world by his intellect, or delights it by his genius, ought, in return, to receive the means of living, in ease and honour, in that society to whose welfare or happiness he contributes. But peace to the memory of Burns! His errors were those of the head, not of the heart. He was early thrown upon the dark and troubled sea of human life, and left to steer his course without protection or guidance, and without ever having learned how to avoid, or even discern, the rocks and quicksands upon which he was driven, at every instant, by his strong feelings and impetuous passions. Though, however, his imprudence blighted his prospects, and even brought him to an untimely grave, yet he never forgot the dignity of his nature, or was guilty of a degrading or dishonourable action. Though thoughtless folly laid him low,' yet nothing but the excessive bitterness of self-reproach could have made him say that it had • stained his name. ? Death and time have long since effaced to every generous eye any stain that his irregularities might have gathered around it; and the errors of his ardent temperament, soaring fancy and proud heart, show like virtues, when contrasted with the low venality and interested servility that have so often degraded the genius of modern times.

When Burns began the task he had undertaken for Mr Thomson, they were aware of the necessity of furnishing a great proportion of the Scottish airs with new poetry. Many of the old verses, particularly the very old ones, were excellent, -containing not only simple and natural expressions of feeling, but admirable delineations of rustic character and manners. But still a great number of the older songs were so debased by grossness and vulgarity, as to be quite unfit for the use of a refined age; and several of them were strangely unsuitable to the character of the airs to which they were sung;-grotesque and humorous words being frequently joined to plaintive and tender melodies. The air of the old song,' Fee him, father, fee him,' for instance, is now joined to one of the most pathetic effusions of Burns; the poet (as he himself informs us) having discovered the true expression of this fine strain from listening to it as performed by a musician on the oboe. It seems difficult to account for this incongruity between national airs and their original poetry, if, indeed, these old verses were the original ones, which, after all, may not have been the case; but the same thing appears to have existed, in an equal degree, among the Irish songs, to many of which Moore has given verses of a character totally different from that of the popular songs to which they were formerly united. Of the more modern songs, a number were composed in that affected and artificial style which was

then beginning to be tiresome, and has now become altogether unsufferable. We can no longer listen with patience to ditties about Corydon and Amynta, and shepherds with their crooks treading Arcadian plains; and we are inclined to think, that too many of these namby-pamby lyrics have still been allowed to remain. But reformation in matters of taste, as in other things, is progressive. Even the reformers themselves cannot shake off the many associations which obscure their judgments. Some of the songs, about the silliness and insipidity of which there cannot now be two opinions, were not only in such general vogue as to be absolutely inevitable, but were even admired by Burns himself. On this account, a few of our very finest airs are still united to verses unworthy of them, and destitute of that high tone of passion which was introduced by Burns, and now characterises the great body of our lyric poetry.

Besides the best specimens of the older Scottish poetry, and almost the whole of the songs of Burns, this work contains a great number of original compositions by the most celebrated poets of the present day, many of which are exceedingly beautiful; and the work has thus acquired a high degree of value in a literary point of view, independently of its value as a musical publication.

In the musical department of the work, Pleyel, Kozeluch,→→ afterwards the immortal Haydn, and lastly Beethoven, the greatest of living composers, and not inferior to the greatest of those who are gone, were employed to compose symphonies and accompaniments to the melodies. Some ridicule has been attempted to be thrown upon the employment of foreign composers to set accompaniments to Scottish airs. But the greatest and most consummate musician of any country is undoubtedly the fittest person to execute any musical task. To such a man, every

combination of musical sound, whether it be the most profound elaboration of harmony, or the simplest national air, is equally familiar. He sees at a glance the character, expression, and capabilities of every air that can be presented to him, while he is able to heighten and relieve the melody, by throwing into his skilful and delicate harmonies those magical traits of genius and feeling which we would vainly expect from an inferior artist. A Scotsman, born and nurtured among Scottish airs, may, from a thousand pleasing associations, learn to like them better than the greatest Italian or German musician would do; but he will never learn to understand them better, nor probably half so well... Yet it is through confounding these two very different things, and imagining that, because we like our own airs better than foreigners do, we must therefore understand them better, that

many persons cannot comprehend how the best accompaniments to Scottish airs should be made by German or Italian composers.

We hear, likewise, a great deal about the Scottish airs, from the irregularity of their structure, being incapable of harmony, and about the consequent absurdity of attempting to give them a regular accompaniment. This sort of reasoning has been employed, in various shapes, by writers who have thought it necessary to enlighten their readers by disquisitions on the metaphysical principles of an art, of which, practically, they knew nothing. Such writers, indeed, generally go a good deal further, and affect to sneer at all elaborate and scientific music, and, in particular, at harmony;-endeavouring to degrade music from its rank as one of the fine arts, requiring, for its successful cultivation, intellect, genius, taste, feeling, and refinement; and to make its only legitimate objects consist in the invention and performance of such airs or melodies as are naturally pleasing, previous to the formation of what they call an artificial or corrupted taste. We cannot enter here into a general discussion of this question, though we must make a few observations on that part of it which relates to harmony, as this subject is more immediately connected with the merits of the work before us. It may, however, be remarked as singular, that music is, more than all others, a subject on which every body is ready to dogmatisedocti indoctique. It is generally considered necessary, before giving confident opinions regarding any other of the fine arts, to be acquainted with it-to know its principles, and to be familar with all its greatest productions. No such thing is considered requisite in music; and yet, if it is reckoned presumptuous to discuss the subject of painting without having studied the works of Raphael or Titian,-or poetry without being familiar with Shakespeare, Milton, or Pope,-the charge seems fully as applicable to those who dogmatise upon music, without knowing any thing of Handel, beyond perhaps the genteelest of tunes, the minuet in Ariadne,-or of Mozart, beyond the fashionable song of the day, sung by the prima donna at the Opera-house.

