Part 13

The sacred origin and meaning of this practice have, however, in modern days been a good deal lost sight of by these uncertificated harmonists in their selection of tunes. In London, particularly, the appropriate music of religious celebration, which in awaking the sleeper should bring the lessons of the season directly to his heart, are (excepting perhaps on the eve of the Nativity itself) most frequently supplanted by the airs of the theatre; and the waits for the most part favor us by night with repetitions of the melodies with which the barrel-organists have labored to make us familiarly acquainted during the day. It is with some such strain that the group of instrumentalists, by whom our artist has here represented these peripatetic musicians, appear to be regaling their neighborhood, in so far as we may venture to judge of the character of the music, by the accompaniment which it is receiving from the lady in the distance. Not that we could by any means have conjectured from the appearance of the performers themselves that the air, however profane, had been at all of the lively, unless what poor Matthews called the "deadly lively," kind,--and, in fact, the vicinity in which the lady appears may perhaps suggest that her joyous inspiration is not derived wholly from the music. She appears to be dancing "unto her own heart's song." If we may presume to argue from the aspects and attitudes of the gentlemen of the bass-viol and flute, he of the trombone (who is evidently performing with considerable energy) appears to have got a good way before his companions without being at all conscious of it; and indeed there is something about his accoutrements, if carefully inspected, which seems to hint that the source of his vigor, and perhaps of his unconsciousness, is of the same kind with that of the lady's liveliness. We have in the case of each a sort of insinuation as to the cause of the _spirited_ character of the performances, and in that of our friend with the trombone it seems a good deal more clear that his pocket has contributed to the supply of his instrument than that his instrument will ever do much for the supply of his pocket. As for the violin, it is clearly in the enjoyment of a sinecure at this late hour, the sensitive performer having apparently lulled himself to sleep with his own music. "Poor knave, I blame thee not; thou art o'er watched!"

"O murd'rous slumber, Lay'st thou thy leaden mace upon my boy That plays thee music? Gentle knave, good night; I will not do thee so much wrong to wake thee."

But we will not answer for the old gentleman with the water-jug, who looks down so benignantly from that window overhead. He seems about to furnish an illustration of the assertion that--

"The heart that music cannot melt, Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;"

and appears to have conceived a stratagem against the group below which, if carried into successful execution on this winter night, will probably _spoil_ more than the music. It bids fair at once to waken the violin-player and to silence the trombone.

The practice of hailing the Nativity with music, in commemoration of the song of the angels, is in full observance in Roman Catholic countries as well as in our own. There are, we fancy, few of our readers who have not had opportunities of listening to the divine strains which mingle in the Roman services that usher in the blessed morning itself. The _noëls_ of France are of the same character as the Christmas carols of England; and the visits of our street musicians at this season are closely resembled by the wanderings of the Italian _pifferari_. These _pifferari_ are Calabrian shepherds who come down from the mountains at the season of Advent, and enter the Italian cities, saluting with their hill music the shrines of the Virgin and Child which adorn the streets. Of these rude minstrels Lady Morgan, in her "Italy," gives some account, and states that having frequently observed them stopping to play before the shop of a carpenter in Rome, her inquiries on the subject were answered by the information that the intention of this part of their performance, was to give his due share of honor to Saint Joseph. Our friend Mr. Hone, in his "Every-Day Book," has given, from an old print in his possession, a representation of this practice, in which two of these mountaineers are playing before the shrine of the Virgin. The practice is continued till the anniversary day of the Nativity.

With modern carol-singing there are few of our readers, in town or in country (for the practice, like that of which we have just spoken, is still very general), who are not well acquainted. For some curious antiquarian information on the subject we must refer them to Mr. Sandys's Introduction, and to a paper in Mr. Hone's book of "Ancient Mysteries." The word itself is derived by Brand, after Bourne, from _cantare_, to sing, and _rola_, an interjection of joy; and although in vulgar acceptance it has come to be understood as implying particularly those anthems by which the Christmas-tide is distinguished, it has at all times been properly applied to all songs which are sung upon any occasion of festival or rejoicing. In strictness, therefore, even in its application to the musical celebrations of Advent, a distinction should be drawn between those carols which are of a joyous or festive character, and those more solemn ones which would be better described by the title of Christmas hymns.

