Act V.
Footnote 656:
Zell, _Ferienschriften_, II. 99 ff., “Ueber die Volkslieder der alten Römer,” is still the best piece of information on the subject, although it was published in 1829.
Footnote 657:
In carrying loads, in cutting, and the like tasks, the Lhoosai in southeast India “clear the lungs with a continuous _hau! hau!_ _uttered in measured time by all_; without making this sound they say they would be unable to work.” Lewin quoted by Böckel, p. lx.
Footnote 658:
_Arbeit u. Rhythmus_, pp. 30 ff. This chapter, quoted above, pp. 107 ff., gives ample references for the subject.
Footnote 659:
_Ehstnische Volkslieder_, 1850, p. 1.
Footnote 660:
_Deutsche Volkskunde_, 1898, pp. 331 f.
Footnote 661:
Work quoted, p. cxxiii. The spinning-room for winter, and in summer the _rundgänge_, when youths and maidens arm in arm go by long rows singing songs to their march, are still a refuge for actual poetry of the people. But, as he says, it is dying fast.
Footnote 662:
Böckel, work quoted, p. clii, notes that the three classes who spread and sing songs of the folk are women, soldiers, shepherds. Blind minstrels, of course, are to be added for the chanting and reciting guild, and in Russia the tailors. But women, soldiers, and shepherds best keep the old clan instincts.
Footnote 663:
Laura Alexandrine Smith, _Music of the Waters_, London, 1888; John Ashton, _Real Sailor Songs_, London, 1891. Boatmen’s songs changing or dying out: Bücher, pp. 128 f. Bücher’s little group of boatmen’s songs, pp. 118 ff., 66 ff., is far more valuable than these long and random collections. See his comments, pp. 68 ff. For example, the boat-song of North American Indians, taken from Baker, is foolishness to the Greeks who make collections for popular use, but is full of instruction for the student of poetry; it runs, without the musical notes:—
Ah yah, ah yah, ah ya ya ya, Ah ya ya ya, ah ya ya ya, Ya ya ya ya ya ya.
Footnote 664:
Böckel, p. lx. Roman oarsmen had not only the _celeusma_ to time their strokes, but often a song of their own: Zell, II. 208.
Footnote 665:
Ed. Murray, E. E. T. S., pp. 40 ff.
Footnote 666:
Bücher, p. 68.
Footnote 667:
Wallaschek, pp. 41, 47. See, too, p. 166: “Mr. Reade observed that his people”—Africans—“always began to sing when he compelled them to overcome their natural laziness and to continue rowing.”
Footnote 668:
Chappell, _Pop. Music Olden Time_, pp. 482, 783; Skelton, _Bowge of Court_.
Footnote 669:
“Cantilenam his verbis Anglice composuit;” see _Historia Eliensis_, II. 27, in Gale, _Hist. Script._, I. 505; it gives the account here quoted, then the verses, adding “et caetera, quae sequuntur, _quae usque hodie in choris publice cantantur_.” ...
Footnote 670:
_Danmarks Gamle Folkeviser_, III. x f.; _Nordboernes Aandsliv_, II. 408.
Footnote 671:
Refrains of rowing are found in many Danish ballads, mostly irrelevant, as these refrains so often are, but unmistakable. See Steenstrup, _Vore Folkeviser_, p. 77, for several examples.
Footnote 672:
In Wright-Halliwell, _Reliquiae Antiquae_, I. 240: it belongs to the fourteenth century. Some rimes for St. Clement’s day are printed by G. F. Northall, _English Folk-Rhymes_, 1892, mostly begging verses (pp. 222 ff.): although there is a ceremony at Woolwich connected with blacksmiths, song, however, yielding to formal speech.
Footnote 673:
23 November. See Hampson, _Medii Aevi Kalendarium_, I. 61; and Brand-Ellis, _Antiquities_, same date. The Germanic year has been recently studied by Dr. A. Tille, _Yule and Christmas_, London, 1899; he corrects in some particulars the current ideas set forth by Weinhold, according to which the seasons were regulated by natural signs,—solstice and the like. Dr. Tille contends that this was rather done by economic conditions. Before the German had a settled agricultural life, Michaelmas superseded Martinmas, the oldest Germanic festival. Actual harvest festivals are comparatively late. While Dr. Tille’s idea of borrowing and of Christian influence goes entirely too far, his emphasis on economic conditions must be noted and approved.
Footnote 674:
_Great Expectations_, Chap. XII.
Footnote 675:
Or rather Mr. J. Cocke; see note to _Works_, ed. Rimbault, p. 288, and p. 89. See also the tinker as “master of music” and chief singer of catches, in Chappell, pp. 187. 353.
Footnote 676:
Among the Romans, too; see Tibullus, Eleg. II. 1:—
Atque aliqua assiduae textis operata Minervae Cantat, et applauso tela sonat latere.
Footnote 677:
See letter in _Evening Post_, quoted above, p. 168; Böckel, work quoted; and the preface written by “Carmen Sylva” for the Countess Martinengo’s _Bard of the Dimbovitzka_, London, 1892.
Footnote 678:
It is almost superfluous to mention Gretchen and the recurrent echo of her wheel in the stanza _Meine Ruh’ ist hin_. But this, of course, is art.
Footnote 679:
A version of “The Cruel Brother” (Child, I. 147), from Forfarshire, has along with the common refrain two lines at the end of the stanza which partly echo the refrain of labour:—
Sing Annet, and Marret, and fair Maisrie, An’ the dew hangs i’ the wood, gay ladie.
Footnote 680:
Northall, _English Folk-Rhymes_, p. 322. See the interesting notes from Southey’s _Doctor_, xxiv, about Betty Yewdale and the song she and her sister had to sing while learning to knit socks. The song kept time with the work, _and had to bring in the names of all the folk in the dale_. See on cumulative song above, p. 200.
Footnote 681:
Dyer, _British Popular Customs_, p. 42.
Footnote 682:
_Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs_, London, 1857, pp. 187 f. Greenside is near Manchester.
Footnote 683:
_Voceri_, pp. 244 f., with a specimen song taken from Viale.
Footnote 684:
E. H. Meyer, _Volkskunde_, p. 236.
Footnote 685:
_Poes. Pop. Gasc._, II. 224 ff. See his references for this interesting subject.
Footnote 686:
Coussemaker in his section of songs for the dance, work quoted, pp. 338 f., gives a “ronde” sung during the fête at Bailleul:—
Now the salad must be sowed, Now the salad must be sowed, Salad, salad, salad, salad, salad, Now the salad must be sowed.
Now the salad must be cut,—
then plucked, washed, dried, and so on. The list of these songs could be extended indefinitely; the fact that this of the salad is sung at a quite alien festivity simply proves the vogue of the thing. One must refer, however, to the dances of Catalonian peasants and children, the songs for which are little more than repetition and refrain descriptive of country toil, as quoted by Wolf, pp. 34 f., of his _Proben Portugiesischer und Catalanischer Volksromanzen_, Wien, 1856.
Footnote 687:
Ed. 1825, IX. 41. The phrase “to town” at which our editor boggles, ignorant of its real meaning, is a further proof of the traditional character of this song.
Footnote 688:
“Is your throat clear for _hooky hooky_?” asks Harvest; and the reapers sing the refrain again. Later he speaks of weeping out “a lamentable _hooky hooky_.” Drake connected _hooky_ with _hockey_, the hock or harvest cart sung by Herrick. But perhaps “hooky” is to be kept without any such change. Leyden, see _Complaynte of Scotland_, p. xciii, speaking of ring dances at the _kirn_ or feast of cutting down the grain, says that reapers who first finished the work danced on an eminence, in view of other reapers, and began the dance “with three loud shouts of triumph, and _thrice tossing up their hooks in the air_.” Cf. the Oxford Dict., s.v. _hook_, the common word for reaping scythe or sickle from Anglo-Saxon down.
Footnote 689:
In his _Neydhardt mit dem Feyhel_, 1562. See Uhland, _Volkslieder_, I. 58, and notes, _Schriften_, III. 24. Böhme follows the song back to the fourteenth century. In the play it is sung by the duchess and repeated by the chorus, as in popular dances of the day.
Footnote 690:
In his edition of the play for Macmillan’s _English Comedies_.
Footnote 691:
The reapers now appear “with women in their hands.”
Footnote 692:
Described to the writer by a Japanese gentleman.
Footnote 693:
Bücher, p. 49.
Footnote 694:
Twelve centuries before Christ, Chinese women gathered plantain with a song that is particularly rich in repetition and refrain; Bücher quotes the translation of Strauss, of which a stanza runs thus:—
Pflücket, pflücket Wegerich, _Eija zu und pflücket ihn_! Pflücket, pflücket Wegerich, _Eija zu, ihr rücket ihn_.
The whole song minutely follows the process of picking.
Footnote 695:
Grimm, _Mythologies_,⁴ pp. 1036 f. He notes the frequency of this shouting, leaping, and singing at the planting of crops. It all goes back, of course, to communal rites.
Footnote 696:
E. H. Meyer, _Volkskunde_, p. 225.
Footnote 697:
Grein-Wülker, _Bibliothek_, I. 312 ff. To describe the whole ceremony in this case as original, is highly absurd.
