
 
 " Eighth, St. Matthew : ' From thence He shall come 
 to judge the living and the dead.' 
 
 " Ninth, St. James, son of Alphaeus : ' I believe in 
 the Holy Ghost.' 
 
 "Tenth, St. Simon Zelotes : 'The holy Catholic 
 church, the communion of saints.' 
 
 " Eleventh, St. Thaddaeus : ' The forgiveness of sins.' 
 
 "Twelfth, St. Matthias: 'The resurrection of the 
 body, and the life everlasting.' " 
 
 It is difficult to discuss the Credo without viewing it 
 from a comparative standpoint. Both the Credo and 
 the Gloria begin with an announcement. The first, 
 " Glory to God," the second, "I believe." The first 
 conveys tidings, the second announces their accepta- 
 tion. Both are triumphant, the one in giving, the
 
 32 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 other in receiving. The first is a rhapsody of mingled 
 prayer and thanksgiving ; the second formulates Chris- 
 tian belief and tells the story of its origin. The inco- 
 herent ecstasy of the one is fully made up by the 
 lucid exactness of the other. Without the Credo, the 
 Gloria would be incomplete. It is so freighted down 
 with the great tidings that it has no room for explana- 
 tion. A man who had never heard of Christianity 
 would learn very little about it from reading only the 
 Gloria. The Credo succeeding it becomes at once its 
 exponent and commentator. The triumph of the 
 Gloria, and the exultant confession of the Credo ; the 
 one to be followed by a prayer, the other by the story 
 of the manger, the passion and the cross. The Gloria, 
 anticipating the recital of the Credo, cries out, " Thou 
 that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy 
 upon us." The Credo, in the same antithetical spirit 
 exclaims, " He became incarnate of the Holy Ghost, 
 of the Virgin Mary, and was made man." At the 
 words, " Et incarnatus est," the people as one fall 
 upon their knees and so remain till " Et homo factus." 
 The tender, loving manner in which this second 
 movement of the creed has been dwelt upon by every 
 great composer by whom it has been set, gives ample 
 testimony to the powerful and dramatic appeal to the 
 imagination. At the words " Et sepultus est," the 
 whole picture of the garden with the tomb hewn in the 
 rock r the weeping women, the darkness, the sacred 
 hush of the just-dawning Easter day, and above all 
 that intensifying sense of sympathy in all the congre- 
 gation, imparts to the individual a feeling of vivid 
 reality which acts alike upon composer and auditor.
 
 The Mass. 33 
 
 if the " Qui tolls " of the Gloria is absorbed in prayer, 
 Ihe " Et incarnatus " of the Credo is lost in contempla- 
 tion. From the first we are roused by the words " For 
 Thou only art holy ! " From the second by the trum- 
 pet call : " The third day He rose from the dead ! " 
 In the one the hymn of triumph is resumed ; in the 
 other the climax of Christian belief has been attained. 
 Standing now, as it were, at the end of these two an- 
 thems, we feel that they are indeed finished, and that 
 the appointed time for the great Amen is at hand. 
 Amen, amen, amen. 
 
 Following the Credo at different intervals, there are 
 four short movements. The Sanctus, the Benedic- 
 tus, the Agnus Dei, and the Dona Nobis. The im- 
 pression which these convey is one of perfect rest and 
 tranquillity. Only twice is this feeling broken, and 
 then not in a manner calculated to jar. This when, at 
 the end of the Sanctus, the voices swell again into the 
 old clarion, " Hosannah in Excelsis," and again at the 
 end of the Benedictus when the same refrain is taken 
 up. With the Credo we reach the dramatic climax 
 of the Mass, and from that time on the spirit follows 
 willingly down to the peaceful sunset of the " Dona 
 Nobis Pacem," and in the quiet radiance of that peti- 
 tion for peace the music of the Mass is ended. 
 
 One object in thus dwelling upon the music of the 
 Mass is, as at first stated, with the intent to show the 
 difficulty if not impossibility of, for instance, setting 
 such an anthem as the Te Deum Laudamus to music 
 limited to five or ten minutes. In so doing, I have 
 been careful to make the distinction between the litur- 
 gical and the non-liturgical music ; for outside of the 
 3
 
 34 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 Mass,_all the good sacred music is unconnected with a 
 liturgy, and this for the reason that the smaller the 
 text the more of a unit will be the composition. Men- 
 delssohn, Bach, Handel, these are the men who made 
 one text cover a multitude of pages. Every composer 
 of sacred music is quite as much an expounder of a 
 text as a minister ; and if a minister finds it a logical 
 impossibility to preach from twenty different texts? 
 how then can he expect a musician to write logically 
 or rationally on more texts than he himself can de- 
 velop. One other reason for reviewing the entire 
 music of the Mass is that it is my wish for clearness to 
 treat of it once and for all, and I consider that no bet- 
 ter or more proper place could be found for such con- 
 sideration than in connection with its founder, the 
 great Gregory.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE TRANSITION PERIOD. 
 
 FROM the days of Gregory until far into the eleventh 
 century the history of music is a blank. Those four 
 centuries were very busy ones to Christendom, and so 
 far as music went, its cultivation was at a standstill, 
 and the best the monasteries could do was to take care 
 of what had come down from Gregory. Society had 
 not to be reformed, but to be created. Alaric, Attila, 
 Genseric all have their will, and the carnival of mas- 
 sacre and ruin shrouds the proud empire forever from 
 view. And now the conqueror is to be conquered, 
 and the religion of the vanquished is become the re- 
 ligion of the victor. In the midst of chaos is heard 
 the trumpet of the soldiers of the Crescent, and not for 
 the first time the fortunes of the Cross tremble in the 
 balance, but the blows of Charles the Hammer fall 
 thick and fast, and the battle of Tours sends the 
 Moslem host back over the Pyrenees. The struggle is 
 from within and without. Every monarch is a despot, 
 every lord follows his master's example. Feudalism 
 and serfdom are the order of the day ; and lo ! in the 
 midst of conflicting forces a cry is raised, and, as a 
 man, Europe springs to its feet and rushes in mad- 
 dened disorder to death, and to save for Christendom 
 
 35
 
 36 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the sepulchre at Jerusalem. These were no times for 
 music or for art of any kind. 
 
 I have digressed in this manner because without 
 considering the nature of the forces with which Europe 
 was shaken from the seventh to the eleventh centuries 
 it is impossible satisfactorily to account for the utter 
 stagnation of everything musical. I do not mean to 
 say that there was no music during all this time, but it 
 has left no record ; and as it comes once more into 
 view shows little if any progress. There were secular 
 melodies, but they were tolerated rather than approved 
 by the Church. Charlemagne, it is true, amid the man- 
 ifold cares of his empire, was careful to have compiled 
 a book containing all the songs of the people then in 
 Use, but by the ungodly zeal of his successor this 
 book was destroyed as having a sinful tendency. In 
 another chapter I have endeavored to show that the 
 growth of the church organ was the forerunner of the 
 study and practice of harmony. This growth had by 
 imperceptible degrees proceeded, and men, by using 
 both hands, began to find out how much better was 
 the sound of an octave than of one single tone, and 
 after awhile, though with less good reason, how much 
 better it was to add fourths and fifths, thus at least 
 presenting a framework to be indeed both added to 
 and altered, yet giving the first impetus in the growth 
 and development of modern harmony. 
 
 About the middle of the eleventh century there arose 
 two men, Guido of Arezzo and Franco of Cologne, who 
 by their discoveries andwinventions made progress in 
 music practicable. Guido was the first to employ any 
 system of notation with a staff. Franco wrote a trea-
 
 The Transition Period. 37 
 
 tise on harmony which in those days of obscurity 
 served as a guide-book to his successors for two cent- 
 uries. Guido also introduced what is known as solmi- 
 zation or singing by syllable, afterwards to form the 
 foundation, and in many cases the material, of the Ger- 
 man choral. He was led to this innovation by observ- 
 ing that in the hymn to St. John the first and middle 
 syllables of the first three lines formed a regular ascent 
 in, the scale of the major mode, as we should say. 
 This hymn is preserved, and, as connected with an in- 
 vention which is still in practice in most countries in 
 Europe, we consider it a curiosity worthy of being pre- 
 sented to our readers. 
 
 " Ut queant laxis 
 
 Resonare fibris 
 
 Mira Gestorum 
 
 Famuli tuorum, 
 
 Solve polluti 
 
 Labii reatum 
 
 Sancte Johannes." 
 
 Thus was brought into use that vocal scale with which 
 we are all so familiar : do, or ut, corresponding to our 
 c, and the remainder of the scale, re, mi, fa, sol, la, the 
 si or b in Guide's system being omitted. 
 
 The next work of importance is the treatise of Mar- 
 chetto of Padua. He wrote about the end of the 
 thirteenth century. Between the time of Franco and 
 that of Marchetto an immense amount of unpreserved 
 work must have gone on, for when he wrote the old 
 system had undergone many changes. In his book 
 there is found a thing never known at any previous 
 time modulation and the use of the sharp. In the 
 fourteenth century there lived one John de Muris, a
 
 38 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 native of Normandy. Dr. Burney says, " His art of 
 counterpoint, though comprised in a very few pages, 
 is the most clear and useful tract on the subject which 
 those times can boast." For the rules contained in 
 this most excellent little work I refer the curious 
 reader to the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, page 44. 
 Before his time there had sprung up the system for 
 regulating lime in music, a thing hitherto unknown. 
 It is said to have begun about the time of Guido, but 
 wherever it came from it was long in reaching perfec- 
 tion. John de Muris' work for the first time gives ex- 
 amples of harmony which are not calculated to offend 
 the ear, and is another of those broad steps on which 
 the tone-system was slowly mounting. 
 
 About the end of the fourteenth century musicians 
 began to depart from the measured feet, that is, the 
 equal values of Guido, and to introduce different values, 
 that is, the quarter, eighth, sixteenth, etc. Fifty years 
 later there arose another John, called Tinctor. This 
 man wrote the first musical dictionary. After this it is 
 easy to imagine that the facilities for acquiring music 
 were mightily increased. Franchinus speaks of only 
 five characters for time : the maxima or large, equal to 
 our whole note, the long or half, the breve, the semi- 
 breve and the minims, or sixteenth ; but other writers, 
 early in the sixteenth century, added to these the 
 crochet, the quaver and semiquaver. Tinctor, already 
 mentioned, founded in Naples the first musical con- 
 servatory ; and coincidently Willaert, another Flem- 
 ing, founded one in Venice, their object being, as im- 
 plied in the definition, to conserve the art of music 
 trom corruption. This was the signal for other similar
 
 The Transition Period. 39 
 
 institutions in different parts of Europe, but it became 
 the fashion wherever there was the newly-revived study 
 of the classics of Greece and Rome, to have a chair of 
 music, thus early in the history of modern European 
 music giving it an equal place with the highest depart- 
 ments of thought 
 
 Notwithstanding the Italian schools of which Rome 
 formed the centre, the great drift of musical invention 
 and genius seems to have passed at this time to the 
 Netherlands. Neither space nor interest admit of 
 more than a passing notice of all these really great 
 men. With the beginning of the fifteenth century we 
 see the names of John Okenheim, his scholar, Josquin 
 des Prez, who was deservedly recognized by his con- 
 temporaries as the greatest musician of his day, Henry 
 Isaac, Jacob Horbrecht. All Europe, Italy not ex- 
 cepted, sat at the feet of the Netherlands, and they fur- 
 nished masters to every country. Adrian Willaert, a 
 Fleming, was the head of the school of Venice, and 
 wrote a valuable work on musical theory. But the 
 greatest glory of the Lowlands was in giving birth to 
 Gaudio Mell. It was he who instructed the young 
 Palestrina, thereby giving to the world the greatest 
 revelation of music it had as yet received. 
 
 About the middle of the sixteenth century the rage 
 for ostentatious, intricate and over-crowded harmonies 
 had reached its climax. Pedantic adherence to rules 
 rapidly becoming obsolete, together with a mania for 
 all kinds of ingenious and grotesque figures thrusting 
 themselves in on all possible and impossible occasions, 
 rushing madly hither and thither, the great point with 
 each composer seemed to be to see how many hair-
 
 4O Studies in Musical History. 
 
 breadth escapes his manifold parts could make by just 
 avoiding a collision. Under this state of things the 
 musical solemnity of the Mass was gone. At what 
 period for high days the Gregorian chant had been laid 
 aside for music of a more rhythmical character is not 
 known, but certain it is that at the time of Palestrina, 
 so far from being a step forward it had reacted upon 
 itself, and what had once promised to be the greatest 
 musical blessing had now become the greatest musical 
 curse. In place of reverence and devotion, the music 
 now caused nothing but amusement and distraction 
 from the services of the Church. Pope Marcellus II. 
 had a bull prepared, and was actually on the point of 
 its publication, banishing from the Church all music, 
 most probably with the intention of a return to the old 
 chants upon which the Church had relied for so many 
 ages. 
 
 I regard this as one of the most important crises in the 
 history of music, for had the Roman Church banished 
 all but the old chants the consequence would have 
 been of a far-reaching character, and might have had 
 results which will readily present themselves to the 
 historian. It was at the earnest prayer of Palestrina 
 that the bull was held in abeyance until he could write 
 a Mass such as he considered to be in accordance with 
 the spirit of the sanctuary. His music was con- 
 structed on an original model, and although he has 
 been surpassed by more modern Mass writers in dra- 
 matic intensity, nowhere has he been surpassed either 
 in purity of harmony or in the perfect spirit of sincere 
 devotion. Like David, Gregory inaugurated the work 
 for the building of the great temple ; and though many
 
 The Transition Period. 41 
 
 ages lay between them, yet, like Solomon, Palestrina 
 was to make good the promise of his predecessor. 
 
 With Palestrina the daylight of music may be said 
 to have fully broken. We have traced it from the 
 banks of the Nile, and accompanied it as it went 
 out with the triumphant hosts of Israel. We have 
 followed it through the wilderness and its dwelling in 
 the Holy Land. We have listened to its voice as it 
 floated out on the air of the spring night in commem- 
 oration of the right which it would ever be its privilege 
 to glorify. We have followed it as it followed the 
 cross from land to land, and have seen the barbarian 
 hosts bow down in dumb wonder before an influence 
 and a sensation never before known. Ambrose, Greg- 
 ory, Guido, Franco, Marchetto, Muris, Tinctor, Oken- 
 heim, Des Prez, Isaac, Horbrecht, Palestrina, 76 are 
 all dead, yet living. The graves which hold you can 
 never hold your memories, and the music which you 
 loved has gone out to all the world in commemoration 
 both of you and of your religion. 
 
 For more than thirty-five centuries the art had 
 awaited recognition. It had seen every other liberal 
 art rise to a climax of perfection, and then decay. 
 There are many trees which require a number of years 
 before bearing, yet having once borne they continue 
 to do so long after their earlier bearing contemporaries 
 are dead and forgotten. As though seeking retirement 
 behind every barrier which nature could interpose, 
 there stands in Calaveras County, California, a group 
 of trees the like of which the world has never seen. 
 There they stand, mountains of everlasting green. 
 Four thousand years have left four thousand rings in
 
 42 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 their massive trunks, telling the story of an unprece- 
 dented and a green old age. By its side the oak 
 might flourish, dwarfing into nothingness the little 
 slender shoot of green ; but the oak reached maturity, 
 grew old, decayed and fell, and the shadow of its 
 smaller companion lay across it. Ages passed away 
 and oak followed oak to the cemetery at the feet of 
 the big trees of Calaveras, and to-day these trees stand, 
 fit emblems of an art which has for four thousand 
 years reached forward, imperceptibly growing and 
 standing alone as the one art without precedent and 
 without approximation. 
 
 History is full of great peaks where the student may 
 pause, and in a general retrospect, take in all the 
 journey that has been accomplished ; and it is to such 
 an eminence that Palestrina carries us. Many of the 
 rules under which he worked have since been declared 
 without harmonic foundation. Innovation after inno- 
 vation has drawn a broad line of demarcation between 
 the music of Palestrina and that of the present day. 
 The world has grown rich in a vast variety of instru- 
 ments possessing an almost unlimited compass. Or- 
 chestration has been born and reached maturity, coun- 
 terpoint has had its rules so immovably fixed as to 
 render it most improbable that they will ever be super- 
 seded. The history, the philosophy, the beauty of 
 music have all been dwelt upon by men whose whole 
 lives have been given up to the one end the glorifica- 
 tion of their art ; but to one man, and to one man 
 alone has it been permitted, once and for all, to draw 
 back the curtain which should unveil the stage of tone- 
 life to mankind forever and forever.
 
 The Transition Period. 43 
 
 The age of Palestrina is noteworthy not only as 
 ushering in a new era of music, but also in its secu- 
 larization and general diffusion among the masses. 
 Strange to say, this result was brought about by the 
 creation of the oratorio. " From a very early period 
 music had been employed to enhance the effect of the 
 sacred plays, and as it continued to occupy the same 
 position when the drama had been secularized, St. 
 Philip Neri, in 1540, in order to counteract the new 
 attraction, originated at Rome the oratorio. About 
 twenty years later, Palestrina, the chaplain of the 
 Vatican, reformed the whole system of church music. 
 These exertions would perhaps have retained for it 
 something at least of its ancient ascendency but for 
 the invention in 1600 of recitative, which by rendering 
 possible complete music dramas, immediately created 
 the opera, withdrew the sceptre of music from the 
 Church, and profoundly altered the prevailing taste. 
 From this time the star of St. Cecelia began to wane, 
 and that of Apollo to shine anew." That such was 
 the case can be a matter of regret to no unbiassed 
 mind. The capabilities of music are so inclusive that 
 to have pent its great overflowing in one channel would 
 have dwarfed into comparative insignificance the most 
 expressive art ever yet developed. The average opera 
 is at best but a poor educator for musical taste, but as 
 a stepping-stone up and into the tone-life, it has been 
 of vast importance. Not only was the great work of 
 music henceforth to lie outside of the church, but 
 ecclesiastical music itself was to experience changes 
 and divisions hitherto unknown. At the beginning of 
 the seventeenth century, the musical drama and the or-
 
 44 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 chestra were unappreciated forces, but in their growth 
 we can trace the growth of every other form of secular 
 music, and it is to them that we must continue to look for 
 the education of the people at large. I have said that 
 church music itself was to experience alterations and 
 sub-divisions, and it is with an unmixed pleasure that I 
 now turn to the representative school of Protestant 
 choral music.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CHORAL. 
 
 IF Palestrina may be said to have fulfilled the Gre- 
 gorian promise, how much more may it be said of John 
 Sebastian Bach, who developed every line of music 
 proceeding from Martin Luther and his school. To 
 Gregory and to Luther was it given to plant, but to 
 Palestrina and to Bach was accorded the privilege of 
 reaping. What Palestrina did for the Mass, Bach did 
 for the German choral. Of the comparative work of 
 the two men, that of Bach stands pre-eminent, and not 
 only by comparison with Palestrina, but with all con- 
 trapuntists. As in the case of Gregory and Palestrina 
 I shall review that of Luther and of Bach from an 
 historical rather than a musical point of view. Of the 
 underlying theological causes which gave weight and 
 impetus to these two great movements, this work has 
 nothing to do ; but if, at some future period, the his- 
 torian should trace an analogy between the music of 
 the Reformation and the spirit which gave it being, I 
 consider it safe to say that that analogy will not be far 
 to seek. 
 
 Bach's development of the German choral has so 
 immediate a bearing on the invention and growth of 
 counterpoint and fugue as to render a brief considera- 
 tion of the departments a necessary introduction. The 
 
 45
 
 46 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 first name which appears in this connection is that of 
 John Dunstable, who died in 1453. He is said to 
 have been the originator of florid counterpoint. Con- 
 sidering the low standard of musical taste now existing 
 in England, it is a matter of surprise that that country 
 in time past has accomplished so much for music. 
 "In the meantime instrumental music, properly so- 
 called, began to improve. Ludovico Viadana, if he did 
 not invent, was at least the first who drew up general 
 rules for the figures of Thorough Bass, and composed 
 an organ bass differing from the voice part. Girolamo 
 Frescobaldi, of Ferrara, who flourished about the begin- 
 ning of this century (that is, the seventeenth) composed 
 fugues expressly for the organ which were admired and 
 imitated all over Europe. His Ricercari, etc., were 
 among the first compositions printed in score and with 
 bars. Ricercari and Fantasie preceded sonatos and 
 concertos, and were the first compositions expressly 
 made for instruments after the invention of counter 
 point." 
 
 For fourteen centuries the people had listened to 
 the chanting of monks, and had on all occasions been 
 silent participants in the services of the Church. They 
 had heard the Mass chanted generation after genera- 
 tion in a foreign and in a dead language. But with 
 the birth of the Reformation, Germany burst into the 
 vernacular choral which has never ceased from that 
 day. I believe it is not too much to say that without 
 the German choral the Protestant revolt against the 
 Church of Rome would never have been permanent ; 
 and the hymns of Luther and his contemporaries 
 occupy quite as important a place in history as gun-
 
 Choral. 47 
 
 powder, printing, or any other prominent discovery or 
 event. It was on that last battle-field on which he 
 was ever to stand that Gustavus Adolphus gathered 
 his 15,000 Swedes about him and all sang, " Ein feste 
 Burg " and " Fear not, O little flock." The drums and 
 brass instruments also played the hymns, and the field 
 .of Liitzen trembled beneath the inspiration born of 
 those never-to-be-forgotten chorals. Listen ! on the 
 shore of the Red Sea there stands a host. They have 
 come out of bondage, and tor the first time in 400 
 years they are a free people. It is the sister of the 
 Lawgiver who sings. More than 3000 years lay be- 
 tween Miriam and Gustavus, yet the spirit of both 
 hymns is essentially the same, and the inspiration de- 
 rived from them nerved men to deeds of heroism, 
 placing beyond a question the influence of the battle- 
 hymn. Miriam sang, " Sing ye to the Lord, for He 
 hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider 
 hath He thrown into the sea." Listen to Gustavus as 
 he stands on the field of Liitzen. " Ein feste Burg ist 
 unser Gott. 
 
 " A safe stronghold our God is still, 
 
 A trusty shield and weapon ; 
 He'll help us clear from all the ill 
 
 That hath us now o'ertaken. 
 The ancient Prince of Hell 
 Hath risen with purpose fell ; 
 Strong mail of craft and power 
 He weareth in this hour, 
 
 On earth is not his fellow. 
 
 " With force of arms we nothing can,. 
 Full soon were we down-ridden ;
 
 48 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 But for us fights the proper man, 
 
 Whom God himself hath given. 
 Ask ye, who is this same ? 
 Christ Jesus is His name, 
 The Lord Zebaoth's son, 
 He and no other one 
 
 Shall conquer in the battle. " 
 
 This is Carlyle's translation, and I cannot help add- 
 ing his memorable words in commenting on this power- 
 ful choral. " The one entitled, ' Ein feste Burg,' uni- 
 versally regarded as the best, jars upon our ears ; yet 
 there is something in it like the sound of Alpine ava- 
 lanches, or the first murmur of earthquakes, in the 
 very vastness of which dissonance a higher unison is 
 revealed to us. Luther wrote this song in times of 
 blackest threatenings, which, however, could in no 
 sense become a time of despair. In these tones, 
 rugged and broken as they are. do we hear the accents 
 of that summoned man who answered his friend's 
 warning not to enter Worms in this wise: 'Were 
 there as many devils in Worms as these tile roofs, I 
 would on ; ' of him who, alone in that assemblage be- 
 fore all emperors and principalities and powers, spoke 
 forth these final and forever memorable words, ' It is 
 neither safe nor prudent to do aught against con- 
 science. Till such time as either by proofs from Holy 
 Scripture, or by fair reason or argument, I have been 
 confuted and convicted, I cannot and will not recant. 
 Here I stand I cannot do otherwise God be my 
 help, Amen ! ' " If ever there were hymn and tune 
 that told their own story of a common and simul- 
 taneous origin, without need of confirmation by ex-
 
 Choral. 49 
 
 ternal evidence, it is these. To an extent quite with- 
 out parallel in the history of music, the power of 
 Luther's tunes, as well as of his words, is manifest 
 after three centuries, over the masters of the art, as 
 well as over the common people. Peculiarly is this 
 true of the great song, Ein feste urg, which Heine 
 not vainly predicted would again be heard in Europe in 
 like manner as of old. The composers of the sixteenth 
 and seventeenth centuries practised their elaborate arti- 
 fices upon it. The supreme genius of Sebastian Bach 
 made it the subject of study. And in our own times it 
 has been used with conspicuous effect in Mendelssohn's 
 Reformation Symphony, in an overture by Raff, in the 
 Festouverture of Nicolai, and in Wagner's Kaiser 
 march ; and is introduced with recurring emphasis in 
 Meyerbeer's masterpiece of The Huguenots. 
 
