Part 59 (1/2)

It is a language peculiar to no period, race, or caste Ageless and universal, it raises to highest daring, or suffuses with tenderness, to-day and here, as once on Argo's deck, or in the halls of Persepolis Purely in and analysis, easily explicable in s that are not dreamt of in the philosophy of Science Why should a certain psychological effect ensue upon certain untranslatable sounds being placed in a given relation to each other, and not when the same sounds are placed in another relation?--and why should that effect be always upward? Why should the composer be perforce a prophet of the sphere above earth's ed with embassy of peace, and fortitude, and new-born ardour, to the troubled, and weary, and heavy-laden? Has ingenuity never distilled from music any spirit of evil?

None Euterpe alone of the Muses defies seduction Harmony is intrinsically chaste There is no secular , its music was pure; and no less pure were the notes which breathed frolutted his I, stay the voluptuous dance, and thedefilement; the redeemed melodies, stainless as fresh-fallen snow, elic sympathy, which shall raise the soul awhile above earth's sordid infection, disclosing the inextinguishable affinity of the divine part of man's dual nature with the dream-like possibility of Eden--purity, and fearless faith, and love unspeakable

The story of the Thracian lyre soothing the horrors of the underworld, and --the story of the shepherd- insanity from the first Hebrened in Jehovah's despite--the story of the hty prophet Elisha, fettered to earth by wrath and scorn till, at his own command, the music swelled, and his enfranchised spirit rose on its viewless wings to behold the veiled Future already woven froled skein of the troubled Present--the thousand-fold story of otten Past, and onward into the iined Future

Onward into the fathoh 'the heaven of each is but what each desires'--though the Aryan heaven be a place of gradation and precedence, a realh the heaven of the Jewish apostle-seer burn with the gold and sparkle with the geh the paradise of the sun-scorched Arab be dark with shade of evergreen trees, and cool with ripple of never-failing streams--yet is the universal art so intertwined with ideal bliss that no heaven of conscious enjoys for ever there

For alas! what else of ions of eternal perfection, or transplanted thither? Science is of the earth; ever bearing sad penalty, in toil of mind and body--and what art, save music, has man dedicated to Deity-worshi+p, without disappointment and loss? Doubtfully, Architecture; and for such consecration we have found no more expressive na was both a mystery and a revelation

I had never before heard anything to coain Talent, taste, feeling, were there, all in superlative degree, and disclosed with the unassu practice in solitude had averted a certain artificiality which, in the judgenerally accompanies musical skill His was no triu score; he was a sy exponent of his composer's revelations, now his own Solitary practice, with no one but hiive a distinct character to his performance, and this character was evident from the first; it wasor tears, beyond ientle heart breaking slowly under discipline untempered by one ray of earthly hope

My own inconise is, perhaps, the lected musical education--at all events, it is the one which causes me most uneasiness

Experience has warned me never to ask a player for the 'Marseillaise,'

or 'Croppies Lie Down,' or what not; for he is pretty sure to say, 'Why, that's just what I've been giving you,' or words to sirew tired of my non-committal remarks and replies, and, with a tact which impressed me more afterward than at the ti it For instance, the yearning tenderness of an exquisitely rendered air would see back some lost consciousness of an earlier and happier existence, suffusing ed for any joy I would feel the notes familiar, but whether of five years or five million years before, or whether in the body or out of the body, I could n't tell Alf, on concluding, would simply murmur, ”Home, Sweet Home,” and all would be explained Then, perhaps, he would say, ”The Last Rose of Suht through

But he did n't confine hiarity of popular airs

He played selections froner, and I don't knohoth he laid the violin across his knees, and, after a pause, his voice rose in one of the sweetest songs ever woven froesting ungauged resources of enchantment unconsciously held in reserve

I sat entranced as verse after verse flowed slowly on, every syllable clear and distinct as in speech; the subtle tyranny of vocal harretful sense that the song must end

But sorrow's sel' wears past, Jean, And joy's a-comin' fast, Jean, The joy that's aye to last, I' the land o' the leal

A' our freens are gane, Jean, We've lang been left alane, Jean

We'll a' ain I' the land o' the leal

”How happy Jean Armour must have been to be with poor Burns, while this cold world seemed to slip away fro Saviour,”his violin on the table, whilst he gazed absently into the expiring fire ”That song was composed by Burns, on his death-bed Is n't it beautiful?”

”It is one of the e,” I replied; ”but Burns is not the author The song was composed by a woman-- Baroness Nairne It is not for men to write in that strain As for Jean Arive, too”

”Ah! do you think a woive?”

returned Alf sadly, and then added, with sudden interest, ”But what difference do you notice between the poetry of men and women? What is the mark of wo Mrs Hemans, and others, you will find that, as a rule, our, but in grace This is not strange, for grace is, after all, a display of force, an aspect of strength But in the quality of sincerity, woood first Take an illustration, while I think of it: Compare the verses of my ancestor, Collins, 'On the Grave of Thompson,'

with Eliza Cook's verses, 'On the Grave of Good'”----

”But Collins was never married,” interposed Alf

”True,” I replied pleasantly ”But our family is aristocratic, and a baton-sinister only sets us off However, in the two poe of, the subject th and the writers have adopted the same iambic octo-syllable, with alternate rhyrace by anything within the range of our literature; but there's nothing else in it whatever Eliza Cook's versification is, in a e occasionally ho of a sincere, sympathetic heart is audible in every line”

”But your ancestor is the most artificial writer of an artificial school, and Eliza Cook is the most spontaneous writer of a spontaneous school,”

replied Alf, with the contradictive ily accoly, ”I would n't presume to criticise such a poet as Collins; but you said, yourself”----

”Oh, that's all right,” said I generously ”However, though your argument blunts the force of my illustration, it does n't weaken my contention

You'll find the distinction I've pointed-out hold good in a greater or less degree throughout literature; you'll find examples by the thousand, and of course, exceptions by the dozen But sing again, Alf, please