[84] Magdalen College. One of the colleges of Oxford University, England. It is noted for an especially beautiful tower.
[85] Clement C. Moore (1779-1863). A wealthy American scholar and teacher who wrote the poem, 'Twas the Night Before Christmas.
[86] Edwin Forrest (1806-1872). A great American actor, noted for his rendition of Shakespeare.
THE SONGS OF THE CIVIL WAR[87]
By BRANDER MATTHEWS
(1852—). One of the most influential American critics and essayists, Professor of Dramatic Literature in Columbia University. He was one of the founders of The Authors' Club, and The Players, and a leader in organizing the American Copyright League. He is a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He is the author of works that illustrate many types of literature, including novels, short stories, essays, poems and plays. Among his books are: A Story of the Sea, and Other Stories; Pen and Ink; Americanisms and Briticisms; The Story of a Story; Vignettes of Manhattan; His Father's Son; Aspects of Fiction; Essays in English; The American of the Future.
When companionable people meet in pleasant converse, whether before the open fire at home, or in chance gatherings at any place, they tell one another about the interesting experiences that they have had or the discoveries that they have made. If you could place on paper what any one of them says, except in narration, and if you could, at the same time, show the feeling and the spirit of the speaker,—if you could in some way transfer the personality of the speaker to the paper,—you would, in all probability, produce an essay.
The author of The Songs of the Civil War has learned some interesting facts concerning our national songs. He communicates those facts as he would to a company of friends, indicating throughout his remarks his own interests and beliefs. His words are the pleasant words of friendship,—not the formal giving of information that characterizes most encyclopedia articles. That part of his essay which is given here is sufficient to indicate the charm of his presentation.
A national hymn is one of the things which cannot be made to order. No man has ever yet sat him down and taken up his pen and said, “I will write a national hymn,” and composed either words or music which a nation was willing to take for its own. The making of the song of the people is a happy accident, not to be accomplished by taking thought. It must be the result of fiery feeling long confined, and suddenly finding vent in burning words or moving strains. Sometimes the heat and the pressure of emotion have been fierce enough and intense enough to call forth at once both words and music, and to weld them together indissolubly once and for all. Almost always the maker of the song does not suspect the abiding value of his work; he has wrought unconsciously, moved by a power within; he has written for immediate relief to himself, and with no thought of fame or the future; he has builded better than he knew. The great national lyric is the result of the conjunction of the hour and the man. Monarch cannot command it, and even poets are often powerless to achieve it. No one of the great national hymns has been written by a great poet. But for his single immortal lyric, neither the author of the “Marseillaise”[88] nor the author of the “Wacht am Rhein”[89] would have his line in the biographical dictionaries. But when a song has once taken root in the hearts of a people, time itself is powerless against it. The flat and feeble “Partant pour la Syrie,” which a filial fiat made the hymn of imperial France, had to give way to the strong and virile notes of the “Marseillaise,” when need was to arouse the martial spirit of the French in 1870. The noble measures of “God Save the King,” as simple and dignified a national hymn as any country can boast, lift up the hearts of the English people; and the brisk tune of the “British Grenadiers” has swept away many a man into the ranks of the recruiting regiment. The English are rich in war tunes and the pathetic “Girl I Left Behind Me” encourages and sustains both those who go to the front and those who remain at home. Here in the United States we have no “Marseillaise,” no “God Save the King,” no “Wacht am Rhein”; we have but “Yankee Doodle” and the “Star-spangled Banner.” More than one enterprising poet, and more than one aspiring musician, has volunteered to take the contract to supply the deficiency; as yet no one has succeeded. “Yankee Doodle” we got during the revolution, and the “Star-spangled Banner” was the gift of the War of 1812; from the Civil War we have received at least two war songs which, as war songs simply, are stronger and finer than either of these—“John Brown's Body” and “Marching Through Georgia.”
Of the lyrical outburst which the war called forth but little trace is now to be detected in literature except by special students. In most cases neither words nor music have had vitality enough to survive a quarter of a century. Chiefly, indeed, two things only survive, one Southern and the other Northern; one a war-cry in verse, the other a martial tune: one is the lyric “My Maryland” and the other is the marching song “John Brown's Body.” The origin and development of the latter, the rude chant to which a million of the soldiers of the Union kept time, is uncertain and involved in dispute. The history of the former may be declared exactly, and by the courtesy of those who did the deed—for the making of a war song is of a truth a deed at arms—I am enabled to state fully the circumstances under which it was written, set to music, and first sung before the soldiers of the South.