Footnote 698:
Zell, _Ferienschriften_, II. 118, 212; see Plin. _Nat. Hist._, XXVIII. 2: “qui fruges excantasset.” Standard works for the investigation of these relics of ancient cult are Mannhardt, _Wald-und Feldkulte_, 2 vols., 1875-1877; the same author’s _Mythologische Forschungen_, already quoted; Pfannenschmid, _Germanische Erntefeste_, Hannover, 1878; and, pioneer of them all, Tylor’s admirable work on _Primitive Culture_. For children’s games, as last refuge of many of these rites, see F. M. Böhme, _Deutsches Kinderlied u. Kinderspiel_, Leipzig, 1897, which could be enlarged by a judicious use of Firmenich, _Germaniens Völkerstimmen_, in four volumes. Böhme says the _Ringelreihen_ of these games are “uralte Reste chorischer Aufführungen bei den Jahres-und Gottesfesten unserer heidnischen Vorfahren,” and gives cases which support his statement. Processional songs of the old cult survive in the _Ansingelieder_, _Umzugslieder_, and so forth, of the children, now mainly begging-rimes like the wren-song in Ireland and England, parallel to the swallow-song in Rhodes. Again, children have games which imitate sounds and movements of labour; Böhme gives a few. See also G. F. Northall, _English Folk-Rhymes_, pp. 360 ff. Halliwell, of course, includes some of these in his nursery-rimes. See also W. W. Newell, _Games and Songs of American Children_, N. Y., 1883. These songs of the children would lead us too far a-field, and we shall cling to the scanty survivals of the songs and refrains of labour itself.
Footnote 699:
Grein-Wülker, I. 323 f., especially version C.
Footnote 700:
Cattle.
Footnote 701:
Halliwell, _Nursery-Rhymes_, p. 129.
Footnote 702:
Mannhardt, _Mythol. Forsch._, pp. 228 ff., J. Grimm, _Kl. Schr._, VII. 229, in a paper on the “Nothhalm,” with account of harvest rites.
Footnote 703:
This child of destiny, asleep on a sheaf of grain, is wafted to the kingless land in a boat,—the Lohengrin parallel. For all the enticing material see Grimm, _Mythologie_,⁴ III. 399 ff.; Müllenhoff, in _Zeitschr. f. deutsch. Alth._, VII. 410 ff., and in his _Beowulf_, pp. 5 ff., with strongly established probability that the myth celebrates the beginnings of agriculture among Germans by the North and Baltic seas.]
Footnote 704:
Mannhardt, _Myth. Forsch._, pp. 15 ff. That the Greeks sang at reaping, as at planting (Smythe, _Melic Poets_, p. 498, girls sing a sowers’ song), is beyond question. See Mannhardt’s note and references, as above, p. 2. He remarks that the Lityerses song in Theocritus (Id. X.) is an imitation of a real Greek folksong of labour, not, however, of the original Lityerses. Mr. Lang notes the resemblance of this situation to the famous scene in Molière’s _Misanthrope_.
Footnote 705:
Work quoted, p. 17. See his _Wald-u. Feldkulte_, p. 262.
Footnote 706:
That the Romans had these refrains of harvest and vintage, as well as their Fescennine flytings and improvised satire, is beyond dispute (Zell, II. 122 ff.), but nothing of it all has come down to us. Fortune has been kinder with regard to the songs and refrains sung in processions about the Roman field.
Footnote 707:
Chappell, II. 580. See his quotation from Tusser. Even here, in the Eastern states of America, middle-aged men have watched the passing of the “wealthy farmer,” who now exists only in newspapers, and even there is kept at long range,—“of Indiana,” “of Texas.” Yet we knew him in our boyhood. The communal farmer occurs in old English novels, and in some new ones; but he is passing rapidly into tradition. See a paper on “England’s Peasantry,” by the Rev. Dr. Jessopp, in the _Nineteenth Century and After_, January, 1901; he tells of the communal conditions which once prevailed, of the change to the present, and is “inclined to doubt seriously whether before another century has ended there will be any such thing as an agricultural labourer to know.”
Footnote 708:
On the modern corruption of old refrains, see Pfannenschmid, pp. 207 ff., 468 ff.
Footnote 709:
Compare the song sung on this occasion in Bavaria as the peasants dance about the fire and leap over it for good luck (Firmenich, II. 703):—
Haliga Sankt Veit, Schick uns a Scheit; Haliga Sankt Wendl, Schick uns an Bengl; Haliga Sankt Florio, Kent uns des Fuiar O! _Kent_ = kindle.
Footnote 710:
Mannhardt, _M. F._, pp. 32 fl., 51.
Footnote 711:
Quoted by Reifferscheid, _Westf. Volksl._, Nos. 49, 50, 51. See the note, p. 188, and variants. The habit is widespread through Westphalia and the Rhinelands. A refrain printed by Firmenich, _German. Völkerstimmen_, III. 175, keeps time with the work (near Iserlohn):—
Dai Klinge dai klank, Dai Hüppe dai sprank, Wuol üöwer de Bank, Wuol niäwen den Pal.
Footnote 712:
Aubrey, _Remains of Gentilisme_. Folk-Lore Soc., IV. (1881), pp. 81 f., under “Rymers.” On p. 169 he says, “when I was a boy, every gentleman almost kept a harper; and some of them could versifie.”
Footnote 713:
Wallaschek, p. 179.
Footnote 714:
He too heard a girl “singing an Erse song,” as she span; and he had his jest, “I warrant you, one of the songs of Ossian.” Hill’s Boswell, V. 133 f.
Footnote 715:
Before this he had been in a boat and heard one Malcolm sing “an Erse song, the chorus of which was ‘Hatyin foam foam eri,’ _with words of his own_.... The boatmen and Mr. M’Queen chorused, and all went well.” _Ibid._, V. 185.
Footnote 716:
_A Journey to the Western Islands_, Dublin, 1775, p. 97.
Footnote 717:
The doctor complaining that he never could get an Erse song explained, was told “the chorus was generally unmeaning,” which, of course, would point to a predominance of the refrain; Johnson himself slyly quoted an unintelligible refrain from an old English ballad. Hill’s Boswell, V. 274.
Footnote 718:
V. 203; Lockhart’s _Life of Scott_, IV. 307. Pennant tells the same story in his _Tour in Scotland_.
Footnote 719:
See above, p. 281, quotation from Leyden. See also for Scottish custom, Chambers, _Book of Days_, II. 376 ff.
Footnote 720:
Note to Passus, IX. 104, ed. of _Piers Plowman_, version C.
Footnote 721:
Above, p. 286.
Footnote 722:
E. H. Meyer, p. 133.
Footnote 723:
Kurschat, _Litth. Gram._, p. 445, quoted by Böckel, p. cxx.
Footnote 724:
Pfannenschmid, p. 392. The song, “Die Ernt’ ist da, es winkt der Halm,” is clearly an outgrowth of the older refrain. See also p. 92. An actual refrain at the work is printed by Firmenich, III. 631:—
Ei Hober, Hober, zeitige Hober! Ei Mädl, kom und schneid den Hober! Ei dirre Hober, dirre Hober! Ei Knechtl, kom und benn den Hober!
Footnote 725:
_Étude_, pp. 24 f.
Footnote 726:
In this dying of communal song, its heart, the refrain, beats strong to the end, despite the other failing powers. See Beaurepaire’s valuable testimony to this fact, _Étude_, pp. 39 ff., 48 f. “Deux lignes au plus composent le couplet. Le refrain est vraiment la partie importante, il supplie à la pauvreté ou à l’absence de la rime.... Au reste, il ne faudrait pas s’y tromper, la longueur du refrain, et son retour continuel, que nous serions tenté de considerer comme un défaut, forme précisement un des plus sûrs moyens du succès de la Chanson de Filasse. Elle exige, en effet, peu d’efforts de mémoire, elle permet à tous les laboureurs de prendre part fréquemment au chant; et avec son allure monotone, elle s’adapte merveilleusement à la marche lente et reguliere de travaux de la campagne. Aussi croyons-nous que c’est en partie à la predominance du refrain, que la chanson cuellissoire doit sa vogue et sa popularité.” He gives another song with a refrain of planting.
Footnote 727:
Pfannenschmid (on the cries and songs) pp. 404 ff.; Mannhardt, _M. F._, pp. 167 ff., for the religious significance; J. Grimm, _Kl. Schr._, VII. 225 f.; _Book of Days_, II. 377 f. Other instances are presently to be recounted.
Footnote 728:
Firmenich, IV. (_Anhang_), 687. A longer version on p. 693. Keriole = _Kyrie eleison_,—substituted for an older heathen cry.
Footnote 729:
See Mannhardt’s chapter on “Demeter,” work quoted; also pp. 20 ff.
Footnote 730:
For all this English material, see Brand-Ellis, “Harvest Home,” in the _Antiquities_.
Footnote 731:
Chappell, I. 120.
Footnote 732:
_Ibid._, II. 745, one version. See for variants, and similar songs, J. H. Dixon, _Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England_, _e.g._ pp. 175 ff., London, Percy Soc., 1846; Broadwood and Maitland, _English Country Songs_, pp. 150 ff., London, 1893.
Footnote 733:
In the fifth act of Dryden’s opera, _King Arthur_, is a harvest-song with this chorus:—
Come, boys, come! Come, boys, come! And merrily roar out Harvest Home!
and the directions are that the actors shall sing this as they dance, a good communal trait. The words of this song grew popular, were varied, and became a ballad; it is in order for some one to show that harvest-home songs, like other popular verse, come from operas, plays, concerts, and the like.