 The German choral possessed two new features, 
 which from the day of its birth gave^ it a hold on all 
 classes. These were the vernacular of the text and 
 the simplicity of the melody. Luther's second preface 
 to the Funeral Hymns expressly states that many of the 
 tunes of which he made use were taken from the 
 music of the Mass, and as many of the chorals were in 
 the old Greek modes they must have been a re-setting 
 of the Gregorian chants. The difference in the chant 
 and the choral being that in the chant many words 
 were sung to one tone ; whereas in the choral there 
 was only one word to each tone. The difference be- 
 tween the German hymn and those of most other na- 
 tions is to be found in the fact that the German chora- 
 is a succession of tones of equal value, and largely 
 consisting of half and whole notes. The first of these 
 4
 
 5o Studies in Musical History. 
 
 peculiarities makes the singing of the choral very easy 
 to every congregation, and the second, by giving 
 greater length to the tones, imparts weight and solem- 
 nity to every word of the text. Another inestimable 
 advantage in having tones of equal value lies in the 
 fact that only on such a succession of tones could 
 those beautiful preludes known as choral preludes, 
 have ever been founded ; for without notes of equal 
 value it would be impossible for a composer to offset 
 them with any given group of tones, or as musicians 
 more commonly express it, to make a succession of 
 any one musical figure. 
 
 Yet another peculiarity of the choral is that every 
 tune has one text and no more. The absurd practice 
 existing in all the American and English churches of 
 singing from ten to a hundred different sets of words 
 to one tune, becomes manifest if the same adaptations 
 be attempted in secular songs. The gentleman who 
 sang " O, all ye people clap your hands " to " Yankee 
 Doodle" was not much further in the wrong than 
 those who sing any other words to the Old Hundred 
 psalm tune. As musically anything seems to be allow- 
 able in the average American church, this very serious 
 defect, while it must always be deplored, cannot excite 
 much surprise or wonder. In beautiful contrast to 
 the Anglican hymn tune, the choral is always known 
 by the first line of the text of which it is the exponent. 
 When the English and Americans write a tune, it is 
 never, and perhaps with very proper humility, consid- 
 ered worthy to bear the name of any text, but is gener- 
 ally named after some man or woman ; or if not, it is to 
 be called Uxbridge, Manchester, Birmingham, etc. If
 
 Choral. 5 1 
 
 the gentlemen who name these hymns intend, by so 
 doing, to convey a healthy and salutary hint that the 
 ways of man will not always be free from smoke, and 
 by inference may come in contact with its possible 
 cause, then we can find no fault with their most admir- 
 able, delicate, and altogether unobtrusive manner of 
 inculcating a very important tenet. 
 
 Contrast the names of the German chorals with such as Cam- 
 bridge, Duke St., Federal St., and Rockingham. This last is an 
 offset to Maryal's Twickenham. The choral disdains a name. 
 Its one text is good enough for it to be known by, and thus 
 they are called, "Dear Heaven, behold," "Out of the Deep 
 I cry to thee," " By help of God I fain would tell," " Now praise 
 we Christ the Holy One." 
 
 In Germany children are taught to sing the choral just as they 
 are taught to read and write. These hymns are the heritage of 
 the people, and the school children know them, not by some ir- 
 relevant, meaningless title, but by that one text which they 
 were intended to interpret. 
 
 One other feature of the greater number of the 
 German chorals is that they are either in four-four or 
 two-four time. The effect of every movement is de- 
 pendent as largely on its time as upon its tempo or 
 speed. The uneven accent attendant upon three- 
 quarter time, except in rare cases, renders it an im- 
 proper medium for hymnody. In the case of two-four 
 or four-four time, the accent falls upon the first and 
 second half of the bar, and in three-four time, upon 
 the first beat alone. In the average hymn, the use of 
 triple time produces an undignified effect which only 
 unusual exigencies can justify. There are many texts 
 to be found in our very best hymns which from their
 
 52 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 rhythmic accent compel that found only in triple time. 
 A very few German chorals have found their way 
 into our hymnody, and the fact of the popularity of 
 such hymns as Dundee and Old Hundred shows that 
 the introduction of the whole Luther choral would be 
 by the mass of the people welcomed and adopted. 
 
 I am aware that this subject is not enough under- 
 stood in this country to be popular, but before leaving 
 it there is one more characteristic to which attention 
 should be called. The introduction into the choral of 
 notes of equal value precludes in most cases the use of 
 dotted notes. A dotted note is usually followed or 
 preceded by a note having only one-third the value of 
 the dotted note, and makes that which should be beau- 
 tiful and stately, both jerky and irrelevant. Added to 
 this, it has a decidedly secularizing effect upon the 
 music of the churches, and to one who was not familiar 
 with either of the melodies it would be difficult to say 
 which was the hymn and which the song, " Don't 
 Leave your Mother, Tom," or " O to be Nothing, Noth- 
 ing." Music must do one of two things. It must 
 either ennoble or debase. If hymnody does not en- 
 noble a service it must detract from it. In the chapter 
 entitled The Standard of Music, I have dwelt at such 
 length on this subject that in spite of my desire to do 
 so, I do not feel justified in farther enlarging upon it. 
 It is with pleasure therefore that I turn from such 
 names as Lowell Mason, Thomas Bradbury, the 
 Messrs. Root, which latter were generally impressed 
 with the necessity of hymn-writing at a very late hour, 
 and that they might inspire a due sense of their feel- 
 ing on that occasion in the hearts of their adorers,
 
 Choral. 5 3 
 
 would write before beginning, " Midnight." Fare- 
 well, ye Lowrys, Doanes, Hulls, Shermins, Grannis, 
 McGranahams, Bliss, Kirkpatricks, Sweenys. 
 
 Coming out of this somewhat unpleasant atmos- 
 phere it is blessed to look to the men to whom all 
 ages must look for musical instruction and the ever- 
 lasting out-welling of the true spirit of devotion. 
 Luther was born in 1483 ; the great Bach was born in 
 1685, 202 years later. It was Luther who dedicated 
 the choral to the German people, but it was the Thirty 
 Years' War which consecrated that choral, sanctifying 
 it with the best blood of the Fatherland. With Luther 
 it was born in war ; with Bach it was developed in the 
 midst of peaceful contemplation and devout study. It 
 is quite as impossible to discuss the German choral 
 without a mention of Bach as it would be to discuss the 
 Mass without the name of Palestrina, the symphony 
 without Beethoven, the oratorio without Handel, the 
 opera without Wagner, the dance without Strauss, the 
 violin without Paganini, the string quartette without 
 Haydn or Bach without the organ. The age of miracles 
 can never be said to have fully passed away so long as 
 men throw away and neglect many of the greatest ac- 
 quisitions. To me the ignorance, indifference and 
 prejudice which ignores and destroys appears, though 
 in an inverted ratio of excellence, quite as marvellous 
 as the creative fiat. Improbable as it seems, the day 
 may come when the German choral shall cease to be 
 the song of the people. Should such ever be the case, 
 the people will deservedly have lost their birthright ; 
 but with the true musician such can never be. What 
 Luther did for the people, Bach did for the musician.
 
 54 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 Until a man shall arise who shall intellectually super- 
 sede Bach, he must always stand pre-eminent as a 
 composer. Through ignorance the mass of the people 
 is always more liable to let slip any manner of good 
 than men of real intelligence and education. Men 
 may play Bach without understanding him, but they 
 cannot understand him without being intelligent. 
 The choral took hold upon the people because it re- 
 quired no study for them to take hold upon it. Of 
 Bach it might be said that his preludes and fugues 
 appeal to the musician because they require severe 
 study ; but no musician who has ungrudgingly be- 
 stowed this labor upon Bach can ever say that Bach 
 has proved himself ungrateful. 
 
 Bach's choral preludes in volume form a compara- 
 tively small part of his unequalled work, but when it is 
 remembered that the amount of that work already 
 published fills thirty thick volumes, and that there is 
 much more yet to follow, it is easy to see that what 
 was very little for Bach would alone have made any 
 other man famous. Those who wish for a condensed 
 and sympathetic insight into the work and excellence 
 of John Sebastian Bach can gratify their wish by read- 
 ing the article by J. S. Dwight, published in the At- 
 lantic Monthly for June, 1885. Bach in his choral pre- 
 lude was peculiarly fortunate, not only in his unlimited 
 imagination, fertility of resource, ingenuity, knowledge 
 of form and his intuitive selection of the exact mate- 
 rial for the right place so that all things he did were a 
 structure builded of closely fitting stones, but in his 
 selection of the subject on which his preludes were 
 based. Bach himself wrote a vast number of chorals,
 
 Choral. 5 5 
 
 indeed some hundreds, and adapted and arranged 
 many more. All this of course fitted him to select 
 with perfect accuracy those hymns which in the pre- 
 lude would most richly and abundantly develop. Com- 
 plete and beautiful as was this department of his 
 work, it was after all the power -of association which 
 gave to them the charm which they possessed for their 
 Lutheran hearers. As every choral is known by its 
 text, so every prelude recalled that text and the re- 
 membrance of it made the playing of Bach quite as 
 much an act of prayer and praise as when the minister 
 prayed or the people sang. The description of one of 
 these choral preludes might be understood by one 
 who had already heard them, but as it would be un- 
 successful for one who had not, I forbear. Sufficient 
 to say that they carry the melody of the choral through- 
 out, only pausing now and then in order that the under- 
 current of origiflal subject-matter may round off a 
 period in the melody, or introduce new contrapuntal 
 material upon the resumption of the choral melody. 
 
 When Bach played, the congregation knew just 
 when the choral theme entered, and where it paused. 
 From their earliest childhood they had listened to 
 these hymns. They had been part of their lesson at 
 the village school, and later on they had joined in 
 singing them with the whole congregation in the Sab- 
 bath Day service. How many sacred memories there 
 are connected with the hymns in our own vernacular, 
 yet we did not learn them in the company of our 
 school-mates, the friends and companions of our early 
 years ; indeed only a few of them sing them, and of 
 those who have departed this life our memory recalls
 
 56 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 * 
 
 only a few who sang ; and yet with all these disadvan- 
 tages, the association of the American hymn-tune is 
 one of the strongest which the Sunday service pos- 
 sesses. But with the Lutheran choral it is, or was, 
 different ; but only in degree, for where we have one 
 such memory they had many. When men are stillest, 
 they feel most. When the lips are mute, the memory 
 is most active. Thus was it that with his congrega- 
 tion gathered about him Bach preached to them a ser- 
 mon of memories. No sentimentality here, but a sol- 
 emn and tender retrospect. Listen ! Bach is preach- 
 ing : " Fruhmorgens, da die Sonn aufgeht " (Early in 
 the morning when the sun is rising). Bach is preach- 
 ing : " Wir glauben All an Einen Gott " (We all be- 
 lieve in one God). 'Bach is preaching : " Ich ruf zu 
 dir, Herr Jesu Christ " (I call to Thee, my Lord and 
 Savior). Bach is preaching, and memory is preaching, 
 and it will be long before the memoty of that choral 
 fades. 
 
 To any other man the creation of any of Bach's 
 masterpieces would have been an event of para- 
 mount importance, but to Bach such things were so 
 common that outside of getting married twice and hav- 
 ing twenty children, his life was a strictly uneventful 
 one. Nor is there evidence that Bach himself consid- 
 ered these as possessing great merit, though from so 
 modest a man such an opinion of himself, if enter- 
 tained, would never have been expressed. The town 
 of Eisenach, where he lived, did not know that he was 
 great, and when he died it seemed that his memory 
 had died with him. The world went on making new
 
 Choral. 57 
 
 musical combinations, and composers lauded them- 
 selves upon their originality, and the art rose to a high 
 degree of excellence. Time passed, a hundred years 
 went by, and the name of Bach was but little known. 
 His works slept in the original manuscript form in the 
 town where he had labored, and it must have been dur- 
 ing this period that some, perhaps many of them, were 
 lost. But like the good seed awaiting its time, Bach 
 only slept. It was Mendelssohn who called him forth 
 and said to the world, Where now is your boasted orig- 
 inality ? No, they had not written one chord, nor 
 made one combination which Bch had not made a 
 century and a half before. 
 
 Since the days of Bach the market has been flooded 
 with text-books. I do not think that Bach ever wrote 
 a text-book, and yet it was he who showed the whole 
 musical world every principle involved either in Har- 
 mony, Counterpoint, or Fugue. Handel was his 
 greatest contemporary, and his work has been before 
 an admiring public ever since its production ; but Han- 
 del's pales before that of the long-forgotten master, 
 and the tardy justice to the memory of the dead has 
 come at last. Besides being the greatest authority on 
 theory, Bach, so to speak, invented many new keys by 
 making the temperament even in all the twelve major 
 keys on the piano. Hitherto only three or four had 
 been employed, but with the new temperament every 
 tone in the system became available for a key-note. 
 This is a subject which should be discussed at length 
 to be made clear, and I hope that the opportunity may 
 at some future time present itself for so doing. No
 
 58 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 monument can ever be raised to the memory of Bach 
 half so imposing as that which he all unconsciously 
 erected. The world does well to honor his memory, 
 for in so doing it does unto itself the greatest of 
 honors.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE ORGAN. 
 
 To every man the power of leading, the power of sway- 
 ing, the power of controlling large bodies, is that qual- 
 ification which seems, for the time being at least, to 
 confer an inherent superiority over the majority of his 
 brethren. Successful or unsuccessful, as the result may 
 determine, the general leading an army to "battle is, no 
 matter how small of stature, the very biggest object 
 there. There is a duple enjoyment of power, some- 
 times objective, sometimes subjective. There is always 
 as much pleasure in yielding to a sway as there is in 
 wielding it. In the crash of a thunder-storm, in the re- 
 sistless fury of a cyclone, the awful majesty of an earth- 
 quake, men stand bewildered and dumb, crushed by the 
 helpless terror of impotence. This is the power of 
 brute matter exercised for our ruin, from which we 
 shrink appalled. These are external. But the influ- 
 ences to which we gladly yield ourselves, are those 
 which appeal to our intellect or passions. The student 
 of moral philosophy might, and with good reason, dis- 
 cuss the latter, which of necessity debases energy ; 
 but such is not my purpose here, but to confine myself 
 to the sway of intellect over intellect, not only from the 
 standpoint of the swayed, but in one particular case to 
 emotions of the swayer of men. The baton of the Ca- 
 
 59
 
 60 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 pell Meister confers happiness on him, as does the 
 baton of the field-marshal. There are bodies which 
 are neither human nor intellectual, yet confer a great 
 dignity upon him who by reason of hard study and inde- 
 fatigable labor has acquired their control. There is a 
 dignity pertaining to the office of the man who, standing 
 at his key-board, draws out a message coming from the 
 other side of the world, and so places you in immediate 
 communication with your fellow-beings who live thou- 
 sands of miles away. There is a dignity pertaining to 
 the office of the smutty engineer as he stands at his 
 post, down in the great ship, and lays his hands on his 
 heart and sees that her pulsations are regular, and her 
 meat and drink always forthcoming, for we know that 
 if that hand pause the heart must stop, and the great 
 ship stand still. 
 
 But there is yet another kind of machinery and an- 
 other kind of dignity to which we must now direct our 
 attention. It is my wish to speak as briefly as possible 
 of the wonderful machinery of the organ, and of the 
 dignity and responsibility of the organist. Like most 
 of our possessions, the organ has a pedigree which 
 reaches back where the memory of man runneth not. 
 Indeed, its father and grandfather are still with us, in 
 some out-of-the-way places, but of them I mean to 
 speak later on. One writer has irreverently called the 
 organ the "box of whistles." Dr. Stainer, in his work 
 entitled "The Organ," has more accurately expressed 
 it as the " collection of flutes." One flute was the be- 
 ginning, two flutes was an improvement, three flutes 
 made a triad, and every additional flute gave greater 
 scope to the instrument and the player. So far as is
 
 The Organ. 61 
 
 known, the first organ had its being among the Chinese, 
 and is called the Cheng. It is blown with the mouth 
 and played with the fingers exclusively. Much research 
 and erudition have been expended by modern scholars 
 in the endeavor to trace the origin and history of the 
 organ, but I believe that all that is known of any value 
 on this subject down to quite a recent period is con- 
 tained in the following lines, from Dr. Stainer's little 
 book called " The Music of the Bible." It is generally 
 said that they were introduced into church services by 
 Pope Vitalianus in the seventh century. But on the 
 other hand, mention is found of an organ which be- 
 longed to a church of nuns, at Grado, before the year 
 580. This instrument has been minutely described as 
 having been two feet long by six inches deep, and as 
 possessing thirty pipes, acted upon by fifteen keys or 
 slides. It is very doubtful if they were familiar to the 
 Romans, although an epigram of Julian the Apostate 
 alludes to them. It seems, however, to be tolerably 
 authenticated that one was sent by Constantine, in 766, 
 as a present to Pepin, King of France. Improvements 
 in their construction are attributed to Pope Sylvester, 
 who died in 1003. When we reach the time of Chaucer, 
 their use must have been common, for he speaks in his 
 " Nonnes Priestes Tale " (None Priests Tale) of a crow- 
 ing cock, " heighte chaunticlere." 
 
 " His voic was merrier than the mery orgon 
 On mass daies that in the chirches gon." 
 
 A somewhat curious record is made by another author 
 which deserves quotation. Elfeg, Bishop of Winchester, 
 procured an organ for his cathedral in 951, which was
 
 62 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the largest then known, having twenty-six pairs of bel- 
 lows, requiring seventy men to fill it with wind. 
 
 It is not needful to enter into details here, with re- 
 gard to the slow and painful steps by which one obsta- 
 cle after another was overcome. The poor bellows- 
 treader, who passed his time playing leap-frog from one 
 bellows to the other, has, in most cases, given place to 
 the blower at the pump-handle or some mechanical ap- 
 pliance of power. There was a time when men for fin- 
 gers used their clenched fists as though playing on the 
 old carillon ; for the spring of the key on an organ man- 
 ual was, for lack of mechanical appliances, less suscep- 
 tible to pressure than the keys on the pedal-board are 
 now. As to the pedal-board itself, we must remember 
 that while an organ is not regarded as an organ without 
 it, and while there is little organ music written which 
 can be played without pedals, the pedal-board is a com- 
 paratively recent addition. 
 
 It is a remarkable fact, and no less remarkable than 
 significant, that with the organ with its polyphonic ca- 
 pacity, came in ever broadening circles the knowledge 
 of the laws which govern music itself. Then ten fin- 
 gers can do much, but they can only reach so far ; when, 
 however, the pedal key-board was added it became pos- 
 sible not only to multiply voices, but to carry each part 
 distinctly, no matter what their compass. As long as 
 the organ was in a rudimentary state, the rules which 
 govern harmony were arbitrary and hypothetical ; but 
 as has already been stated, the growth of harmony was 
 synchronous with the growth of the organ ; and while 
 this cannot be directly traced to the immediate influ-
 
 The Organ. 63 
 
 ence of the organ, it should exercise due weight with 
 musicians, and lays claim to their lasting gratitude. 
 
 Another great and important addition was yet to be 
 made, and the one which to-day to the listener is per- 
 haps the most marked feature of organ music. While 
 the pedals enabled the organist to render each voice to 
 the full extent of its capacity, it was long before what 
 is commonly known as the sub-bass was added to them, 
 thus making it possible to distinguish the pedal part 
 from the manual, besides conferring upon the bass that 
 breadth and volume which is so essential as a founda- 
 tion to every musical composition. 
 
 Gradually the pedal-board was enlarged until, in 
 some instruments, it reaches the dimensions of two oc- 
 taves and a half ; that is, from the C to the G, two octaves 
 above. But the use of large pedal-boards has been of 
 slow growth, and both in England and America it is 
 common to find them with an octave and a fifth, or 
 even with one octave. This is part of the grandfather 
 before alluded to ; but having in his day and generation 
 done good service, he should be laid to rest with his 
 forefathers. In order to play organ music a pedal- 
 board must have at least two octaves. If anything, the 
 upper octave is more important than the lower, and no 
 organist can be at home on a board of less capacity. If 
 I have dwelt at length on the value of the pedal-board 
 it was because its importance justified it. Take it away 
 and you might as well take away the organ itself. 
 
 To the organ there has been added stops of every 
 possible nature ; some of them peculiar to it, but most 
 of them either resembling, or attempting to resemble, 
 some instrument. Most stops give but one tone to
 
 64 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 each key when pressed, but there are mixture stops hav- 
 ing four ranks of pipes, which, when drawn, yield four 
 tones to each key. We have mechanical combinations 
 for drawing and o//V/zdrawing whole rows of stops, and 
 combinations for drawing a whole organ at once. In- 
 stead of one, we have four organs, three for the hands, 
 and one for the feet. For one stop for the pedals we 
 have twenty. Couplers which connect one manual with 
 another, or each manual separately with the pedals, or 
 combine all four at once in an overwhelming flood of 
 sounds. A whole orchestra cannot surpass the tone- 
 power of the full organ, and no orchestra can be re- 
 duced to a more perfect pianissimo ; nor does the won- 
 der cease here steam and electricity have been called 
 in to supplement and manipulate what was already the 
 wonder of the age. What does it matter to the organ- 
 ist that his instrument requires five or six horse-power 
 to run it ? The seventy men can all stay at home now 
 and need not work the bellows, as in the days of good 
 Elf eg, Bishop of Winchester. Way back where nobody 
 can hear him there is a little monster puffing away, and 
 he says : " I am worth all that seventy men do, and a 
 good deal more besides, for I never get tired, and I can 
 make the organ hold out just as long as the gentle- 
 man at the key-boards." What is it to the organist 
 that only a part of his organ is before him and the re- 
 mainder scattered around the church ? for does not the 
 lightning aid him in the chancel, in the crypt, so far 
 that the echoes just reach his ear ? His fingers guide 
 the electric current on its mission the song of prayer 
 and praise. Fire and thunder, wind and water, all com- 
 bine to do his bidding. Just as in the tempest, the
 
 The Organ. 65 
 
 lightning of the electric fluid is followed by the pealing 
 thunder of the double diapason. The power which 
 turns the looms of half the world, which has carried 
 civilization beyond the Rocky Mountains, and bears in 
 safety across the fathomless sea the proudest navies 
 that have ever floated into port, cbmes, after its week- 
 day labor, to the Sabbath temple and there pours out 
 its wealth of worship through the organ's ten thousand 
 throats. Solemn, majestic, overwhelming! Too stu- 
 pendous for conception, too full of adoration for thought 
 to grasp or language frame. 
 
 But one says, " What ! will you worship by machin- 
 ery ? " My friend, it is not the matter of how you shall 
 worship which troubles you. Oh, no ! I know plenty 
 of men just like you. You are counting the cost of 
 keeping up the batteries, of paying the organ tuner. 
 You think that that engine burns too much fuel ; you 
 think they pay the organist too much. But let me tell 
 you one thing : it is better that you should pay a ma- 
 chine to sing well for you than to provoke the ridicule 
 of your neighbors by your unnatural grimaces, and 
 your still more uncouth and unnatural attempts to vocal- 
 ize. But this is a digression into which I have been 
 inadvertently led. Before leaving the subject of the 
 organ to take up that of the organist, in order to con- 
 vey an adequate idea of the vastness of the complete 
 organ to those who are not familiar with such matters, 
 I wish to present a few details with regard to some of 
 the greatest organs of Europe, which must convey to 
 every one some idea of their dimensions. In the Ben- 
 edictine Monastery at Weingarten is an organ of four 
 rows of keys and sixty stops, fifteen of which are for 
 5
 
 66 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the fifth organ or pedal-board. There are 6666 pipes in 
 this organ. In the great organ there is a stop called 
 mixture, with twenty ranks of pipes. The longest pipe 
 of this organ is thirty-two feet. 
 
