A like propitiatory offering of food to one's personal fate forms a feature of a second Sicilian story which is so important in all its bearings on the subject in hand, that it would not do to abridge it. Here it is, therefore, in its entirety.
There was a certain merchant who was so rich that he had treasures which not even the king possessed. In his audience chamber there were three beautiful arm-chairs, one of silver, one of gold, and one of diamonds. This merchant had an only daughter of the name of Caterina, who was fairer than the sun. One day Caterina sat alone in her room, when suddenly the door opened of itself, and there entered a tall and beautiful lady, who held a wheel in her hands. "Caterina," said she, "when would you like best to enjoy your life? in youth, or in age?" Caterina gazed at her in amazement, and could not get over her stupor. The beautiful lady asked again, "Caterina, when do you wish to enjoy your life in youth or in age?" Then Caterina thought, "If I say in youth, I shall have to suffer in age; hence I prefer to enjoy my life in age, and in youth I must get on as the Lord wills." So she said, "In age." "Be it unto you according to your desire," said the beautiful lady, who gave a turn to her wheel, and disappeared. This tall and beautiful lady was poor Caterina's fate. After a few days her father received the sudden news that several of his ships had gone down in a storm; again, after a few days, other of his ships met with the same fate, and to make a long story short, a month had not gone by before he saw himself despoiled of all his wealth. He had to sell everything, and remained poor and miserable, and finally he fell ill and died. Thus poor Caterina was left alone in the world, and no one would give her a home. Then she thought, "I will go to another city and will seek a place as serving-maid." She wandered a long way till she reached another city. As she passed down the street, she saw at a window a worthy-looking lady, who questioned her. "Where are you going, all alone, fair girl?" "Oh! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and I would willingly go into service to earn my bread. Could you, by chance, employ me?" The worthy lady engaged her, and Caterina served her faithfully. After a few days the lady said one evening,"Caterina, I am going out, and shall lock the house-door." "Very well," said Caterina, and when her mistress was gone, she took her work and began to sew. Suddenly the door opened, and her fate came in. "So!" cried this one, "you are here, Caterina, and you think that I shall leave you in peace!" With these words, she ran to the cupboards and turned out the linen and clothes of Caterina's mistress, and threw them all about the room. Caterina thought, "When my mistress returns and finds everything in such a state, she will kill me!" And out of fear she broke open the door and fled. But her fate made all the things right again, and gathered them up and put them in their places. When the mistress came home, she called Caterina, but she could not find her anywhere. She thought she must have robbed her, but when she looked at her cupboards, she saw that nothing was missing. She wondered greatly, but Caterina never came back—she ran and ran till she reached another city, when, as she passed along the street, she saw once more a lady at a window, who asked her, "Where are you going, all alone, fair girl?" "Ah! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and I wish to find a place so as to earn my bread. Could you take me?" The lady took her into her service, and Caterina thought now to remain in peace. Only a few days had passed, when one evening, when the lady was out, Caterina's fate appeared again, and spoke hard words to her, saying, "So you are here, are you? and you think to escape from me?" Then she scattered whatever she could lay hands on, and poor Caterina once more fled out of fright.To be brief, poor Caterina had to lead this terrible life for seven years, flying from city to city in search of a place. Whenever she entered service, after a few days her fate always appeared and disordered her mistress' things, and so the poor girl had to fly. As soon as she was gone, however, her fate repaired all the damage that had been done. At last, after seven years, it seemed as if the unhappy Caterina's fate was weary of persecuting her. One day she arrived in a city where she saw a lady at a window, who said, "Where go you, all alone, fair girl?" "Ah! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and willingly would I enter service to earn my bread; could you employ me?" The lady replied, "I will take you, but every day you will haveto do me a certain service, and I am not sure that you have the strength." "Tell me what it is," said Caterina, "and if I can, I will do it." "Do you see that high mountain?" said the lady; "every morning you will have to carry up to the top a baker's tray of new bread, and then you must cry aloud, 'O fate of my mistress!' three times repeated. My fate will appear and will receive the bread." "I will do it willingly," said Caterina, and thereupon the lady engaged her. With this lady Caterina stayed many years, and every morning she carried the tray of fresh bread up the mountain, and after she had cried three times, "O fate of my mistress!" there appeared a beautiful, stately lady, who received the bread. Caterina often wept, thinking how she, who was once so rich, had now to work like any poor girl, and one day her mistress asked her, "Why are you always crying?" Caterina told her how ill things had gone with her, and her mistress said, "You know, Caterina, when you take the bread up the mountain to-morrow? Well, do you beg my fate to try and persuade yours to leave you in peace. Perhaps this may do some good." The advice pleased poor Caterina, and the following morning when she carried up the bread, she told her mistress' fate of the sore straits she was in, and said, "O fate of my mistress, pray ask my fate no longer to torment me." "Ah! poor girl," the fate answered, "your fate is covered with a sevenfold covering, and that is why she cannot hear you. But to-morrow when you come, I will lead you to her." When Caterina had gone home, her mistress' fate went to her fate, and said, "Dear sister, why are you not tired of persecuting poor Caterina? Let her once again see happy days." The fate replied, "To-morrow bring her to me; I will