Footnote 734:
Perhaps “we end,” as Brand suggests; but perhaps and probably not. At another place in Devonshire they cry “the knack,” and a rime is repeated:—
Well cut, well bound, Well shocked, well saved from the ground.
Footnote 735:
_Five Hundred Points of Husbandry_, Eng. Dial. Soc., 1878, p. 126, under August. Hentzner noted the shouting of the people _in the cart_. See Furnivall’s Harrison, _Descrip. Eng._, p. lxxxiv. A curious custom of the largess-shilling in Suffolk is described by Major Moor, note to Tusser, p. 294. The reapers answer their leader’s “Holla Lar! Holla Lar! Holla Lar!—jees,” with “o-o-o-o-,” head inclined, and then, throwing the head up, vociferate “a-a-a-ah.” This is thrice done by harvesters for a shilling.
Footnote 736:
Brand-Ellis, “Twelfth Day.”
Footnote 737:
See Uhland, _Kl. Schr._, III. 389 f., and note, with references, 467 f., for the “bornfart,” “bronnefart,” with “dantzen, rennen, springen, jagen,” closely connected with the May feasts. On the whole subject of processions, see Pfannenschmid’s second chapter along with his notes, pp. 342 ff.
Footnote 738:
_Georg._, I. 343 ff.
Footnote 739:
Translation of J. Rhoades. The last line—‘det motus incompositos et carmina dicat’—is suggestive: “spontaneous gestures and steps, with song,” emphasize a purely communal dance as compared with the ritual of the Brothers. Tibullus, by the way, has the Lares, not Ceres, in mind for the dance and song of his rustics: _Eleg._, I. 1, 23 f.
Agna cadet vobis, quam circum rustica pubes Clamet: _Io! Messes et bona vina date!_
Footnote 740:
A “queen,” accompanied by a guard of brothers and young folk generally, goes on Whitsuntide in Servia from farm to farm; at each she stops and her companions form a circle (_kolo_) and sing their songs. Each line is thrice repeated, and then follows the refrain _Leljo!_ Then the dancers hold one another by the belt and dance in a half-circle, led by an exarch. Between the songs any ready young man cries out a lusty phrase or two, or makes a verse, after the fashion of the German _schnaderhüpfl_. See A. W. Grube, _Deutsche Volkslieder_, Iserlohn, 1866, pp. 132 f.
Footnote 741:
_Germania_, xl.
Footnote 742:
The procession of the Phrygian goddess, the _magna deum mater materque ferarum et nostri genetrix_, described by Lucretius in often-quoted lines, _Rer. Nat._, II. 598 ff., with its Dionysian features, cannot be discussed here; Germanic and modern examples must suffice.
Footnote 743:
It is a commonplace in sociology that agricultural communities worship female deities as representatives of fertility, while the god like Tiw or Woden springs from warlike and nomadic conditions.
Footnote 744:
For example, the rain-song in Servia, an interesting ceremony, full of cries and with a refrain sung by dancing maidens. The _dodola_, a girl otherwise naked, but entirely covered with grass, weeds, and flowers, goes with a retinue of maidens from house to house; before each house the girls form a dancing ring with the _dodola_ in the middle. The woman of the house pours water over the _dodola_, while she dances and turns about; the other maidens now sing the song for rain, each line ending with the refrain, _oj dodo oj dodo le!_ See Grimm, _Mythologie_⁴, p. 494. Similar customs prevail in Greece; the song is here full of repetitions. See Grimm, _Kl. Schr._, II. 447. In the _Athenæum_, No. 2857 (1882), G. L. Gomme has some interesting notes on a survival of these processional rites.
Footnote 745:
E. H. Meyer, p. 223.
Footnote 746:
Grimm, _Mythol._,⁴ I. 52.
Footnote 747:
References _ibid._, I. 214 ff., with similar cases. See also III. 86 f.
Footnote 748:
William of Malmesbury tells a story to show that the church could do better than condemn. In 1012 fifteen young men and women were dancing and singing in a churchyard and disturbed Robert the priest. He prayed at them, and for a whole year they had to dance and sing without ceasing until they sank to the middle in the earth.
Footnote 749:
Gregor. M. _Dial._, III. 28, quoted by W. Müller, _Geschichte und System der altdeutschen Religion_, Göttingen, 1844, pp. 74 f. The first book of this excellent treatise is even now the best summary of old Germanic rites,—clear, compact, and with all necessary references. For the boar’s head and the famous Latin song, at Oxford, see Grimm, _Mythol._⁴, p. 178; for the vows, Grimm, _Rechtsalterthümer_, pp. 900 f.
Footnote 750:
From Du Cange, s.v. _Kalendae_. See too Hampson, _Med. Æv. Kal._, I. 140 ff.
Footnote 751:
Broadwood and Maitland, p. 30. Survivals of procession song (_Ansingelieder_) are printed by Böhme, _Kinderlied_, 331 ff. The refrain has some body in a song “’t Godsdeel of den Rommelpot,” printed by Coussemaker, _Chants Pop. des Flamands_, p. 95, and also found in different parts of Germany. The begging songs for Martinmas Eve, found in Flanders, are widespread in Germany; Firmenich, work quoted, prints a good dozen and more from different places. The steps of dance and march are best heard in his version from Oldenburg, I. 231.
Footnote 752:
Firmenich, I. 281.
Footnote 753:
_Reuzelied_, pp. 139 ff.:—
Als de groote Klokke luyd De Reuze komt uyt. _Keere u e’s om, de Reuze, de Reuze, Keere u e’s om, Reuzekom_.
That is, “When the big bell sounds, Reuze (giant?) comes out. _Turn back, Reuze, Reuze, turn back, good Reuze._” The text is corrupt, and Reuze is not easy to explain; but one need not appeal with Coussemaker to the Scandinavians to establish the antiquity of this procession and this refrain.
Footnote 754:
Hampson, I. 61.
Footnote 755:
For a good description of wakes, see Brand-Ellis, and Song 27 of Drayton’s _Polyolbion_, where such cheering is recorded of the villages—
That one high hill was heard to tell it to his brother, That instantly again to tell it to some other.
Footnote 756:
Besides T. Wright’s _Songs and Carols_, Percy Soc., 1847, see W. Sandy’s _Christmas Carols, Ancient and Modern_, London, 1833, with a long introduction, and the same editor’s Festive Songs, Percy Soc., 1848. Sandys (_Carols_) gives the cries or refrains of many Christmas songs:—
Nowell, nowell, nowell, nowell,— No—el, el, el, el, el, el, el, el, el, el,— Noel, Noel—
_à moult granz cris_, the familiar refrain in France.
Footnote 757:
_Remaines Gentil._, pp. 9, 21, 23, 26, 31, 36, 40, 161, 180. “Little children,” he says here, “have a custome when it raines to sing or charme away the Raine; thus they all joine in a Chorus, and sing thus, viz.:—
Raine, raine, goe away, Come againe a Saterday.
I have a conceit that this childish custome is of great antiquity.”
Footnote 758:
See the Helstone Furry-Day Song, Bell, _Ancient Poems_, pp. 167 f., with a refrain of some value.
Footnote 759:
Also cross-week and grass-week. See Dyer, _British Popular Customs_, pp. 204 ff., for a sympathetic account of the customs still lingering in England.
Footnote 760:
The standard description of English May-games, of course hostile, is that of Stubbes in his _Anatomie of Abuses_, ed. New Shaks. Soc., p. 149. See also the diatribe in John Northbrooke’s _Treatise wherein Dicing, Dancing ... are Reprooved_. London, 1579. He leans to Chrysostom’s view (that is, Age takes this side against Youth, in the dialogue) that dancing “came firste from the Diuell”, and p. 68ᵇ (only one page of the leaf is numbered) he describes the May.
Footnote 761:
Compare the chorus of the Maypole song in _Actæon and Diana_, in Chappell, I. 126:—
Then to the Maypole come away, For it is now a holiday.
“Trip and go” was “one of the favourite Morris-dances,” and the words seem to have become a proverbial expression. See Chappell, I. 126, 302. It was on the basis of some refrain of this sort that the first part-song in English, the famous Cuckoo Song, was built up. Ten Brink is surely right in giving it a communal origin, though not communal making.
Footnote 762:
“We have brought the summer home,” is the spirit of all the May refrains, as the young folk come back with flowers and boughs. See Brand, “Maypoles.”
Footnote 763:
Still in vogue in some parts of Germany. See E. H. Meyer, p. 256.
Footnote 764:
_Volkslieder_, I. 23. For the whole subject, see Uhland’s _Abhandlung über die deutschen Volkslieder_, pp. 17 ff. Suspicion has been expressed that these flytings are a late echo of the Vergilian eclogue through such a transmitting element as the mediæval _Conflictus Veris et Hiemis_ and the song to the cuckoo:—
Salve, dulce decus cuculus per saecula, salve!
Comparison of the fragments, however, shows this suspicion to be groundless, and it is thoroughly discredited by Uhland, _Kl. Schr._, III. 24. See also Ebert, _Christ. Lat. Lit._, II. 69.
Footnote 765:
_Love’s Labour’s Lost_, V. 2.