 The organ in the Church of St. Peter and Paul con- 
 tains 32 stops and 3270 pipes. The pedal organ con- 
 tains 20 stops. In the choir organ there is a stop 
 called carillons, a set of small bells. The organ in the 
 Cathedral of Freyburg has 68 stops, and is world- 
 famed not only for its power, but its Vox Humana. 
 The organ of Haarlem is 108 feet in height, 50 in 
 breadth, and has 68 stops. The largest metal pipe is 
 32 feet long. In some foreign instruments two sets of 
 pedals are provided, which may be described as great 
 and choir pedals. The great pedal is in the usual 
 position ; the choir pedal is in front of the other, and 
 sloping. It is so placed that the feet rest on it 
 naturally when stretched out in front of the per- 
 former. There is a choir pedal of this kind in the 
 organ in the Minster at Ulm, built by Walcher, of 
 Ludwigsburg. It is a very large instrument, having 
 100 sounding-stops. 
 
 While all these organs are phenomenally great, they 
 are also, with one or two exceptions, more than a 
 century old. But it is to be questioned if the builders 
 of those great tone-castles did not, after all, succeed in 
 putting a better and purer tone into their instruments 
 than the builders of later days. There is yet another 
 thing to be borne in mind, and that is that if all the 
 elements of nature were to combine with the organ 
 they would, after all, be only accessories. Magnificent 
 as is the effect of external appliances, it must never be
 
 The Organ. 67 
 
 forgotten that it is not them but the organ, and it 
 alone. Beautiful, vast and various as are the combina- 
 tions of stops, it must not be overlooked that the ma- 
 jority of them are ephemeral, superficial and dependent 
 on the few foundation stops, such as the diapason and 
 principal, for nearly every substantial effect. If the 
 variety of stops were less and their caliber greater, in 
 my opinion the organ would be a far more religious 
 and effective instrument. Where the superficial stops 
 are used without judgment the effect on the cultivated 
 ear is grating and unpleasant to the last degree. 
 These stops are nauseating from their very sweetness. 
 An organist often has a hobby about a stop or a com- 
 bination, and on Sunday morning he will go into the 
 choir gallery and there put on some pet reed, with, 
 perhaps, the tremolo, and smack his lips over it and' 
 grind away as though neither he nor the congregation 
 had ever tasted sugar candy before. 
 
 It would be impossible to lay down any general rule 
 for organ registration which did not admit of a thou- 
 sand exceptions. If the amateur adheres to the uni- 
 son stops he will generally be correct. If the organ 
 is too small to admit of his using the intended registra- 
 tion, then he should be so acquainted with the nature 
 of the stops indicated as to be able to in a manner sub- 
 stitute them. While all the registers and accessories 
 to an organ which have been mentioned are to be de- 
 sired, there are but few pieces which cannot be ren- 
 dered on two manuals and a pedal-board of two 
 octaves. These are absolutely indispensable, and it 
 is as idle to try to play music on one manual, as it is 
 to try to play pedals on an octave and a fifth. Refer-
 
 68 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 ring to this latter, I will state that common as the 
 grandfather pedal-board is, there has never yet been 
 found any composer of classic organ music who has 
 written any work which does not do most of the ped- 
 alling on the upper octave. With regard to stops, 
 every builder outside of certain regulation registers 
 makes his own specification, but to the student of the 
 organ I would give one piece of advice : unless you 
 are a pianist, don't go to the organ. If you are, learn 
 to use the pedals with both feet, and with as much 
 dexterity as you do your hands on the manuals ; and 
 when you accomplish that, stop-changing will come 
 to you easily enough. Guard against defects not seri- 
 ous in themselves, and yet enough so to make them 
 amusing ; such as pressing down the pedal one or two 
 seconds before beginning a piece, or slowing up on an 
 Amen until the choir either break down or sound like 
 bagpipes. These are a few of the eccentricities of the 
 amateur organist which should be avoided, and so the 
 best guard is this : don't play anything that is not 
 written ; don't retard when it is not intended ; don't ac- 
 celerate the verse of a hymn, because it commences 
 with the words, " Oh, hasten ; come, hasten." This 
 may be descriptive music, but I have not found it cata- 
 logued anywhere. Schumann said, " Neglect no op- 
 portunity of practising on the organ. There is no other 
 instrument which inflicts such prompt chastisement 
 on offensive and defective composition or execution." 
 As to the character of organ music, let us see what 
 Schneider, one of the most thorough of organists, has 
 to say : " Beautiful, simple melodies, calming the 
 heart, floating on powerful, solemn and thrilling har-
 
 The Organ. 69 
 
 monies these are the first fundamental elements of 
 which alone all organ playing ought to be composed ; 
 ornaments and graces cannot but appear as a desecra- 
 tion of what is holy, as a stain on what is beautiful and 
 venerable. It is as a disfiguration of what is in the 
 first place absolutely necessary : that a good organist 
 should have a complete knowledge of theory, since the 
 instrument requires always full, complete harmony." 
 
 The fugue is the best species of music an organist 
 can employ, provided his subject be lofty and sublime, 
 which it can only be by deviating from everything that 
 is trivial, secular or common. Happily the musical 
 world is enriched by many masterly fugues, composed 
 expressly for the organ ; and no player need depre- 
 cate the charge of unskilfulness who has modesty suf- 
 ficient to prefer the works of Handel, Graun, Bach, 
 Altorchstberger and others to his own extemporaneous 
 effusion. The introductory is supposed to have a 
 character of its own. It should be in grave and sol- 
 emn style, abounding in full, close-wrought harmony, 
 and inspiring a feeling of reverential awe. The con- 
 cluding or out-voluntary is that in which the organist 
 generally shows off the full power and effects of the 
 instrument he presides over. The pieces best suited 
 for this occasion are those expressly composed for the 
 organ, consisting generally of an introduction and 
 fugue wherein the pedals may be employed. 
 
 Dr. Stainer says : " A good organist may be known, 
 if by nothing else, by his use of the crescendo of the 
 swell organ. A bad player, when he has a leg to spare 
 seems to think it cannot be better employed than 
 pumping the swell-pedal up and down, with utter dis-
 
 7O Studies in Musical History. 
 
 regard to the composer's intentions. It might often 
 be said that such performers try to use the swell-pedal 
 even when one leg cannot be spared, and thus fre- 
 quently sacrifice beautiful pedal passages by consign- 
 ing their rendering to the frantic efforts of the left foot 
 only." The Encyclopaedia Britannica says : " The 
 essence of legitimate playing is putting the feet over 
 each other freely, so as to use the alternate method as 
 much as possible." Rink, in his voluminous works, 
 has left his lasting tribute of reverence for the monarch 
 of instruments. 
 
 It would be impossible, if not useless, further to quote 
 authorities on this subject, yet there is one work to 
 which I must allude. It is Ritter's great "Organ 
 School," in three volumes, translated by John Paul 
 Morgan. I trust that in this place it may not be in- 
 appropriate that I should pay my tribute of affectionate 
 respect to one who, throughout his all too brief life, 
 was so loved and respected by all who knew him. 
 While I do not in the least overrate the value of Rit- 
 ter's vast compilation, I am well aware that I am in- 
 fluenced largely by the fact that it was translated by 
 my teacher. And now, for the benefit of the one- 
 legged organists who stamp round the pedals on Sun- 
 day, while their fingers perform the vilest sacrilege, let 
 me record this fact : I never heard him improvise- 
 Great as his knowledge of the doctrine of music must 
 have been by reason of his being the translator of 
 Richter's " Manual of Harmony," his " Manual on Coun- 
 terpoint," and Richter's treatise on the fugue, and not- 
 withstanding the fact that he wrote and published a 
 large amount of music, I must repeat, I never knew
 
 The Organ. 71 
 
 him to be guilty of the impertinence of improvising. 
 It is now seven years since we followed him to the 
 grave, but his words are ever with me. This he said : 
 " Under God I have been the instrument of translating 
 the noblest work that was ever written for the organ." 
 If, instead of writing on the walls of the church, " Ho- 
 liness becometh thine house, O Lord," that text were 
 tattooed on the organist, it might be more respected. 
 
 John Paul Morgan was an ideal organist. His in- 
 strument to him was as sacred as the building in which 
 it was placed, and his reverence for it was such that 
 nothing could have induced him to play on it anything 
 frivolous or secular. Conscience, conscience, con- 
 science ! Bishops, priests and deacons have to feel a 
 call to enter into the service of the sanctuary. Is the 
 organist nothing more than a hireling ? How is it 
 possible that persons believing in the religion which 
 they hear preached daily, can go to their organ and in 
 act, if not in word, let it be understood that any kind 
 of music is good enough for God. The world is full of 
 good, beautiful organ music ; how is it that you do in 
 church what you dare not do in your own parlor ? You 
 can be as sacrilegious with an organ as you can be with 
 your lips. 
 
 The most unpleasant feature of the so-called im- 
 provising is that the improvisator has, in the course of 
 his or her life, actually strung together some musical 
 progressions, and that each time that he seats himself 
 at the organ, it is to grind out the same composition, 
 Sunday after Sunday and year after year. There are 
 very few people who know aught of harmony, and there 
 are still fewer who, knowing, have the gift to make
 
 72 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 a practical use of it. It is better not to play at all 
 than to play badly. Many times I have been asked 
 the question : " How long will it take me to learn the 
 organ ? " And when I have said that a couple of years 
 might make them organists, I have been met with the 
 
 reply that " learned to play in three months." I 
 
 do not discuss the fact, but retire from the field in as 
 good order as I can. Nobody ever did learn to play 
 the organ in three or six months, or in a year. That is 
 one proposition, and another is, that nobody ever will. 
 Organ playing doesn't mean just playing hymn tunes, 
 but it means playing Bach and Handel. It means 
 deserving your own approbation: It means power, not 
 only over your instrument, but over the people who 
 listen to you. It means that you are above the igno- 
 rant and that because your labor has entitled you to 
 be. 
 
 Show me a good organist and I will show you a fine 
 brain. Show me one of your slop-shop organists and 
 I will show one who neither fears God nor regards 
 man. The highest happiness that a man can have is 
 an approving conscience. The criticism of one musi- 
 cian is worth more than a whole city full of ignorant 
 eulogists. Don't be satisfied with being a half-way 
 musician. To be thorough one must practise every 
 day, and this not for the time that they are learning, 
 but for all time. Said Federlein : " Without struggle 
 there is no victory ; without labor, no success."
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 OUTLINE OF THE ORGAN. 
 
 A MANUAL is a key-board. The pedal-board is a 
 small manual for the feet with raised keys to corre- 
 spond to the black keys on the manuals. 
 
 Slops. All stops are registers, but all registers are 
 not stops. Every stop represents an instrument and 
 should properly run the whole length of the manual, 
 although one or two, sometimes more, treble stops reach 
 only as low as F, the fourth line in the bass clef, 
 where they are continued by one bass stop. Pipes are 
 sometimes of metal and sometimes of wood. This is 
 for the reason that as wood and metal produce different 
 qualities of tone, the color-sound of each stop depends 
 on the material of which it is made. As every com- 
 plete stop on the manual includes sixty pipes, it is 
 easy to see how the multiplication of stops increases 
 the cost of the organ. 
 
 The pipes of an organ range in all degrees of length 
 from thirty-two feet down to three-eighths of an inch. 
 Organ builders classify these under the head of thirtyr 
 two, sixteen, eight, four, and two-foot tones. As the 
 pedal-board has but two octaves, and the key-board but 
 five, the whole number of keys does not exceed the scale 
 of a seven-octave piano. The unison, or eight-foot tone, 
 is that which corresponds in pitch to the treble and bass 
 
 73
 
 74 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 clefs. These are always the most powerful stops on 
 the manuals, and of them the diapason is always the 
 greatest. The four-foot tone includes all stops which 
 give the octave above the eight-foot tone, and is to the 
 organist what Svais to the pianist. Of these there are 
 also a number ; most important of which is the Principal. 
 The two-foot tone is that which gives the tone two oc- 
 taves above the one written, thus enabling the organist 
 to strike two octaves with one finger. Of the two-foot 
 stops, the fifteenth is the most common. It is so called 
 because it gives the fifteenth tone in the scale above the 
 eight-foot tone. Even now the octave capacity of one 
 key has not been fully stated, for if we have climbed up 
 so many octaves, why should we not descend, thus en- 
 abling one finger on the organ to do what both hands 
 cannot accomplish on the piano-forte. The sub-octave is 
 called the Bourdon, and illustrates a remarkable princi- 
 ple in acoustics ; for while the Bourdon is only an eight- 
 foot pipe, it gives a sixteen-foot tone. I am not aware 
 to whom we are indebted for this discovery, but the prin- 
 ciple, like most laws, is simple enough after being 
 known. And this leads me to speak of organ pipes in 
 general. 
 
 Pipes. If a four-foot pipe be, as is customary, open 
 at the top, it produces a four-foot tone. Closed at 
 the top, the same pipe makes an eight-foot tone; that 
 is, a tone an octave below. The column of air which 
 enters the pipe at its base traverses its length twice, 
 that is, eight feet ; whereas, were the stopper removed, 
 it would only travel four feet. Thus an eight-foot 
 Bourdon is made to give as deep a tone as a sixteen- 
 foot Diapason, but not as powerful ; and a sixteen-foot
 
 Outline of the Organ. 75 
 
 as deep as a thirty-two foot Diapason. Many names 
 are given to stops, but they can all be classified under 
 a few heads pipes stopped or open ; or else, metal, 
 wooden or reeds. Schneider says : " Organ pipes 
 may be distributed into flue-pipes and reed-pipes. 
 They are made either of metal or wood. The form of 
 the metal pipes is either that of a cylinder, or of a 
 cone, direct or inverted. The form of the wooden 
 pipes is generally that of a rectangular prism, though 
 occasionally they are also pyramidal, these being the 
 forms most easily constructed, and most advantageous 
 as to tone. Pipes are either altogether open at the top, 
 or they are stopped totally or partially ; the wooden pipes 
 in the former case by means of a stopper, and the 
 metal pipes by a cap. Some of the stopped pipes have 
 a small tube passing through the centre of the cap or 
 stopper ; this is called a chimney ; these of course are 
 only partially stopped." Another feature of the or- 
 gan which has no counterpart in any instrument or in- 
 struments is the high-pitched stops, which are included 
 under the head of mixture stops. It is an anomaly 
 without a parallel. Any stop is called mixture which 
 produces more than one tone at the pressure of one key. 
 Even some are so included, as the twelfth and seven- 
 teenth or tierce, and this because, as they are never 
 used alone, they form harmonic combinations foreign 
 to any pure system of harmony. For example, if one 
 mixture stop has three ranks, each key will give the 
 common triad. If the key C be struck, the result will 
 be the common chord of C ; but if to this be added 
 another key, the third, E, a second triad is now 
 sounded, and this in discord with the first. Add then
 
 76 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the remainder of the dominant seventh, and in like 
 manner we have two more triads, making a discord 
 which must be heard to be appreciated. We have the 
 chords of C, E, G, B flat, complete. This makes 
 twelve tones ; even the reading of it is distressing. 
 The triad of C is C, E, G. That of E is E, G sharp, 
 B. The chord of G is G, B, D. And that of B flat, 
 B flat, D, F. I have written of this at an unintentional 
 length, but as it is not easy to make clear, and is but 
 little known to many, I have been thus minute in the 
 attempt. But before leaving this set of stops, I must 
 answer the question which has naturally arisen : Why 
 are they used at all ? They are for use only with 
 heavy eight and four-foot tones, that the pure harmo- 
 nies may be so powerful as to cover up the discords, 
 and cause them, while not obtrusive, to still impart a 
 crash and brilliancy to the full organ which can be had 
 in no other manner. 
 
 Reeds. The coloring capacity of the reed-stops is 
 perhaps more varied than all others ; but this very high 
 coloring renders it dangerous, for there is no coloring 
 so high as not to become common by constant use. 
 Some of these reed-stops are most plaintive, and form a 
 marked contrast to the martial character of others. 
 The reed differs from other stops in its construction, in 
 that tone is produced by the current of air vibrating a 
 little tongue of metal, thus producing the peculiar qual- 
 ity. This makes itself felt over the most powerful 
 organ, and for tenderness or force cannot be overrated. 
 But while no organ is complete without reeds ; it should 
 be remembered that unless they are tuned at least once 
 a month they were best left out altogether, for one reed
 
 Outline of the Organ. 77 
 
 requires more care than twelve other stops. The 
 slightest variation of temperature, the jarring of the or- 
 gan by the pumper, the vibrations of the reed-tongue 
 itself, dust, moisture, all these things affect it, and that 
 to such a degree as to render it in a few weeks quite 
 unfit for use. Here the old rule, which knows no ex- 
 ception, applies : If you would have a good thing, you 
 must pay for it. Some of the reed stops are Trumpet, 
 Clarion, or octave-trumpet, Bassoon, Vox Humana, 
 Hautboy, etc., etc. And now as to the possible future 
 of the organ. This is dependent on three agencies. 
 The first, because it recognizes tone ; the second, be- 
 cause it causes tone ; and the third, because on it both 
 of the preceding are dependent. These three are the 
 ear, the science of acoustics, and the application of me- 
 chanics. In the field of speculation it is a recognized 
 tenet that we may be surrounded by forces as active 
 and influential as those of either light or sound, but 
 having no senses through which they may reach us 
 their action is not directly recognized, and their origin 
 unknown. This is a glimpse into a field into which, at 
 some future day, I hope to enter more fully, but it has 
 been brought under consideration by the reflection 
 that as without the ear the organ would have never ex- 
 isted, without the continuance of the ear it would im- 
 mediately cease to exist. The ear has shown itself ca- 
 pable of as great cultivation as the eye, as may be 
 easily demonstrated by the study of the history of 
 music. 
 
 " Mr. Ruskin, in a most interesting passage in ' Mod- 
 ern Painters,' shows that the sense of color has been 
 developed in the course of ages. He says the Greek
 
 78 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 sense of color seems to have been so comparatively 
 dim and uncertain that it is almost impossible to ascer- 
 tain what the real idea was which they attached to any 
 word alluding to hue," (" Color Music," by Rev. J. 
 Crofts). Every harmony which some more progressive 
 ear discovered had to fight its way to the comprehen- 
 sion of all the other ears. Thus it is that it has been 
 evolutionized from the apprehension of the old Greek 
 modes up to the polyphony and superlative orchestra- 
 tion of Baireuth. It will readily be perceived that the 
 effect has been placed before the cause, the ear before 
 acoustics, because without the sensation of sound, 
 sound itself could not be taken into consideration di- 
 rectly as sound. The organ had a scale ranging from 
 nine to ten octaves. It does not seem probable that 
 this limit will soon, if ever, be exceeded successfully ; 
 for as we increase the dimensions of pipes, we diminish 
 the number of vibrations in inverse ratio, and conversely 
 with the diminution of a pipe. As all sound is the re- 
 sult of vibration, it follows that if vibration be too in- 
 frequent, it becomes little more than a succession of 
 puffs, like those of a railroad engine. On the other 
 hand, if it be so frequent as to create, instead of a suc- 
 cession of waves, a constant current of air, the sound 
 becomes too attenuated and loses the power of creating 
 either sensation or color. There must be sixteen vi- 
 brations in a second to produce the lowest tone, while 
 the upper limit of sound is produced by 38,000 vibra- 
 tions in a second. So much for the vibrations of the 
 extremes. What has been, shall be again. The 
 growth that has taken place in the nature and con- 
 struction of organ-pipes must continue until the science
 
 Outline of the Organ. 79 
 
 of acoustics has yielded up the key of her every hidden 
 chamber. The organ is already the most elaborate 
 complexity of mechanism ever applied to musical pur- 
 poses, but it is either in its childhood, or else must al- 
 ways remain a most imperfect instrument. This may 
 seem rather at variance with all that has been said, 
 but I hope to make this clear without seeming incon- 
 sistent. In a chorus, or in an orchestra, where in- 
 crease or decrease of volume is required, it is accom- 
 plished by all the voices or instruments growing louder 
 through additional pressure of either wind or hand, 
 and the reverse by diminishing the pressure. The dif- 
 ference between a stop and a voice is that the stop can 
 never be any louder or softer, but that the tone of the 
 organ can only be increased or diminished by the ad- 
 dition or subtraction of the stops. The effect is never 
 the same as that of an orchestra, or a chorus, for they in- 
 crease and diminish altogether, where such effects are 
 required, thereby preserving the same quality of tone, 
 which can never be the case in an organ. True, you 
 may make it so soft as to be scarcely audible, but that 
 will probably be only one stop, and when the full or- 
 gan is used as the climax it will have been by the ad- 
 dition of stops, and such cannot be legitimately con- 
 sidered a crescendo. The swell organ answers every 
 requirement so far as it goes, but as it is the smallest 
 of the three organs it serves rather to show off the im- 
 perfections of the other two. It is very easy to suggest 
 and advise the impossible, but I should regret to be 
 thought ignorant of the defects as well as the merits of 
 the instrument. If, instead of having only one organ 
 in a swell, each one, not excepting the pedal-organ,
 
 8o Studies in Musical History. 
 
 were placed in swell-boxes, the effect of the crescendo 
 of the whole instrument would indeed be overwhelming 
 in the extreme. There may be other ways by which 
 such a result might be accomplished, but none have 
 ever suggested themselves to me. There are doubtless 
 many other mechanical improvements, but I cannot be- 
 lieve that any of them is second in importance to this. 
 I should not wish, as so lengthy a sketch would imply, 
 to seem to run the organ as a hobby, or even to say 
 that it is capable of superseding any other single instru- 
 ment. Its future does not lie in superseding others, 
 but in developing itself. The factors to which it is in- 
 debted for being will not forsake it on the threshold 
 of its greatness. Having now considered the past, 
 present, and possible future of the organ, there re- 
 mains but one more subject demanding attention. 
 
 The position of the organ. If we have a picture, we 
 hang it where it catches the best light. If we have 
 a flower, we so locate it that its perfume may most 
 readily reach us ; but with the organ this rule seems 
 to be reversed. In the small town where I live 
 there are four two-manual organs. Of these, three 
 are so placed that more than half their power is 
 Tost. The absurdity of purchasing a three thousand 
 dollar instrument in order to place it where it can 
 give but one thousand dollars' worth of tone is too 
 manifest to require comment. In order that an or- 
 gan shall speak it must be so placed that there will 
 be no impediment to its tone. The long pipes should 
 never be where the ceiling is so low that they must be 
 thrust through it. The instrument itself should never 
 be located in a corner or recess of any kind. As sound
 
 Outline of the Organ. 8 1 
 
 has a tendency to ascend, it is always to be desired 
 that an organ should be placed as nearly on a level 
 with the congregation as possible. Every practical or- 
 ganist should be familiar with the structure of his 
 organ-pipes. Not only to enable him to rectify in case 
 of need, but that he may, by his knowledge of the 
 character of each stop, be better able to judge of its 
 possible effect on others, sitting at a distance. The 
 name register is given to every draw-stop and coupler. 
 It also includes whatever else there may be, such as 
 bellows-signal, bellows-check, tremolo, etc. So when 
 we consider the verb to register a piece, its meaning 
 will be readily understood. 
 
 The swell organ is an organ varying in size in differ- 
 ent instruments, and entirely separate from the main 
 organ. It is shut up in a box which has a number of 
 little doors in its front connected by a lever with what 
 is called the swell-pedal, which in its turn is operated 
 by the right foot. The effect of the crescendo on 
 opening the doors is beautiful in the extreme ; that is, 
 of course, where the intention of the composer is fol- 
 lowed. It is not my purpose in this place to speak of 
 the internal arrangement of the organ ; that is, the con- 
 struction of the bellows, or sets of bellows, of the wind- 
 chests, slides, pallets, conductors, and so on, for no one 
 can understand these things by description alone, but 
 must have an opportunity of seeing for themselves their 
 practical application. 
 
