The Story of the Hymns and Tunes Part 50

Our G.o.d is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me; As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free.

While G.o.d is marching on.

_THE TUNE._

The music of the old camp-meeting refrain,--

Say, brothers will you meet us?

--or,--

O brother, will you meet me,

(No. 173 in the _Revivalist_,) was written in 1855, by John William Steffe, of Richmond, Va., for a fire company, and was afterwards arranged by Franklin H. Lummis. The air of the "John Brown Song" was caught from this religious melody. The old hymn-tune had the "Glory, Hallelujah" coda, cadenced off with, "For ever, ever more."

In 1860-61 the garrison of soldiers at work on the half-dismantled defenses of Fort Warren in Boston Harbor, were fain to lighten labor and mock fatigue with any species of fun suggested by circ.u.mstances or accident, and, as for music, they sang everything they could remember or make up. John Brown's memory and fate were fresh in the Northern mind, and the jollity of the not very reverent army men did not exclude frequent allusions to the rash old Harper's Ferry hero.

A wag conjured his spirit into the camp with a witticism as to what he was doing, and a comrade retorted,

"Marchin' on, of course."

A third cried, "Pooh, John Brown's underground."

A serio-comic debate added more words, and in the midst of the banter, a musical fellow strung a rhythmic sentence and trolled it to the Methodist tune. "John Brown's body lies a mould'rin' in the ground" was taken up by others who knew the air, the following line was improvised almost instantly, and soon, to the accompaniment of pick, shovel and crowbar,--

His soul goes marching on,

--rounded the couplet with full lung power through all the repet.i.tions, till the inevitable "glory, glory hallelujah" had the voice of every soldier in the fort. The song "took," and the marching chorus of the Federal armies of the Civil War was started on its way. Mrs. Howe gave it a poem that made its rusticity sublime, and the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" began a career that promises to run till battle hymns cease to be sung.

Julia Ward was born in New York city, May 27, 1819. In 1843 she became the wife of Samuel Gridley Howe, the far-famed philanthropist and champion of liberty, and with him edited an anti-slavery paper, the _Boston Commonwealth_, until the Civil War closed its mission. During the war she was active and influential--and has never ceased to be so--in the cause of peace and justice, and in every philanthropic movement. Her great hymn first brought her prominently before the public, but her many other writings would have made a literary reputation. Her four surviving children are all eminent in the scientific and literary world.

KELLER'S AMERICAN HYMN.

Naturally the t.i.tle suggests the authorship of the ode, but fate made Keller a musician rather than a poet and hymnist, and the honors of the fine anthem are divided. At the grand performance which created its reputation, the hymn of Dr. O.W. Holmes was subst.i.tuted for the composer's words. This is Keller's first stanza:

Speed our republic, O Father on high!

Lead us in pathways of justice and right, Rulers, as well as the ruled, one and all, Girdle with virtue the armor of might.

Hail! three times hail, to our country and flag!

Rulers, as well as the ruled, one and all, Girdle with virtue the armor of might; Hail! three times hail, to our country and flag!

"Flag" was the unhappy word at the end of every one of the four stanzas.

To match a short vowel to an orotund concert note for two beats and a "hold" was impossible. When the great Peace Jubilee of 1872, in Boston, was projected, Dr. Holmes was applied to, and responded with a lyric that gave each stanza the rondeau effect designed by the composer, but replaced the flat final with a climax syllable of breadth and music:

Angel of Peace, thou hast wandered too long!

Spread thy white wings to the sunshine of love!

Come while our voices are blended in song, Fly to our ark like the storm-beaten dove!

Fly to our ark on the wings of the dove, Speed o'er the far-sounding billows of song, Crown'd with thine olive-leaf garland of love, Angel of Peace, thou hast waited too long!

Angels of Bethlehem, answer the strain!

Hark! a new birth-song is filling the sky!

Loud as the storm-wind that tumbles the main, Bid the full breath of the organ reply, Let the loud tempest of voices reply, Roll its long surge like the earth-shaking main!

Swell the vast song till it mounts to the sky!

Angels of Bethlehem, echo the strain!

But the glory of the _tune_ was Keller's own.