Footnote 766:
Ritson, _Ancient Songs_, 3d ed., pp. 113 ff. The text is a sort of dramatic description. See also T. Wright, _Songs and Carols_; and Brand, under “Morris Dancers.” The refrains are unfortunately seldom recorded, but they are the foundation of the little drama.
Footnote 767:
Used as refrain in ballads; see Child, I. 19 f., _e.g._:—
Sing ivy, sing ivy ... Sing holly, go whistle, and ivy ... Sing green bush, holly, and ivy.
Footnote 768:
_Deutsche Volkslieder aus Oberhessen_, p. xi. His list of references is valuable.
Footnote 769:
At a harvest-home at Selborne, 1836, Bell (pp. 46 ff.) heard two countrymen recite a “Dialogue between the Husbandman and the Servingman”; “it was delivered in a sort of chant or recitative,” though the rhythm is good for such doggerel; what suggests the older refrain is that the rime (second and fourth lines of each stanza) has to be either with “husbandman” or with “servingman” throughout. The odd lines have interior rime.
Footnote 770:
See Jeanroy’s chapter, “Le Debat,” in _Origines de la Poésie Lyrique en France_, pp. 45 ff.
Footnote 771:
Böhme, _Kinderlied_, pp. 332 ff. See p. 347.
Footnote 772:
See Firmenich, II. 15, where children in the Palatinate on “Rose-Sunday” go about and sing:—
Ri, ra, ro Der Summertaagk iss do!
See _ibid._, II. 34.
Footnote 773:
Letourneau, _L’Évolution Littéraire_, p. 21.
Footnote 774:
“Choruses are about all the Indians sing. They have probably four or five words, then the chorus. ‘They have brought us a fat dog’; then the chorus goes on for half a minute; then a repetition again of the above words ‘they have brought us a fat dog.’... Tukensha, a rock, or grandfather, is often appealed to in the choruses for aid.” Answer to question about Indian poetry by Rev. Mr. Fletcher, who lived several years with the Winnebago Indians. He says, too, “there are no Indian poets in this country.” Schoolcraft, IV. 71.
Footnote 775:
“Account of the History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations who once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighbouring States,” _Transact. Amer. Philos. Soc._, 1819, pp. 200 ff.
Footnote 776:
Quoted above, p. 255, from _Indian Tribes_, V. 563 f.
Footnote 777:
_Die Korndaemonen_, Berlin, 1868. See also his _Roggenwulf und Roggenhund_, Danzig, 1866.
Footnote 778:
Work quoted, I. 25.
Footnote 779:
_Ibid._, I. 248.
Footnote 780:
_Ibid._, I. 517 ff.; II. 189 f.
Footnote 781:
_Ibid._, I. 525.
Footnote 782:
Jean de Lery, _Histoire_, etc., pp. 268 ff.
Footnote 783:
Opposite p. 274.
Footnote 784:
See above, p. 253.
Footnote 785:
On pp. 25 ff.
Footnote 786:
The name of the brave.
Footnote 787:
One can readily understand that Stevenson heard his islanders sing, in chorus of perhaps a hundred persons, legendary songs about which not two of these singers could agree in their translation. _Letters of R. L. Stevenson_, II. 152.
Footnote 788:
_Lais_, p. 18. Professor Schipper, in his valuable treatise on _Englische Metrik_, I. 326 ff., follows Wolf in this definition; but in both cases the analytic purpose excuses this neglect of the communal origin, and the material presented allows the student to make his own comparisons and supply the neglected considerations.
Footnote 789:
A. W. Grube, _Deutsche Volkslieder_, Iserlohn, 1866, in his sections “Der Kehrreim des Volksliedes,” pp. 1-103, and “Der Kehrreim bei Goethe, Uhland und Rückert,” pp. 187-306, follows Wolf in part, deriving refrains from the church hymns (p. 112), but adds a plea for the antiquity of folksong, which is “von Haus aus Chorgesang” (p. 183). So, too, on p. 125, he seems to view the origin of poetry of the people as a statement of contemporaneous events in one sentence—hence not “invented”—which is sung by the throng. He notes the increased power of the refrain with the preponderance of lyric over epic elements: though he neglects the dance and communal conditions generally. The close connection of Goethe (as in the _Ach neige, Du Schmerzensreiche_) and of Rückert (as in the beautiful repetitions of _Aus der Jugendzeit_) with popular poetry, is admirably treated. See pp. 189 ff., 284 ff.
Footnote 790:
See a note in the author’s _Old English Ballads_, p. lxxxiv.
Footnote 791:
See Chappell, _Popular Music_, I. 222 ff., 34, 264; II. 426, 457.
Footnote 792:
III. 4. See also the Oxford _Dictionary_, s.v. “burden,” with the reference to Shakspere’s _Lucrece_, v. 1133.
Footnote 793:
III. 1.
Footnote 794:
_English Rhythms_, II. 290.
Footnote 795:
Child, I. 113.
Footnote 796:
_Nordboernes Aandsliv_, II. 434 ff.; but this evolution is stoutly denied by Steenstrup, _Vore Folkeviser_, pp. 120 ff., in a study of the refrain to be considered below.
Footnote 797:
Child, I. 403: printed after the sixth stanza, and so till the eleventh, when the chorus is slightly changed to suit the story, and kept so to the end. For the strophic refrain or chorus and its popularity in Old French, see Schipper, I. 328.
Footnote 798:
Child, I. 209, 214.
Footnote 799:
_Ibid._, I. 126 ff., in F., O. See H.
Footnote 800:
_Studies in the English Ballad Refrain, with a Collection of Ballad and Early Song Refrains._ Thesis presented by John Henry Boynton in candidacy for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English, May 1, 1897. In 3 vols., Ms., Harvard University Library. The material is excellently put together; but the genetic and historical elements are not sufficiently brought out. The comparative work is good, and as a study of actual refrains this dissertation is of distinct value. The burden-stem is discussed in section V., pp. 184 ff.
Footnote 801:
_Chronik_, ed. Dahlmann, I. 176 f. See also II. 559 ff.
Footnote 802:
Chappell quoted by Child, _Ballads_, I. 7. “I must avow myself,” says Professor Child, “to be very much in the dark as to the exact relation of stem and burden.” See also _Ballads_, II. 204, first note.
Footnote 803:
This technical side of the case is discussed by Valentin, _Studien über die schwedischen Volksmelodien_, pp. 9 f.
Footnote 804:
_Les Origines de la Poésie Lyrique en France au Moyen Age_, Paris, 1889, pp. 102 ff. (see note 2, p. 111), and 387 ff. On the etymology of _refrain_, see pp. 103 f.
Footnote 805:
_Ibid._, p. 113. Jeanroy will not accept the view of Wackernagel and Bartsch that the refrains preserved in old French lyric poetry are actual “popular” songs, or fragments of them; but he willingly accepts the theory that all refrains were once of a communal kind. These, he thinks, are hopelessly lost. See pp. 115 ff. A few older refrains can be found in foreign lyric which imitated the French; pp. 177 ff.
Footnote 806:
_Ibid._, p. 396, note 1. Or, as in old Portuguese song, copied from the popular manner, one part of the dancers sang one verse, and another part, like strophe and antistrophe, repeated the verse with a slight change, usually in the final word which rimes with the other final word. The connection of this with the _contrasto_ of lover and sweetheart, imitated in the dance, of debate, flyting, _tenso_, and the like, would lead too far afield. See p. 207, and below, p. 325.
Footnote 807:
_Ibid._, p. 405. This chapter, where Jeanroy traces the growth of artificial forms, like the rondel and so on, out of purely popular refrain and verse, is of distinct value to the student of communal poetry. It completely refutes the claim of superficial criticism, common enough of late, that ballad and folksong are merely dregs of an older art, and that some pretty comparison, say a tramp in an old dress-coat, solves the communal problem. As jaunty and insufferable a piece of comment as can be found anywhere in print is Mr. Gregory Smith’s chapter on “The Problem of the Ballads and Popular Songs” in his _Transition Period_, pp. 180 ff.
Footnote 808:
See above, p. 174. The refrain is very clearly an actual cry at the dance.
Footnote 809:
Quoted by Ritson, _Anc. Songs_³, p. xxxv.
Footnote 810:
Difference.
Footnote 811:
It is useless to pile up references; any collection has such refrains in plenty. This “springewir den reigen” (_Carmina Burana_, ed. Schmeller, p. 178), however, like Neidhart’s dance-songs, although it goes with the welcome to May, is conventional already and artistic.
Footnote 812:
Chambers, _Popular Rhymes of Scotland_, pp. 132 ff. “Another form of this game is _only a kind of dance_,” says the editor, without italics, “in which the girls first join hands in a circle and sing while moving round to the tune of Nancy Dawson:—
Here we go round the mulberry-bush,
and so on. Then:—
This is the way the ladies walk ... This is the way they wash the clothes ...
with refrain, or chorus, as before, and imitative actions.”
Footnote 813:
Lucian, in his treatise on the dance, is no authority for primitive dancing and refrain; but it is noteworthy that he gives such an exhortation as a kind of refrain. “The song that they sing as they dance,” he says of the Lacedæmonians, § 11, “is an invitation to Venus and the loves.... One of these songs is a lesson in dancing (!): ‘On,’ they sing, ‘young people, stretch your legs and dance your best.’”
