"More than half a century ago the one starved genius of the Shield [Kentucky], a writer of songs, looked out upon the summer picture of this land, its meadows and ripening corn tops; and as one presses out the spirit of an entire vineyard when he bursts a solitary grape upon his tongue, he, the song writer, drained drop by drop the wine of that scene into the notes of a single melody. The nation now knows his song, the world knows it—the only music that has ever captured the joy and peace of American home life—embodying the very soul of it in the clear amber of sound."
Bibliography. Atlantic Monthly (November, 1867); Current Literature (September, 1901). Strangely enough no formal biography of Foster has been written.
MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME, GOOD-NIGHT
[From Stephen Collins Foster Statue (Louisville, Kentucky, 1906, a pamphlet)]
The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home,
'Tis summer, the darkies are gay;
The corn-top's ripe and the meadow's in the bloom,
While the birds make music all the day;
The young folks roll on the little cabin floor,
All merry, all happy, and bright,
By'n-by hard times comes a-knocking at the door,
Then my old Kentucky home, good-night!
Chorus:
Weep no more, my lady, O weep no more to-day!
We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home,
For the old Kentucky home far away.
They hunt no more for the 'possum and the coon,
On the meadow, the hill, and the shore;
They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon,
On the bench by the old cabin door;
The day goes by, like a shadow o'er the heart,
With sorrow, where all was delight;
The time has come when the darkies have to part,
Then my old Kentucky home, good-night!
Chorus:
Weep no more, my lady, O weep no more to-day!
We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home,
For the old Kentucky home far away.