Soon after the close of the war a prize of $500 had been offered by a committee of American gentlemen for the best "national hymn" (meaning words and music). Mr. Keller, though a foreigner, was a naturalized citizen and patriot and entered the lists as a compet.i.tor with the zeal of a native and the ambition of an artist. Sometime in 1866 he finished and copyrighted the n.o.ble anthem that bears his name, and then began the struggle to get it before the public and test its merit. To enable him to bring it out before the New York Academy of Music, where (unfortunately) he determined to make his first trial, his brother kindly lent him four hundred dollars (which he had laid by to purchase a little home), and he borrowed two hundred more elsewhere.

The performance proved a failure, the total receipts being only forty-two dollars, Keller was $500 in debt, and his brother's house-money was gone. But he refused to accept his failure as final.

Boston (where he should have begun) was introduced to his masterpiece at every opportunity, and gradually, with the help of the city bands and a few public concerts, a decided liking for it was worked up. It was entered on the program of the Peace Jubilee and sung by a chorus of ten thousand voices. The effect was magnificent. "Keller's American Hymn"

became a recognized star number in the repertoire of "best" national tunes; and now few public occasions where patriotic music is demanded omit it in their menu of song.[33]

[Footnote 33: In b.u.t.terworth's "_Story of the Tunes_," under the account of Keller's grand motet, the following sacred hymn is inserted as "often sung to it:"--

Father Almighty, we bow at thy feet; Humbly thy grace and thy goodness we own.

Answer in love when thy children entreat, Hear our thanksgiving ascend to thy throne.

Seeking thy blessing, in worship we meet, Trusting our souls on thy mercy alone; Father Almighty, we bow at thy feet.

Breathe, Holy Spirit, thy comfort divine, Tune every voice to thy music of peace; Hushed in our hearts, with one whisper of thine, Pride and the tumult of pa.s.sion will cease.

Joy of the watchful, who wait for thy sign, Hope of the sinful, who long for release, Breathe, Holy Spirit, thy comfort divine.

G.o.d of salvation, thy glory we sing, Honors to thee in thy temple belong; Welcome the tribute of gladness we bring, Loud-pealing organ and chorus of song.

While our high praises, Redeemer and King, Blend with the notes of the angelic throng, G.o.d of salvation, thy glory we sing.

--_Theron Brown_.]

It is pathetic to know that the composer's one great success brought him only a barren renown. The prize committee, on the ground that _none_ of the competing pieces reached the high standard of excellence contemplated, withheld the $500, and Keller's work received merely the compliment of being judged worth presentation. The artist had his copyright, but he remained a poor man.

Matthias Keller was born at Ulm, Wurtemberg, March 20, 1813. In his youth he was both a musician and a painter. Coming to this country, he chose the calling that promised the better and quicker wages, playing in bands and theatre orchestras, but never acc.u.mulating money. He could make fine harmonies as well as play them, but English was not his mother-tongue, and though he wrote a hundred and fifty songs, only one made him well-known. When fame came to him it did not bring him wealth, and in his latter days, crippled by partial paralysis, he went back to his early art and earned a living by painting flowers and retouching portraits and landscapes. He died in 1875, only three years after his Coliseum triumph.

"G.o.d BLESS OUR NATIVE LAND."

This familiar patriotic hymn is notable--though not entirely singular--for having two authors. The older singing-books signed the name of J.S. Dwight to it, until inquiring correspondence brought out the testimony and the joint claim of Dwight and C.T. Brooks, and it appeared that both these scholars and writers translated it from the German. Later hymnals attach both their names to the hymn.[34]

[Footnote 34: For a full account of this disputed hymn, and the curious trick of memory which confused _four_ names in the question of its authorship, see Dr. Benson's _Studies of Familiar Hymns_, pp. 179-190]

John Sullivan Dwight, born, in Boston, May 13, 1813, was a virtuoso in music, and an enthusiastic student of the art and science of tonal harmony. He joined a Harvard musical club known as "The Pierian Sodality" while a student at the University, and after his graduation became a prolific writer on musical subjects. Six years of his life were pa.s.sed in the "Brook Farm Community." He was best known by his serial magazine, Dwight's _Journal of Music_, which was continued from 1852 to 1881. His death occurred in 1893.

Rev. Charles Timothy Brooks, the translator of Faust, was born, in Salem, Ma.s.s., June 20, 1813, being only about a month younger than his friend Dwight. Was a student at Harvard University and Divinity School 1829-1835, and was ordained to the Unitarian ministry and settled at Newport, R.I. He resigned his charge there (1871) on account of ill health, and occupied himself with literary work until his death, Jan.

14, 1883.

G.o.d bless our native land!

Firm may she ever stand Through storm and night!

When the wild tempests rave.