Footnote 814:
Coussemaker, I. 328; Firmenich, I. 380, IV. 679.
Footnote 815:
In the other version “nonnetje,” “nönneke,” little nun.
Footnote 816:
Bujeaud, _Chants et Chansons ... de l’ouest_, I. 88, from Poitou; reprinted by Crane, _Chansons Populaires_, pp. 87 ff. See a similar song, Crane, pp. 162 ff.; many more could be instanced, and some have been already named.
Footnote 817:
Waitz, _Anthropologie_, VI. 606.
Footnote 818:
_Vore Folkeviser_, pp. 75-112, “Omkvaedet.” Geijer denied that the refrain is necessary to a ballad, but Steenstrup’s argument is convincing; out of 502 Scandinavian ballads which he examined, not more than 20 lacked a refrain. The ballads in Child’s collection point the same way, at least for the older and shorter ballads; the _Gest_, of course, and others of that sort, as well as broadside copies, have passed from the lyrical stage. But even these must go back to an earlier song with a refrain. Of the two-line ballads, the older form, there are 31, and of these only 7 lack the refrain in their present form. Of the 305 ballads in the collection, 106 in at least one version show evidence of refrain or chorus,—more than a third; while of some 1250 versions in all, about 300 have the refrain. This count was made very carefully by Mr. C. H. Carter, of Haverford College. Of course, Wolf had long since proved that the refrain is characteristic of all early poetry in the vernacular, and played a leading part in popular verse everywhere, from its first collection in the fifteenth century down to the present time. See his _Lais_, pp. 27, 191.
Footnote 819:
“Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft,” _Schriften_, III., pp. 87, 89. See also Ribot, _Psychology of the Emotions_, p. 334, who calls dancing the “primordial art,” and shows that here is the transition from mere movement to æsthetic activity.
Footnote 820:
_Geschichte des Tanzes_, p. 4. This is the best treatise on the subject, though mainly confined to Germany. _A History of Dancing from the Earliest Ages ... from the French of Gaston Vuillier, with a Sketch of Dancing in England_, by Joseph Grego, London, 1898, is of scant use for the student of origins and development. Dancing “was probably unknown to the earliest ages of humanity,” a bold assertion, is followed by another, that “it is certain that dancing was born with man.” Information of value can be found, however, on special topics; _e.g._ on the _branle_, p. 100, and its connection with children’s games.
Footnote 821:
_Sociology_, II. 123.
Footnote 822:
See also Yrjö Hirn, _Förstudier_, pp. 89 f. Dismissing exceptions, he declares that “dancing in its widest sense is as universal as laughing and weeping.”
Footnote 823:
No dancing in Iceland, says Kerguelen, who visited there in 1767. See Pinkerton, _Voyages and Travels_, I. 751. Volumes of proof could be furnished for refuting this light-hearted assertion.
Footnote 824:
See Bastian, “Masken und Maskereien,” _Zeitschr. f. Völkerpsych._, XIV. 347.
Footnote 825:
_Anthropologie der Naturvölker_, VI. 78 ff.
Footnote 826:
Wallaschek, p. 189.
Footnote 827:
Letourneau, p. 28.
Footnote 828:
Work quoted, pp. 95 ff. He refers to Hartshorne, “The Weddas,” _Indian Antiquary_, VIII. 316 f.; E. Tennent, _Ceylon_, II. 437 ff.; and E. Schmidt, _Globus_, LXV. 15 f.
Footnote 829:
See above, p. 95. It is interesting, however, particularly in connection with the idea of rhythm as the chief factor in the social process, that these Veddahs live mainly in pairs; “except on some extraordinary occasion they never assemble together,” and this dance is evidently their chief means to express a social union. See Bastian, _Der Völkergedanke_ ..., p. 72.
Footnote 830:
See also the Brazilian dances noted by Lery, above, p. 312.
Footnote 831:
_Béowulf_, 631 ff., 2631 ff. The _béot_ is the same thing; _Battle of Maldon_, 213.
Footnote 832:
Pinkerton, _Voyages and Travels_, London, 1808 ff., XI. 535, 543, 648.
Footnote 833:
Pinkerton, _Voyages and Travels_, pp. 652, 723.
Footnote 834:
_Ibid._, p. 667; no italics in the original. So, p. 654, twenty young women dance to their own singing, and in many other cases; the fact is beyond dispute. For a dance of more complicated character, but with chorus and refrain, see pp. 678 f.
Footnote 835:
_Three Years’ Travel_, etc., Phila., 1796; the travels were in 1766-1768. See pp. 171 ff., 220.
Footnote 836:
See Lescarbot, _Histoire de la Nouvelle France_, Paris, 1609, pp. 317 ff., an account of the tribal dances of the Algonquins in honour of a victory, with interesting particulars. So, too, pp. 691 ff., another account, with a dance where they “do nothing but sing _Hé_ or _Het_! like a man cutting wood, with a movement of the arm; and they dance a ‘round’ without holding one another or stirring from one place, beating their feet upon the earth.” So, says Lescarbot, they make fires and jump through them, like our French peasants on the eve of St. John, who shout and dance the whole night. His fifteenth chapter, pp. 765 ff., is on _Danses el Chansons_, and accents the dance after a feast. Here, too, he says, “après la panse vient la danse.” Savages, he says, always sing to their dancing.
Footnote 837:
It is unfortunately not superfluous to suggest that the dances described by Homer are anything but primitive, though they retain some primitive traits. The dance pictured on the shield of Achilles (_Il._ XVIII.), youths dancing and fair maids, hand in hand, is a _ronde_, to be sure, in form, but a society affair as well, with full dress, complicated figures, and a “divine minstrel” for the music. However, the vintage dance to the Linos song, described in the preceding verses, holds, like our harvest refrains, an older fashion.
Footnote 838:
Ten Broeck, in Schoolcraft, IV. 84.
Footnote 839:
Clavigero, _History of Mexico_, trans. Cullen, London, 1787, I. 399 f., a description of the great public dances.
Footnote 840:
_Schoole of Abuse_, p. 34.
Footnote 841:
When M. Gaston Paris, _Les Origines de la Poésie Lyrique en France au Moyen Age_, p. 42, says he has found no dance among the old Romans except the professional dance, he overlooks the fact that this rustic dance in procession about the fields is proof of similar dances for pleasure. It is no professional affair which Vergil has in mind: _det motus incompositos et carmina dicat_. Surely the dances were not danced by slaves.
Footnote 842:
Described by Mr. Arthur Symons in _Harper’s Monthly Magazine_, March, 1901, p. 503.
Footnote 843:
Pfannenschmid, _Germ. Erntef._, p. 400.
Footnote 844:
See above, p. 301.
Footnote 845:
See the suggestive treatment of this subject by Posnett, _Comparative Literature_, pp. 117 ff., with his references to Réville and Burnouf.
Footnote 846:
Silius Italicus, naming the troops which Hannibal led out of winter quarters, comes to the Gallician contingent, and describes their youth—
barbara nunc patriis ululantem carmina linguis, nunc, pedis alterno percussa verbere terra, ad numerum resonas gaudentem plaudere caetras.
Lemaire (_Bib. Class. Lat._, Sil. Ital. _Punic._, III. 345 ff.), explains this as a heroic ballad which the soldiers sing, as they dance and strike their shields, when going into battle. He refers to the classical passages for this as well as for the Pyrrhic dance; but see note at the end of this chapter. The perhaps similar custom of the Germans, noted by Tacitus, is treated in a masterly way by Müllenhoff. See the next note but one.
Footnote 847:
Pantomime, as early form of dance leading to poetry and drama, was noted by Adam Smith, _Essays_, p. 151. For older literature, see Blankenburg, _Zusätze_, I. 153 ff. Erotic dances were exaggerated by Scherer into the protoplasm of all poetry, _Poetik_, pp. 83, 114; and are more moderately treated by Hirn, _Förstudier_, pp. 88 ff., and Grosse, _Anf. d. Kunst_, pp. 21 ff. It is a developed art, of course, that Lucian has in mind in his treatise on the dance. See, however, Lucian, §§ 36, 63, 65.
Footnote 848:
Manley, _Specimens of the Pre-Shaksperian Drama_, I. 296 ff., from the Folk-Lore Journal, VII. 338 ff. The date of the play is 1779. For the Germanic sword-dance, see Müllenhoff, _Festgabe für G. Homeyer_, “Ueber den Schwerttanz,” p. 117. A bibliography of this subject is printed in the _Zeitschr. f. Völkerpsychol._, etc., XIX. 204, 416; especially see p. 223; and other references may be added from Paul’s _Grundriss_, II. i. 835, for the German. For the sword-dance in Shetland noted by Scott, see Lockhart’s _Life_, ed. 1837, III. 162. For other gymnastic plays, see the two books of Groos, _Spiele der Thiere_ and _Spiele der Menschen_.
Footnote 849:
See Bruchmann, _Poetik_, p. 212.
Footnote 850:
Skill, of course, and rivalry are early provocatives of art in the dance. As to ball-playing as a part of it, references could be given for all times and climes.
Footnote 851:
See _Old English Ballads_, p. lxxvi.
Footnote 852:
Such as the author of the _Complaynt of Scotland_ watched at their dancing, and noted the songs.
Footnote 853:
See below, Chap. VII.