The practice itself, as applied to religious commemoration, is drawn from the very first ages of the Church. It is frequently referred to in the Apostolic writings, and the celebrated letter of the younger Pliny to the Emperor Trajan, in the seventh year of the second Christian century, mentions, amongst the habits of the primitive Christians, their assembling at stated times "to sing among themselves alternately a hymn to Christ, as to God." Such a practice, however, constitutes no peculiarity of the new worship, hymns of praise to their deities having made a portion of the rites of most religions. Indeed, in the more severe times of the Early Church there are prohibitions against this form of worship, as against several other practices to which we have alluded, on the express ground of its resemblance to one of the customs of the pagan celebration.

The custom of celebrating the festivities of the season by the singing of carols in these islands, appears to have mingled with the Christmas observances from the earliest period. We have specimens of the carols themselves of a remote date, and have already given an extract from one, the manuscript of which, in the British Museum, is dated as far back as the thirteenth century. There are evidences of the universality of the practice in the fifteenth century; and the great popularity of these songs about this time is proved by the fact of a collection thereof having been printed in the early part of the following century by Wynkyn de Worde. It is to the Puritans that we appear to have been indebted for the introduction of the religious carol. Those enemies of all mirth, even in its most innocent or valuable forms, finding the practice of carol-singing at this festive time too general and rooted to be dealt with by interdiction, appear to have endeavored to effect their objects by directing it into a channel of their own, and probably retaining the ancient airs, to have adapted them to the strange religious ballads, of which we must give our readers a few specimens. The entire version of the Psalms of David made by Sternhold and Hopkins was published about the middle of the sixteenth century; and some time before the middle of the seventeenth a duodecimo volume appeared, under the title of "Psalmes or Songs of Zion, turned into the language and set to the tunes of a strange land, by W. S. [William Slatyr], intended for Christmas Carols and fitted to divers of the most noted and common but solemne tunes everywhere in this land familiarly used and knowne."

Of these old ballads of both kinds, many (and snatches of more) have survived to the present day, and may be heard, particularly in the Northern counties of England, ringing through the frosty air of the long winter nights, in the shrill voices of children, for several weeks before Christmas, probably, too, to the old traditional tunes. They are, however, as might be expected of compositions which have no more substantial depositary than the memories of the humble classes of the young, full of corruptions, which render some of them nearly unintelligible. The difficulty of restoring these old carols in their original forms is becoming yearly greater, in consequence of the modern carols, which are fast replacing them by a sort of authority. In country places many of the more polished carols, of modern composition, find their way into the Church services of this season; and amongst the singers who practise this manner of appealing to the charities of the season with most success are the children of the Sunday-schools and the choristers of the village church. These, with their often sweet voices, bring to our doors the more select hymns and the musical training which they have gathered for more sacred places; and from a group like that which stands at the parsonage door in our plate, we are more likely to hear some carol of Heber's, some such beautiful anthem as that beginning, "Hark! the herald angels sing," than the strange, rambling old Christmas songs which we well remember when we were boys. These latter, however, occasionally are not without a wild beauty of their own. We quote a fragment of one of them from memory. We think it begins:--

"The moon shines bright, and the stars give light, A little before the day;"

and wanders on somewhat after the following unconnected fashion:--

"Awake, awake, good people all! Awake, and you shall hear How Christ our Lord died on the cross For those he loved so dear.

"O fair, O fair Jerusalem! When shall I come to thee? When shall my griefs be at an end, That I thy tents may see!

"The fields were green as green could be When, from his glorious seat, The Lord our God he watered us With his heavenly good and sweet.

"And for the saving of our souls Christ died upon the cross! We never shall do for Jesus Christ What he has done for us!

"The life of man is but a span, And cut down in its flower; We're here to-day, and gone to-morrow, We're all dead in an hour.

"Oh, teach well your children, men! The while that you are here, It will be better for your souls, When your corpse lies on the bier.

"To-day you may be alive, dear man, With many a thousand pound; To-morrow you may be a dead man, And your corpse laid under ground,--

"With a turf at your head, dear man, And another at your feet. Your good deeds and your bad ones They will together meet.

"My song is done, and I must begone, I can stay no longer here; God bless you all, both great and small, And send you a happy new year."

Our Lancashire readers know that a similar wish to that expressed in the two last lines is generally delivered in recitative at the close of each carol, or before the singers abandon our doors,--which wish, however, we have heard finally changed into a less quotable ejaculation in cases where the carolists had been allowed to sing unregarded.

