506 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[Dec. 29. 1855. 



works of nature, and who could embody their 

 peculiarities in verse as sweet and as melodious, 

 as his celebrated father poet. I allude to Hartley 

 Coleridore, eldest son of that celebrated genius, 

 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The note below is in 

 allusion to the following song, addressed to the 

 lark and the nightingale. Hartley Coleridge's 

 poetry has, in my opinion, not been duly appre- 

 ciated, nor has his wild and romantic character 

 until recently received that discrimination which 

 it deserved. I knew him in his early days at 

 Oxford. But it was not until he took up his 

 residence among the mountains and lakes in 

 Westmorland, that his peculiar turn of mind 

 •was thoronirhly developed. As Beattie sings of 

 his Minstrel Boy : 



" Deep thought oft seemed to fix his infant eye ; 

 Dainties he heeded not, nor gaude, nor toy, 

 Save one short pipe of rudest minstrelsy: 

 Silent when glad ; affectionate, though shy ; 

 And now his look was most demurely sad ; 

 And now he laughed aloud, yet none knew why .... 

 In truth he was a strange and wayward wight, 

 Fond of each gentle, and each dreadful scene. 

 In darkness and in storm he found delight : 

 Even sad vicissitude amused his soul ; 

 And if a sigh would sometimes intervene, 

 And down his cheek a tear of pity roll, 

 A sigh, a tear, so sweet, he wish'd not to control." 



The following song is extracted from a thin 8vo. 

 volume of poems by Hartley Coleridge, published 

 at Leeds in 1833 : 



«' 'Tis sweet to hear the merry lark, 



That bids a blithe good-morrovv ; 

 But sweeter to hark in the twinkling dark. 



To the soothing song of sorrow. 

 Oh, niffhtinc^ale ! What doth she ail ? 



And is she sad or jolly? 

 For ne'er on earth was sound of mirth 



So like to melancholy. 



" The merry lark, he soars on high. 



No worldly thought o'ertakes him ; 

 He sings aloud to the clear blue sky, 



And the daylight that awakes him. 

 As sweet a lay, as loud, as gay. 



The nightingale is trilling ; 

 With feeling bliss, no less than his, 



Her little heart is thrilling. 



" Yet ever and anon, a sigh 



Peers through her lavish mirth ; 

 For the lark's bold song is of the sky, 



And her's is of the earth. 

 B}' night and day she tunes her lay, 



To (h'ive awa}' all sorrow ; 

 For bliss, alas! to-night must pass. 



And woe may come to-morrow." 



To this sweet song Hartley Coleridge has ap- 

 pended the following note : — 



" Among the controversies of the day, not the least im- 

 portant is that respecting the song of the nightingale. It 

 is debated whether the notes of this bird are of a joyous 

 or a melancholy expression. He who has spoken so de- 

 cisively of 'the merry nightingale,' must forgive my 

 somewhat unfilud inclination toward the elder and more 



No. 322.] 



common opinion. No doubt the sensations of the bird 

 while singing are pleasurable ; but the question is, What is 

 the feeling which its song, considered as a succession of 

 sounds produced by an instrument, is calculated to con- 

 vey to a human listener? When we speak of a pathetic 

 strain of music, we do not mean that either the fiddler or 

 his fiddle are unhappv, but that the tones or intervals of 

 the air are such as the mind associates with tearful sym- 

 pathies. At the same time, I utterly den)^ that the voice 

 of Philomel expresses present pain. I could never have 

 imagined that the pretty creature ' sets its breast against 

 a thorn,' and could not have perpetrated the abominable 

 story of Tereus. In fact, nature is very little obliged ta 

 the heathen mj^thology. The constant anthropomorphism 

 of the Greek religion sorely perplexed the ancient con- 

 ceptions of natural beauty. A river is turned into a god, 

 who is still too much of a river to be quite a god : it is a 

 statue of ice in a continual state of liquefaction." 



J. M. G. 

 Worcester. 



CHRISTMAS JINGLE. 



The following lines form, as I am inclined to 

 think, one of the productions " so puerile and 

 simple " alluded to by Brand in his Popular An- 

 tiquities. See Bohn's edition, 1849, vol. i. p. 490. 



Rude, however, and monotonous as these lines 

 are, they occupy a prominent place in the recollec- 

 tions of most of the present generation who are — 



" . . . . native here. 

 And to the manner born " — 



it having been, up to within twenty years, ex- 

 tremely popular as a schoolboy's Christmas chant: 



"The first day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 

 A partridge upon a pear-tree. 



" Tlae second day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 

 Two turtle-doves, 

 And a partridge upon a pear-tree. 



" The third day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 

 Three French hens, &c. 



" The fourth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Four collie birds *, &c. 

 " The fifth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Five gold rings, &c. 

 « The sixth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Six geese a-laying, &c. 

 " The seventh day of Christmas my true-love sent tome 



Seven swans a-swimming, &c. 

 « The eighth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Eight maids a-milking, &c. 

 "The ninth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Nine drummers drumming, &c. 

 " The tenth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Ten pipers piping, &c. 



" The eleventh day of Christmas ray true-love sent to me 



Eleven ladies dancing, &c. 

 " Tlie twelfth day of Christmas my true-love sent to me 



Twelve lords a-leaping. 



Eleven ladies dancing, 



* What is the meaning of collie birds? [A blackbird 

 is called by this name in Somersetshire.] 