Footnote 854:
See Uhland, _Kl. Schr._, III. 399 ff., and 484 ff., who gives other well-known instances of this panic dance, as well as the _tarantella_ of Italy. The shaman, of course, even among a tribe as low as the Veddahs, dances himself into a fit.
Footnote 855:
See book of this title by Sir J. G. Wilkinson, London, 1848, I. 399.
Footnote 856:
It translates “dance” in Luke xv. 25.
Footnote 857:
See Kögel, _Gesch. d. deutsch. Lit._, pp. 7 ff.
Footnote 858:
_Sigeléoð_ in Anglo-Saxon, sung after a victory, was doubtless the same thing. Kögel notes that _leikr_, _leik_, in Norwegian dialects down to this day, means both “war” and “dance”; and he conjectures that _winelâc_, in Anglo-Saxon, goes back to an originally erotic dance, as it may go forward to a children’s “kissing-game.”
Footnote 859:
Wolf, _Lais_, pp. 18, 183 f., puts too much stress on the singing of church music, though he concedes popular origins; p. 22.
Footnote 860:
Work quoted, p. cxvii.
Footnote 861:
Bladé, _Poésies Populaires de la Gascogne_ (Vol. III. is devoted entirely to songs for the dance), III. i. ff. “En général on ne danse aux chansons que faute de mieux,” although even now, at times, “they bid the music cease, and dance to the sound of their own voices.” The dancing is literally a round, a circle.
Footnote 862:
See Wolf’s note, _Lais_, pp. 185 f. On this _carole_ or _ronde_, danced mainly by women, but now and then by men and women, see Jeanroy’s chapter, already quoted, and the additional suggestions of M. Gaston Paris, _Origines d. l. Poés. Lyr._, pp. 44 ff., really a review of Jeanroy’s book. “Ce qui caractérisait surtout les caroles, c’était le chant qui les accompagnait,” says M. Paris. The only use of instruments, and these very simple, was to mark the rhythm. Dancers turned to the left.
Footnote 863:
An early reference, from “Ruodlieb,” may be added to show the connection of dance and song; the passage occurs in a description of the dancing bears (III. 84 ff., ed. Grimm-Schmeller, _Lat. Ged. des X. u. XI. Jhrh._, p. 144):—
cum plebs altisonam fecit gyrando choream, accurrunt et se mulieribus applicuere, quae gracili voce cecinerunt deliciose, insertisque suis harum manibus speciosis erecti calcant....
The bears dance, then, along with the singing and dancing women; Grimm calls them _spielweiber_, and quotes an ecclesiastical prohibition (_ibid._, p. xv); but part of the description, witness the _plebs_, will pass for a communal dance.
Footnote 864:
In the translation ascribed to Chaucer, w. 759 ff., “Tha myghtist thou karoles sene,” etc.
Footnote 865:
_De vulg. Eloq._, II. iii. See note in Howell’s translation, London, 1890. Crescimbeni, _L’Istoria della volgar Poesia_, Venez., 1731 (written in 1697), quotes, though in disapproval, Minturno for the primacy of _ballate_ (p. 148): “ballads,” says M., because “si cantavano ballando,” which is the root of the matter.
Footnote 866:
It has been repeatedly noticed that older English dances are known by the ballads sung to them. Even some of the tragic ballads were used for the dance; but one must think of gay little songs and refrains as staple for the merry rounds; nothing else will fit the seasons when “maydes daunce in a ring.”
Footnote 867:
3ᵇ, Bodley copy of 1568. See also the refrain for a dance in the _Four Elements_, above, p. 322.
Footnote 868:
See _Kind-Harts Dreame_, ed. Rimbault, Percy Soc., 1841, p. 38, and note, p. 79.
Footnote 869:
_English Minstrelsie_, I., p. ix.
Footnote 870:
In 1767 a “young lady from Scotland” sang as she danced, at the royal theatre in Copenhagen; but there, too, in 1726, a Stockholm dancing-girl had done the same thing. “Novelty” is not the word. See Steenstrup, _Vore Folkev._, pp. 8 f.
Footnote 871:
Brand, “New Year’s Day.”
Footnote 872:
Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, in many places; Pfannenschmid, _Germ. Erntej._, pp. 271 ff., 580 ff. For love-songs and the dance, Uhland, III. 391 ff., and notes, 471, with valuable account of the manner of dancing, and of the leader, the _voresingen_ and the _voretanzen_.
Footnote 873:
See Böhme, _Altd. Liederb._, p. xxxv.
Footnote 874:
_’T Boertje_, Coussemaker, pp. 329 f., and _’t Patertje_, already quoted.
Footnote 875:
_Pétition pour des Villageois que l’on empêche de danser._ Par Paul-Louis Courier, Vigneron, ... Paris, 1822, addressed to the Chamber of Deputies, asking that the folk of Azai may dance on Sundays “sur le place de leur commune.” Despite the mystification, there is some serious intent behind this fooling.
Footnote 876:
In Germany itself: cf. Meyer, _Volkskunde_, pp. 158, 160, 163.
Footnote 877:
_Arbeit u. Rhythmus_, pp. 103 f.
Footnote 878:
See note, end of chapter.
Footnote 879:
Grosse, _Anf d. Kunst_, p. 218; Donovan, _Lyre to Muse_, pp. 91, 127 ff.; Jacobowski, _Anfänge d. Poesie_, p. 127. This author’s discussion of circle and straight line, as of women and of men in the dance, and of other formations, is a bit fanciful although interesting and suggestive. See, too, Donovan on the ring of folk (choral) about a centre of interest,—altar or the like. Work quoted, p. 204.
Footnote 880:
The development of the dance into different kinds of poetry is foreshadowed by many of the older writers, although the first really comparative treatment of the subject must be assigned to A. W. Schlegel in the lectures at Berlin a century ago. Herder has some valuable remarks on the subject in his early essay _Vom Geist der ebräischen Poesie_, following, of course, many hints of Lowth. Two hundred years ago, Burette, a really learned writer, drew up his “Mémoire pour servir à l’Histoire de la Danse des Anciens,” published in the _Mém._, Acad. of Inscript., etc., I. 93 ff., Paris, 1717. Movement and imitation caused the dance, which is “nearly as old as man,” and sprang from joy. Cadence is the mainspring; avoid, he says, Lucian’s prattle about the stars. Wedding, festival, vintage, harvest,—look to these, says Burette, in quite modern spirit, for the origins of the dance. He traces metres to the rhythm of songs sung by the dancers. Another article of this writer investigates ball-playing, often combined with dance and song. Another writer on the dance was John Spencer, D.D., master of Corpus Christi College (1630-1693), the founder of the science of comparative religions; his “Dissertatio de Saltandi Ritu,” is printed in the _Thesaurus Antiquitat. Sacrar. complectens selectissima clarissimorum Virorum Opuscula in quibus Veterum Hebraeorum Mores, Leges, etc., illustrantur_, Vol. XXXII., Venet., 1767. Spencer studies the dance of the Hebrews, and his references are valuable; he is comparative, and uses dances of modern Turks to illustrate his subject. Hebrews got some of their festal dances from heathen,—the _saltationes promiscuas_; for erotic dances he thinks to have been early and everywhere. For a man of his date, he concludes very boldly “probabilius est, sacras choreas agendi morem, ex antiquissimo gentium usu primitus oriundum,” and so came to the Hebrews. The festal dances, where Jews bore about branches and sang a choral full of repetitions and with a constant refrain, he compares with pagan affairs of the sort; the pæan is compared with refrains like _Hallel_ and _Hosannah_. In fine, this is sharp, clear, comparative work, and good reading still. From Joannis Meursi _Orchestra sive de Saltationibus Veterum_ ... Lugd. Batav., 1618, not much is to be learned except a list (alphabetical) of the old dances, with references to the classic passages. Most of the articles are short, but the Pyrrhic Dance has twelve pages. An early essay on dancing, with considerable scope for its time, is inserted in Elyot’s _Governour_, edited by Croft, London, 1880, from the edition of 1531, I. 202 ff. Elyot seems to be the first Englishman who wrote about the art.
Footnote 881:
See above, p. 128.
Footnote 882:
_Essai Comparatif sur l’Origine et l’Histoire des Rythmes_, Paris, 1889.
Footnote 883:
Even this may be questioned in a literal sense. “Formen,” says Usener, _Altgriechischer Versbau_, p. 111, “werden nicht geschaffen, sondern sie entstehen und wachsen. Der schöpferische Künstler erzeugt sie nicht, sondern bildet das Ueberkommene veredelnd um.” He is speaking of the popular four-accent verse found in so many languages.
Footnote 884:
_L’Esthétique du Mouvement_, Paris, 1889, Cap. iv. See pp. 54, 65.
Footnote 885:
In the _First Principles_.
Footnote 886:
_Essai_, pp. 102, 104.
Footnote 887:
_Mélusine_, I. 1 ff. See, too, _Poésie du Moyen Age_, pp. 77, 89.
Footnote 888:
_Zeitschr. f. Völkerpsychol._, XVII. 113 ff.
Footnote 889:
_Kalewala_, p. 38.
Footnote 890:
_Nordboernes Aandsliv_, II. 437 ff.
Footnote 891:
The refrain of two lines, he thinks, was added to the two-line stanza of narrative ballads; and so resulted the common ballad stanza. This is denied by Steenstrup.