 Tuning. If the question has presented itself be- 
 fore, why should we get fine organs if they are to 
 be played on by people who don't understand how 
 to play them, the same question should present itself 
 6
 
 82 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 as to keeping them in tune. The finer an organ 
 is, the worse it is for being out of tune. Where it 
 is possible, it is cheaper to employ a tuner for the 
 organ by the year, as the piano tuners are engaged, 
 than to suddenly be aroused to the fact that through 
 neglect and carelessness the instrument is in a horri- 
 ble condition. If not this, then an organ ought to be 
 overhauled entirely once a year, and the reed-stops 
 should be tuned once a month. It is the misfortune of 
 the organ that, being the property of a number of peo- 
 ple, it is to no one. person's interest to look after it, 
 while the piano, being the property of an individual, is 
 studiously cared for. It is to be regretted that church 
 people, while so particular as to the condition of their 
 own instruments, do not care whether the instrument of 
 the Lord is in order or not. I trust that no one will 
 think that this is said with any feeling of disrespect 
 either to creed or congregation ; but looking at it from 
 another point of view, it is certainly inconsistent that 
 instruments costing many thousands of dollars should 
 not receive as much care as those costing a few hun- 
 dreds. In this sketch of the organ, it was my wish to 
 make clear to the public in general some parts of that 
 noblest of instruments, thereby enabling them to form 
 a conception of the complexity of its structure, the di- 
 versity of its tone-qualities, the intricate nature of its 
 manipulation, requiring of the feet that they should 
 play on the pedal-board while they, at the same time, 
 make a judicious use of the swell and combination 
 pedals ; of the hands that shall manage two, three, and 
 even four manuals, draw and withdraw registers and 
 turn music, while the eyes take cognizance of every-
 
 Outline of the Organ. 83 
 
 thing, but more particularly of the music being read. 
 Trusting that I have intelligibly acquitted myself in 
 these respects, I wish, before closing, once more to re- 
 iterate that the organ deserves good treatment at the 
 hands both of players and tuners ; and it is with the 
 earnest hope of conveying such a conviction to at least 
 a few that this paper has been written.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 USE AND INFLUENCE OF BELLS. 
 
 EVERY piece of matter which, upon being struck, 
 emits a sound may be regarded as an instrument of 
 percussion ; and the more sonorous the nature of the 
 body so struck, the more perfectly is it adapted to that 
 purpose. The variety and use of such instruments is 
 great, but their relations, one to the other, are not al- 
 ways apparent, as, for example, we do not immediately 
 classify under the same head drums and bones with 
 such instruments as the bell or the piano, and yet a 
 moment's thought makes their relationship manifest. 
 In the case of all instruments, whether wind, string or 
 percussion, the end sought is the same vibration, but 
 the means to that end vary with the character of each 
 of these three classes of instruments. The weakest are 
 the string, and the most far-reaching, the percussion : 
 it therefore required no particular sagacity to recog- 
 nize the latter as that best fitted for call and signal. 
 Nor does the law of natural selection stop here, for of 
 percussion instruments the largest and most vibratory 
 were those best adapted for such purposes, and of 
 these the drum and the bell were the most prominent 
 and effective. 
 
 In the choice between these last two the prolonged 
 and sustained vibrations of the bell gave to it a pre- 
 
 84
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 85 
 
 dominance in power and sweetness over all other in- 
 struments of a like nature. One of the most graceful 
 flowers that grows is the moretous campannula, the bell 
 flower, which in its simple grace was the mute fore- 
 shadowing of -its silver-tongued prototype. In despite 
 of the sinister use to which the bell has been frequently 
 put, it may be considered with justice the emblem of 
 peace, as opposed to its rival percussion brother, the 
 drum, and like the olive branch, tells the story of 
 peace on earth. Drums perish with the war in which 
 they were beaten, but bells endure through peace and 
 war, forever perpetuating their own memory. If the 
 Church may be considered the bulwark of the State, 
 then the bell may rightfully be regarded as its official 
 utterance. It may be that in our pursuit of this sub- 
 ject we shall find that its position as a social factor has 
 been materially altered, but if the bell has been with- 
 drawn from active life, so far from losing, it has rather 
 acquired dignity. Indeed, in the history of bells we 
 find a striking analogy to the life of man, rewarded in 
 old age with the crown of honored years. It is there- 
 fore with a sense of profound veneration not unmixed 
 with awe that I approach the consideration of the 
 voice of the steeple and the invitation to prayer. 
 Whether we regard the bell as an historical, ecclesias- 
 tical, architectural or musical agency, it occupies a 
 prominence in the life of the past to which men of to- 
 day are slow in according recognition. While we must 
 regard it from all these separate points of view, they 
 are so interwoven as to be almost identical. If we 
 attempt to regard the bell from an historical stand- 
 point, we are reminded that its first prominence in Eu-
 
 86 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 rope was given to it by Christianity. If, however, we 
 regard it as an ecclesiastical institution, secular history 
 confronts us on every hand with the manifold uses of 
 the bell for purposes other than those of ecclesiasticism. 
 As the badge of the Christian was the cross, and of 
 the Mohammedan, the crescent, quite as sharp cut was 
 the line drawn between the Christian and Mohamme- 
 dan call to prayer. Wherever the bell was heard there 
 was Christianity. So clearly was this recognized and 
 admitted that wherever the rule of the Turk extended, 
 there the voice of the bell was silent. Thus it was that 
 the cross and the bell went side by side, and with the 
 banishment of the one came the silence of the other. 
 Men grew to love and venerate their bells, and as this 
 feeling intensified, superstition and ignorance endowed 
 them with miraculous powers, and whether used in 
 cursing or blessing, the bell was an important factor. 
 
 The architectural influence of bells, while really very 
 great, has been of a negative character and cannot 
 therefore be considered independently. Bell music 
 might, from its peculiar character, be a subject afford- 
 ing separate consideration ; but such a dissertation 
 could only interest the musician, and it is for the 
 perusal of the general reader that these pages are in- 
 tended. As the effect of causes which have to a large 
 extent ceased to exist, the conclusion forces itself 
 upon us that the bell has passed its maximum influence, 
 and, though by slow degrees, is in the path of deca- 
 dence and desuetude. 
 
 As an instrument of ecclesiasticisms the bell is what 
 it always was, but it has passed out of civil life, and as 
 an historical factor will never become prominent again.
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 87 
 
 The fact is, the bell is not in sympathy with the age ; 
 but with the Church it is different : it peals for the 
 marriage and it tolls for the dead. Though far above 
 the world it yet speaks to the world. It tells of kneel- 
 ing congregations, of officiating priests, of the inspired 
 organ, the chanting choir, incense, painting, sculpture. 
 Of all these things it tells, and yet more, for it speaks 
 of the hearts of the worshipping thousands. Morning, 
 noon and evening its voice is heard, and through the 
 silence of the night it marks the hours for the sleeping 
 world. Like the choral, it is a chapter of memories, 
 but with the outside world its place has been rilled and 
 must so continue. 
 
 The bell, in order to be heard at a distance, had to 
 be elevated, and this compelled the erection of high 
 towers. The higher the tower the farther went the 
 sound, and with the growth of the tower all the other 
 architectural proportions had to be modified to pre- 
 serve that harmonious whole which Schlagel called 
 " Frozen music in stone." But here also it is safe to 
 say the limit has been reached, and attention is now 
 turned more upon utility than the aesthetic, and the 
 successors of the old bell-towers, like the old bells, 
 will grow fewer and fewer as the spirit of the age de- 
 velops itself. But admitting that this active architect- 
 ural influence has come to an end, there yet remains 
 the negative principle which will ever continue in 
 effect. 
 
 Strange as it may at first seem, the daily paper is 
 the bell's deadliest enemy, and in the rustle of its 
 columns we hear folded all, and more than all, that was 
 told by the bell of former days. For great public sig-
 
 88 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 nals among ancient peoples the trumpet was in most 
 general use, but the sound of the bell was more far- 
 reaching than that of the trumpet, and by tacit consent 
 the latter passed into disuse ; but the old order ever 
 changeth, and in the inarticulate utterance of the 
 newspaper, whose voice is heard so far as steam and 
 electricity can carry it, we can hear the doom of the 
 great bell as a servant of the public. It has done its 
 work well and faithfully ; but loving it, yes hallowing 
 it, as we may, we cannot help the feeling that it is a 
 part of the dead past, forming a component of a chap- 
 ter over which has been written the word, Finis ; part 
 of that chapter in which the Crusades occupy so im- 
 portant a place ; part of that chapter in which feudal- 
 ism and chivalry constituted the base and bulwark of 
 society. Yes, the chapter is finished ; but as we close 
 it with a sigh, the present reality supplants the memo- 
 ries of the past, and while we deplore the decadence of 
 the art of bell-ringing and the love of bells, we are com- 
 pelled to realize the law of compensation as we relin- 
 quish our hold upon the usages of the past. 
 
 So it is not altogether with regret that we lay aside 
 the historical chapter on bells ; for, viewing them from 
 our modern and utilitarian standpoint, they must be 
 regarded conditionally, and in our consideration of the 
 bell we must remember that it may become quite as 
 much of a curse as a blessing, and that where they do 
 not exist in perfection, their room is much to be pre- 
 ferred. On a certain time, Bordeaux rose in rebellion, 
 and as a mark of humiliation her bells were taken 
 from her ; when, however, the period of expiation had 
 passed and the bells were to be reinstated, the citizens
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 89 
 
 of that municipality declined to receive them back, 
 alleging as their reason that they had enjoyed such 
 rest and quiet in their absence that they wished that 
 absence continued. 
 
 These things are matters, not only of taste but of 
 habit ; and while no sweeping denunciation of bells is 
 here intended, it can be conclusively shown that bell- 
 ringing can be productive of quite as much evil as it 
 has ever done good. The action taken by some of our 
 American cities in condemning bell-ringing sufficiently 
 evidences the fact that the feeling against bells is 
 growing. If, on the score of utility, it be urged that 
 without the bell people would not know when to go to 
 church, the answer readily presents itself : if churches 
 need bells to call people to hours of regular worship, 
 why should not the theatres stand in far greater need 
 of them ? I have noticed that in the Jewish syna- 
 gogues no bell is used, and yet the congregations 
 meet with quite as much punctuality as those of the 
 Christian churches. We do ring bells for fires because, 
 as it is not customary to set the time at which a fire 
 shall take place, this is the only means by which the 
 public may be notified. If, however, the public use of 
 bells be urged on account of their beautiful effect, then 
 indeed we are confronted with an argument possessing 
 great weight, but which, in order to be effective, re- 
 quires other conditions than those to which the average 
 American citizen is accustomed. The beauty of all 
 bells is dependent upon their quality or purity of tone 
 and their relative pitch. If these essentials have been 
 supplied, the effect of one bell will, in most cases, ful- 
 fil the object for which it was cast, viz., that of beauty
 
 90 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 and solemnity ; but if the tone be either shrill or im- 
 pure the effect is neither beautiful nor solemn. In 
 using the term pitch I have been careful to qualify it as 
 relative ; and this for the reason that as all harmony 
 is based on a system of relative tones, bells can form 
 no exception to the laws of harmonic construction. It 
 has been said that under certain conditions the effect 
 of a bell is beautiful and solemn, but even where these 
 conditions are present, that effect is largely dependent 
 upon its location. These then are the three essentials 
 to bell music, purity, pitch and location. 
 
 The importance of placing bells in as lofty a position 
 as may be attained is better understood when we re- 
 member that it is to them that towers of any height 
 owe their existence only as the home of the bell. Prior 
 to the use of large bells, towers were unknown save for 
 purposes of defence, but like the growth of harmony 
 with the organ, the growth of the tower with the bell 
 has been synchronous. The higher the tower the fur- 
 ther will be heard the voice which it contains, and its 
 tone be mellowed and softened in its immediate vi- 
 cinity. 
 
 Archaeologists have worried themselves mightily as 
 to the age of bells, but as the birth of the large bell is 
 of a comparatively recent date, the antiquity of the 
 baby bells, from which no doubt the big ones have 
 grown, is a matter of very little concern. They were 
 in use in Egypt ; the Jewish High-Priest used them on 
 his robe ; Egyptians, Jews, Greeks and Romans alike 
 employed them in their temple services, and among 
 the last-mentioned nation a secular use of the bell, 
 such as to call people to an auction sale or a distribu-
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 91 
 
 tion of provisions, was common ; but no matter whether 
 in the temple service or in the public mart, only hand 
 bells were in use, and the great bell of to-day had to 
 wait the processes of evolution. 
 
 The case of the average American bell violates 
 every one of the above-named conditions. They are 
 swung low, are small, and pitched without reference 
 one to another. It is cheaper to build low towers and 
 to have small bells, but cheapness was never the road 
 to the artistic. If, therefore, the bell be neither useful 
 nor artistic why should this perpetual jangle of an 
 hundred church bells grate on the quiet of the Sunday 
 morning noon and night. In Holland, Belgium, Italy 
 and France, where the artistic is always kept in view, 
 they have bells ; but such glorious bells ! Of these, 
 their dimension and number, I shall speak later. At 
 present the utility and history of the bell must engage 
 our attention. 
 
 This instrument of percussion, as has been before 
 intimated, has played a most important part in the 
 history of architecture, especially ecclesiastical archi- 
 tecture, and it would be difficult to consider the one 
 without a brief mention of the other. If the bell built 
 the tower, the tower cast the bell. The higher the 
 tower the further would the bell be heard, and as the 
 towers grew in height they grew proportionately mas- 
 sive, and the idea was not long in presenting itself of a 
 bell to suit the tower, as well as a tower to suit the bell, 
 for the ever increasing strength of the one warranted a 
 proportionate increase in the weight of the other. 
 
 " The introduction of bells is attributed to Paulinus, 
 Bishop of Nola, in Campania, about the year 400, but
 
 02 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 there is an epistle of that bishop still extant in which 
 he describes his church, but makes no mention of 
 either tower or bell, yet it is not a little remarkable 
 that the general name for bell was nolae or campanae, 
 and hence the word noil, as meaning the sound of a 
 single bell, and campanile, a bell tower. Sabianus, 
 who was pope in 604, ordered the bells to ring the 
 horcR canoniccB at the proper times during the day. 
 And Berendic, Abbot of Wearmouth, brought his bells 
 from Italy about the year 680. Bells were hung in 
 towers in the East in the ninth, and in Germany in the 
 eleventh century. Those that were in use before are 
 supposed to be hand bells ; several examples as old as 
 the sixth century are still preserved in some parts of 
 Europe and the United Kingdom. St. Patrick's bells, 
 St. Ninian's bell, St. Gall's bell and others are plates 
 of iron riveted together. St. Gall's bell, about 646, is 
 still shown in the monastery of the city called by his 
 name in Switzerland. In the thirteenth century, larger 
 bells were cast, but it was not until the end of the fif- 
 teenth century that they began to assume greater pro- 
 portions." 
 
 In the councils of Cologne it is said, " Let bells be 
 blessed, as the trumpets of the church militant, by 
 which the people are assembled to hear the word of 
 God ; the clergy to announce His mercy by day, and 
 His truth in their nocturnal vigils ; that by their sound 
 the faithful may be invited to prayers, and that the 
 spirit of devotion in them may be increased. The 
 Fathers have also maintained that the demons, af- 
 frighted by the sound of bells calling Christians to 
 prayer, would flee away, and when they fled, the per-
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 93 
 
 sons of the faithful would be secure ; that the destruc- 
 tions of lightnings, of whirlwinds would be averted, and 
 the spirits of the storm defeated." The far-reaching, 
 almost omnipresent sound of the bell impressed men 
 powerfully, and, after all, it was not so singular that 
 with their reverence for their bells there should have 
 grown up a superstition which overshadowed their 
 feelings of reverence. Even in early history, when 
 there existed none but bells of the smallest character, 
 the sense of safety and protection from evil through 
 their use is marked and general. As the Christian era 
 advanced, and bells grew both in size and dignity, their 
 offices were multiplied and their virtues augmented. 
 No matter of what material it was composed, the bell 
 was a sacred instrument, and its powers were invoked 
 on all occasions. The explanation is simpler than 
 may at first appear, for the bell was the one remedy 
 for the one evil, and that evil appearing in every con- 
 ceivable and inconceivable form, on the land and on 
 the sea, on the mountain and in the valley, at home or 
 abroad, in the air, nay, in the sanctuary itself, was the 
 spirit of darkness in the form of demons. When the 
 storm lashed the sea into a froth of fury, and the great 
 ships danced upon the billows and were hurled upon 
 the rocks, then was the demon power at its height, and 
 then it was that the rebuking and exorcising power of 
 the bell was called into play, and the demons after an 
 ineffectual resistance, fled from the scene of their dis- 
 comfiture. Thus in times of earthquake, eclipse of 
 the sun and moon, and other unusual phenomena, the 
 bell was a constant source of comfort and a sure de- 
 fence against the powers of darkness. But even here
 
 94 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the bell did not reach the maximum of its potency. 
 Having followed a man through all his career with its 
 benign influence, it exercised that influence in its most 
 signal capacity in the closing moments of his life. It 
 is in the hour of dissolution, when the body and mind 
 are alike enfeebled and benumbed, that the whole 
 power of the demon world is gathered and concen- 
 trated upon the effort to capture and destroy the de- 
 parting spirit. Then it was amid the agonies of disso- 
 lution that the bell was wont to be sounded, and the 
 poor soul was comforted and solaced in his warfare 
 with the demon host, and the devils trembled and fled 
 as the consecrated sound reached their ears, and the 
 spirit rested from its labors.* 
 
 The use of bells which called worshippers together is 
 supposed to be of Christian origin, but it is said that 
 the feast of Osiris in Egypt was announced by the 
 ringing of bells. In speaking of the image supposed 
 to have belonged to St. Patrick himself, Kingsley says, 
 " Where, too, hung till late years (it is now preserved 
 in Dublin) an ancient bell ; such a strange little oblong 
 bell such as the Irish saints carry with them to keep 
 off demons ; one of those magic bells which appear, so 
 far as I am aware, in no country save Ireland and 
 Scotland till we come to Tartary and the Buddhists ; 
 such a bell as came down from heaven to St. Senan ; 
 such a bell as St. Fursey sent flying through the air to 
 greet St. Cuandu at his devotions when he could not 
 come himself ; such a bell as another saint, wandering 
 
 * Putnam's " Dictionary of Dates " says, " Bells were used in 
 churches by order of Pope John IX., as a defence, by ringing them 
 against thunder and lightning, about 900."
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 95 
 
 in the woods, rang till a stag came out of the covert, 
 and carried it for him on his horns." 
 
 If bells have exercised so large an influence in the 
 cause of religion, they have also been the prelude of 
 some of the darkest and most sinister chapters in 
 modern history. As in the case of the " Holy Ghost " 
 bell in the tower at Strasbourg, only rung when two 
 fires are seen in the town at once ; or that other, the 
 " Recall " bell, only rung at the approach of storms ; or, 
 as in the time of Charles. VII., of France, to call in the 
 cattle at the approach of the English yeomanry ; or, as 
 when the Florentines, in answer to the threat of Charles 
 VIII. that if his demands were not acceded to he 
 would blow his trumpets, replied, "And we will ring 
 our bells ; " or as during the fair at Leyden, the bell of 
 St. Panchrist rang out on the night to tell the multi- 
 tude gathered there that the enemy was at the gates, 
 and that their only alternative was flight or famine in 
 the walls of the beleaguered city ; or as on that Easter 
 Monday, when at the ringing of the vesper bell all 
 Sicily rose as a man, and eight thousand French, 
 without distinction of age or sex, were massacred 
 by the enraged populace ; or as on that never-to-be- 
 forgotten night, when the bell of the Luxerrois rang 
 the funeral knell of from thirty to seventy thousand 
 Huguenots. 
 
 It is curious to read many of the bell inscriptions, 
 having in them a ring both of quaintness and simplic- 
 ity. For example, the bell in St. Paul's Cathedral has 
 this inscription: "Richard Phelps made me, 1716." 
 Another in the Westminster Abbey tower : " Remember 
 John Whitmell, Isabelle his wife, and William Rus,
 
 96 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 who first gave this bell, 1430. New cast July, 1599, 
 and in April, 1738. Richard Phelps, T. Lester, fecit." 
 The oldest bell, somewhat smaller, dates from 1583. 
 The next oldest is the second largest bell, date 1598. 
 It bears an inscription, " Timpanis patrem laudate so- 
 nantibus altum. Gabriel Goodman, decanus 1598." 
 Another bell : 
 
 " Thomas Lester, London, made me, 
 And with the rest I will agree, 
 Seventeen hundred and forty three." 
 
 One of the Ghent bells bears an inscription not un- 
 common in Flanders in the low countries : 
 
 " My name is Roland, 
 When I tole then it is foj a fire ; 
 When I chime, then there is stormy weather in Flanders." 
 
 Upon the famous Holy Ghost bell in Strasbourg 
 tower is dated, " 1375, 3 n onas Augusti," weighs about 
 eight tons, and, "O Rex gloriae Christe veni cum 
 pace." These inscriptions are all taken from Mr. 
 Harweis' book entitled, " Music and Morals." Two 
 more inscriptions I will give from two old English 
 bells, " Hac nova campana Margaretta est nominata ; " 
 and the other in the same place, " In mustis annis 
 resonet campana Johannis." On the subject of bell 
 music I prefer to quote again from Mr. Harweis : " To 
 Belgium belongs the honor of having first understood 
 and felt bells as musical tones, and devised that aerial 
 and colossal musical instrument known as the carillon. 
 " The rise of beii music in Belgium was sudden and 
 rapid. In the sixteenth century the use of several 
 bells in connection with the town-clocks was common
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 97 
 
 enough. Even little tunes were played at the quarters 
 and half hours. The addition of a second octave was 
 clearly only a matter of time. In the seventeenth 
 century carillons were found in all the principal towns of 
 Belgium, and between the seventeenth and eighteenth 
 centuries all the finest carillons now in use, including 
 those of Mechlin, Antwerpt Bruges, Ghent and Lou- 
 vain, were set up. There seems to have been no limit 
 to the number of bells, except the space and strength 
 of the building. Antwerpt Cathedral has sixty-five 
 bells ; St. Rombaud, Mechlin, forty-four bells ; Bruges, 
 forty bells and one Bourdon, or heavy bass bell; 
 Ghent, thirty-nine ; Tournay, forty ; St. Gertrude, at 
 Louvain, forty." 
 
 These colossal instruments, as they have been cor- 
 rectly termed, possess in a remarkable degree that 
 element of sympathy so powerful and effective as to be 
 universally acknowledged. The conductor wielding 
 his baton, or the organist at his instrument, influences 
 a greater number of people distributed through a larger 
 space than by any other ordinary musical agency ; but 
 with the carillon, the incidental essentials to such a 
 great hearing no longer exist. Outside the walls of 
 the cathedral or the concert hall the strains of music 
 reach us but faintly, and the more piano passages are 
 altogether lost ; but with the carillon the conditions 
 are reversed. Where we formerly required a roof and 
 walls, as it were, to draw the sound closer and retain it 
 in its entirety, with this great, free flood of bell music 
 we want heaven for our organ loft, and the whole earth 
 for the audience chamber. 
 
 Bells were, and are, in the Catholic Church conse- 
 7
 
 98 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 crated, the bishop performing the ceremony. He 
 made five crosses pronouncing these words : " Santi- 
 ficetur et consecretur domine, signum istud in nomine 
 patris et filii et spiritus sancti. In honorem sancti N. 
 pax tibi." 
 
 A singular and sinister usage of the bell existed in 
 former times, and I shall quote the passage alluding to 
 it without change or curtailment. The excommunica- 
 tion of bell, book and candle is a solemnity belonging 
 to the Church of Rome. The officiating minister pro- 
 nounces the formula of excommunication, consisting of 
 maledictions on the head of the person anathematized, 
 and closes the pronouncing of the sentence by shutting 
 the book from which it is read, taking a lighted candle 
 and casting it to the ground, and tolling the bell as for 
 the dead. This mode of excommunication appears to 
 have existed in the Western churches as early as the 
 eighth century. Its symbolism may be explained by 
 quoting two or three sentences from the conclusion of 
 the form of excommunication used in the Scottish 
 Church before the Reformation : " Cursed be they from 
 the crown of the head to the sole of the foot. Out be 
 they taken from the book of life. And as this candle 
 is cast from the sight of men, so be their souls cast 
 from the sight of God into the deepest pit of hell." 
 The Rubric adds, " And the candle being dashed on 
 the ground and quenched, let the bell be rung." So 
 also the sentence of excommunication against the mur- 
 derers of the Archbishop of Dublin in 1534: "And to 
 the terror and fear of said damnable persons in sign 
 and figure that they be accursed of God, and their 
 bodies committed into the hands of Satan, we have
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 99 
 
 rung these bells, erected this cross with the figure of 
 Christ, and as ye see this candle's light taken from the 
 cross and the light quenched, so be the cursed murder- 
 ers excluded from the light of heaven, the fellowship 
 of angels and all Christian people, and sent to the low 
 darkness of fiends and damned creatures, among whom 
 everlasting pains do endure." 
 