give her something that will supply all her needs." The next morning, when Caterina brought the bread, her mistress' fate conducted her to her own fate, who was covered with a sevenfold covering. The fate gave her a skein of silk, and said, "Take care of it, it will be of use to you." After she had returned home, Caterina said to her mistress, "My fate has made me a present of a skein of silk; what ought I to do with it?" "It is not worth three grains of corn," said the mistress. "Keep it, all the same; who knows what it may be good for?"After some time, it happened that the young king wasabout to take a wife, and, therefore, he had himself made some new clothes. But when the tailor was going to make up one fine piece of stuff, he could not anywhere find silk of the same colour with which to sew it. The king had it cried through the land, that whosoever had silk of the right colour was to bring it to court, and would be well paid for his pains. "Caterina," said her mistress, "your skein of silk is of that colour; take it to the king and he will make you a fine present." Caterina put on her best gown, and went to court, and when she came before the king, she was so beautiful that he could not take his eyes off her. "Royal Majesty," she said, "I have brought a skein of silk of the colour you could not find." "Royal majesty," cried one of the ministers, "we should give her the weight of her silk in gold." The king agreed, and the scales were brought in. On one side the king placed the skein of silk, and on the other a gold piece. Now, what do you think happened? The silk was always the heaviest, no matter how many gold pieces the king placed in the balance. Then he ordered a larger pair of scales, and he put all his treasure to the one side, but the silk remained the heaviest. Then he took his gold crown off his head and set it with the other treasure, and upon that the two scales became even."Where did you get this silk?" asked the king. "Royal Majesty, my mistress gave it to me." "That is not possible," cried the king. "If you do not tell me the truth I will have your head cut off!" Caterina related all that had happened to her since the time when she was a rich maiden. At Court there was a very wise lady, who said: "Caterina, you have suffered much, but now you will see happy days, and since the gold crown made the balance even, it is a sign that you will live to be a queen." "She shall be a queen," cried the king, "I will make her a queen! Caterina and no other shall be my bride." And so it was. The king sent to his bride to say that he no longer wanted her, and married the fair Caterina, who, after much suffering in youth, enjoyed her age in full prosperity, living happy and content, whereof we have assured testimony.
There was a certain merchant who was so rich that he had treasures which not even the king possessed. In his audience chamber there were three beautiful arm-chairs, one of silver, one of gold, and one of diamonds. This merchant had an only daughter of the name of Caterina, who was fairer than the sun. One day Caterina sat alone in her room, when suddenly the door opened of itself, and there entered a tall and beautiful lady, who held a wheel in her hands. "Caterina," said she, "when would you like best to enjoy your life? in youth, or in age?" Caterina gazed at her in amazement, and could not get over her stupor. The beautiful lady asked again, "Caterina, when do you wish to enjoy your life in youth or in age?" Then Caterina thought, "If I say in youth, I shall have to suffer in age; hence I prefer to enjoy my life in age, and in youth I must get on as the Lord wills." So she said, "In age." "Be it unto you according to your desire," said the beautiful lady, who gave a turn to her wheel, and disappeared. This tall and beautiful lady was poor Caterina's fate. After a few days her father received the sudden news that several of his ships had gone down in a storm; again, after a few days, other of his ships met with the same fate, and to make a long story short, a month had not gone by before he saw himself despoiled of all his wealth. He had to sell everything, and remained poor and miserable, and finally he fell ill and died. Thus poor Caterina was left alone in the world, and no one would give her a home. Then she thought, "I will go to another city and will seek a place as serving-maid." She wandered a long way till she reached another city. As she passed down the street, she saw at a window a worthy-looking lady, who questioned her. "Where are you going, all alone, fair girl?" "Oh! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and I would willingly go into service to earn my bread. Could you, by chance, employ me?" The worthy lady engaged her, and Caterina served her faithfully. After a few days the lady said one evening,"Caterina, I am going out, and shall lock the house-door." "Very well," said Caterina, and when her mistress was gone, she took her work and began to sew. Suddenly the door opened, and her fate came in. "So!" cried this one, "you are here, Caterina, and you think that I shall leave you in peace!" With these words, she ran to the cupboards and turned out the linen and clothes of Caterina's mistress, and threw them all about the room. Caterina thought, "When my mistress returns and finds everything in such a state, she will kill me!" And out of fear she broke open the door and fled. But her fate made all the things right again, and gathered them up and put them in their places. When the mistress came home, she called Caterina, but she could not find her anywhere. She thought she must have robbed her, but when she looked at her cupboards, she saw that nothing was missing. She wondered greatly, but Caterina never came back—she ran and ran till she reached another city, when, as she passed along the street, she saw once more a lady at a window, who asked her, "Where are you going, all alone, fair girl?" "Ah! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and I wish to find a place so as to earn my bread. Could you take me?" The lady took her into her service, and Caterina thought now to remain in peace. Only a few days had passed, when one evening, when the lady was out, Caterina's fate appeared again, and spoke hard words to her, saying, "So you are here, are you? and you think to escape from me?" Then she scattered whatever she could lay hands on, and poor Caterina once more fled out of fright.