Footnote 892:
“Proved” by that old primitive-Aryan process now something discredited: _danz_ is an imported word (meaning both song and dance). See Vigfusson’s _Icelandic Dictionary_, _s.v._ More formidable, but far from final, is the silence of the sagas.
Footnote 893:
A similar denial, not only of the original character of recorded ballads, but of the ballad habit itself, is made for Denmark by Professor G. Storm in his otherwise valuable book, _Sagnkredsene om Karl den Store og Didrik af Bern hos de nordiske Folk_, Kristiania, 1874, pp. 174 f.
Footnote 894:
See below on the _schnaderhüpfl_ and _stev._
Footnote 895:
Comparetti, _Kalewala_, 1892. pp. 3, 264 ff. The very name of the Finnish song is probably borrowed; but its original and native character is successfully defended by Comparetti, pp. 37, 272, against the attempt of Ahlqvist to prove alliteration in Finnish verse a loan from the Scandinavians.
Footnote 896:
Set forth in Tarde’s _Les Lois de l’Imitation_, Paris, 1890; but the best recent summary of his views is _Les Lois Sociales_, Paris, 1898. Special problems of the crowd as imitative, dangerous, weak, are treated in his _Essais et Mélanges Sociologiques_, Lyon-Paris, 1895. See also “Les deux Éléments de la Sociologie,” in _Études de Psychologie Sociale_, Paris, 1898, an address delivered in 1894 before the first international Congress of Sociology.
Footnote 897:
_Les Lois de l’Imitation_, p. 279. So p. 48,—“A l’origine un anthropoïde a imaginé ... les rudiments d’un langage.”
Footnote 898:
_Of the Origin and Progress of Language_, I. 318 ff.
Footnote 899:
He concedes that a different relation exists when two are working together at the same thing (_Lois Soc._, p. 129); although here are “model and copy,” suggestion at least.
Footnote 900:
_Ibid._, p. 159.
Footnote 901:
He sees light ahead for a world now hung in Schopenhauer-black; the infinitesimal shall cheer us. _Ibid._, pp. 87, 105, 110.
Footnote 902:
_Lois Sociales_, pp. 40 f. This passage will repay close attention.
Footnote 903:
_Critique Scientifique_, pp. 191 ff. Carstanjen made a fierce attack on the milieu in art, and, by implication, in literature: _Vierteljahrsschrift f. wissenschaftl. Philosophie_, XX. (1896), 1 ff., 143 ff. He explains the art of the renaissance by the artists of that time, and not by their environment. For a fine defence of the _milieu_, however, see the late M. Texte’s book on _Jean-Jacques Rousseau et les Origines du Cosmopolitisme Littéraire_, pp. xvii. ff.
Footnote 904:
_Outlines of Sociology_, trans. F. W. Moore for the Amer. Acad. Pol. and Soc. Sci., June, 1899, pp. 45, 88. See the translator’s abstract, p. 7.
Footnote 905:
_Die Philosophie der Geschichte als Sociologie_, Leipzig, 1897, I. 183, 213 f.
Footnote 906:
_Principles of Sociology_, New York, 1896.
Footnote 907:
“Ueber Ziele und Wege der Völkerpsychologie,” in _Philosophische Studien_, 1888, IV. 1 ff., particularly pp. 11 ff. and 17.
Footnote 908:
In his _Völkerpsychologie_ (Vol. I., Leipzig, 1900, has appeared), he undertakes to study the making of these three products, which he calls a _gemeinsames Erzeugniss_. See pp. 4, 6, 24 f. A sensible plea for the _volksseele_, “which need not have any mystical connotation,” was made by Gustav Freytag in the introduction to his _Bilder aus der deutschen Vergangenheit_, I. 13 ff.
Footnote 909:
_Psychologie des Foules_; and in English translation, _The Crowd_.
Footnote 910:
“Das Wesen des Gesammtgeistes,” _Studien und Aufsätze_, pp. 504 ff.
Footnote 911:
Significant is the change from _Völkerpsychologie_ to _Volkskunde_. The new journal is edited by Professor Weinhold, and began in 1891.
Footnote 912:
In Paul’s _Grundriss der Philologie_, II. i., 512 ff. See also Ten Brink’s _Beowulf_, pp. 105 f.
Footnote 913:
_Débute._ See _Lois de l’Imit._, p. 233. He is arguing against Spencer’s doctrine of the development of the arts, and implies the same “high initial source” for music, architecture, and the rest.
Footnote 914:
“Enfin ce triple poésie découle de trois grandes sources, la Bible, Homère, Shakspeare.”
Footnote 915:
_Lois Sociales_, p. 49.
Footnote 916:
The abstract question is foreign to the present purpose; but it may be urged that one is wise to take neither the extreme position of Buckle, Gumplowicz, and Bourdeau,—who said that if Napoleon had been shot at Toulon, Hoche, or Kleber, or some one, would have done what Napoleon did,—nor yet the equally extreme stand of Tarde and his school. Some sensible remarks on the whole matter may be found in Bernheim’s _Lehrbuch d. historischen Methode_, pp. 513 ff. of the second edition, Leipzig, 1894.
Footnote 917:
See Lloyd Morgan, _Habit and Instinct_, Chap. II. Solitary chicks hatched in an incubator can be heard chirping, all in the same way, before they break the shell, and with no chance of imitation in the case. Weismann, “Gedanken über Musik,” _Rundschau_, LXI. (1889), 63, remarks that a young finch brought up alone will sing the song of its kind, “but never so beautifully as when a good singer is put with him as teacher.” The concession is enough.
Footnote 918:
Morgan, work quoted, p. 90. Even Mr. Witchell, for whom the song of birds is traditional, grants that call-notes, alarm-notes, and all such utterances are instinctive. See Morgan, p. 178, and Romanes, _Mental Evolution in Animals_, pp. 222 f.
Footnote 919:
_Psychology of the Emotions_, p. 265. The part assigned to imitation in seemingly spontaneous expression of emotion in a child, Baldwin, _Mental Development in Child and Race_, pp. 260 ff., does not affect this study of emotion in throngs.
Footnote 920:
_Die Spiele der Thiere_, Jena, 1896, p. 8. See, however, _Spiele der Menschen_, pp. 4, 365 ff., 431, 446 ff., 511 f.
Footnote 921:
So Noiré explained the case in the section on the development of language in his book, _Die Welt als Entwicklung des Geistes_, Leipzig, 1874. Like Donovan, too, he assumed that the first words were uttered under pressure of communal excitement, elation, joy, social sense. He assumes that social conditions quite overwhelmed the individual, who hardly existed as such. See pp. 266 f.
Footnote 922:
Quoted, p. 328, by Morgan, from _Lectures on Human and Animal Psychology_, p. 397.
Footnote 923:
See Wallaschek against this idea, above, p. 100.
Footnote 924:
Work quoted, p. 21.
Footnote 925:
Work quoted, p. 340. Play is thus tabulated:—
════════════════════╤════════════════════╤════════════════════ Selbstdarstellung. │Nachahmung. │Ausschmückung. ────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────────────────── Persönliches. │Wahres. │Schönes. ────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────────────────── Beim Thier: │ │ Bewerbungskünste. │Nachahmungskünste. │Baukünste. ────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────────────────── Beim Menschen: │ │ Erregungstanz. │Nachahmungstanz. │Kunstgewerbe. Musik. │Mimik. │(Gartenbaukunst.) Lyrik. │Plastik. │Architectur. │Malerei. │ │Epik. │ │Drama. │ ════════════════════╧════════════════════╧════════════════════
Compare with this the table given in Mr. Baldwin Brown’s useful book on _The Fine Arts_, p. 36.
Footnote 926:
_Lyre to Muse_, pp. 127 f. Mr. Baldwin Brown, _The Fine Arts_, p. 23, also regards art in general as an outgrowth of festal celebrations.
Footnote 927:
At the end of his _Lyre to Muse_, p. 209.
Footnote 928:
_Arbeit und Rhythmus_, pp. 17, 25, 82.
Footnote 929:
In Ribot’s _Psychology of the Emotions_, e.g., p. 332, ample justice is done to spontaneous emotion and expression.
Footnote 930:
See Butcher’s translation, pp. 15 ff.
Footnote 931:
So Butcher explains, p. 252: “a wild religious excitement, a bacchic ecstasy.”
Footnote 932:
_Kunstlehre des Aristoteles_, Jena, 1876, pp. 83 ff. Gerber, _Die Sprache als Kunst_, I. 32, follows Aristotle in denying that improvisations are ever poetry, which is enthusiasm plus deliberation and selection.
Footnote 933:
_Vorlesungen_, I. 356 ff. Compare I. 340.
Footnote 934:
Waitz-Gerland, _Anthropologie_, I. (2d. ed.), 345.
Footnote 935:
_Vorlesungen_, II. 117, 119. He calls the Homeric epos an artistic improvisation as compared with earlier spontaneous, instinctive improvisation. See also II. 20.
Footnote 936:
_Ibid._, III. 141,—a mere note for his lecture.
Footnote 937:
_Die Geburt der Tragödie_, oder _Griechenthum und Pessimismus_, 3d. ed. 1894; the immediate title, however, is _Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geiste der Musik_.
Footnote 938:
_Welt als Wille_, etc., I. 416. Nietzsche, pp. 22, 35 f.