 It is very surprising to consider the vast resources 
 of a large chime of bells. As showing the proportion- 
 ate increase accruing from the acquisition of every bell, 
 we find a striking illustration of the influence of the in- 
 dividual upon the whole. A somewhat amusing, not to 
 say curious calculation has been made by John Stainer, 
 and without taking the trouble to verify his figures, I 
 submit them as they stand. " Change ringing, or cam- 
 panology, is frequently practised when there are more 
 than three bells, such changes being known by the 
 names of Bob Majors, Bob Triples, Norwich Court 
 Bobs, Grandsire Bob Triples and Caters. The number 
 of changes a set of bells may be known by in multiply- 
 ing the numbers of the set. Thus three bells may ring 
 six changes, 123, 132, 213, 231, 321, 312; four bells 
 will give twenty-four changes; five bells, 120 changes; 
 six bells, 720 changes; seven bells, 5040 changes; 
 eight bells, 40,320 changes ; nine bells, 362,880 
 changes ; ten bells, 3,628,800 changes ; eleven bells, 
 39,916,800 changes ; twelve bells, 479,001,600 changes. 
 To ring the changes that twelve bells are capable of 
 would take ninety-one years at two strokes per second, 
 while a peal of twenty-four bells can make so many 
 changes that it would occupy 117,000 billions of years 
 to ring them all."
 
 ioo Studies in Musical History. 
 
 It would be unfair to close this sketch without pre- 
 senting the reader with the size of some of the largest 
 bells, and to that end the following list is subjoined. 
 The great bell of St. Paul's weighs 8400 pounds^ 
 Great Tom, of Lincoln, 9894 pounds ; Great Tom, of 
 Oxford, 17000; St. Peter's, at Rome, 18,500; great bell 
 at Erfurth, 18,114; St. Ivan's bell, Moscow, 127,836; 
 bell of the Kremlin, 443,772. This last is the great 
 unsuspended bell, the wonder of travellers. 
 
 One other remarkable and exclusive feature the bell 
 possesses over every other musical instrument, and 
 that is the lasting effect which it has had upon the 
 human mind. Look through your library and see how 
 many poets have written at length of any instrument 
 but the bell. I refer to no other class of writers, be- 
 cause of all writers the poet is the truest interpreter of 
 emotion. Let other men write elaborate and didactic 
 treatises upon the organ, violin, or whatsoever other 
 instrument, the great out-welling of the human heart 
 breathes its " deep affection and recollection," as 
 Father Prout has it, continuing, 
 
 " For the bells of Shandon 
 That sound so grand on 
 The pleasant waters 
 Of the river Lee." 
 
 To Milton, to Wordsworth and Cowper was the ring- 
 ing of bells their happiness and their comfort. Ten- 
 nyson could hear in their voice the ring of the Christ 
 that is to be. Longfellow, by the ringing of the 
 chimes of Bruges, was carried back to his own child- 
 hood's home, and woke with the happy tears upon
 
 Use and Influence of Bells. 101 
 
 his cheek. But it was Poe who best understood the 
 moods of the bells, and he could pass from the syl- 
 van jingle of the sleigh bells over the frosted snow 
 to the voluptuous rise and fall of the golden wed- 
 ding bell, or starting with the startled ear of night, 
 portray the fierce alarum bell with all its attendant 
 terror and despair, full of the brazen clangor of 
 
 " The clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire, 
 In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire," 
 
 or passing from terror to horror, confront us with the 
 death tolling of the iron bell. 
 
 It is with a painful sense of its incompleteness that 
 I bring this paper to a close ; but it, in company with 
 its fellows, does not pretend to exhaust any of the sub- 
 jects of which they treat. As elsewhere stated, the 
 object of these chapters is not to elaborate but to 
 condense, and by that condensation to present in a 
 concrete form the active principles and causes which 
 underlie musical history. Thus when I say of this 
 chapter that it is most incomplete, it may be considered 
 an admission for them all. But if prominent land- 
 marks have been brought more clearly into view, then 
 all that was intended has been accomplished. It will 
 be seen by the preceding pages that the bell, no matter 
 from what point of view we regard it, is a source of 
 endless interest. Especially to the antiquarian does 
 the study of bell history commend itself. There is not 
 nor ever was any other instrument about which clus- 
 tered so much of dogma, superstition, tradition and 
 custom. At all these things I can only hint, but if 
 any one better gifted for such a task should undertake
 
 IO2 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 an elaborate and philosophic discussion of bell history 
 I feel safe in saying that the dead past will yield up 
 much that is now hidden, and that not only the anti- 
 quarian but the historian will find himself in posses- 
 sion of new and undreamed of links in the chain of 
 human actions. 
 
 It has been objected, and perhaps with justice, that the man- 
 ner in which the usages of bells have been treated presents no 
 reflection of the spiritual meaning, and that adherence to the out- 
 ward act and an intimation of an exclusively superstitious motive 
 is all that has been presented. These are matters of doctrine, 
 and as such become rather the province of the theologian, and 
 their omission implies neither ignorance of their existence nor a 
 wilful act having for its end their omission. Let it therefore be 
 borne in mind that the bell and its usages was the exclusive 
 object of this paper, and that while there is no attempt to ignore 
 any spiritual significance, the presentation of such a subject in 
 this place would be irrelevant and out of place.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 COLOR AND THOUGHT IN MUSIC. 
 
 THERE are many ways of saying the same thing, but 
 there is only one best way of saying it. To know how 
 best to express one's thought is a rare gift; but to 
 know when to express it is a gift which confers perhaps 
 even greater advantages upon its possessor. In ordi- 
 nary life we call this tact, but in a larger sphere it is 
 recognized as diplomacy. But while the gift of know- 
 ing when to speak is rarest and greatest, it is altogether 
 dependent upon knowing how to speak. The right 
 speaking at the right time is what, in a more modified 
 sense in art, is called coloring. It is this peculiarity 
 of coloring which distinguishes one painter from 
 another, one author from another, one composer from 
 another, and goes to make up the whole life of orches- 
 tration. Intellectually speaking, as every man must be 
 regarded as a type of some class of his fellow-men (and 
 the range is by no means limitless), and as we refer 
 every shade of color to one of the seven prismatic 
 colors, so by the law of derivation and material arrange- 
 ment the sound of any musical instrument is its own 
 best classification. 
 
 This word color, like so many others, is one which 
 may be used in two different senses, either that of a 
 cause or that of an effect. Thus, when we speak of 
 103
 
 IO4 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 orchestral coloring it is not the cause to which we refer 
 but the effect ; it is not the tone of the instrument, but 
 the sensation induced by the sound. Color is often 
 the result of association, as in the Luther chorals in- 
 troduced by Meyerbeer into his opera of " Les Hugue- 
 nots." In spite of all Meyerbeer's irreverent cobbling 
 of " Ein feste Berg," this opera derives most of its 
 finest dramatic effects from the introduction of this 
 choral, which tinges the whole play with the sense of 
 the impending massacre. It is strangely powerful, 
 this coloring, marching men on to the battle-field to 
 the sound of the drum and fife, up to the breast-works 
 where death stands waiting them. There is great 
 power in association, awakened by hearing a national 
 melody or a national instrument in a foreign land ; 
 something grand and solemn, connected with a tune 
 which by consent of a great nation has been elected to 
 be its expression of enthusiasm and patriotism. How 
 many memories rise up at the sound of old melodies 
 that used to lead the boys to battle twenty years ago. 
 
 A Scotchman once said to me that he would rather 
 hear the bagpipes than any other instrument. I 
 thought it bad, not to say execrable, taste. On me it 
 produced only the effect of sensation, but on him that 
 of beloved association. In the hearing of music, sen- 
 sation and association are so blended as to render it 
 impossible to make any minute analysis. Association 
 remains where memory has ceased to record. We are 
 charmed with a melody ; it frequently happens that the 
 charm lies in hearing again that which we no longer 
 remember. The memory of it has faded, but the asso- 
 ciation remains. As our lives are colored by motives
 
 Color and Thought in Music. 105 
 
 which we cannot ourselves fathom, so is all musical 
 sound colored by some old theme which memory fails 
 to recall. The term, descriptive music, implies a com- 
 position so highly colored, either by instrumentation, 
 chord formations, rhythms, or perhaps all of these, as 
 to really reflect the thought of the composer. In the 
 days of Shakespeare, the management used to put a 
 rock on the stage to represent the sea-shore, and a sign 
 to convey the idea of an inn ; but the sea-shore and 
 the tavern were but symbolized, and the audience had 
 to depend on the text for every source of enjoyment. 
 
 The melody of the Hundredth Psalm, written long 
 before the time of Luther, was a love ditty. The 
 queen of Henry II. sang her favorite psalm, " Rebuke 
 me not in thine indignation," to a fashionable jig, and 
 Anthony, King of Navarre, sang " Stand up, O Lord, to 
 revenge my quarrel " to the air of a dance of Poitou. 
 Now we have on the stage the exact representation of 
 a beach or an inn, and the skin of a horse is no longer 
 used to symbolize that animal. 
 
 To-day we have noble chorales to sing in the house 
 of worship, we have love-songs which convey but the 
 one meaning they are intended to convey, and what- 
 ever may be the mood of a man, be sure he can find 
 somewhere the song which was one day written by 
 another man in the same frame of mind. Men want 
 exact thinkers now-a-days in music as in philosophy. 
 We don't want love-songs tacked on to psalm-tunes, 
 nor sacred texts found in the company of Moody and 
 Sankey. Just in this place I want to express my re- 
 spect for all kinds of music. As in every human pas- 
 sion there are many degrees of intensity, in a corre-
 
 io6 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 spending degree we find every grade expressed in the 
 modern song, from the lofty height of self-abnegation 
 and devotion of Schumann and Franz down to the 
 most slipshod twaddle of the American ballad. These 
 represent planes of sentiment, and as such are to be 
 respected as genuine. The true poet will ever make 
 himself understood. The very simplest material 
 through judicious handling produces the most beautiful 
 and lasting result. For instance, take Rubenstein's 
 song, the " Asra." Its elements are the simplest, yet 
 it would be difficult in the whole range of modern Lied 
 to find any song possessing a higher dramatic coloring. 
 But the most astonishing economy of material is found 
 in J. S. Bach's fifteen two-part inventions for the 
 piano-forte. The color of an idea -cannot be clearly 
 ascertained until every change on it has been rung. 
 
 The most transcendent genius must fail inevitably, 
 unless tutored into economy of ideas and material. 
 He who has too many ideas is almost as poor as he 
 who has none. The Latin proverb which bids us fear 
 the man of one book enunciates the importance of 
 following a thought through all its developments. 
 When Draper wrote on the " Force of an Idea," he 
 showed how monotheistic belief had given color to the 
 whole Jewish thought, and through it to all modern 
 history. This definiteness of purpose is that which 
 gives to every work of value its merit. It is the com- 
 plete whole that is required, and not a collection of 
 graceful fragments. Strength and symmetry are the 
 great ends to be sought in any work, great or small. 
 To sum up, these three things are required : the right 
 thing in the right place, to know what is most befitting
 
 Color and Thought in Music. 107 
 
 the particular occasion, and how best to render it. 
 Next to the composer of music the executive musician 
 stands in point of merit. One of these latter may have 
 it in his power to vitiate the taste of a whole commu- 
 nity. This kind of people conceal the emptiness of 
 their skulls by living on the cheap ideas of others. 
 The true musician requires a conscience, and an active 
 one at that. The applause elicited from the ignorant 
 can only flatter the vulgarian. It may be objected, 
 and with good cause, that I have used the word color 
 as synonymous with every factor in the laboratory of 
 music. 
 
 Indeed I am not disposed to quarrel with such 
 a charge, but as I have considered color from a sub- 
 jective, rather than an objective point, I believe 
 that my vein is a somewhat broader one than that gen- 
 erally taken ; and in order that there may be no ob- 
 scurity in the meaning of this paper, I will restate my 
 definition of color. It is sensation, whether that sen- 
 sation be caused by rhythm, instrumentation, key, 
 modulation, chord-formation, economy, affluence of 
 material, tempo or shading; all alike produce sensa- 
 tion. The distinction is between color and ideas. 
 The most perfect command of technique could not 
 create an idea. With all the rhythm, all the counter- 
 point, all the instrumentation, all the technique in the 
 world, you could not make a composer. And so I feel 
 justified in saying that all which goes to make music 
 is not music, but the material of music. Color is ma- 
 terial, music is thought.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE MODERN SONG. 
 
 WE estimate the present by contrasting it with the 
 past. In no department of art is the spirit of the age 
 so apparent as in that of music, and in none of its sub- 
 divisions is it stronger than in the Lied. 
 
 In fixing our attention exclusively upon the most 
 exalted type of the German Lied, the first reflection 
 is its characteristics : its differences and similarities 
 differences from, and similarities to, its predeces- 
 sors ; and second, the diversities of conditions and 
 number of individuals by which its proper rendition is 
 imperilled. The average success of a composition is 
 rarely in proportion to its actual merit. 
 
 Ill-balanced or untrained judgment often regards a 
 production as with a microscope, magnifying into pro 
 portions which, by comparison, dwarf into insignifi- 
 cance compositions exhibiting real genius and possess- 
 ing great merit. While the voice of the people must al- 
 ways pronounce the verdict, it is not to be trusted when 
 pronouncing upon an innovation. The mass must be 
 led, and the inaugurator of every upward step, espe- 
 cially in art, must always depend on the few for sup- 
 port and even existence. Such was the case of Franz, 
 when at an advanced age he found himself confronted 
 with poverty, and was only saved from absolute pen- 
 
 108
 
 The Modern Song. 109 
 
 ury by the benefit concerts organized and directed by 
 Liszt, aided by the first talent of the age. 
 
 So the evolutionized song has to struggle for its 
 place, biding its time, but knowing that it is sure to 
 come at last. It is to the bravery of the musicians 
 who bring such compositions before an unsympathetic 
 public quite as much as to their own merit that their 
 eventual success is due, and it is to these men and 
 women, who (for conscience' sake and devotion to the 
 most perfect embodiment of thought) dare to encoun- 
 ter public prejudice and endeavor to elevate its taste, 
 that the gratitude of every composer and executant 
 should be ungrudgingly tendered. 
 
 In another paper I have discussed the importance 
 and influence of art culture upon the public, and 
 shall not enter into that here ; but wherever it is en- 
 countered, this pandering to an uneducated taste and 
 encouragement of wilful ignorance, cannot be too 
 strongly condemned. If the admiration of a few ig- 
 norant people can outweigh a clear conscience and 
 a sense of duty performed by the musicians, then, 
 " Verily, they have their reward." 
 
 Our subject (that is, song) naturally subdivides it- 
 self into material and executive elements. The first 
 involves the dudes and requisites of the singer and the 
 accompanist ; the second, the consideration of the 
 Lied proper and its text. It is then under these four 
 heads that the Lied presents itself, and it is to their 
 consideration, separately and collectively, that we now 
 proceed. We have all read, talked and perhaps 
 thought a good deal about the underlying meaning of 
 the poet, but the question is, did we ever get at it,
 
 no Studies in Musical History. 
 
 and if so, were we able to convey it to others ? Bee- 
 thoven somewhere said, " There are poets of tone as 
 well as poets of words.'' 1 It is of these tone poets and 
 their meaning that I speak. 
 
 Voice. We have all reason to thank the Lord that so 
 few men and women are able to sing ; or, whether they 
 can or not, that so few do sing. While a good voice 
 is the most beautiful thing in the world, it is one of 
 the very rarest, and, moreover, requires so many ac- 
 cessories of mind and training that it is, after all, a 
 questionable blessing. There are indispensable quali- 
 fications, such as accurate memory, vivid imagination, 
 and most of all that which makes every great acton 
 poet, painter and author the conception of a part. 
 While these are the result of training, they cannot be 
 taught. To one who has not an accurate memory no 
 degree of excellence is possible in any department of 
 art ; but more especially does this apply in the matter 
 of singing, for if the memory has not conquered 
 every minor detail of pronunciation and inflection, the 
 attention will be continually diverted from the purpose 
 of the song to be expended upon the minutiae which 
 should have been mastered once for all. 
 
 The other quality upon which I have laid particular 
 stress is the imagination. What we call feeling in 
 singing or playing is the result of the reproduction in 
 the mind of the performer of the subject, as it pre- 
 sented itself to the composer. In other words, if you 
 would express another man's thought you must put 
 yourself in his place. If a song has a meaning which 
 you cannot grasp, then it were better that you should 
 let it alone altogether. Most people sing all songs
 
 The Modern Song. Ill 
 
 alike, and if they were actors they would play all plays 
 alike, and to them all literature reads alike. So much 
 is to be gotten over, and whether they be words or 
 tones, grave or flippant, it matters little so it is done. 
 The composer can, at the best, merely outline his 
 meaning, and it is the privilege as well as the duty 
 of the singer to seek for it until he has the original 
 conception. A correct conception indicates not only 
 analytical study, but intuition. 
 
 As has been said, these intuitive endowments must 
 be supplemented by every physical means, the chief 
 of which is deep, systematic and noiseless breathing. 
 To sing well, one must be natural, but the very effort 
 to be natural creates a constraint. " Be virtuous and 
 you will be happy " ; be natural and you will sing with 
 ease ; but it is frequently as difficult to be natural as 
 it is to be virtuous, and while both maxims embody 
 sound advice, they make it not one whit easier to be 
 natural or virtuous. " A hint to the wise is sufficient." 
 You must be on the lookout for such hints. First, 
 judge the words by the music and then the music by 
 the words. In this way you may the better get at the 
 real thought of the composer. If you have a song to 
 sing do not you sing it ; try and let the composer 
 speak through you. Be content that you are found 
 worthy to be his mouth-piece. Do not let a spirit of 
 egotistical impertinence lead you into adding embel- 
 lishments or making omissions. Always be sure of 
 this, if the composer knew no more of music than you 
 he was very ignorant. If so, then he can teach you 
 nothing ; and if not, then any alteration of yours can 
 only mar the composition. Do not bellow. All the
 
 112 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 world is full of lunatics who think to be better liked 
 for their loud noise. Mezzo forte is the rule, and 
 pianissimo and forte impart the life-giving variety so 
 indispensable to every composition, great and small. 
 
 " That art of singing that abides with the bel canto 
 and is unable to sing Bach, Beethoven and Schumann 
 has not attained to the height of their period. It 
 becomes its task to adapt itself to these new circum- 
 stances, to renounce the comfortable solfeggios, and 
 acquire the poetic expression that they accept." The 
 greatest difficulty attending voice-culture is the impos- 
 sibility of conveying any immediate knowledge of (if 
 I may be allowed the expression) throat-technique. 
 At the piano the teacher can place the fingers in posi- 
 tion, but with the voice the master can only give the 
 quality of tone to be imitated, and so far from being 
 able to manipulate the muscles of the throat with his 
 own fingers, cannot make himself understood by the 
 pupil when he speaks of them. The pupil in his en- 
 deavor to imitate can only grope after the meaning, 
 and when he has found it will realize that it is quite as 
 much the result of his own search as of the example 
 and instruction of the teacher. It will always be so 
 in singing ; you will never get that which you do not 
 yourself find. Instruction is indispensable, but the 
 only road to success in song is that of the earnest 
 seeker. 
 
 One of the most serious blemishes to which singers 
 of English are liable is mispronunciation. If words 
 are to be linked with music, they should be an object 
 of quite as much care as the music. It is difficult to 
 illustrate on paper this most common of these errors.
 
 The Modern Song. 113 
 
 It is safe to say that nine-tenths of the people who pro- 
 nounce correctly in conversation would never do so 
 in singing. The reason is this : words are short tones ; 
 the predominant sound of every word is a vowel ; the 
 lengthening of a word is to make it become a percepti- 
 ble tone. The general conversational tone is so short 
 as to make it impossible to detect much that is impure 
 in the pronunciation of vowels ; but the moment that 
 we begin to lengthen them we become aware that the 
 sounds are not pure, or that they become impure. 
 This is particularly noticeable with the vowel i. Let 
 any one sustain such words as light, bright, and the i 
 will soon become an e ; or such words as clear, fire, 
 the sound of e and i is soon lost in the vowel sound at 
 the end of the word, and instead of e and i we have 
 the sound er. Correct vowel singing is in fact the 
 rarest exception ; and if any one questions this state- 
 ment, let him test it by the examples given, and he will 
 in every case find himself slipping off the pure vowel 
 sound. Whole books of such examples could be writ- 
 ten, but common sense and a correct ear can pick them 
 out wherever they appear. 
 
 I shall have occasion elsewhere to speak of dead 
 songs, but here I wish to speak of dead voices. When 
 a voice becomes harsh or false through age or bad 
 habits, then it cannot be considered a living voice. 
 Do not wait for other people to tell you, but put it 
 away (with tears, perhaps) as a mother who realizes 
 that her baby is dead. If it was the most beautiful 
 thing you had, then let its memory remain beautiful 
 with all who knew it. There is no more pathetic spec- 
 tacle than that of a singer who does not know that he 
 8
 
 114 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 has lost his voice. 1 was once at a large theatre ; the 
 singer had been great, but when he came on the stage 
 that night his voice broke, and for the first time he 
 realized that it was not what it had been. It was all 
 in vain that the people called him back. He only 
 said : " Ce n'esf plus moi, ce ri'est plus moi." 
 
 The Accompanist. The difficulty attending the ren- 
 dition of the modern song does not lie in the voice 
 alone ; quite as important, and much more difficult, is 
 the part of accompanist, and this presents a third 
 obstacle, for besides the difficulty of finding two per- 
 sons who can attain to the inner meaning, it does not 
 always happen that a correct conception will be the 
 same, for the rendition of a song widely differing in 
 important details may yet leave the same impression. 
 If sympathy between a singer and the audience is in- 
 dispensable to success, it is easy to realize the para- 
 mount importance of perfect accord between singer 
 and player. What the orchestra is to the chorus, 
 the piano is to the singer. It is this sympathy be- 
 tween musicians, not in the daily affairs of life, but in 
 the one point which characterizes them as musicians, 
 which raises music into a transcendental sphere where 
 soul lies bare to soul, and for a time individuality be- 
 comes merged into unity. When this end has been 
 reached, the true purpose of art is fulfilled, and all 
 personality is lost sight of in the nirvana of absorption. 
 
 But to return to the accompanist. To accompany 
 well requires not only talent but long experience. A 
 good accompanist is quite as rare as a good singer. 
 The art of accompanying is second to no branch of 
 music. To be a competent accompanist not only ne-
 
 The Modern Song. 115 
 
 cessitates executive ability, but a knowledge of theory. 
 It is difficult to think of intelligent playing which does 
 not understand the laws under which it acts. Another 1 
 reason why the knowledge of the theory of music is in- 
 dispensable to the accompanist proceeds from the fact 
 that he must be prepared to cover any errors com- 
 mitted by the singer, and to supply any omissions, 
 without violating the rules of harmony. He must be 
 continually on his guard against surprise from the 
 freak, carelessness, or incapacity of the singer. He 
 must be ready to lead or follow, as the occasion de- 
 mands, and must furnish a full support for the voice, 
 and yet never become too prominent, but always bear 
 in mind that he only furnishes the frame and back- 
 ground for the picture. 
 
 Accompanying is a thankless task, for while the suc- 
 cess of the singer is to a large extent dependent on his 
 support, the singer always receives the credit. The 
 duties of the accompanist are so many, and his qualifi- 
 cations so varied, as to make any more minute consid- 
 eration'of them impracticable in this space. In brief, 
 it is his business to make manifest the powerful under- 
 current of feeling which is the most marked and dis- 
 tinctive feature of the modern song. One suggestion 
 more presents itself. The accompanist should always 
 remember that no matter how insignificant or unobtru- 
 sive his part, the adherence to its letter and spirit is 
 quite as much incumbent upon him as upon the singer. 
 
 The Lied. It is only in our own century that the 
 song has been elevated to its present high position. 
 Haydn, Handel, Mozart, Gluck and their contempora- 
 ries wrote a vast number of songs, but they had
 
 1 1 6 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 neither the breadth nor intensity characterizing the 
 modern Lied. In consequence, the modern German 
 song demands more concentration and forgetfulness 
 of self than it has ever claimed before. If rightly fol- 
 lowed, the study of song is a highly intellectual pur- 
 suit. As it treats of nothing but the loftiest emotions 
 it demands close mental analysis and accurate inter- 
 pretation. 
 
 Respectfully, yet with badly disguised indifference, 
 we lay aside the Lieder, which so delighted the past 
 generation, for the deeper glow and greater complexity 
 of its modern saccessor. " It would demand the 
 nature of a grave-digger to give attention to the deca- 
 dence of the numerous art productions that for half a 
 century or more proved the delight and pride of a na- 
 tion. It were unmanly, on the other hand, to close 
 one's eyes to the fact that even art must have its ceme- 
 tery, and possesses elements that, like all earthly 
 things, are liable to decay, and that it were but a false 
 reverence ever to exhibit anew the faded robes of state 
 of a past age as the most precious adornment of the 
 present." (From the Tone World.) 
 
