Chapter 3

It would be difficult, for those reared amid the elegancies and refinements of life in city and town, to appreciate the enjoyments of the gatherings and merry-makings of the great masses of the people who live in the rural districts of our country. The historian records the deeds of the great; he consigns to fame the favored few; but leaves unwritten the short and simple annals of the poor--the lives and actions of the millions.

The modern millionaire, as he sweeps through our valleys and around our hills in his palace car, ought not to look with derision on the cabins of America, for from their thresholds have come more brains and courage and true greatness than ever eminated from all the palaces of this world.

The fiddle, the rifle, the axe, and the Bible, symbolizing music, prowess, labor, and free religion, the four grand forces of our civilization, were the trusty friends and faithful allies of our pioneer ancestry in subduing the wilderness and erecting the great Commonwealths of the Republic. Wherever a son of freedom pushed his perilous way into the savage wilds and erected his log cabin, these were the cherished penates of his humble domicile--the rifle in the rack above the door, the axe in the corner, the Bible on the table, and the fiddle with its streamers of ribbon, hanging on the wall. Did he need the charm of music, to cheer his heart, to scatter sunshine, and drive away melancholy thoughts, he touched the responsive strings of his fiddle and it burst into laughter. Was he beset by skulking savages, or prowling beasts of prey, he rushed to his deadly rifle for protection and relief. Had he the forest to fell, and the fields to clear, his trusty axe was in his stalwart grasp. Did he need the consolation, the promises and precepts of religion to strengthen his faith, to brighten his hope, and to anchor his soul to God and heaven, he held sweet communion with the dear old Bible.

The glory and strength of the Republic today are its plain working people.

"Princes and Lords may flourish and may fade, A breath can make them, as a breath has made; But an honest yeomanry--a Country's pride, When once destroyed, can never be supplied;"

Long live the common people of America! Long live the fiddle and the bow, the symbols of their mirth and merriment!

THE TWO COLUMNS.

Music wooes, and leads the human race ever onward, and there are two columns that follow her. One is the happy column, ringing with laughter and song. Its line of march is strewn with roses; it is hedged on either side by happy homes and smiling faces. The other is the column of sorrow, moaning with suffering and distress. I saw an aged mother with her white locks and wrinkled face, swoon at the Governor's feet; I saw old men tottering on the staff, with broken hearts and tear stained faces, and heard them plead for their wayward boys. I saw a wife and seven children, clad in rags, and bare-footed, in mid-winter, fall upon their knees around him who held the pardoning power. I saw a little girl climb upon the Governor's knee, and put her arms around his neck; I heard her ask him if he had little girls; then I saw her sob upon his bosom as though her little heart would break, and heard her plead for mercy for her poor, miserable, wretched, convict father. I saw want, and woe, and poverty, and trouble, and distress, and suffering, and agony, and anguish, march in solemn procession before the Gubernatorial door; and I said: "Let the critics frown and rail, let this heartless world condemn, but he who hath power and doth not temper justice with mercy, will cry in vain himself for mercy on that great day when the two columns shall meet! For, thank God, the stream of happy humanity that rolls on like a gleaming river, and the stream of the suffering and distressed and ruined of this earth, both empty into the same great ocean of eternity and mingle like the waters, and there is a God who shall judge the merciful and the unmerciful!"

THERE IS A MELODY FOR EVERY EAR.

The multitudinous harmonies of this world differ in pathos and pitch as the stars differ, one from another, in glory. There is a style for every taste, a melody for every ear. The gabble of geese is music to the goose; the hoot of the hoot-owl is lovlier to his mate than the nightingale's lay; the concert of Signor "Tomasso Cataleny" and Mademoiselle "Pussy" awakeneth the growling old bachelor from his dreams, and he throweth his boquets of bootjacks and superannuated foot gear.

The peripatetic gentleman from Italy asks no loftier strain than the tune of his hand organ and the jingle of the nickels, "the tribute of the Cæsars."

The downy-lipped boy counts the explosion of a kiss on the cheek of his darling "dul-ci-ni-a del To-bo-so" sweeter than an echo from paradise; and it is said that older folks like its music.

The tintinnabulations of the wife's curtain lecture are too precious to the enraptured husband to be shared with other ears. And in the hush of the bed-time hour, when tired daddies are seeking repose in the oblivion of sleep, the unearthly bangs on the grand piano below in the parlor, and the unearthly screams and yells of the budding prima donna, as she sings to her admiring beau:

"Men may come and men may go, but I go on 'for-ev-oor' 'ev-oor' I go on 'for-ev-o-o-r' 'e-v-o-o-r' I go on 'for-ev-oor.'"

It is a thing of beauty, and a "nightmare" forever.

MUSIC IS THE WINE OF THE SOUL.

