Part 2

Father and I went down to camp Along with Captain Gooding, And there we saw the men and boys, As thick as hasty pudding. Yankee Doodle, keep it up, Yankee Doodle Dandy! Mind the music and the step, And with the gals be handy!

And there we see a thousand men As rich as Squire David, And what they wasted every day,-- I wish it had been savèd.

The 'lasses they eat up every day Would keep our house all winter,-- They have so much that I'll be bound They eat whene'er they've a mind to.

And there we see a whopping gun, As big as a log of maple, Mounted on a little cart,-- A load for father's cattle.

And every time they fired it off It took a horn of powder, And made a noise like father's gun, Only a nation louder.

I went as near to it As 'Siah's underpinning; Father went as nigh agin,-- I thought the devil was in him.

Cousin Simon grew so bold, I thought he meant to cock it; He scared me so, I streaked it off, And hung to father's pocket.

And Captain Davis had a gun He kind o' clapped his hand on, And stuck a crooked stabbing-iron Upon the little end on 't.

And there I saw a pumpkin shell As big as mother's basin; And every time they sent one off, They scampered like tarnation.

I saw a little bar'el, too, Its heads were made of leather; They knocked on it with little plugs, To call the folks together.

And there was Captain Washington, With grand folks all about him; They says he's grown so tarnal proud, He cannot ride without them.

He had on his meeting-clothes, And rode a slapping stallion, And gave his orders to the men,-- I guess there was a million.

And then the feathers in his hat, They were so tarnal fine-ah, I wanted peskily to get To hand to my Jemima.

And then they'd fife away like fun And play on cornstalk fiddles; And some had ribbons red as blood All wound about their middles.

The troopers, too, would gallop up, And fire right in our faces; It scared me a'most to death To see them run such races.

And then I saw a snarl of men A-digging graves, they told me, So tarnal long, so tarnal deep,-- They allowed they were to hold me.

It scared me so I hooked it off, Nor stopped as I remember, Nor turned about, till I got home, Locked up in mother's chamber.

It is certainly the tune of _Yankee Doodle_, and not the words of this old song, which captured the fancy of the country and held its sway in America for nearly a hundred and fifty years.

The tune, however, is much older than that. It has been claimed in many lands. When Kossuth was in this country making his plea for liberty for Hungary, he informed a writer of the Boston _Post_ that, when the Hungarians that accompanied him first heard _Yankee Doodle_ on a Mississippi River steamer, they immediately recognized it as one of the old national airs of their native land, one played in the dances of that country, and they began to caper and dance as they had been accustomed to do in Hungary.

It has been claimed also in Holland as an old harvest song. It is said that when the laborers received for wages "as much buttermilk as they could drink, and a tenth of the grain," they used to sing as they reaped, to the tune of _Yankee Doodle_, the words,--

"Yanker, didel, doodle down, Diddle, dudel, lanther, Yanke viver, voover vown, Botermilk und tanther."

From Spain, also, comes a claim. The American Secretary of Legation, Mr. Buckingham Smith, wrote from Madrid under date of June 3, 1858: "The tune of _Yankee Doodle_, from the first of my showing it here, has been acknowledged, by persons acquainted with music, to bear a strong resemblance to the popular airs of Biscay; and yesterday, a professor from the north recognized it as being much like the ancient sword-dance played on solemn occasions by the people of San Sebastian. He says the tune varies in those provinces. The first strains are identically those of the heroic Danza Esparta of brave old Biscay."

France puts in a claim, and declares that _Yankee Doodle_ is an old vintage song from the southern part of that land of grapes; while Italy, too, claims _Yankee Doodle_ for her own.

The probabilities are that it was introduced into England from Holland.

_Yankee Doodle_ became an American institution in June, 1755. General Braddock, of melancholy fate, was gathering the colonists to an encampment near Albany for an attack on the French and Indians at Niagara. The countrymen came into camp in a medley of costumes, from the buckskins and furs of the American Indian to some quaint old-fashioned military heirloom of a century past. The British soldiers made great sport of their ragged clothes and the quaint music to which they marched. There was among these regular troops from England a certain Dr. Richard Shuckburg, who could not only patch up human bodies, but had a great facility in patching up tunes as well. As these grotesque countrymen marched into camp, this quick-witted doctor recalled the old air which was sung by the cavaliers in ridicule of Cromwell, who was said to have ridden into Oxford on a small horse with his single plume fastened into a sort of knot which was derisively called a "macaroni." The words were,--

"Yankee Doodle came to town, Upon a Kentish pony; He stuck a feather in his cap, Upon a macaroni."

