POPULAR SONGS. 



4>9 



by the gallants and ladies of the court, to confer great honour upon Guido 

 Cavalcanti, Cino de Pistoia, Guido Orlandi, and the rest of the composers ; 

 but they took no root amongst the people, who either did not understand 

 them or turned them into jest. Rhythm and song were in a measure instinc- 

 tive requirements in a land where the love of poetry and music is innate. As 

 late as the last century the gondoliers of Venice were in the habit of singing 

 verses from Tasso while plying the oar (Fig. 329). But these were not 



Fig. 329. Venetian Gondola. From the " Grand Procession of tho Doge of Venice," attributed 

 to Jost Amman, published at Frankfort in 1597. 



popular songs, to find which we must search the numerous patois, which were, 

 many of them, equal, if not superior, to the correct Italian language. There 

 was not a town or village which had not its local literature, and which could 

 not boast of the clever and poetical works of some one or more of its sons. 



In Spain, more than in any other country of Europe, popular song had a 

 very marked and special physiognomy, and assumed the form, not of ballad, 