Footnote 939:
Lyric and folksong, according to Nietzsche, p. 48, are outcome of music. “Diesen Prozess einer Entladung der Musik in Bildern haben wir uns auf eine jugendfrische, sprachlich schöpferische Volksmenge zu übertragen, um zur Ahnung zu kommen, wie das strophische Volkslied entsteht.”
Footnote 940:
The usual references for Bacchic or Dionysian orgies are Livy, IX. 4 ff., where minute particulars are given; Strabo, bk. X.; Athenæus, X.
Footnote 941:
In Nietzsche’s mystic phrase, the chorus “auf seiner primitiven Stufe in der Urtragödie,” is “eine Selbstspiegelung des dionysischen Menschen ... eine Vision der dionysischen Masse.”
Footnote 942:
See pp. 60 f. This artistic power is his definition of the poetic process. Professor Giddings, on hints of Mr. Spencer, has drawn a picture of solitary, primitive man arguing a spirit from the phenomenon of his shadow and of the echo of his voice. It may be pointed out that communal shouts and cries, echoed from the rocks, would be more likely to rouse a belief in that horde of spirits with which the primitive human horde thought itself surrounded. Early religion was social, communal; individual meditation, a process of individual thought, was utterly subordinate to communal thought. Even now superstition is a lingering “they say.”
Footnote 943:
“Eine Gemeinde von unbewussten Schauspielern,” p. 61.
Footnote 944:
_Journal d’un Poète_, p. 38.
Footnote 945:
“Das charakteristische Merkmal der Volkspoesie,” _Zeitschr. f. Völkerpsychol._, XIX. (1889), 115 ff.
Footnote 946:
_Zeitschr. f. Völkerpsychol._, XIX., p. 120.
Footnote 947:
See Schultze, _Der Fetischismus_, pp. 30 ff., with his authorities.
Footnote 948:
Two famous utterances voice this feeling. Swift loved his Peter, Paul, John, and the rest; he hated the human race at large. This for the outer circle. As for crowds, Schiller put the antithesis in a distich:—
Jeder, sieht man ihn einzeln, ist leidlich klug und beständig; Sind sie _in corpore_, gleich wird euch ein Dummkopf daraus.
Footnote 949:
“Foules et Sectes,” in _Essais et Mélanges Sociol._, p. 4.
Footnote 950:
_Principles of Sociology_, I. 459, 704 f. Tribe to nation, I. 584. Rise of professions due to “specialization of a relatively homogeneous mass,” III. 181. See II. 307 ff. In the _First Principles_, §§ 125, 127, he had defined the process as “change from an incoherent homogeneity to a coherent heterogeneity,” and had applied the idea not only to the primitive union of poetry, music, and dancing, but within poetic limits to that undifferentiated song which held in germ the epic, the lyric, the drama.
Footnote 951:
_Revue des deux Mondes_, 15 Feb., 1898, p. 880; “le passage de l’homogène à l’heterogène,” that “idée mère, l’idée substantielle de l’évolution or in Haeckel’s words, “gradual differentiation of matter originally simple.”
Footnote 952:
_L’Évolution des Peuples_, pp. 37 f. See also pp. 43, 167.
Footnote 953:
_Primitive Folk_, p. 57.
Footnote 954:
So the reviews summarize the doctrine of A. H. Keane, _Man Past and Present_, 1899.
Footnote 955:
_Critique Scientifique_, pp. 112, 115.
Footnote 956:
In the _Rassenkampf_ and especially in _Outlines of Sociology_, trans. Moore, pp. 39, 124, 139 note; on p. 142 he names the factors which made a horde homogeneous.
Footnote 957:
Dr. Richard Mucke, _Horde und Familie in ihrer urgeschichtlichen Entwicklung_, Stuttgart, 1895.
Footnote 958:
Grosse, _Format der Familie_, pp. 30 ff. See p. 39. He takes as “representatives of the oldest form of social life” those scattered tribes which subsist entirely by hunting; we know nothing so primitive, and while checked in culture, these tribes are probably not degraded (32 f.). The statements in the text are based on careful arrangement of the statistics, a very important point. See Mucke, _Horde und Familie_, pp. 181 ff. Spencer describes the “small, simple aggregates,” coöperating “with or without a regulating centre, for certain public ends,” of which the “headless” kind must be regarded as the primitive type; and gives a list of these not very different from the list of Grosse. _Prin. Soc._, I. § 257.
Footnote 959:
Grosse refuses to extend this lack of individual power to promiscuity in sexual relations. That precious theory was doubtless carried to an absurd point; but the reaction may likewise go too far, and the case of those Andamanese (p. 43) with their “absolute conjugal fidelity even unto death,” uncannily suggests Sir Charles Grandison and even Isaac Walton’s mullet.
Footnote 960:
_Anthropology_, p. 79.
Footnote 961:
_Anthropologie_, I. 74 ff., 349 ff.
Footnote 962:
Waitz, I. 446, answers objections to this view, and disposes of the idea that civilization levels mankind.
Footnote 963:
See above, p. 372, note 942.
Footnote 964:
_Anfänge der Kunst_, p. 224.
Footnote 965:
_Ibid._, pp. 300 f.
Footnote 966:
_Ibid._, p, 236.
Footnote 967:
_Comparative Literature_, p. 72. See pp. 89 ff., 155 ff., 347 f., and the whole chapter on “The Principle of Literary Growth.” He glorifies sympathy as the poetic mainspring; but he fails to study the dualism in terms of actual throng and actual artist. The spirit and plan of the book, however, are worthy of the highest praise, whatever its shortcomings in detail.
Footnote 968:
Catullus, lxiv.
Footnote 969:
_Werke_, VI. 26.
Footnote 970:
_Esthétique de la Tradition_, pp. 69 ff.
Footnote 971:
Spencer, _Sociology_, I. 56 ff., 70 f., II. 271, note; Grosse, _Formen der Familie_, p. 57, with quotation from Petroff’s book on Alaska; Schultze, _Fetischismus_, pp. 51 f.
Footnote 972:
_The Theory of Law and Civil Society_, London, 1888, pp. 106 f. See above, p. 26.
Footnote 973:
Professor Baldwin, _Social and Ethical Interpretations_, p. 214, puts the beginning of the social period just after man’s release from the animal. See too his appendix. Ribot, work quoted, p. 281, says the gregarious life—of animals in hordes, that is—“is founded on the attraction of like for like, irrespective of sex.” See this whole chapter on “The Social and Moral Feelings.”
Footnote 974:
See, however, the case of New Zealanders who work in large numbers and in perfect accord by singing their song _totowaka_. Wallaschek, _Prim. Mus._, p. 43.
Footnote 975:
Even Mr. Spencer points out that this is no bar to communal consent, _Sociology_, I. 59; for the variability implies “smaller departure from primitive reflex action ... lack of the re-representative emotions which hold the simpler ones in check.” Bastian, too, has shown that in the formation of society out of individuals, the social element as such, the social whole, must precede the element of social individuality or of the individuality within the mass. This is what one gathers from Bastian’s books in general; in one case, _Die Welt in ihren Spiegelungen unter dem Wandel des Völkergedankens_, p. 413, he applies this idea to the priority of social property as compared with individual property.
Footnote 976:
Perhaps there is some connection between the fervour and merit of French war-songs like the Marseillaise, the _Ça ira_, and the fact that French literature as a whole is averse from undue stress upon the individual and does not suffer, whatever its other defects, from “too much ego in its cosmos.” Texte points out that Jean-Jacques, Germanic by nature, noticed this trait in the French. “Le _je_ ... est presque aussi scrupuleusement banni de la scène française que des écrits de Port-Royal, _et les passions humaines_ ... _n’y parlent jamais que par on_.” How contemptuously M. Brunetière, who has no superior in the appreciation of French literature as a whole, speaks of that new personal note, set in fashion by Rousseau, “most eloquent of lackeys!” See “La Littérature Personnelle,” in B.’s _Questions de Critique_, pp. 211 ff., and his review of Hennequin’s book in the same collection, pp. 305 ff.
Footnote 977:
Boas, _Report Bur. Ethnol._, 1884-1885, pp. 564, 600 ff.
Footnote 978:
_Anf. d. Kunst_, p. 132.
Footnote 979:
On this baffling theme there is good reasoning in a neglected book by Noiré, _Die Welt als Entwicklung des Geistes_, pp. 240 f. He notes the mnemonic force of earliest words, which were few and used under strong emotional excitement; language was a kind of “thinking aloud.”
Footnote 980:
Stated in different terms by W. von Humboldt, _Werke_, VI. 198.
Footnote 981:
Wallaschek, _Prim. Mus._, pp. 70 f.
Footnote 982:
I. von Döllinger, _Beiträge zur Sektengeschichte des Mittelalters_, Munich, 1890, II. 623 f., from an old Ms., “de hystrionibus et officiis inutilibus.” Priests are instructed what professions bar the granting of absolution,—an interesting passage. “Cum igitur meretrices ad confessionem venerint, vel hystriones, non est eis danda poenitentia, nisi ex toto talia relinquant officia,” etc.
Footnote 983:
See Dana’s account of an improvising islander working in California, _Two Years before the Mast_, Chap. XIX.
Footnote 984:
Wallaschek, quoting Portman, p. 278.
Footnote 985:
J. Darmesteter, _Chants Populaires des Afghans_, Paris, 1888-1890, p.