Doctor Shuckburg at once began to plan a joke upon the uncouth newcomers. He set down the notes of _Yankee Doodle_, wrote along with them the lively travesty upon Cromwell, and gave them to the militia musicians as the latest martial music of England. The band quickly caught the simple and contagious air which would play itself, and in a few hours it was sounding through the camp amid the laughter of the British soldiers. It was a very prophetic piece of fun, however, which became significant a few years later. When the battles of Concord and Lexington began the Revolutionary War, the English, when proudly advancing, played along the road _God save the King_; but after they had been routed, and were making their disastrous retreat, the Americans followed them with the taunting _Yankee Doodle_.

It was only twenty-five years after Doctor Shuckburg's joke when Lord Cornwallis marched into the lines of these same old ragged Continentals to surrender his army and his sword to the tune of _Yankee Doodle_.

Francis Hopkinson, of Philadelphia, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and the father of Joseph Hopkinson, the author of _Hail Columbia_, adapted the words of his famous song _The Battle of the Kegs_, to the tune of _Yankee Doodle_. David Bushnell, the inventor of the torpedo, in December, 1777, had set adrift at night a large number of kegs charged with gunpowder, which were designed to explode on coming in contact with the British vessels in the Delaware. They failed in their object, but, exploding in the vicinity, created intense alarm in the fleet, which kept up for hours a continuous discharge of cannon and small arms at every object in the river. This was "the battle of the kegs."

Verses without number have been sung to the tune of _Yankee Doodle_, but the ballad given here is the one that was best known and most frequently sung during the war for independence. They are said to have been written by a gentleman of Connecticut whose name has not survived. The exact date of their first publication is not known, but as these verses were sung at the Battle of Bunker Hill it must have been as early as 1775.

_THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER._

O say, can you see by the dawn's early light, What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming! And the rocket's red glare, The bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there; O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On that shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep, Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes, What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep, As it fitfully blows now conceals, now discloses? Now it catches the gleam Of the morning's first beam, In full glory reflected now shines on the stream; 'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh, long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion A home and a country should leave us no more? Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution. No refuge could save The hireling and slave From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave; And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Oh, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation! Blessed with victory and peace, may the heaven-rescued land Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation. Then conquer we must, When our cause it is just, And this be our motto--"In God is our trust:" And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

--_Francis Scott Key._

No song could have had a more inspiring source of creation than did this. Its author, Mr. Francis Scott Key, was a young lawyer who left Baltimore in September, 1814, while the war of 1812 was yet going on, and under a flag of truce visited the British fleet for the purpose of obtaining the release of a friend of his, a certain Doctor Beanes, who had been captured at Marlborough. After his arrival at the fleet he was compelled to remain with it during the bombardment of Fort McHenry, as the officers were afraid to permit him to land lest he should disclose the purposes of the British. Mr. Key remained on deck all night, watching every shell from the moment it was fired until it fell, and listening with breathless interest to hear if an explosion followed. The firing suddenly ceased before day, but from the position of the ship he could not discover whether the fort had surrendered or the attack had been abandoned. He paced the deck for the remainder of the night in painful suspense, watching with intense anxiety for the return of day, and looking every few minutes at his watch to see how long he must wait for it; and as soon as it dawned, and before it was light enough to see objects at a distance, his glass was turned to the fort, uncertain whether he should see there the Stars and Stripes or the flag of the enemy. At length the light came, and he saw that "our flag was still there;" and as the day advanced he discovered from the movement of the boats between the shore and the fleet that the English troops had been defeated, and that many wounded men were being carried to the ships. At length Mr. Key was informed that the attack on Baltimore had failed, and he with his friend was permitted to return home, while the hostile fleet sailed away, leaving the Star-Spangled Banner still waving from Fort McHenry.