Music is the wine of the soul. It is the exhileration of the palace; it is the joy of the humblest home; it sparkles and glows in the banquet hall; it is the inspiration of the church. Music inspires every gradation of humanity, from the orangoutang and the cane-sucking dude with the single eye glass, _up to man_.

There was "a sound of revelry by night," where youth and beauty were gathered in the excitement of the raging ball. The ravishing music of the orchestra charmed from the street a red nosed old knight of the demijohn, and uninvited he staggered into the brilliant assemblage and made an effort to get a partner for the next set. Failing in this, he concluded to exhibit his powers as a dancer; and galloped around the hall till he galloped into the arms of a strong man who quickly ushered him to the head of the stairs, and gave him a kick and a push; he went revolving down to the street below and fell flat on his back in the mud; but "truth crushed to earth will rise again!" He rose, and standing with his back against a lamp post, he looked up into the faces that were gazing down, and said in an injured tone: "Gentlemen, (hic) you may be able to fool some people, but, (hic) you can't fool me, (hic) I know what made you kick me down them stairs, (hic, hic). You don't want me up there--that's the reason!" So, life hath its discords as well as its harmonies.

There was music in the magnificent parlor of a modern Chesterfield. It was thronged with elegant ladies and gentlemen. The daughter of the happy household was playing and singing Verdi's "Ah! I have sighed to rest me;" the fond mother was turning the pages; the fond father was sighing and resting up stairs, in a state of innocuous desuetude, produced by the "music" of old Kentucky Bourbon; but he could not withstand the power of the melody below. Quickly he donned his clothing; he put his vest on over his coat; put his collar on hind side foremost; buttoned the lower buttonhole of his coat on the top button, stood before the mirror and arranged his hair, and started down to see the ladies and listen to the music. But he stumped his toe at the top of the stairs, and slid down head-foremost, and turned a somersault into the midst of the astonished ladies. The ladies screamed and helped him to his feet, all crying at once: "Are you hurt Mr. 'Rickety'--are you hurt?" Standing with his back against the piano he exclaimed in an assuring tone: "Why, (hic) of course not ladies, go on with your music, (hic) that's the way I always come down----!"

Two old banqueters banqueted at a banquet. They banqueted all night long, and kept the banquet up together all the next day after the banquet had ended. They kept up their banqueting a week after the banquet was over. But they got separated one morning and met again in the afternoon. One of them said: "Good mornin':" The other said: "Good evenin'!" "Why;" said one, "It's mornin' an' that's the sun; I've investigated the queshtun." "No-sir-ee," said the other, "You're mistaken, it's late in the evenin' an' that's the full moon." They concluded they would have no difficulty about the matter, and agreed to leave it to the first gentleman they came to to settle the question. They locked arms and started down the street together; they staggered on till they came upon another gentleman in the same condition, hanging on a lamp post. One of them approached him and said: "Friend (hic) we don't desire to interfere with your meditation, (hic) but this gen'lman says it's mornin' an' that's the sun; I say it's evenin' an' that's the full moon, (hic) we respectfully ask you (hic) to settle the question." The fellow stood and looked at it for a full minute, and in his despair replied:

"Gen'lmen, (hic) you'll have to excuse me, (hic) I'm a stranger in this town!"

THE OLD TIME SINGING SCHOOL.

Did you never hear the music of the old time singing school? Oh! who can forget the old school house that stood on the hill? Who can forget the sweet little maidens with their pink sun bonnets and checkered dresses, the walks to the spring, and the drinks of pure, cold water from the gourd? Who can forget the old time courtships at the singing school? When the boy found an opportunity he wrote these tender lines to his sweetheart:

"The rose is red; the violet's blue-- Sugar is sweet, and so are you."

She read it and blushed, and turned it over and wrote on the back of it:

"As sure as the vine clings 'round the stump, I'll be your sweet little sugar lump."

Who can forget the old time singing master? The old time singing master with very light hair, a dyed mustache, a wart on his left eyelid, and with one game leg, was the pride of our rural society; he was the envy of man and the idol of woman. His baggy trousers, several inches too short, hung above his toes like the inverted funnels of a Cunard steamer. His butternut coat had the abbreviated appearance of having been cut in deep water, and its collar encircled the back of his head like the belts of Jupiter and the rings of Saturn. His vest resembled the aurora borealis, and his voice was a cross between a cane mill and the bray of an ass. Yet beautiful and bright he stood before the ruddy-faced swains and rose-cheeked lassies of the country, conscious of his charms, and proud of his great ability. He had prepared, after a long and tedious research of Webster's unabridged dictionary, a speech which he always delivered to his class.

"Boys and girls," he would say, "Music is a conglomeration of pleasing sounds, or a succession or combernation of simultaneous sounds modulated in accordance with harmony. Harmony is the sociability of two or more musical strains. Melody denotes the pleasing combustion of musical and measured sounds, as they succeed each other in transit. The elements of vocal music consist of seven original tones which constitute the diatonic scale, together with its steps and half steps, the whole being compromised in ascending notes and half notes, thus:

Do re mi fa sol la si do-- Do si la sol fa mi re do.