The gradual decay into which these ancient religious ballads are rapidly falling was in some measure repaired by Mr. Davies Gilbert in 1823, who published a collection containing upwards of twenty carols in a restored state, with the tunes to which it was usual to sing them in the West of England. Of Welsh carols various collections are mentioned both by Hone and by Sandys, and in that country the practice is in better preservation than even in England. In Ireland, too, it exists to the present day, although we have not met with any collection of Irish carols; and in France, where there are numerous collections under the title of _noëls_, the custom is universal. In Scotland, however, it was extinguished, with the other Christmas practices, by the thunders of John Knox and his precisians, and we believe has never been in any degree restored. We should add that there are numerous carols for the Christmas season scattered through the writings of our old poets, amongst whom Herrick may be mentioned as conspicuous.

But the most ample and curious published collection of Christmas carols with which we have met is that by Mr. Sandys to which we have so often alluded; and from the text of this collection we will give our readers one or two specimens of the quaint beauties which occasionally mingle in the curious texture of these old anthems. Mr. Sandys's collection is divided into two parts, the first of which consists of ancient carols and Christmas songs from the early part of the fifteenth to the end of the seventeenth century. We wish that in cases where the authorship belongs to so conspicuous a name as Herrick,--and indeed in all cases where it is ascertained,--the names of the authors had been prefixed. The second part comprises a selection from carols which the editor states to be still used in the West of England. We can inform him that many of these we have ourselves heard, only some dozen years ago, screamed through the sharp evening air of Lancashire at the top pitch of voices that could clearly never have been given for any such purposes, "making night hideous," or occasionally filling the calm watches with the far-lulling sounds of wild, sweet harmony. The practice, however, is, under any circumstances, full of fine meanings that redeem the rudeness of performance; and for ourselves, we like the music at its best and worst.

Of the festive songs we have already given occasional examples in the progress of this work, and shall just now confine ourselves to extracts from those of a more religious character. From the old part of the collections before us we will give a verse of a short carol which, while it will exhibit in a very modified degree the familiar tone in which the writers of these ancient songs dealt with the incidents of the sacred story, is full of a tenderness arising out of that very manner of treatment. We give it in the literal form in which we find it in this collection, with the exception of extending an occasional cypher. It begins with a burden:--

"A, my dere son, sayd mary, a, my dere, Kys thi moder, Jhesu, with a lawghyng chere;"

and continues:--

"This endnes nyght I sawe a syght all in my slepe, Mary that may she sang lullay and sore did wepe. To kepe she sawght full fast a bowte her son fro cold; Joseph seyd, wiff, my joy, my leff, say what ye wolde; No thyng my spouse is In this howse unto my pay; My son a kyng that made all thyng lyth in hay. "A, my dere son."

Some of these ancient carols run over the principal incidents in the scheme of man's fall and redemption; and we are sorry that our limits will not permit us to give such lengthened specimens as we should desire. We will, however, copy a few verses from one of a different kind, in which, beneath its ancient dress, our readers will see that there is much rude beauty. It begins:--

"I come from heuin to tell The best nowellis that ever be fell."

But we must take it up further on:--

"My saull and lyfe, stand up and see Quha lyes in ane cribe of tree; Quhat babe is that so gude and faire? It is Christ, God's Sonne and Aire.

. . . . . . .

O God, that made all creature, How art thou becum so pure, That on the hay and straw will lye, Amang the asses, oxin, and kye?

"And were the world ten tymes so wide, Cled ouer with gold and stanes of pride, Unworthy zit it were to thee, Under thy feet ane stule to bee.

"The sylke and sandell, thee to eis, Are hay and sempill sweiling clais, Quhairin thow gloiris, greitest king, As thow in heuin were in thy ring.

. . . . . . .

"O my deir hert, zoung Jesus sweit, Prepare thy creddill in my spreit, And I sall rock thee in my hert, And neuer mair from thee depart."

The Star-song in this collection is, if our memory mislead us not, Herrick's, and taken from his "Noble Numbers." It begins:--

"Tell us, thou cleere and heavenly tongue, Where is the babe but lately sprung? Lies he the lillie-banks among?

"Or say if this new Birth of our's Sleep, laid within some ark of flowers, Spangled with deaw-light; thou canst cleere All doubts, and manifest the where.

"Declare to us, bright star, if we shall seek Him in the morning's blushing cheek, Or search the beds of spices through, To find him out?"