During the intense anxiety of waiting for dawn, Mr. Key had conceived the idea of the song and had written some lines, or brief notes that would aid him in calling them to mind, upon the back of a letter which he happened to have in his pocket. He finished the poem in the boat on his way to the shore, and finally corrected it, leaving it as it now stands, at the hotel, on the night he reached Baltimore, and immediately after he arrived. The next morning he took it to Judge Nicholson, the chief justice of Maryland, to ask him what he thought of it; and he was so pleased with it that he immediately sent it to the printer, Benjamin Edes, and directed copies to be struck off in handbill form. In less than an hour after it was placed in the hands of the printer it was all over the town, and hailed with enthusiasm, and at once took its place in the national songs. The first newspaper that printed it was the _American_, of Baltimore.

The tune, which has helped so much to make it famous, also had an interesting selection. Two brothers, Charles and Ferdinand Durang, were actors at the Holliday Street Theater in Baltimore, but were also soldiers. A copy of Francis Key's poem came to them in camp; it was read aloud to a company of the soldiers, among whom were the Durang brothers. All were inspired by the pathetic eloquence of the song and Ferdinand Durang at once put his wits to work to find a tune for it. Hunting up a volume of flute music which was in one of the tents, he impatiently whistled snatches of tune after tune, just as they caught his quick eye. One, called _Anacreon in Heaven_, struck his fancy and riveted his attention. Note after note fell from his puckered lips until, with a leap and shout, he exclaimed, "Boys, I've hit it!" And fitting the tune to the words, there rang out for the first time the song of _The Star-Spangled Banner_. How the men shouted and clapped; for there never was a wedding of poetry to music made under more inspiring influences! Getting a brief furlough, the Durang brothers sang it in public soon after. It was caught up in the camps, and sung around the bivouac fires, and whistled in the streets, and when peace was declared, and the soldiers went back to their homes, they carried this song in their hearts as the most precious souvenir of the war of 1812.

The song bears evidence of the special incident to which it owes its creation, and is not suited to all times and occasions on that account. To supply this want, additional stanzas have, from time to time, been written. Perhaps the most notable of all these is the following stanza, which was written by Oliver Wendell Holmes, at the request of a lady, during our civil war, there being no verse alluding to treasonable attempts against the flag. It was originally printed in the Boston _Evening Transcript_.

"When our land is illumined with liberty's smile, If a foe from within strike a blow at her glory, Down, down with the traitor who dares to defile The flag of her stars and the page of her story! By the millions unchained Who their birthright have gained We will keep her bright blazon forever unstained; And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave While the land of the free is the home of the brave."

The air selected under such interesting circumstances as we have described--_Anacreon in Heaven_,--is that of an old English song. In the second half of the eighteenth century a jovial society, called the "Anacreontic," held its festive and musical meetings at the "Crown and Anchor" in the Strand. It is now the "Whittington Club;" but in the last century it was frequented by Doctor Johnson, Boswell, Sir Joshua Reynolds and others. One Ralph Tomlinson, Esq., was at that time president of the Anacreontic Society, and wrote the words of the song adopted by the club, and John Stafford Smith set them to music, it is claimed to an old French air. The song was published by the composer, and was sold at his house, 7 Warwick Street, Spring Garden, London, between the years 1770-75. Thus the source of the music so long identified with this inspiring song is swallowed up in the mystery of the name of Smith.

The flag of Fort McHenry, which inspired the song, still exists in a fair state of preservation. It is at this time thirty-two feet long and of twenty-nine feet hoist. In its original dimensions it was probably forty feet long; the shells of the enemy, and the work of curiosity hunters, have combined to decrease its length. Its great width is due to its having fifteen instead of thirteen stripes, each nearly two feet wide. It has, or rather had, fifteen five-pointed stars, each two feet from point to point, and arranged in five indented parallel lines, three stars in each horizontal line. The Union rests in the ninth, which is a red stripe, instead of the eighth, a white stripe, as in our present flag. There can be no doubt as to the authenticity of this flag. It was preserved by Colonel Armstead, and bears upon its stripes, in his autograph, his name and the date of the bombardment. It has always remained in his family and in 1861 his widow bequeathed it to their youngest daughter, Mrs. William Stuart Appleton, who, some time after the bombardment, was born in Fort McHenry under its folds. She was named Georgians Armstead for her father, and the precious flag was hoisted on its staff in honor of her birth. Mrs. Appleton died in New York, July 25, 1878, and bequeathed the flag to her son, Mr. Eben Appleton, of Yonkers, New York, who now holds it.