Now, the diapason is the ad interium, or interval betwixt and between the extremes of an octave, according to the diatonic scale. The turns of music consist of the appoggiatura which is the principal note, or that on which the turn is made, together with the note above and the semi-tone below, the note above being sounded first, the principal note next and the semi-tone below, last, the three being performed sticatoly, or very quickly. Now, if you will keep these simple propersitions clear in your physical mind, there is no power under the broad canister of heaven which can prevent you from becoming succinctly contaminated with the primary and elementary rudiments of music. With these few sanguinary remarks we will now proceed to diagnosticate the exercises of the mornin' hour. Please turn to page thirty-four of the Southern harmony." And we turned. "You will discover that this beautiful piece of music is written in four-four time, beginning on the downward beat. Now, take the sound--sol mi do--All in unison--one, two, three, _sing_:

Sol sol, mi fa sol, la sol fa, re re re, re mi fa Re mi fa, sol fa mi, do do do-- Si do re, re re re, mi do si do, re do si la sol, Si do re, re mi fa sol la, sol fa mi, do do do."

THE GRAND OPERA.

I heard a great Italian Tenor sing in the Grand Opera, and Oh! how like the dew on the flowers is the memory of his song! He was playing the role of a broken-hearted lover in the opera of the "Bohemian Girl." I can only repeat it as it impressed me--an humble young man from the mountains who never before had heard the _Grand Opera_:

"When ethaer-r-r leeps and ethaer-r-r hairts, Their-r-r tales auf luff sholl tell, In longwidge whose ex-cess impair-r-r-ts. The power-r-r-r they feel so well, There-r-r-e may per-haps in-a such a s-c-e-n-e Some r-r-re-co-lec-tion be, Auf days thot haive as hop-py bean-- Then you'll-a r-r-r-re-mem-b-a-e-r-r-r me-e-e, Then you'll-a r-re-mem-b-a-e-r-r, You'll-a r-re-mem-ber a-me-e-e!!"

MUSIC.

The spirit of music, like an archangel, presides over mankind and the visible creation. Her afflatus, divinely sweet, divinely powerful, is breathed on every human heart, and inspires every soul to some nobler sentiment, some higher thought, some greater action.

O music, sweetest, sublimest ideal of Omniscience, first-born of God, fairest and loftiest Seraph of the celestial hierarchy, Muse of the beautiful, daughter of the Universe!

In the morning of eternity, when the stars were young, her first grand oratorio burst upon raptured Deity, and thrilled the wondering angels; all heaven shouted; ten thousand times ten thousand jeweled harps, ten thousand times ten thousand angel tongues caught up the song; and ever since, through all the golden cycles, its breathing melodies, old as eternity, yet ever new as the flitting hours, have floated on the air of heaven. The Seraph stood, with outstretched wings, on the horizon of heaven--clothed in light, ablaze with gems; and with voice attuned, swept her burning harp strings, and lo! the blue infinite thrilled with her sweetest note. The trembling stars heard it, and flashed their joy from every flaming center. The wheeling orbs that course their paths of light were vibrant with the strain, and pealed it back into the glad ear of God. The far off milky way, bright gulf-stream of astral glories, spanning the ethereal deep, resounded with its harmonies, and the star-dust isles floating in that river of opal, re-echoed the happy chorus from every sparkling strand.

"THE PARADISE OF FOOLS."

Have you ever thought of the wealth that perished when paradise was lost? Have you ever thought of the glory of Eden, the first estate of man? I think it was the very dream of God, glowing with ineffable beauty. I think it was rimmed with blue mountains, from whose moss-covered cliffs leaped a thousand glassy streams that spread out in mid-air, like bridal veils, kissing a thousand rainbows from the sun. I think it was an archipelago of gorgeous colors, flecked with green isles, where the grapevine staggered from tree to tree, as if drunk with the wine of its own purple clusters, where peach, and plum, and blood-red cherries, and every kind of berry, bent bough and bush, and shone like showered drops of ruby and of pearl. I think it was a wilderness of flowers, redolent of eternal spring and pulsing with bird-song, where dappled fawns played on banks of violets, where leopards, peaceful and tame, lounged in copses of magnolias, where harmless tigers lay on snowy beds of lilies, and lions, lazy and gentle, panted in jungles of roses. I think its billowy landscapes were festooned with tangling creepers, bright with perennial bloom, and curtained with sweet-scented groves, where the orange and the pomegranate hung like golden globes and ruddy moons. I think its air was softened with the dreamy haze of perpetual summer; and through its midst there flowed a translucent river, alternately gleaming in its sunshine and darkening in its shadows. And there, in some sweet, dusky bower, fresh from the hand of his Creator, slept Adam, the first of the human race; God-like in form and feature; God-like in all the attributes of mind and soul. No monarch ever slept on softer, sweeter couch, with richer curtains drawn about him. And as he slept, a face and form, half hidden, half revealed, red-lipped, rose-cheeked, white bosomed and with tresses of gold, smiled like an angel from the mirror of his dream; for a moment smiled, and so sweetly, that his heart almost forgot to beat. And while yet this bright vision still haunted his slumber, with tenderest touch an unseen hand lay open the unconscious flesh in his side, and forth from the painless wound a faultless being sprang; a being pure and blithesome as the air; a sinless woman, God's first thought for the happiness of man. I think he wooed her at the waking of the morning. I think he wooed her at noon-tide, down by the riverside, or by the spring in the dell. I think he wooed her at twilight, when the moon silvered the palm tree's feathery plumes, and the stars looked down, and the nightingale sang. And wherever he wooed her, I think the grazing herds left sloping hill and peaceful vale, to listen to the wooing, and thence themselves, departed in pairs. The covies heard it and mated in the fields; the quail wooed his love in the wheat; the robin whistled to his love in the glen;