 In an immense amount of operatic display mechani- 
 cal dexterity is the only requisite to success ; but in 
 the sensitive and highly organized modern song, the 
 spiritual so far predominates over the material that its 
 rendition is more the result of psychical than of phys- 
 ical accuracy. The inner meaning is too sacred to lie 
 on the surface to be toyed with by the mob, but like 
 the precious gem it represents, lies hidden, awaiting a 
 discoverer. The songs of Robert Schumann, Robert 
 Franz, Franz Schubert and their school, exhibit the
 
 The Modern Song. 117 
 
 most wonderful condensation of thought ever embodied 
 in so limited a space. " The Lied always represents a 
 power in directing the emotions, for its province lies in 
 seeking out intimate relations between the voice and 
 the instrument." 
 
 Text. " If we are to have words to music, let us sub. 
 ordinate the thought to the emotion. The best words 
 to music are those which contain the fewest number of 
 thoughts and the greatest number of emotions. Such 
 are the shorter poems of Goethe, of Heine, of Byron ; 
 and, as a consequence, it is notorious that Beethoven, 
 Schubert, Mendelssohn and Schumann between them 
 have, with pardonable avidity, set to music almost all 
 those precious lyrics. The character of the text pretty 
 surely indicates the quality of the music. In the union 
 of song and poetry, insipid verses beget insipid music, 
 just as men and women enter the marriage state by 
 reason of their similarity of disposition. It is on the 
 excellence of every part that the whole depends. The 
 musician cannot write music to words which do not 
 touch a sympathetic chord in his own nature. It is by 
 the law of sympathy that the doctrine of natural affinity 
 is demonstrated ; and the indifference of American 
 ballad writers as to the quality of the verses they set is 
 the clearest indication of a low standard of musical 
 taste and training. 
 
 " It cannot be too deeply deplored that the effect of 
 many of our most beautiful German songs is marred, 
 if not destroyed, by a defective translation. It may be 
 too literal or not literal enough, or it may be, and fre- 
 quently is, nothing more than doggerel. This is not 
 always due to the incapacity of the translator, for if the
 
 Ii8 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 idioms of our language make it difficult to translate its 
 prose with exactness, how much more does this apply 
 in the case of beautiful poetry ? The essence is most 
 frequently just that quality which alone cannot be 
 translated ; and while there is much to censure in the 
 translated texts, it must always be remembered that 
 the work is one presenting peculiar difficulties. This 
 may serve to explain the incongruity between the text 
 and many of the most perfect compositions. 
 
 The analogy between music and poetry as showing 
 degrees of excellence becomes manifest when we com- 
 pare such men as Schubert, Schumann and Franz, 
 with Kiichen, Gumbert and Sullivan, or such poets as 
 Tennyson and Swinburne as compared to Rosetti and 
 Oscar Wilde. He who selects his text at random 'will 
 write random music. 
 
 In concluding so interesting a study as the modern 
 German Lied, I beg to state that it has been written in 
 no spirit of pedantry, but only with the wish to show 
 its aim and relative position. If this has been accom- 
 plished it then becomes an important matter of justice 
 to acknowledge the indebtedness of every musician, 
 great or small, to the great outwelling of song from 
 the heart of the people to the folk-lieder. If we are 
 charmed by the spontaneity of Franz, bewildered by 
 the complexity of Schumann, or thrilled by the dra- 
 matic power of Schubert ; if amid the labyrinth of in- 
 terlacing harmonies, we are mastered by this fervid 
 glow and feel in them the expression of thought for 
 which language has no equivalent and the heart no 
 interpreter ; if, coming out of these unutterable pro- 
 fundities we pause and ask whence come they, what
 
 The Modern Song. 119 
 
 is their source, and listening for answer we hear these 
 words spoken by the seer, by Schumann himself : 
 " Apply yourself most attentively to all popular songs. 
 They are a mine of most charming melodies and afford 
 an insight into the character of nations." 
 
 NOTE. The words " popular melodies," with Schumann did 
 not mean the song of to-day or yesterday, dying out almost in the 
 hour of its birth, but the abiding folk-lieder of which America 
 possesses so few, and most of them, as in the case of " Yankee 
 Doodle " and the tune " America," imported. 
 
 " Not from the grand 1 old masters, 
 Not from the bards sublime, 
 Whose distant footsteps echo 
 Through the corridors of time. 
 
 For like strains of martial music, 
 
 Their mighty thoughts suggest 
 Life's endless toil and endeavor 
 
 And to-night I long for rest 
 
 Read from some humbler poet 
 Whose songs gushed from his heart, 
 
 As showers from the clouds of summer, 
 Or tears from the eyelids start ; 
 
 Such songs have power to quiet 
 
 The restless pulse of care, 
 And come like the benediction 
 
 That follows after prayer." 
 
 " First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in 
 the ear." The order of every growth is from the 
 simple to the complex ; from the germ life to the fully 
 organized existence. If ever it seems to proceed by 
 leaps it is because the attention of the observer was
 
 I2O Studies in Musical History. 
 
 not keen enough to follow the imperceptible grada- 
 tions through which it expanded. The history of music 
 furnishes just such an example, and the modern Ger- 
 man song, with all its gorgeous wealth of tropical 
 foliage, flower and fruit, can show a lineal and honor- 
 able descent from melodies of the people which, in 
 their untutored simplicity, bring with them the resinous 
 odors of the pine forest, the scent of decaying leaves, 
 the rustle of wings among the branches, and the far-off 
 croon of the deep-thicketed brook. Nature can ac- 
 complish much, but art can do more ; but nature and 
 art together have joined hands in the making of the 
 modern song, and in its limitless range of thought, 
 depth of sentiment, power and exactness of expression 
 it is at once a model of symmetry and strength.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 TEACHERS AND TAUGHT. 
 
 " You have no idea, by the way, how much dirty 
 work there is, to do anything at all, in music." " I 
 suppose you mean to get at anything? But it can- 
 not be worse than what people go through to get 
 to heaven." Charles Auchester. Mr. Haweis, in 
 his little book entitled, " My Musical Memories," 
 gives utterance to a sentiment, which, notwithstanding 
 the fact that it is so generally entertained by most 
 music-teachers and their pupils, I have never found 
 in print elsewhere. " All personal relations (and 
 teaching relations are intensely personal) have to do 
 with subtle conditions unexplored, but inexorable, 
 and instantly perceived." For some reasons the po- 
 sition of teachers of music is, as far as it goes, a trust 
 which involves no slight responsibility. Although 
 rather incongruous, the most pertinent analogy which 
 offers itself is that of the dentist. In both cases, you 
 place yourself, or your family, in the hands of a person 
 who, if he be not both honest and competent, will 
 receive your money without giving the equivalent. 
 In a common education most parents are able to form 
 a pretty fair estimate of the amount and quality of 
 the work their children are doing, and in a manner, 
 every one is able to form a correct estimate of the kind
 
 122 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 of labor to which he himself has been accustomed. 
 But set the dentist to judge of the music-teacher by 
 his standard of dentistry, or the music-teacher to 
 judge the dentist's work by his standard of teaching, 
 and you will attain just about as correct an estimate 
 of their respective merits as is usually reached by the 
 majority of parents until some period when the work 
 that has been done will adjudicate upon itself. Not 
 that I would imply that parents recognize this fact ; 
 quite the contrary. The greater number not only 
 consider themselves critics of music, but authorities on 
 this subject, and are kind enough to advise the teacher 
 as to his mode of instruction. This is not the result 
 of egotism, but of ignorance. The Rev. Dr. Savage 
 said, " It is not at all necessary that a man should 
 ever have preached in order to be abundantly qualified 
 to tell a minister what he ought to be and to do, to sat- 
 isfy a thousand contradictory tastes and opinions. His 
 point might be further illustrated by noticing the wis- 
 dom of unmarried people in the matter of training 
 children. Having received a good deal of advice on 
 this subject from unprejudiced old bachelors and old 
 maids, I have learned thoroughly to appreciate its 
 worth." It is very common to hear persons say : 
 " I can detect the slightest error in music," while, in 
 fact, the grossest violation of every musical principle 
 would be entirely unobserved by them. It is a prev- 
 alent impression that every'one who can play music, 
 can teach it. There can be no greater error. The 
 science of music may be divided and classified under 
 three heads composition, execution and teaching. 
 All these, as in the case of Liszt, may be combined
 
 Teachers and Taught. 123 
 
 in one individual, but such a union is by no means 
 common. When we come to consider the amount of 
 study involved in the grasp of any of these three 
 divisions, the marvel is that one brain should ever 
 be found to grasp all in one lifetime. Let us see 
 what is required to constitute a good teacher, and 
 by this I mean only for the piano-forte. 
 
 Harmony. Above all he must be a student of the 
 science of harmony, if not of the loftier branches of 
 counterpoint and fugue. It inspires in a pupil addi- 
 tional respect, and while enabling the teacher to give 
 theoretical instruction, at the same time renders him 
 capable of detecting any errors in a composition, and 
 explaining satisfactorily the laws and rules which 
 make music, not as it was three centuries ago, a col- 
 lection of hypotheses, but a demonstrated art, founded 
 on fundamental laws of acoustics. Without some 
 knowledge of the theory of music it is impossible for 
 the teacher to make a correct application of the loud 
 pedals, and this, for piano-playing, is a matter of the 
 utmost importance. A knowledge of harmony also 
 enables its possessor to select with judgment, and to 
 discriminate the good from the bad, and to state 
 wherein one composition is superior to another, and 
 to choose, not at random or from caprice, but with a 
 due regard to the requirements of the pupil, and 
 always with the view of moulding and maturing his 
 taste. Upon this fact too much stress cannot be laid, 
 and the only means of acquiring such judgment is to 
 be found in the knowledge of the underlying principles 
 of music itself. 
 
 Form, There are many other things which a
 
 124 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 teacher ought to know. He should, at least, be suffi- 
 ciently familiar with musical forms to be able to show 
 his pupils why a sonata is a sonata by reason of its 
 formation, and why a fugue is a fugue by reason of 
 its construction. The pupil should be taught that 
 these are not names arbitrarily applied to pieces, bu. 
 that they really indicate a peculiar form pertaining to 
 each composition thus designated. It should be un- 
 derstood that the symphony is but an enlarged form 
 of the sonata, just as the sonata is an enlarged form of 
 the sonatina, or the fugue of the fugetta. The subject 
 of musical form alone is a large one, and to be clearly 
 comprehended requires no little thought. These two 
 requisites in the music-teacher are of course only ap- 
 plicable to advanced pupils, but I have laid particular 
 stress on them, as their importance, if not their exist- 
 ence, is unknown to many. 
 
 Accent. Without punctuation, written or oral lan- 
 guage loses half its meaning. What punctuation is to 
 language, accent or phrasing, as it is more commonly 
 called, is to music. As there is no sentence without 
 punctuation, so there is no music without accent. 
 As there are many kinds of time in music, so are there 
 many kinds of accent. These are always divided into 
 two the primary and the secondary. A correct ac- 
 cent cannot be too early impressed upon the pupil, as 
 it is the very soul of rhythm itself. There is nothing 
 which so clearly illustrates this as poetry. Read the 
 most beautiful poem without accent, and the effect of 
 the rhythm is altogether lost. To make understood 
 a correct system of phrasing, should be part of the 
 earliest work of every teacher,
 
 Teachers and Taught. 125 
 
 Fingering. I prefer foreign fingering, not that it is in 
 itself of any particular value, but for the reason that, 
 as all classic music is written with it, and as a vast 
 amount of music is not written with American finger- 
 ing, I think it best to use that which is most universal 
 This department should be studied with the greatest 
 care, for without a correct technique no composition 
 of any difficulty can be rendered. 
 
 Time. All these things are so essential that the 
 great difficulty is to say which is most important ; but 
 the inculcation of an inexorably strict time must stand 
 among the first of the essentials. And just here I 
 want to score a point. There are few teachers who 
 dwell enough on the distinction between time and 
 tempo. Time indicates the number of beats in a bar ; 
 tempo, the degree of rapidity with which it shall be 
 played. Time may be two-quarter, four-quarter, three- 
 eighth, six-eighth, nine-eighth, twelve-eighth and a score 
 more ; while tempo is classified and divided under five 
 great heads adagio, largo, andante, allegro and presto. 
 If strict time cannot be obtained otherwise, it can be 
 arrived at by the use of the metronome. If a correct 
 tempo is required, most compositions of any value are 
 metronomized, and by the use of that instrument the 
 exact tempo of the composer can be reached. 
 
 Touch. A good teacher is known by the touch of 
 his pupils. A correct touch can only be acquired by 
 long practice, and a correct position of the whole arm 
 and hand. The touch should be both strong and elas- 
 tic, so that the softest passage could be executed as 
 smoothly as the very loudest. There are other requi- 
 sites to the make-up of a good teacher, but so much
 
 126 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 has been said about those which were more important 
 that, for fear of becoming prolix, the catalogue will end 
 here. But it must be remembered that we cannot cat- 
 alogue the more subtle endowments which constitute 
 the chain between teacher and taught, and stimulate to 
 reciprocal ambition the pupil for the teacher, and the 
 teacher for the pupil. Now, while I claim that all 
 these things are needful to an honest and competent 
 teacher of the piano, I must also admit that there is no 
 available test by which many parents could prove them 
 to their satisfaction. What litmus paper is to acids 
 a diploma would be to the music-teacher. Indeed, if 
 both teacher and pupil could be submitted to a 
 thorough chemical analysis, the result would in all 
 cases, if not gratifying, be productive of good by pre- 
 venting disappointment and failure. Let us imagine 
 such a quantitative analysis. Pupils subjected to a 
 chemical test of character. Result : Dislike of study, 
 125 ; love of cat-worrying, 75 ; dislike of restraint, 200 ; 
 love of riding horse-back, 198 ; dislike of music-teacher, 
 500 ; love of circus, 500 ; total 1598. Quantitative anal- 
 ysis of teacher : Dislike to work, 600 ; dislike to pupils, 
 25; bad temper, 217; indifference, 411; total, 1253. 
 This is what might be mildly termed incompatibility of 
 temperament. Supposing the analysis to be correct in 
 the case of either party the result must be fatal to both ; 
 for in either case the pupil will not improve, and the 
 teacher must lose caste from having a pupil who reflects 
 no credit upon him. For all parties concerned, there- 
 fore, it is best that the character of the pupil, as well 
 as that of the teacher, be studied before letting him 
 begin. There is still a third and most important
 
 Teachers and Taught. 127 
 
 agent to be considered in this connection. This is the 
 parent. What the teacher does in his hour it remains 
 for the parent to supplement during his absence. Un- 
 less this is done, it were as well never to let children 
 begin. Music presents peculiar difficulties to the 
 child, in that it differs from every other study by offer- 
 ing no daily competition with fellow-students in the 
 presence of the whole class. It is a laborious and 
 solitary line of stud}', and to this I believe that the 
 failure of thousands must be largely attributed. The 
 child who knows that if he misses his lesson he will re- 
 ceive a public reprimand, will in most instances study 
 without being forced ; but in the study of music, if the 
 home supervision be not systematic, the music had 
 best be abandoned as soon as possible. More failures 
 arise from indifference of parents than from the incom- 
 petence of the teacher. This difference between teach- 
 ing singly and in a body may explain another problem 
 to which such frequent allusion is made. It is common 
 to hear, "It costs as much for me to give my children 
 music-lessons as to pay all the rest of their schooling 
 put together." Very true ; but do not forget that the 
 time expended in teaching one music-pupil would have 
 been sufficient to have taught two classes of forty each, 
 in some other study. The training of a child in music 
 is like unto marriage " An estate not to be lightly en- 
 tered into." It is commenced in uncertainty ; it must 
 involve years of diligent study and great expense. 
 
 Do not let it be supposed that I have overestimated 
 the importance of a competent instructor ; for under 
 an inferior one, children contract habits which it some- 
 times requires years to eradicate. In this connection
 
 128 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the Stuttgart piano-school says : " The foundation can 
 hardly be too thoroughly laid. If the elementary in- 
 struction lacks thoroughness in a technical, musical, 
 and especially rhythmical point of view, the result will 
 be that afterward difficulties will be met at almost 
 every step, and more time will be lost by stopping over 
 details than would have been needed at first for a 
 more thorough course of preparation." Another error 
 into which most parents fall, is that of supposing that 
 any piano is good enough for a beginner. A child can 
 contract bad habits of hearing more quickly than it can 
 those of fingering. It does not follow that the instru- 
 ment used must be a new one, but it should be kept in 
 good condition both as regards tune and action. If 
 the piano is not in tune the child's ear will be vitiated ; 
 and if it has not a goad action, it will altogether pre- 
 vent a correct touch. It is poor economy, that which 
 is penny wise and pound foolish. Better spend no 
 money at all than to throw it away on incompetent 
 teachers and worthless pianos. If your child is a 
 good one, it should be looked after twice a week ; if 
 your piano is a good one, it deserves to be looked 
 after once every three months, at least. In the study 
 of music there can be no little mistakes. Any trivial 
 omission in the beginning grows with the widening 
 of the musical perception until it assumes propor- 
 tions which infallibly mar, if not destroy, the 
 beauty of every performance. The teacher must not 
 only have good habits of rendition himself, but he 
 must be on his guard against the ever new and vicious 
 habits which crop out in almost every individual pupil. 
 Many, I know, will think this whole subject has re-
 
 Teachers and Taught. 129 
 
 ceived undue consideration, but I beg to submit that, 
 as ninety-five out of every hundred children grow up to 
 be musical failures, there must be an ascertainable 
 cause, and whether that cause lies with the parent, the 
 teacher, or the child, cannot be discovered. Without 
 co-operation of all three, failure is almost sure. Don't 
 expect children with talent to learn without competent 
 instruction and constant home supervision, and don't 
 expect children without talent to learn under any cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 Since writing the above, I have been advised by one 
 far more competent to judge in such matters than my- 
 self, and it is in compliance with his advice, that I add 
 this P. S.: 
 
 First, I refer to the development of a musical taste 
 by the judicious selection of music by the teacher. 
 This has been touched upon, but not with emphasis ; 
 nor does space permit giving it the prominence which 
 it deserves. To be able so to select is to have knowl- 
 edge of the greater part of the field of piano music, 
 and to be able to adapt one's self to the peculiar wants 
 of each individual pupil. Without this knowledge 
 and capacity, music in the hands of a teacher will 
 rather deprave than elevate ; must injure rather than 
 benefit. 
 
 Another point is this : If you believe your teacher 
 competent, do not expect his lesson to bear early fruit. 
 This green, half-ripened result is just as apt to produce 
 mental cholera infantum as any other green fruit will 
 cause the more common malady. There are, of course, 
 children of exceptional talent whose progress is phe- 
 nomenal ; but with the average, commencing between 
 9
 
 130 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the years of eight and twelve, it is safe to say that they 
 will not be able to take what is commonly denominated 
 a piece that is, to read it for two years, or at least 
 eighteen months. No one can call himself a musician 
 who cannot read music with the same ease that he 
 reads books. If it takes years to acquire the ability to 
 read books, why should it be thought strange that it 
 should take as long, if not longer, to acquire the read- 
 ing of music, which is much more complicated. No 
 child should be allowed to memorize a composition 
 until it can read it at sight. The learning of good 
 music is like the learning of good grammar, and we ac- 
 quire more of both by hearing them than in any other 
 way. If you have money to give in charity, remember 
 that there are more worthy objects than you can ever 
 minister to. A music-teacher, as a music-teacher, is 
 never an object of charity. Music had best be learned 
 altogether or not at all. Better to have no teacher 
 than an incompetent one.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 FOLK LORE. 
 
 Vox populi, vox Dei. Whether that be or not, it is 
 well worth listening to. These stories of the people are 
 of priceless value, growing with generations and pass- 
 ing from land to land, leaving their trace on the man- 
 ners and customs of every nationality. In considering 
 these traditional bequests it behooves us to remember 
 that the subject lies behind us. The old press of John 
 of Gutenberg was the first alarm that sounded the 
 death-knell of tradition. Yes, the tradition song and 
 story are being congealed into print, and this oral 
 education may be said to have passed away... All the 
 stories of ghosts and goblins, saints and devils, that 
 our forefathers told, were as real to them as steam 
 and electricity are to us now. And while we know 
 that much they said was erroneous, we also know that 
 it was told^for truth, and their honesty has left an ele- 
 ment of reality, lacking in the modern lore. There is 
 pure gold in this Folk Lore, if we would only search 
 long enough to find it. There is also a great deal of 
 jubbish. It is to the in-lying truth what the casket 
 is to the jewel or the husk to the nut. There are ele- 
 ments in this people's life of the past which on the 
 modern stage can never be reproduced. Chief of
 
 132 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 these is credulity. Next, simplicity, and a lack of any 
 circumlocution. As I have said before, these were 
 truths to them, and the unvarnished sincerity of the style 
 was the best guarantee of the honesty of their narra- 
 tors. Beware of the man whose thought is so great 
 that it takes him an hour to give it full expression. 
 Ten chances to one he is piling up verbiage and string- 
 ing together platitudes, which make up the rubbish of 
 two thirds of the sermons and lectures delivered. It 
 is the gift of truth to be in itself sufficient adornment. 
 Quantity never compensates for quality. It is in this 
 confidence of the narrator, and the child-like directness 
 with which he approaches his subject, wherein lies his 
 success. His thought, complete and vivid, is trans- 
 ferred to your mind and heart. Ours are days of 
 commentaries and text-books. The scepticism which 
 encounters us at every turn is a barrier to any grave 
 assertion which does not bring with it all the creden- 
 tials requisite for defence, argument and proof. If an 
 assertion is made, look well to your armor, for the 
 enemy is at your gate. Sentimentally we may deplore 
 the disappearance of so much honest faith in such dis- 
 honest fable. Regarded as repositories of knowledge, 
 either direct or implied, their value is great. We stand 
 on the threshold of opening cycles, and no man can 
 say what the sequence will be. In the rush of hete- 
 rogeneity the simpler elements disappear before the 
 more complex, and the problem of the future is, How 
 much can we combine and yet comprehend ? The 
 road whereon we travel is one of which none may pre- 
 dict the end ; and it is only the rough hewing, the 
 hopeful groping in the dark, the eager reaching forward
 
 Folk Lore. 133 
 
 to to-morrow, and the final lying down to give room 
 and place to another, that leads us on, on. 
 
 If the question be asked, What is folk lore ? the diffi- 
 culty of a direct answer is obvious, for, what is it not ? 
 If we say it is tradition, we have only half stated the 
 case, for much of our own history is drawn from these 
 sources. If by a paradox we attempt to cover the 
 ground by saying pre-historic history, all the horizon 
 becomes clouded with a chaos of gods and demigods, 
 men and titans, and again we feel that our answer is 
 but half complete. To apprehend the true dignity of 
 folk lore we must realize that it is contemporary with, 
 and antecedent to, all history. Not a phenomenal 
 outburst of popular superstition of to-day or yesterday, 
 but a continuous and unbroken chain of invention and 
 belief, always finding a soil adapted to its perpetua- 
 tion. At our end of history the scribe stands with 
 dripping pen, ready to record the latest event. At 
 the other end, where authentic history begins, each 
 nation brings with it the story of an origin more mirac- 
 ulous than the other. Our historian at this end does 
 not always speak truth, nor does the spokesman at the 
 other end always speak false. The popularity of every 
 historian is largely dependent upon the concessions 
 which he makes to popular prejudice and popular be- 
 lief. The grains of truth contained in the early nar- 
 ratives are sufficient alone to preserve them from 
 oblivion. 
 