_The Star-Spangled Banner_ has come out of the Spanish War baptized with imperishable glory. Throughout the war it has been above all others, in camp or on the battlefield, the song that has aroused the highest enthusiasm. During the bombardment of Manila the band on a British cruiser, lying near the American fleet, played _The Star-Spangled Banner_, thus showing in an unmistakable way their sympathy with the American cause. In the trenches before Santiago it was sung again and again by our soldiers and helped, more than anything else, to inspire them to deeds of heroic valor. Once when the army moved forward in the charge, the man who played the E-flat horn in the band left his place and rushed forward with the soldiers in the attacking column. Of course the band's place is in the rear. But this man, unmindful of everything, broke away and went far up the hill with the charge, carrying his horn over his shoulder, slung with a strap. For a time he went along unobserved, until one of the officers happened to see him. And he said to him, "What are you doing here? You can't do anything; you can't fight; you haven't any gun or sword. This is no place for you. Get down behind that rock." The soldier fell back for a minute, half dazed, and feeling the pull of the strap on his shoulder cried out in agony: "I can't do anything, I can't fight." And so he got down behind the rock. But almost instantly he raised his horn and began to play _The Star-Spangled Banner_. They heard him down in the valley, and immediately the band took it up, and in the midst of those inspiring strains the army charged to victory.

_HAIL COLUMBIA._

Hail, Columbia! happy land! Hail, ye heroes! heaven-born band! Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause, Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause, And when the storm of war was gone, Enjoy'd the peace your valor won. Let independence be our boast, Ever mindful what it cost; Ever grateful for the prize, Let its altars reach the skies. Firm, united, let us be, Rallying round our Liberty; As a band of brothers join'd, Peace and safety we shall find.

Immortal patriots! rise once more: Defend your rights, defend your shore: Let no rude foe, with impious hand, Let no rude foe, with impious hand, Invade the shrine where sacred lies Of toil and blood the well-earn'd prize. While offering peace sincere and just, In Heaven we place a manly trust, That truth and justice will prevail, And every scheme of bondage fail.

Sound, sound, the trump of Fame! Let WASHINGTON'S great name Ring through the world with loud applause, Ring through the world with loud applause; Let every clime to Freedom dear, Listen with a joyful ear. With equal skill, and Godlike power, He govern'd in the fearful hour Of horrid war; or guides with ease, The happier times of honest peace.

Behold the chief who now commands, Once more to serve his country stands, The rock on which the storm will beat; The rock on which the storm will beat. But, arm'd in virtue firm and true, His hopes are fix'd on Heaven and you. When hope was sinking in dismay, And glooms obscured Columbia's day, His steady mind, from changes free, Resolved on death or liberty.

--_Joseph Hopkinson._

Joseph Hopkinson, like Francis Scott Key, the author of _The Star-Spangled Banner_, was also a lawyer. He commenced the practice of law in Easton, Pennsylvania, but soon removed to Philadelphia, where he acquired high distinction at the bar. He was four years a member of Congress, and was afterward appointed judge of the United States District Court, an office held by his grandfather under the British Crown before the Revolutionary War, and to which his father had been chosen on the organization of the United States Judiciary in 1789. He retained this office until his death in 1842.

Mr. Hopkinson was still a young man, only twenty-eight years of age, when he wrote the song which will make his name honored as long as American liberty is remembered. It was in the summer of 1798, when a war with France was thought to be inevitable. Congress was in session in Philadelphia, discussing the advisability of a declaration of war, and many acts of hostility had actually occurred. England and France were at war already, and the people of the United States were divided into factions for the one side or the other. One party argued that policy and duty required Americans to take part with republican France; the other section urged the wisdom of connecting ourselves with England, under the belief that she was the great conservator of modern civilization, and that her triumph meant the rule of good principles and safe government. Both belligerents had been careless of our rights, and seemed to be forcing us from the just and wise policy of Washington, which was to maintain a strict and impartial neutrality between them. The prospect of a rupture with France was exceedingly offensive to that portion of the people who hoped for her success, and the violence of party spirit ran to the highest extreme.