"The lark was so brim-full of gladness and love, The green fields below him--the blue sky above, That he sang, and he sang, and forever sang he: I love my Love, and my Love loves me."

Love songs bubbled from the mellow throats of mocking-birds and bobolinks; dove cooed love to dove; and I think the maiden monkey, fair "Juliet" of the House of Orang-outang, waited on her cocoanut balcony for the coming of her "Romeo," and thus plaintively sang:

(Sung to the air of My Sweetheart's the Man in the Moon.)

"My sweetheart's the lovely baboon, I'm going to marry him soon; 'Twould fill me with joy Just to kiss the dear boy, For his charms and his beauty No power can destroy."

"I'll sit in the light of the moon, And sing to my darling baboon, When I'm safe by his side And he calls me his bride; Oh! my Angel, my precious baboon!"

All paradise was imbued with the spirit of love. Oh, that it could have remained so forever! There was not a painted cheek in Eden, nor a bald head, nor a false tooth, nor a bachelor. There was not a flounce, nor a frill, nor a silken gown, nor a flashy waist with aurora borealis sleeves. There was not a curl paper, nor even a threat of crinoline. Raiment was an after thought, the mask of a tainted soul, born of original sin. Beauty was unmarred by gaudy rags; Eve was dressed in sunshine, Adam was clad in climate.

Every rich blessing within the gift of the Almighty Father was poured out from the cornucopia of heaven, into the lap of paradise. But it was a paradise of fools, because they stained it with disobedience and polluted it with sin. It was the paradise of fools because, in the exercise of their own God-given free agency, they tasted the forbidden fruit and fell from their glorious estate. Oh, what a fall was there! It was the fall of innocence and purity; it was the fall of happiness into the abyss of woe; it was the fall of life into the arms of death. It was like the fall of the wounded albatross, from the regions of light, into the sea; it was like the fall of a star from heaven to hell. When the jasper gate forever closed behind the guilty pair, and the flaming sword of the Lord mounted guard over the barred portal, the whole life-current of the human race was shifted into another channel; shifted from the roses to the thorns; shifted from joy to sorrow, and it bore upon its dark and turbulent bosom, the wrecked hopes of all the ages.

I believe they lost intellectual powers which fallen man has never regained. Operating by the consent of natural laws, sinless man would have wrought endless miracles. The mind, winged like a seraph, and armed like a thunderbolt, would have breached the very citadel of knowledge and robbed it of its treasures. I think they lost a plane of being only a little lower than the angels. I believe they lost youth, beauty, and physical immortality. I believe they lost the virtues of heart and soul, and many of the magnificent powers of mind, which made them the images of God, and which would have even brushed aside the now impenetrable veil which hides from mortal eyes the face of Infinite Love; that Love which gave the ever-blessed light, and filled the earth with music of bird, and breeze, and sea; that Love whose melodies we sometimes faintly catch, like spirit voices, from the souls of orators and poets; that Love which inlaid the arching firmament of heaven with jewels sparkling with eternal fires. But thank God, their fall was not like the remediless fall of Lucifer and his angels, into eternal darkness. Thank God, in this "night of death" hope _does_ see a star! It is the star of Bethlehem. Thank God, "listening Love" _does_ "hear the rustle of a wing!" It is the wing of the resurrection angel.

The memories and images of paradise lost have been impressed on every human heart, and every individual of the race has his own ideal of that paradise, from the cradle to the grave. But that ideal in so far as its realization in this world is concerned, is like the rainbow, an elusive phantom, ever in sight, never in reach, resting ever on the horizon of hope.

THE PARADISE OF CHILDHOOD.