 So long as picture-writing was the only mode of 
 recording thought, both the record and its vocabulary 
 must have been limited ; but with the birth of the 
 alphabet, sounds, not symbols, came to be represented,
 
 134 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 and thought became literature, diffusing knowledge and 
 formulating beliefs. The alphabet did not originate 
 Folk Lore, but did serve to preserve many of its orig- 
 inal outlines and more prominent features. Reach- 
 ing beyond the confines of literature, folk lore discussed 
 (satisfactorily to its generation at least) religion, geog- 
 raphy and astronomy. These last were, however, 
 merely the outcome of the first, for the religion which 
 created the gods demanded a geography and an as- 
 tronomy which should locate their place of habitation. 
 " Comparative theology, which depends on the law of 
 continuous variations of human thought, and is in- 
 deed one of its expressions, universally proves that 
 the moment man adopts the idea of an existence 
 of invisible beings, he recognizes the necessity of 
 places for their residence ; all nations assigning them 
 habitations beyond the boundaries of the earth. I 
 have not space to tell of the wonders which served to 
 decorate the geography of those times. On the north 
 (that is of Greece) there was the delicious country of 
 the Hyperboreans, beyond the reach of winter ; in the 
 west the garden of the Hesperides, in which were the 
 apples of gold ; in the east the groves and dancing- 
 ground of the sun ; in the south, the country of the 
 blameless Ethiopians, whither the gods were wont to 
 resort. There was no river, no grotto that had not 
 its genius ; no island, no promontory without its 
 legend." 
 
 Without any intention of discussing ancient my- 
 thology as such, it nevertheless becomes necessary to 
 touch upon it as one, if not the chief and most produc- 
 tive source of what we denominate Folk Lore. No
 
 Folk Lore. 135 
 
 conception has undergone so great a change as that 
 which the human race has entertained of God. In the 
 Greek and Roman conception of deity, dignity does 
 not form a leading, or even an essential component. 
 But as Christianity grew more and more, the tricks and 
 buffooneries of Olympus were transferred by the peo- 
 ple to Satan and to his imps : and in the mediaeval 
 passion-plays his character is not so widely separated 
 from the more frolicsome vagaries of the thunderer as 
 would at first be imagined. The whole of the early 
 Greek mythology is saturated with anthropomorphism. 
 There is but one marked difference between gods and 
 men ; the one were immortal, the other, mortal. The 
 gods paid the penalty for any offences which they com- 
 mitted, but they could not die. They were swayed by 
 human passions, and were made up of all human ca- 
 price and human frailty. One great difference there 
 was between nearly all ancient and modern beliefs ; that 
 was, the lack of any being corresponding to the devil, 
 whose whole life was altogether given over to wicked- 
 ness. There were not lacking evil and depraved 
 spirits, but their power was not commensurate with 
 their wickedness. 
 
 It is in Greece that the birth and growth of myth is 
 most clearly to be traced, and it is to Greece that we 
 look as the type of such growths in other lands. Long 
 prior to Grecian mythology, China, Egypt and India 
 had doubtless passed through similar stages, and this 
 process has been repeated with greater or less varia- 
 tions wherever polytheism has prevailed. In every age 
 of the world's history, "and at every period of human 
 life, a love of the marvellous has been a predominating
 
 136 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 feature. Man is of such a nature that his curiosity 
 must be gratified in one way or another ; and it matters 
 little whether that gratification be the result of demon- 
 strated laws, or the rank fruit of the most unbridled 
 imagination. "What great ones do, the less will 
 prattle of." So every nation prattled of his maker or 
 makers, of whose nature they could by no possibility 
 have knowledge. If it was natural for men to create 
 a pantheon, it was also natural that its inmates should 
 resemble its creators. Belief in that pantheon has 
 never been extinguished, only its location has been 
 altered. All that vast system of demonology which 
 grew with the growth of Christianity, found in jthe old 
 Pagan polytheism material enough to stock Chris- 
 tendom with a full supply of devils for two thousand 
 years. 
 
 Old Rome languished and died of her loathsome 
 vices, and her power was but a shadow of the past. 
 Over Europe there settled a pall of ignorance and su- 
 perstition, and through the darkness of that night of 
 the Middle Ages all things were shadowy, and every 
 imagination was warped by the uncertainty of its sur- 
 roundings. The great highways by which alone Rome 
 could preserve her military supremacy, fell into decay, 
 and commerce and travel became the exception instead 
 of the rule. In the mental stagnation which followed, 
 it cannot be a matter of wonder that the imagination 
 should people its surroundings with existence both 
 grotesque and horrible. Belief in witches and witch- 
 craft was as honest, and as generally entertained, as 
 the belief in Christianity itself. Another strong feat- 
 ure of popular credulity was their belief in apparitions
 
 Folk Lore. 137 
 
 of the dead. These two beliefs alone were sufficiently 
 gloomy to terrorize every community in which they were 
 held ; but here the category did not stop, and men 
 trembled and drew close about the fire at night as 
 they heard the Wild Huntsman rush by at the head cf 
 his terrible pack of dogs, and amid the howling fury of 
 the winter blast. Every man believed in a personal 
 devil, and his agency was recognized in every calami- 
 tous event. Satan was the chief of the great host of 
 demons before alluded to, always ready to do his bid- 
 ding, and, like their master, always seeking whom they 
 might devour. But the Church, which was the first 
 to recognize the omnipresence of the Old Harry, was 
 not to be outdone by him, and from every monastery 
 and convent, from the deserts of Arabia, and from all 
 the lonely places of the earth, there poured forth the 
 vast concourse of saints, of whose bones it might be 
 said that, like wine, they improved with age. And so 
 the war went on between the principle of good and 
 evil ; the imps of darkness undoing the work of the 
 saints as soon as their respected backs were turned. 
 Down in the mines, the leathern-eared dwarfs were 
 busy in the preparation of explosives which ever and 
 anon crashed down on the mortals who invaded their 
 domain, leaving nothing but their charred corpses to 
 tell the tale. On the coast of Gaul there were mid- 
 night knockings at the doors of the fishermen's huts, and 
 they, rising, came forth to find their boats freighted, 
 deep in the water, with the souls of the dead, and en- 
 tering in, steered them across the channel where the 
 unknown world was located. In some parts of Europe 
 it was the custom to fasten the dead into their graves
 
 138 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 by driving skewers through their bodies, and thus pre- 
 vent their re-appearance. But the full measure of 
 degradation was not reached until when Adrian VI. 
 published his famous bull against witchcraft and 
 sorcery. Lecky says in the ninth century a total eclipse 
 of the sun struck terror through Europe, and is said to 
 have been one of the causes of the death of a French 
 king. In the tenth century a similar phenomenon put 
 to flight an entire army. More than once the appari- 
 tion of a comet filled Europe with an almost madden- 
 ing terror, and whenever a noted person was struck 
 down by sudden illness, the death was attributed to 
 sorcery. Thus, toward the end of the sixth century 
 a son of Fredegonda died after a short illness, and 
 numbers of women were put to the most prolonged and 
 excruciating torment, and at last burned, or broken on 
 the wheel, for having caused, by incantation, the death 
 of the prince. In Germany, the " Codex de mathe- 
 maticus et maleficus " long continued in force, as did 
 the old Salic law on the same subject, in France. 
 Charlemagne enacted new and very stringent laws 
 condemning sorcerers to death, and great numbers 
 seem to have perished in his reign. Hail and thunder- 
 storms were almost universally attributed to their de- 
 vices, though one great ecclesiastic of the ninth century, 
 Agobard, archbishop of Lyons, had the rare merit of 
 opposing the popular belief. " Sprenger computes that 
 during the Christian epoch no less than nine millions 
 of persons, mostly women of the poorer classes, were 
 burned for witchcraft." 
 
 The air was dense with superstition to which the 
 monks added continually by their legends of the saints,
 
 Folk Lore. 139 
 
 and the miracles produced through their interposition. 
 These were, at least, a contrast to the demonology of 
 the age, and presented a brighter picture to terrorized 
 humanity. There was, as there has been from time 
 immemorial, the belief in fairies ; and to these nursery 
 tales men listened with a credulity scarcely surpassed 
 by the four-year-old of to-day. " Once upon a time." 
 "And they lived happily ever after." Those two 
 clauses, the one at the beginning, the other at the end 
 of our nursery joys, doubtless imparted greater pleas- 
 ure a thousand years ago than they do to-day. Fort- 
 une-telling was a very serious matter, more often to 
 the teller than to the told, for any dealing in the 
 black art was a road which generally found its terminus 
 at the stake. There-was a pot of gold at the end of 
 the rainbow, and there was any amount of buried 
 treasure, if only one could find it. It would be pleas- 
 ing to linger over these playful imaginings, but where 
 so large a subject is to be considered, it becomes 
 a matter of necessity to economize space. 
 
 An intrinsically valuable department of the Folk 
 Lore, because of its epigrammatic embodiment of truth, 
 are all those pithy sentences and couplets which, from 
 their general acceptation and constant use by the com- 
 mon people through all the world, have come to be 
 known as proverbs. I say intrinsic, because while le- 
 gend and myth are of incalculable value to the philol- 
 ogist, furnishing clews and links which in the family of 
 languages must otherwise be lacking, they do not in 
 themselves embody any self-evident truth as do the 
 proverbs, and can, at best, rank no higher than clever 
 fables. The proverb appeals to our common sense, but
 
 140 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the narrative to the imagination. In Folk Lore we 
 might almost say that the one is remembered by reason 
 of its truth, and the other by reason of its falsity. 
 Doubtless every story had its foundation, no matter 
 how slight, in, some actual occurrence, but under the 
 comparatively imposing superstructure which soon 
 arose, the foundation was lost sight of ; while the pro- 
 verb, admitting of no such superstructure, remained, 
 and always will remain, the common-sense exponent of 
 every-day life. That a saying, or narration, has be- 
 come Folk Lore by becoming common property, by no 
 means implies a common origin. It is to Bishop 
 Trench's work on proverbs that I am indebted for the 
 following examples. I instance a few which speak with 
 such clearness as to be their own best commentary. 
 "He who waits for dead men's shoes may go bare- 
 foot." A yet more lugubrious one says, " Every door 
 may be shut but death's door;" Another, back as far 
 as the fourth century, says, " One must not look a gift- 
 horse in the mouth." Another of equal antiquity says, 
 " Liars should have good memories." From the Span- 
 ish we have the following sanguinary proverb : " Kill, 
 and thou shalt be killed, and they shall kill him who 
 kills thee." A companion to this is to be found in the 
 Italian, which says, " Revenge of a hundred years old 
 hath still its sucking-teeth." The English proverb, 
 " Gray hairs are death's blossoms," seems to find a 
 fitting sequel in that of the Turk, " Death is a black 
 camel which kneels at every man's gate ; " and this 
 may possibly be yet farther extended to that from the 
 Arabic, "There are no fans in hell." A somewhat 
 consoling proverb comes to us from the Chinese, to
 
 Polk Lore. 141 
 
 any who may wish to appropriate it: "Towers are 
 measured by their shadows, and great men by their 
 calumniators." Say the Italians, " Silence was never 
 written down, and there is no worse robber than a bad 
 book ; " and also, " He has need of a long spoon who 
 eats with the devil." I will give but one more, which 
 is from the Arabic, and combining both wisdom and 
 poetry : " Every day in thy life is a leaf in thy his- 
 tory." In glaring contrast to all this cut-and-dried 
 wisdom I now present some witty frivolities which have 
 certainly a right to be classed as folk lore. 
 
 This is what is known as " cant " in England, liter- 
 ally meaning "thieves' dialect," but in this country 
 comprehended under the head of " slang." While the 
 English mind has been very prolific in this kind of 
 coinage, it has been sadly lacking in the wit which im- 
 parts to the slang of other lands vivacity and humor ; 
 and it is for this reason that I omit any quotations 
 from the English. The French slang for prison is 
 " College " or " Abbays de Sots," the college or fool's 
 abbey. The gibbet is " Veuve," the widow. To suf- 
 fer capital punishment, " Epouser la Veuve," to marry 
 the widow. To eat, "Jouer des Dominos," to play 
 dominoes. And the sea is, " La grande Tasse," the 
 large cup. Rain, "Bouillon de Chien," dog soup. 
 The moon is "Moncharge" or "Cafarde," female spy. 
 An Englishman, " God dem." In the Gypsy cant a 
 priest is " Schwarzbarbar," black dyer. In the dialect 
 of Germania a highway robber is picturesquely called 
 "Ermitano de Camino," the hermit of the road. A 
 man hanged is spoken of as " Racimo," a bunch of 
 grapes. Wit and wisdom are not always characteristic
 
 142 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 of Folk Lore. All languages abound in sayings and 
 couplets which preserve themselves rather by their 
 jingle than by the embodiment of truth. Many of 
 these were born, and live, and will continue to live, 
 for the benefit of the little people. So we may be said 
 to have a lore corresponding in its babbling to the 
 ears it is intended to tickle. 
 
 The following, taken from the celebrated work en- 
 titled, " Notes and Queries," will serve to illustrate : 
 
 "On Candlemass Day jf the sun shines clear, 
 The shepherd would rather see his wife on the bier." 
 
 Says another : 
 
 " As far as the sun shines in on Candlemass Day 
 So far will the snow blow in before old May." 
 
 There is an old monastic proverb on the same 
 theme : 
 
 " Si sol lucescat Maria purificante 
 Majus frigus erit post quam erat ante." 
 
 "If the sun shines on Mary's purification 
 There will be greater cold after than before." 
 
 And yet another : 
 
 " When Candlemass Day is come and gone, 
 The snow won't lay on a hot stone." 
 
 Antiquaries may be able to find beauty in the fol- 
 lowing lines, but I confess myself incapable of so much 
 enthusiasm : 
 
 " Shroving, shroving, I am come to shroving : 
 A piece of bread, a piece of cheese, 
 A piece of your fat bacon,
 
 Folk Lore. 143 
 
 Doughnuts and pan-cakes 
 
 All of your own making. 
 
 Shroving, shroving, I am come to shroving." 
 
 A somewhat different version of Marjory Daw is 
 found in Cornwall, the Pixies alluded to being a spe- 
 cies of fairy abounding thereabout : 
 
 " See-saw, Marjory Daw 
 Sold her bed and lay upon straw ; 
 Sold her straw and lay upon hay, 
 Pixies came and carried her away." 
 
 But two of these amiable little people are known by 
 name, and they are thus alluded to : 
 
 *' Jack o' the Lantern ! Joan the Wad 1 
 Who tickled the maid and made her mad, 
 Light me home, the weather's bad." 
 
 One more, and I shall have done with these exhaust- 
 ing productions : 
 
 " White bird, featherless, 
 Flew from Paradise, 
 Pitched on the castle wall ; 
 Poor Lord Landless 
 Came in a fine dress, 
 And rode away horseless." 
 
 By reason of the curious conceit I am led to add yet 
 one more : 
 
 " A row of white horses 
 Sat on a red hill. 
 Now they go, now they go, 
 Now they stand still." 
 
 This is the picture, for the babies, of white teeth on 
 red gums.
 
 144 St tidies in Musical History. 
 
 Leaving behind all these fragmentary embodiments 
 of thought of the people, we must again turn our atten- 
 tion to the vast repository of Folk Lore proper, com- 
 prised under the head of Myth and Legend. In a 
 sketch of this kind, the merest outlines of the subject 
 only may be given. The material and variety are so 
 abundant as to make the task of a comprehensive, and 
 yet condensed presentation a difficult one. Through 
 all the vast field of history, directly or indirectly, we 
 can trace the powerful influence of myth and legend. 
 The savage mind, not content with personifying the 
 powers of good and the powers of evil as individu- 
 als, sub-created an innumerable host which have held 
 their place through all time, and, to a large extent, 
 continue to do so. If our own language is so rich in 
 names for this unseen world, we may readily believe 
 that in this respect it is only the counterpart of others. 
 That Paganism should be Christianized was not 
 enough, but as has been said before, we have Chris- 
 tianized their myths also. The demons, dryads, har- 
 pies, wizards and sirens have only changed names, and 
 been baptized over in the popular belief, and modern- 
 ized, and remodelled into fairies, gnomes, goblins, 
 elves, pixies, and a thousand others, not to speak of 
 an innumerable company who possess only a local 
 reputation. Saturated with the spirit of modern criti- 
 cism, we cannot enter into the world where our fath- 
 ers liVed. We can no more be magnetized by its 
 mysteries than we are to be frightened by its terrors. 
 Intelligence and incredulity have marched side by 
 side through the whole history of the human race ; 
 and these stones, which still receive credence among
 
 Folk Lore. 145 
 
 the vulgar to an unrealized extent, will continue to be 
 preserved as long as ignorance predominates. The 
 imagination which peopled earth, air and ocean with 
 existences, some favorable, some inimical to the inter- 
 ests of man, is now directed to tracing the origin and 
 development of such fantasies. The most striking 
 illustration of the decline of the belief in Mythology 
 and Demonology is to be found in the almost phenom- 
 enal disappearance of any belief in witchcraft. The 
 good old custom of burning a woman because some 
 one else's cow broke her leg, or a child was sick, or 
 the sheep had the rot, or the butter wouldn't come, 
 has quite passed out of existence, and the high-cock- 
 olorum and the broomstick are become a part of the 
 past ; but the myths remain, and while we cannot rev- 
 erence them as oracles, we can at least pay them the 
 respect due to antiquity, and it is with a reverent 
 rather than a curious disposition that I approach their 
 discussion. 
 
 I am the more encouraged in this spirit by the fol- 
 lowing passage from the little book called " The Ori- 
 gin of Myth." Mr. Clodd says, " In this " (that is, Folk 
 Lore) " lies Primitive Philosophy, Theology and Sci- 
 ence, the beginnings of all knowledge that has been 
 and that ever will be." A belief, whetherfounded on a 
 demonstrable basis, or existing merely as a hypothesis, 
 is the cause of all action. All religion has for its foun- 
 dation the belief in its founder or founders. Religion 
 and superstition have been sadly mixed up in men's 
 minds, and it is not strange that they should have 
 been often mistaken, the one for the other, thus giving 
 to superstition as great an authority for good or ill as 
 10
 
 146 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 possessed by religion. It would be idle to discuss so 
 self-evident a fact, as the paramount influence of re- 
 ligion over the race is indisputable ; but as all religion, 
 to a large extent, is founded on narrative, it is to these 
 narratives that we must look as the power tiehind the 
 throne. Call these myths if you choose, but remember 
 that they are the sum of the factors that made you 
 what you are. As factors in making history they are 
 quite as important as the greatest historical events, 
 and let it never be forgotten that the faith in a false 
 creed has quite as much longevity and power of exe- 
 cution as that possessed by a true faith. 
 
 If the object of this paper was to become the thor- 
 ough exponent of any one of the branches under which 
 Folk Lore naturally divides itself, the length of that 
 one subject alone would fill a volume, possibly many. 
 If, in what has preceded, passages have been cited to 
 exemplify certain forms of Folk Lore, it was either on 
 account of their epigrammatic or fragmentary nature. 
 Of the myths and legends it is only permitted to me 
 to speak, not to illustrate. The highest guarantee of 
 the value of such data is to be found in the opinion of 
 the men from whom I shall now quote. From the lit- 
 tle book just cited, " The Origin of Myth," Mr. Clodd 
 says : " The application of the scientific method to 
 the study of man has given a wider meaning to the 
 word ' myth ' than that commonly found in the dic- 
 tionary. These explain it as a fable, as designedly 
 fictitious, whether for amusement only, or to point a 
 moral. The larger meaning which it holds to-day in- 
 cludes much more than this ; to wit, the whole area of 
 intellectual products which lie beyond the historic
 
 Folk Lore. 147 
 
 horizon and overlap it, effacing, on nearer view, the 
 lines of separation." In another place he says: 
 "One thing is certain, that language was once the 
 scene of an immense personification," and has thereby 
 added vitality to myth. Says Keary : " The world is 
 all before them where to choose. Nature, in her mul- 
 titudinous works and ever changing shows, is at hand 
 to give breath to the faculty of myth-making, and lay 
 the foundation for all the stories which have ever been 
 told." Mr. Gould in his " Curious Myths of the Middle 
 Ages," thus epitomizes a number of legends, and I can 
 do no better than to quote him at length. " John the 
 Divine slept at Ephesus, untouched by corruption, with 
 the ground heaving over his breast as he breathed, 
 waiting the summons to come forth and witness against 
 anti-Christ. The Seven Sleepers reposed in a cave, 
 and centuries glided by like a watch in the night. 
 The Monk of Hildesheim doubting how with God a 
 thousand years could be as yesterday, listened to the 
 melody of a bird in the green wood during three min- 
 utes, and found that in three minutes three hundred 
 years had flown. Joseph of Arimathea, in the blessed 
 city of Sarras, draws perpetual life from the Saint 
 Grail. Merlin sleeps and sighs in an old tree, spell- 
 bound of Vivian. Charlemagne and Barbarossa wait, 
 crowned and armed, in the heart of the mountain, till 
 the time come for the release of the Fatherland from 
 despotism. And on the other hand, the curse of a 
 deathless life has passed on the Wild Huntsman be- 
 cause he desired to chase the red deer forever more ; 
 on the captain of the phantom ship becaused he vowed 
 he would double the Cape whether God willed it or
 
 148 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 not ; on the Man in the Moon because he gathered 
 sticks during the Sabbath rest ; on the dancers of Kol- 
 beck because they desired to spend eternity in their 
 mad gambols." These are only examples of the ma- 
 terial of which myths are made, and must be classed, 
 as does Mr. Gould, as rather curious than valuable. 
 
 The real value of a myth depends on its antiquity 
 and general diffusion. To the groping of the primeval 
 mind the deifying of nature was a step which it re- 
 quired no highly colored imagination to take. The 
 next step was as inevitable as the first had been nat- 
 ural. The gentle rain descended, and beneath its 
 warming, softening influence the ground parted as. by 
 magic, and the sweet, warm moisture drew from the 
 fertile earth the fruits and cereals without which all 
 intellectual life must soon pass away. Out of the 
 same sky burst the tempest, wind, hail, thunder and 
 lightning, and all that the kindly rain had done was in 
 a moment obliterated. The sun shone down, and un- 
 der his genial rays animal and vegetable life alike 
 rejoiced ; but the sun departed to be succeeded by 
 gloom and darkness. Was it possible that the terror 
 inspired by such phenomenon on the one hand, and 
 the joy by that on the other, could be the emanations 
 of one and the same being ? No, the semi-barbaric 
 mind rejected the proposition with scorn, and thus was 
 taken the second and inevitable step, and from wor- 
 shipping nature as a whole, men turned to personifying 
 her in accordance with her different attributes. In 
 this connection Keary says : " We may expect to find 
 myths relating especially to the labors of the sun, like 
 those of Heracles and Thor ; or to the wind, like that
 
 Folk Lore. 149 
 
 of Hermes stealing the cattle of Apollo ; or to the 
 earth sleeping in the embrace of winter, or sorrowing 
 for the loss of her greenery, or joyful again in her 
 recovered life." Can we wonder that about the sun- 
 god there gathered more and more a halo of loving 
 tradition ? Can we wonder that men shrank with ter- 
 ror and abhorrence from his foes who seemed momen- 
 tarily threatening him and the whole human race with 
 destruction, and the universe with chaos? Abhor it 
 as we may, can we wonder that to the terrified belief 
 of the conscience-stricken savage even human sacrifice 
 seemed not too great a propitiatory offering to avert 
 from the race such a calamity ? Thus there came into 
 being a priesthood and a ritual, and the masses looked 
 to them for strength and aid when all else failed. 
 This was a power greater than that of the monarch, 
 and these were the beliefs by which men shaped their 
 lives. A power within a power is a dangerous institu- 
 tion, and when they clashed, then came the making of 
 history. And the priest said, as he has in later days 
 also : " Give to me the power over man's conscience, 
 and it is but a question of time and opportunity and I 
 will own him, body and soul." And now, behold ! the 
 vague groping of man after the unknowable has for- 
 mulated itself into the written law of millions ; alike 
 the support of despotism, and the consolation of the 
 dying beggar. 
 