Every practical musician is aware, that the connexion between melody and harmony is of the most intimate kind, and that every melody that is really good, however unartificial in its structure, is perfectly susceptible of receiving additional beauty from good harmony. The pleasure which we receive from harmony is as natural (or as much derived from our original constitution) as that which is produced by melody. A contrary conclusion, indeed, is attempted to be drawn, from the ignorance of harmony among the ancients, and among uncultivated tribes,

and from the circumstance, that it generally affords no pleasure to children, or to persons unaccustomed to it. As to the state of music among the ancients, we really know too little of the matter to be able to determine, whether they were ignorant of harmony or not. The ignorance of harmony among uncultivated nations, arises from this, that harmonical combinations cannot be discovered without the aid of instruments, and of skill in the use of them, not to be found in a rude state of society. With regard, again, to the fact, as it is called, that harmony is at first positively disagreeable to persons who have not been accustomed to it, we conceive that much error exists, both as to the fact, and the inference drawn from it. An uncultivated taste has a very narrow circle of enjoyments. The common people of one country, who are passionately fond of their own melodies, can neither relish nor comprehend an air of another country, though it may be really as simple as one of their own. They cannot get it into their ear,' as they say, nor discover its beauty, till frequent repetition has reconciled them to a rhythm and modulation, so different from what they have been used to. Indeed it is quite common for a person of this description to be unable to comprehend even an air of his own country, if he happens to hear it for the first time. No wonder, then, that such people should be unable, at first, to perceive the beauty of a thing so new to them, as harmonical combinations of sound. But the truth is, that they learn to feel the beauties of simple harmony as soon as those of an unusual style of melody. Witness the delighted crowds of ragged boys and girls who used to stand in ecstasy round the military bands that paraded in all our marketplaces, in those piping times' of war which are now happily gone by. Witness also the numbers who follow our street-musicians, whenever the stupendous novelty of a violoncello is added to the ambulating orchestra.' The new effect of a bass, added to our popular tunes and dances, was immediately found to be delightful; and yet the ascent, from this harmony, which is thus experimentally shown to be natural, to the most chromatic combinations of Beethoven, is gradual and unbroken, arising merely from progressive refinement, and more enlarged views of the art. Witness, in the last place, the population of Wales, which is probably neither more nor less refined than that of other countries, but where, owing to the immemorial use of the harp, the pleasures of harmony are as familar as those of melody.

Si

*To this day,' says Professor Robison, the most uncultivated boor in the Russian empire would be ashamed to sing in unison. 'He listens a little while to a new tune, holding his chin to his

milar considerations apply to children. They learn, on their nurse's knee, to like melody; but, were they as early accustomed to listen to the sound of consonant thirds and fifths, we see no reason to doubt, that they would like them as soon as sounds in pleasing succession. Without resting on such remarkable cases as those of Mozart or Crotch, who delighted in harmonious sounds from their earliest infancy, we will venture to state it as a fact, well known to those who have bestowed any observation on the subject, that children who have an opportunity of hearing concordant sounds, very soon experience great pleasure from them. In addition to these considerations, others, of a more technical nature, may be pointed out, as establishing the same conclusion. It may be shown, for example, that a pleasing harmonical combination produces a pleasure of a similar kind, when the notes, of which the harmony consists, are thrown into a melody, or series of single sounds. But these views of the question would require a minuteness of detail, into which it is impossible at present to enter.

Rousseau is, we believe, the only writer, really a musician, who has maintained a doctrine contrary to that which we now contend for and, accordingly, his authority has been appealed to by those who have tried to place melody and harmony in opposition, as it were, to each other. But there are two or three things which render Rousseau's authority of little value. The first is, his fondness for singular and paradoxical opinions. The man who could write eloquent declamations, to show that the best state of mankind is a state of nature, without arts or sciences, or the institutions of civilized life, might, very consistently, represent the most inartificial music as the best. Rousseau, besides, though he possessed taste and feeling, was very far from being a skilful or learned musician. He could compose simple and pretty airs (of which his celebrated opera, Le Devin du Village, entirely consists); but he was never able to produce any thing which required a mastery of the rules of counterpoint. Hence he was naturally disposed to exalt that branch of the art in which he excelled, and to depreciate what was beyond his reach. Lastly, the rules of harmony, in Rousseau's age and country, were narrow and erroneous,-founded upon an artifi

breast; and as soon as he has got a notion of it, he bursts out in concert, throwing in the harmonic notes by a certain rule, which he feels, but cannot explain. His harmonics are generally alternate major and minor thirds, and he seldom misses the proper cadence on the fifth and key. '-Encycl. Brit. Article, Temperament of the Scale of Music.