The second part of Sandys's collection contains an imperfect version of a carol of which we find a full and corrected copy in Mr. Hone's "Ancient Mysteries," formed by that author's collation of various copies printed in different places. The beautiful verses which we quote are from Hone's version, and are wanting in that of Sandys. The ballad begins by elevating the Virgin Mary to a temporal rank which must rest upon that particular authority, and is probably a new fact for our readers:

"Joseph was an old man, And an old man was he, And he married Mary, Queen of Galilee,"--

which, for a carpenter, was certainly a distinguished alliance. It goes on to describe Joseph and his bride walking in a garden,--

"Where the cherries they grew Upon every tree;"

and upon Joseph's refusal, in somewhat rude language, to pull some of these cherries for Mary, on the ground of her supposed misconduct,--

"Oh! then bespoke Jesus, All in his mother's womb, 'Go to the tree, Mary, And it shall bow down;

"'Go to the tree, Mary, And it shall bow to thee, And the highest branch of all Shall bow down to Mary's knee.'"

And then, after describing Joseph's conviction and penitence at this testimony to Mary's truth, occur the beautiful verses to which we alluded:

"As Joseph was a walking, He heard an angel sing: 'This night shall be born Our heavenly king.

"'He neither shall be born In housen nor in hall, Nor in the place of Paradise, But in an ox's stall.

"'He neither shall be clothed In purple nor in pall, But all in fair linen, As were babies all.

"'He neither shall be rock'd In silver nor in gold, But in a wooden cradle, That rocks on the mould.

"'He neither shall be christen'd In white wine nor in red, But with the spring water With which we were christened.'"

The strange, wild ballad beginning,--

"I saw three ships come sailing in, On Christmas day, on Christmas day; I saw three ships come sailing in, On Christmas day in the morning,"--

and the still stranger one of "The Holy Well," we would have copied at length, as examples of these curious relics, if we could have spared the space. Of the latter, however, we will give our readers some account, to show the singular liberties which were taken with sacred personages and things in these old carols. In the one in question, the boy Jesus, having asked his mother's permission to go and play, receives it, accompanied with the salutary injunction,--

"And let me hear of no complaint At night when you come home.

"Sweet Jesus went down to yonder town, As far as the Holy Well, And there did see as fine children As any tongue can tell."

On preferring, however, his petition to these children,--

"Little children, shall I play with you, And you shall play with me?"

he is refused on the ground of his having been "born in an ox's stall," they being "lords' and ladies' sons."

"Sweet Jesus turned him around, And he neither laugh'd nor smil'd, But the tears came trickling from his eye Like water from the skies."

Whereupon he returns home to report his grievance to his mother, who answers,--

"Though you are but a maiden's child, Born in an ox's stall, Thou art the Christ, the King of Heaven, And the Saviour of them all;"

and then proceeds to give him advice neither consistent with the assertion in the last line, nor becoming her character:--

"Sweet Jesus, go down to yonder town, As far as the Holy Well, And take away those sinful souls, And dip them deep in hell.

"Nay, nay, sweet Jesus said, Nay, nay, that may not be; For there are too many sinful souls Crying out for the help of me."

Both these latter carols are given by Sandys as amongst those which are still popular in the West of England; and we remember to have ourselves heard them both many and many a time in its Northern counties.

We must give a single verse of one of the ancient French provincial _noëls_, for the purpose of introducing our readers to a strange species of chanted burden; and then we must stop. It is directed to be sung _sur un chant joyeux_, and begins thus:

"Quand Dieu naquit à Noël, Dedans la Judée, On vit ce jour solemnel La joie inondée; Il n'étoit ni petit ni grand Qui n'apportât son présent Et n'o, n'o, n'o, n'o, Et n'offrit, frit, frit, Et n'o, n'o, et n'offrit, Et n'offrit sans cesse Toute sa richesse."

Our readers are no doubt aware that the carol-sheets still make their annual appearance at this season, not only in the metropolis, but also in Manchester, Birmingham, and perhaps other towns. In London they pass into the hands of hawkers, who wander about our streets and suburbs enforcing the sale thereof by--in addition to the irresistible attraction of the wood-cuts with which they are embellished--the further recommendation of their own versions and variations of the original tunes, yelled out in tones which could not be heard without alarm by any animals throughout the entire range of Nature, except the domesticated ones, who are "broken" to it. For ourselves, we confess that we are not thoroughly broken yet, and experience very uneasy sensations at the approach of one of these alarming choirs.

"'T is said that the lion will turn and flee From a maid in the pride of her purity."

We would rather meet him under the protection of a group of London carol-singers. We would undertake to explore the entire of central Africa, well provisioned and in such company, without the slightest apprehension, excepting such as was suggested by the music itself.