[345]. Songs of the Russian People, p. 40.
[346]. Krohn, “La Chanson Populaire en Finlande,” Proceedings Internat. Folk-Lore Congress, 1891, pp. 134 ff., a valuable paper. “La poésie s’est refugiée dans la pensée, mais elle n’a pu se maintenir intacte de trivialité.” See also Comparetti, Kalewala, pp. 16 f.
[347]. E. H. Meyer, Volkskunde, pp. 327, 331.
[348]. James Hogg (Famous Scots Series), p. 25.
[349]. In Mélusine, IV, (1888-1889), pp. 49 ff., and continued.
[350]. It is significant that the vogue of singing-clubs in German rural districts, which would seem to make for communal ballads, really drives them out. See Dunger, Rundâs u. Reimsprüche aus dem Vogtlande, Plauen, 1876, p. xxx.
[351]. The introduction to Rosa Warrens’s Schwedische Volkslieder, 1857, is by Wolf, and Grundtvig did a similar favour for her Dänische Volkslieder, 1858; opposed as regards authorship, the two are agreed on the source of a ballad in the homogeneous community. This even Comparetti recognizes: Kalewala, p. 21. See, too, Liliencron, Deutsches Leben im Volkslied um 1530, p. xi., and Baring-Gould, English Minstrelsie, Vol. VII. Introduction (“On English Song-Making”). But it is useless to pile up these references.
[352]. January 27, 1900.
[353]. Of course, one community may still sing, while another has forgotten. Beaurepaire, Étude sur la Poésie Populaire en Normandie, 1856, pp. 24 f., notes this, as well as the fact that some kinds of songs linger while others die. He found no vocero left in Normandy, but old choral wedding songs still were heard. The dance is going—the old village dance, the ronde: pp. 30 f.
[354]. Böckel, Deutsche Volkslieder aus Oberhessen, Marburg, 1885, has an introduction of great value, which shows how utterly German folksong is a closed account. Traditional ballads are still sung, but none are made; what is now made is mainly “Schmutz und Rohheit.” Factories, singing-schools, are putting an end to communal song. The process of decay, he thinks, began as early as 1600. For description of modern communal songs, see p. cxxviii. Folksong, he says (p. clxxxiii), is dead throughout civilized Europe.