 These are generalities, but the student of history will 
 no more question them than he will question the mag- 
 nitude of their influence. There is something very 
 impressive in thus contemplating the history of history. 
 This standing, as it were, with the primeval page
 
 150 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 dimly outlined before us. What a subject for the stu- 
 dent of paleontology. Link after link slowly brought 
 to light, and gradually evolving the chain of cause and 
 effect, and carrying us, by a pathway hitherto un- 
 dreamed of, back to the beginning of human history. 
 History indeed repeats itself, but the repetitions take 
 place in ever widening circles. And what makes up 
 the substance of these ever recurring cycles? Most 
 truly many things , but I believe that these may be 
 summed up under two heads : the warped and fallible 
 judgment of man, forever warring with his lofty striv- 
 ing after a greater good. Like most morals, that con- 
 tained in the history of Folk Lore is one which is so 
 obvious as to need no pointing. First, the egotism 
 which could assign a cause without a sufficient basis 
 for belief; second, the credulity which could accept 
 that cause as truth; and third, the fallibility of the 
 judgment which finally formulated that belief into a 
 dogma. Little did he dream, who gave the impetus to 
 the first stone of mythology, that it should roll and 
 roll, never pausing till it had gathered about it mate- 
 rial sufficient to rear the vast and imposing structure of 
 polytheistic belief. Standing at a later day, we can 
 better estimate the energy of the forces then set in 
 motion and better judge of their titanic workings. 
 Like the'volcanic fires which forever burn beneath our 
 feet, they have upheaved whole continents, and sub- 
 merged others. Standing amid the wrecks of dead 
 empires, of dead civilizations and of dead religions, we 
 must yet admit that the spirit which brought them into 
 existence has not died out, but, like the volcanic fires, 
 still smoulders beneath our feet, and the leaven bred
 
 Folk Lore. 151 
 
 of ignorance and superstition may yet burst forth in a 
 more lurid and more awful cataclysm than the world 
 has ever seen. The seed-time of one age makes the 
 harvest of the next. Unconsciously the woof of myth, 
 tradition and legend has been woven, and beneath the 
 unity of purpose in, and detail of, its far-reaching fibres 
 all humanity is enfolded, and the lore which points to a 
 common origin points alike to a common history and a 
 common destiny. To what is it that we listen ? Is it 
 the voice of a man ? Of a class ? Of a nation ? 
 Verily, no ; but the fathomless, boundless chant of the 
 myriads that have preceded us, and the myriads follow- 
 ing in their footsteps. Vox populi, vox Dei.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 
 
 THE COMMON AND COMMONPLACE. 
 
 EMERSON once" said, in substance, that the greatest 
 literary defect was a lapse into the commonplace. 
 In a recent address, Mr. Lowell said, in substance, we 
 cannot overrate our debt to those things which are 
 commonplace. Here is a discrepancy. But there 
 may be a good many paths to the top of the same 
 mountain, and two men may travel in opposite direc- 
 tions, and yet meet on the summit. When Emerson 
 condemned the commonplace, he did not condemn the 
 common. When Lowell commended the common- 
 place, I think he confused the idea of the common- 
 place with the common. Our ideas of the common 
 and the commonplace, so far a.s their likeness and dis- 
 similarity are concerned, are not as easy to express as 
 to appreciate, and by this I mean that no language 
 has ever been adequate to the task of formulating into 
 words, those subtleties of intuition, which we call 
 trains of thought. The common may be common- 
 place, and the commonplace may be common ; but 
 the qualities which distinguish each, will, in their very 
 fusion, disclaim affinity. What, then, is the difference 
 between common and commonplace ? The word 
 common is the most ill used in the English language. 
 'Common, in the general acceptation, denotes some- 
 
 152
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 153 
 
 thing unattractive, plain, as when we say a common 
 house, or a common man or woman. By this we 
 do not mean that the house, man, or woman are 
 property common to the public, or even that their 
 similarity to other houses, and other men and women, 
 makes them a type of a class. Either of these uses 
 would be correct; but in the manner in which it is 
 used we seem to have a whole staircase of commons, 
 reaching up from all kinds of meanings placed on the 
 word, to what I consider the loftiest, noblest common. 
 Strictly, there is but one meaning to the word com- 
 mon : it is that which, under the great democracy of 
 humanity, has become the general inherited possession 
 of mankjnd. To be common is to be as the ocean 
 that rolls its waves impartially under the equatorial 
 sun^ and in the mysterious unknown of the northern- 
 most polar sea. To be common is to be as the Gulf 
 Stream, as it coils about the world, holding it in its 
 encircling grasp like a beneficent serpent. To be 
 common is to be like the winter as it lays its iron hand 
 upon nature, in the dumb foreshadowing of a greater 
 catastrophe. Common is the mother rejoicing over 
 her babe. Common is that mother as she stands by 
 the grave of her babe. To be common is to be as life, 
 as death, as love, as hate. It is to be as the sun- 
 shine giving life and gladness wherever it rests ; or as 
 the rain which falls in due season, sending the warm 
 life through the veins of all nature ; or as the plague, 
 pestilence, famine, battle and murder, leaving in its 
 wake a pathway charred and blasted. All these 
 things are common, but none commonplace. All no-
 
 154 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 ture, in the broadest sense, is common ; but there is 
 nothing commonplace. 
 
 Every man, consciously or unconsciously, defines 
 certain words in his own peculiar manner; and my 
 definition of the commonplace is the threadbare, 
 Threadbare from the constant use, and from its ever- 
 lasting sameness. Some kinds of cloth are a good 
 deal harder to rub threadbare than others, but if you 
 rub long enough you will get the gloss off, and the 
 shiny smoothness will make its appearance. Some- 
 times this cloth is mightily freshened, by being put 
 away for a long time and then brought out, just as in 
 literature, books are often laid aside for one or two 
 generations, and come out looking fresher than ever. 
 Real honest love, and real honest hate, are never 
 threadbare, because they, like nature, are forever pre- 
 senting new phases. To the .individual himself, life is 
 never commonplace, inasmuch as each day brings (it 
 may be in a trifling degree) some new phase of living, 
 or some novelty. Death is never commonplace, and 
 for many reasons : men do not die alike any more than 
 they live alike, and the last act of a man's life, that 
 is, his dying, is remembered when many more impor- 
 tant ones are forgotten. It is the sham death, the 
 sham life, the artificial nature, that is commonplace. 
 Nature is, after all, the great teacher and exemplar. 
 Whether for our good or ill, she makes no distinction in 
 favor of a class or creed, but her rain falls alike upon 
 the just and the unjust : the common mother to the 
 common humanity. Therefore when we seek the 
 commonplace, it must not be in the writing on the
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 155 
 
 primeval page of nature ; but, turning from her, we 
 must look for it in the hearts of men. 
 
 Look at their sayings and doings ; at their vul- 
 garities and littlenesses. We shall see wherein the 
 common may or may not be commonplace. We shall 
 neither be wasting time splitting hairs, nor dealing with 
 abstract subtleties. It is the peculiar province of a man 
 that he may go into himself, as into a house, and hav- 
 ing shut to the door, look into the condition and char- 
 acter of the furniture of his mind and heart. It is not 
 only his peculiar province, but his highest privilege 
 and most bounden duty. Well is it for such an one 
 if, when he looks about him, he shall find nothing in 
 that furnishing which is not in accordance with the 
 great commonalty of humanity without. 
 
 I have stated before that common doesn't mean 
 the good, any more than it means the bad ; but it is 
 neither little nor puny. It stands up, strong and lusty, 
 and speaks with a voice that can be heard above the 
 little voices about it, and says, " I hate, I love." O 
 strong hate and love ! Both perhaps right, both per- 
 haps wrong; nothing can adjudicate upon them but 
 the causes which lie behind. Viewed in this aspect, a 
 man ceases to be a type, but is representative nature. 
 His lawless passion, riding down every bulwark of 
 society, and brooking no barrier, is as swift and as 
 fierce as the maelstrom grasping its victim, and hurry- 
 ing it down to satisfy its unsatiable and unnatural 
 appetite. Lawless this, very, but common ; common 
 as the race, and as nature. How many men have 
 written on Napoleon Bonaparte ! how many men have 
 denounced him ! But with all their writing, there is
 
 156 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 something within them of which they themselves are 
 not aware. O the frailty of humanity! and therein 
 we are not like nature, for we would do that which we 
 cannot. 
 
 You men who pile up volumes in condemnation of 
 the conqueror of Europe, what is it that you lack? 
 Ambition ? No. Pride ? No. Self-love ? No. Arro- 
 gance ? No. What, then ? O mockery ! the one 
 thing that made Napoleon what he was ability! 
 What is it that makes your pulses thrill when you 
 read of the conqueror in Leipsic, in Vienna, in Mos- 
 cow, in Berlin, in Brussels, now in the high Alpine 
 heaven, now in the valleys of Italy ; standing where 
 forty centuries look down upon him, or making himself 
 crowned head of half the world : what is it but admira- 
 tion ? Conceal it from yourself if you will, it is there ; 
 and, with the proper environment, would bear fruit of 
 which you little dream. Yes, it is the fellow feeling, 
 given certain conditions, and certain results will follow 
 which proclaims our oneness in the life which is 
 common to all. But you say, Napoleon was common- 
 place in his littlenesses. What of that? they never 
 made him great. Every littleness that that conqueror 
 had was commonplace, yet they were common. Every 
 act of heroism, every deed of patriotism, every story 
 which tells of a deep-laid plot of revenge carries us 
 with it. Read again the story of William the Con- 
 queror. Read again the story of Harold, the defender 
 of his country. No matter which, our hearts go forth 
 to "them. It is our double self proclaiming itself first 
 on one side, and then on the other. It is our common 
 feeling, asserting itself on either side. Go back as
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 157 
 
 far as you will Cataline against Cicero, and Cicero 
 against Cataline. Caesar against Pompey, and Pom- 
 pey against Caesar. Savonarola against the Pope, 
 the Pope against Savonarola. John of Barnavelt 
 against Maurice of Orange, and Maurice against John. 
 Guelph against Ghibelline, Ghibelline against Guelph. 
 You will find men of to-day taking sides, not on facts 
 but with factions. Take the case of the British occu- 
 pation of India. How we all sympathize with the na- 
 tive princes and their Subjects, bound hand and foot 
 under the British yoke : and yet what pleasure it gives 
 us to see the dominion of the white man reach over 
 the land of India. These are paradoxes; and yet 
 they are common to us all, and indisputable. 
 
 What though the silence of annihilation brood for- 
 ever over the halls of the Montezumas ? What though a 
 civilization of equal development as that of Mexico 
 was wrested from the hands of the Incas, and not shat- 
 tered, but distilled into nothingness ? What though 
 heaven be shaken with the outcry of the down-trod- 
 den millions ? What though the earth be strewn with 
 their corpses, and the rivers run thick with their blood, 
 though the sky be black by day, and blazing by night, 
 with the conflagration of a thousand villages ? What 
 of the hundreds of thousands, dying and rotting, deep 
 down in the mines, goaded on by the whip of the hell- 
 hound Spaniard to satisfy his insatiable lust for gold ? 
 Weep over them, deplore them, put in your share of 
 pity with your common humanity. Say, " He was my 
 brother ; this was his life, his home, his land, his blood, 
 his ruin," and then ask your heart how much you have 
 kept back for the men who did all this devil's work
 
 158 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 Ask how much admiration, how much hero-worship. 
 O the brave Castilian ! O the chivalric Spaniard ! 
 look at him. For every man, a thousand foes. March 
 on, conqueror, by the beacon fires which thine enemies 
 have kindled for thy destruction. How exhausting 
 your marches ! how valiantly fought your battles ! how 
 overwhelming your victories ! A handful of men 
 against a whole nation. Blood ! blood ! Is he not de- 
 fending his life ? Help for Cortez ! help for Pizarro ! 
 no time to be lost. But see ! O wonder ! O glory ! 
 O marvel, not of the age but of all time ! they over- 
 come, they conquer. Now let your common mother- 
 hood assert herself, and, for lack of your own glory, 
 glory in the glory of another type of your race. Ah, 
 defeated people, we weep with you, and in our hearts 
 we raise up monuments to your memories, for are you 
 not human, and might not your misfortunes have been 
 ours? But, O conqueror, we joy with you, for the 
 crown of glory sits upon your banner, and we triumph 
 in your victory. 
 
 Wonderful is this commonness, in its ability to look 
 at both sides, even in this posthumous way. Common 
 to be condemned, common to be glorified. Common 
 to be in earnest, commonplace to be the threadbare 
 object of toleration, if not of contempt. To be both 
 common and commonplace is to be weak ; to be com- 
 mon is to be strong; to be commonplace is to be vul- 
 gar and meaningless. Whatever lacks character, what- 
 ever has stamped on its face insipidity, whatever does 
 not convey to us a meaning and a purpose that is the 
 true commonplace. Cortez, Pizarro, fight on ! conquer ! 
 Aztec, Peruvian, defend your homes as best you may !
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 159 
 
 Your fight began with the first memory of man, and it 
 will not end till his last memory. Nothing common- 
 place here, in the court which the Spaniard has left be- 
 hind him. He may one day again form part of it, but 
 that is no concern of ours, for we have to do but with 
 the struggle, which is the typical struggle of all the 
 race. Common, common, gloriously common this 
 strength, this weakness. It is this effort to balance 
 the accounts of the ages, by standing first on one side 
 and then on the other ; that is the common effort of the 
 race. 
 
 The common ground on which we stand is becoming 
 broader, and more men are thinking their own thoughts 
 than ever did before, and there is more of an effort to 
 reach out and help others to the highest level of 
 common humanity. What is it to us that the land is 
 flooded, like the sand on the sea-shore, with the froth 
 and tinsel of journalistic platitudes. Much that is 
 good must drop through the sieve of public opinion ; 
 but if a man is really in earnest, and withal, has some- 
 thing worth the hearing, he will not long lack an audi- 
 ence. In the world of mental forces there are only a 
 certain number of truths to be known, and, in this re- 
 spect, there is nothing new under the sun. But turn- 
 ing from the purely intellectual, to the influence of the 
 immaterial over the material, we stand immediately in 
 the presence of those mental processes, formulated, 
 and crystallized into matter. The Pharaohs raised the 
 pyramids, that they might thereby preserve their mem- 
 ory; history has set her seal of rebuke upon those 
 proud monarchs, by obliterating that memory. The 
 thought of preserving their memories was as small as
 
 160 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the thought of building the pyramids was large. The 
 man who can be remembered by nothing better than 
 a pile of stone, were best forgotten. Yet the pile of 
 stone stands, and we glory in it. Not as the work of 
 part of the race, but as part of the work of the race. 
 
 I trust I may not be considered irreverent in speak- 
 ing of these piles, when I say that our admiration is 
 excited, not so much by their immensity as by the fact 
 that our race built them. After all, if we were in 
 search of size, whereby we might be overawed, we 
 would not go to the pyramids at all, but go and look 
 up the first respectable mountain, near at hand. Ah, 
 if we had only built the mountains, then our laudations 
 of the race, and our pride in the race, never would 
 have known limits. Pyramids, temples, shorn of your 
 glory, standing in your lonely grandeur in Thebes, in 
 Memphis, Baalbec, Nineveh, Rome, Athens, your 
 children have returned to the earth from whence they 
 sprang, and ye stand, childless and bare, amid the 
 memories which alone make you what you are ! Power, 
 wealth, beauty, they have all held sway over the 
 earth, and have each in turn left their trace, and be- 
 queathed their influence and their exhortation to the 
 children of their children. But if these things were found 
 in nature, would we wonder over them ? Do you want 
 power? Go to nature. Do you want wealth? Go 
 to nature. Do you want beauty ? Bow down in voice- 
 less wonder before the unspeakable glory which men 
 may not even imitate. Heaven and earth, sun, moon, 
 and stars, sea and mountain, tempest, volcano, and 
 earthquake, these are the pigments, the elements, and 
 the ministers of her will. Nature builds as a giant ;
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 161 
 
 men build as pigmies. And yet there has been a 
 whole library written to commemorate the deeds of 
 men, where one page has been written to tell the won- 
 ders that are in nature. This is right, this is just, for 
 she is no part of us though we be part of her. I would 
 rather be possessed of one of the Aztec manuscripts, 
 destroyed by the Spaniards in the square of the city of 
 Mexico, than to be owner of a universe of rainbows. 
 I would rather have the library destroyed at Alexan- 
 dria than to be possessor of the solid golden peacock's 
 throne. Better to have been the discoverer and in- 
 terpreter of the Rosetta stone than to have been 
 Rothschild. 
 
 We want to know who were our common fathers 
 and mothers. What did they do as they stood on the 
 threshold of history ? I had rather hold the key to 
 that history, than to hold the key to the Cosmos. We 
 cannot too earnestly search nature, that we may wrest 
 her secrets, and thereby triumph over her. Love na- 
 ture for all she is worth, but love your fellow man for 
 your common origin, and common brotherhood. I 
 think I have said enough of the commonplace to en- 
 able me now, and finally, to let so unpleasant a subject 
 rest, in order to devote the remainder of our time to 
 the consideration of the truly common in humanity. 
 
 As I have said before, in substance, to be common 
 is to represent the striving of the race ; and the main 
 current of that striving is not downward, but upward. 
 The strong tendency is not for evil, but for good. It 
 would be difficult to-day to find many Roman Catholics 
 who would justify the massacre of the Eve of St. Bar- 
 tholomew ; the sack of Constantinople, the capital of
 
 1 62 Studies in Musical History. 
 
 the Greek Church ; the extirpation of the heresy in the 
 south of France, nor the working of the Holy Inquisi- 
 tion. Protestantism has less to reproach itself with, 
 partly because it was the product of a later age, partly 
 because its life has been shorter and its opportunities 
 fewer, and partly because the responsibility of any 
 overt act could not rest on a Church which had no 
 temporal head, but on the individuals by whom it was 
 committed. The Protestant is as loath to endorse 
 such acts as the Catholic. We, as a race, stand on a 
 higher ground than we did four centuries ago. If we 
 do not repudiate, we do not endorse the crimes of our 
 ancestors. This article does not treat of causes, but 
 of results. I am not now discussing the question, 
 whether it is to the Church, or to a greater freedom 
 of thought we owe our enfranchisement. Those are 
 questions which belong rather to the theologian and 
 logician, and have no bearing on the subject under 
 discussion. 
 
 The world is full of blessed memories, and of what ? 
 Of good men, blessed because they were good. Have 
 you any blessed memories connected with a foreman ? 
 These are the memories common to us all, that come 
 to us like the very voice of God. Show me the man 
 who has no such memories, and I will show you a bes- 
 tial savage. Back, back, over the broad and fertile 
 fields of history, where the first streaks of the rising 
 sun may just be seen ; back where the twilight is just 
 beginning to appear, yes, even into the awed hush of 
 the primeval morning of history, these inherited mem- 
 ories carry our hearts. All history ought to be dear 
 to us, for it is indeed written in the blood of the race.
 
 The Common and Commonplace. 163 
 
 How reverentially we should approach it, this common 
 story of our common destiny. You can hear them 
 marching, their bugle-calls, and the roll of their drums. 
 But we need not look so far back for ideals. We need 
 not go to Thermopylae for heroes, nor seek the relig- 
 ious philosopher in Marcus Antoninus, or Epictetus. 
 All along the pathway where men. have trodden they 
 have planted these memories, which have flourished 
 like bay trees, by the rivers of water. They never 
 died ; they are all living and real. Take the great 
 men, good in the main, because their work for the race 
 was good in the main : Clovis, Charlemagne, Alfred, 
 William, Charles Martel, Wellington, Washington. 
 
 Crash, roar, battle everywhere ; but, lo ! as the white 
 heart, said to have been found among the ashes of 
 Joan of Arc, so comes out humanity : not exactly, nor 
 half, nor to any very great extent white, but whiter, 
 getting whiter every day. How many common mem- 
 ories we have of teachers and reformers, ministers of 
 governments, and of God. How great is OUF common 
 love for the men who write our books for us. The 
 men who do our thinking, and our talking. What a 
 pleasure it is to be part of a race that lays claim to 
 such men. Our common boast is, that we can go 
 faster, and talk further, than ever before. Our great 
 buildings are not for show, but for use. Our railroads, 
 reaching for thousands of miles ; our bridges, spanning 
 great estuaries ; our leviathan ships, our prodigious 
 commerce, our giant machinery, astronomy, chemistry, 
 law, medicine, these are all sources of just pride and 
 joy to us all.
 
 164 Studies in Musical History, 
 
 M Men my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping something 
 
 new, 
 
 That which they have done but earnest of the things that 
 they shall do." 
 
 We are only standing in the doorway of our common 
 house. Co-operation was never so general, discipline 
 never so perfect. As the unparalleled diffusion of 
 knowledge and civilization is chiefly due to our in- 
 creased facilities of communication, it follows that, 
 with these facilities ever increasing, the spread of 
 knowledge must be in equal ratio. Our fathers are 
 dead, but they built for us. Shall we fear to be step- 
 ing-stones for those who come after ? Community of 
 sentiment means community of interest. If we look 
 back with pride upon what the race has done, we may 
 well look forward with child-like wonder to what the 
 race shall do. The representative man is the com- 
 mon man. Not by reason of his clothes, his face, 
 speech, or manners, but in his thoughts and deeds. 
 Scoff at the suggestion if you will, but altruism, the 
 true commonism, which loves its neighbor as itself, 
 and makes common cause against all men for all men, 
 is the greatest growth of the age. In this republic of 
 mind, the highest boast that you can make is, that you 
 stand in the rank of the grand army ; that your 
 brother's cause is your own, even as yours is his. 
 The battle-field is great, and the battle will be long ; 
 but the men who have hearts common enough to fight 
 for, and to lay down their lives for common humanity 
 will be victorious at last, and be counted among the 
 commonest blessings of the human family.
 
 The Story of the Nations. 
 
 MESSRS. G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS take pleasure in 
 announcing that they have in course of publication a 
 series of historical studies, intended to present in a 
 graphic manner the stories of the different nations that 
 have attained prominence in history. 
 
 In the story form the current of each national life will 
 be distinctly indicated, and its picturesque and noteworthy 
 periods and episodes will be presented for the reader in 
 their philosophical relation to each other as well as to 
 universal history. 
 
 It is the plan of the writers of the different volumes 
 to enter into the real life of the peoples, and to bring 
 them before the reader as they actually lived, labored, and 
 struggled as they studied and wrote, and as they amused 
 themselves. In carrying out this plan, the myths, with 
 which the history of all lands begins, will not be over- 
 looked, though these will be carefully distinguished from 
 the actual history, so far as the labors of the accepted 
 historical authorities have resulted in definite conclusions. 
 
 The subjects of the different volumes will be planned 
 to cover connecting and, as far as possible, consecutive 
 epochs or periods, so that the set when completed will 
 present in a comprehensive narrative the chief events in 
 the great STORY OF THE NATIONS ; but it will, of course, 
 not always prove practicable to issue the several volumes 
 in their chronological order. 
 
 The " Stories " are printed in good readable type, and 
 in handsome I2mo form. They are adequately illustrated 
 and furnished with maps and indexes. They are sold 
 separately at a price of $1.50 each.
 
 The following is a partial list of the subjects thus far 
 determined upon : 
 
 THE STORY OF EARLY EGYPT. Prof. GEORGE RAWLINSON. 
 
 " *CHALDEA. Z. RAGOZIN. 
 " " " *GREECE. Prof. JAMES A. HARRISON, 
 
 Washington and Lee University. 
 " " " *ROME. ARTHUR GILMAN. 
 
 "*THEJEWS. Prof. JAMES K. HOSMER, 
 
 \Vashington University of St. Louis. 
 ' " " " *CARTHAGE. Prof. ALFRED J. CHURCH, 
 
 University College, London. 
 BYZANTIUM. 
 
 THE GOTHS. HENRY BRADLEY. 
 *THE NORMANS. SARAH O. JEWETT. 
 *PERSIA. S. G. W. BENJAMIN. 
 *SPAIN. Rev. E. E. and SUSAN HALE. 
 *GERMANY. S. BARING-GOULD. 
 THE ITALIAN REPUBLICS. 
 HOLLAND. Prof. C. E. THOROLD ROGERS. 
 *NORWAY. HJALMAR H. BOYESEN. 
 *THE MOORS IN SPAIN. STANLEY LANE-POOLE. 
 *HUNGARY. Prof. A. VAMBERY. 
 
 THE ITALIAN KINGDOM. W. L. ALDEN. 
 ' EARLY FRANCE. Prof. GUSTAVE MASSON. 
 ' ALEXANDER'S EMPIRE. Prof. J. P. MAHAFFY. 
 ' THE HANSE TOWNS. HELEN ZIMMERN. 
 ' ASSYRIA. Z. RAGOZIN. 
 " *THE SARACENS. ARTHUR GILMAN. 
 " TURKEY. STANLEY LANE-POOLE. 
 1 " PORTUGAL. H. MORSE STEPHENS. 
 
 " MEXICO. SUSAN HALE. 
 " IRELAND. Hon. EMILY LAWLESS. 
 " PHCENICIA. 
 V SWITZERLAND. 
 " RUSSIA. 
 " WALES. 
 " SCOTLAND. 
 
 * (The volumes starred are now ready, January, 1887.) 
 
 G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
 NEW YORK LONDON 
 
 and 39 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET 
 
 27 KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND

 
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