To be brief, poor Caterina had to lead this terrible life for seven years, flying from city to city in search of a place. Whenever she entered service, after a few days her fate always appeared and disordered her mistress' things, and so the poor girl had to fly. As soon as she was gone, however, her fate repaired all the damage that had been done. At last, after seven years, it seemed as if the unhappy Caterina's fate was weary of persecuting her. One day she arrived in a city where she saw a lady at a window, who said, "Where go you, all alone, fair girl?" "Ah! noble lady, I am a poor girl, and willingly would I enter service to earn my bread; could you employ me?" The lady replied, "I will take you, but every day you will haveto do me a certain service, and I am not sure that you have the strength." "Tell me what it is," said Caterina, "and if I can, I will do it." "Do you see that high mountain?" said the lady; "every morning you will have to carry up to the top a baker's tray of new bread, and then you must cry aloud, 'O fate of my mistress!' three times repeated. My fate will appear and will receive the bread." "I will do it willingly," said Caterina, and thereupon the lady engaged her. With this lady Caterina stayed many years, and every morning she carried the tray of fresh bread up the mountain, and after she had cried three times, "O fate of my mistress!" there appeared a beautiful, stately lady, who received the bread. Caterina often wept, thinking how she, who was once so rich, had now to work like any poor girl, and one day her mistress asked her, "Why are you always crying?" Caterina told her how ill things had gone with her, and her mistress said, "You know, Caterina, when you take the bread up the mountain to-morrow? Well, do you beg my fate to try and persuade yours to leave you in peace. Perhaps this may do some good." The advice pleased poor Caterina, and the following morning when she carried up the bread, she told her mistress' fate of the sore straits she was in, and said, "O fate of my mistress, pray ask my fate no longer to torment me." "Ah! poor girl," the fate answered, "your fate is covered with a sevenfold covering, and that is why she cannot hear you. But to-morrow when you come, I will lead you to her." When Caterina had gone home, her mistress' fate went to her fate, and said, "Dear sister, why are you not tired of persecuting poor Caterina? Let her once again see happy days." The fate replied, "To-morrow bring her to me; I will give her something that will supply all her needs." The next morning, when Caterina brought the bread, her mistress' fate conducted her to her own fate, who was covered with a sevenfold covering. The fate gave her a skein of silk, and said, "Take care of it, it will be of use to you." After she had returned home, Caterina said to her mistress, "My fate has made me a present of a skein of silk; what ought I to do with it?" "It is not worth three grains of corn," said the mistress. "Keep it, all the same; who knows what it may be good for?"
After some time, it happened that the young king wasabout to take a wife, and, therefore, he had himself made some new clothes. But when the tailor was going to make up one fine piece of stuff, he could not anywhere find silk of the same colour with which to sew it. The king had it cried through the land, that whosoever had silk of the right colour was to bring it to court, and would be well paid for his pains. "Caterina," said her mistress, "your skein of silk is of that colour; take it to the king and he will make you a fine present." Caterina put on her best gown, and went to court, and when she came before the king, she was so beautiful that he could not take his eyes off her. "Royal Majesty," she said, "I have brought a skein of silk of the colour you could not find." "Royal majesty," cried one of the ministers, "we should give her the weight of her silk in gold." The king agreed, and the scales were brought in. On one side the king placed the skein of silk, and on the other a gold piece. Now, what do you think happened? The silk was always the heaviest, no matter how many gold pieces the king placed in the balance. Then he ordered a larger pair of scales, and he put all his treasure to the one side, but the silk remained the heaviest. Then he took his gold crown off his head and set it with the other treasure, and upon that the two scales became even.
"Where did you get this silk?" asked the king. "Royal Majesty, my mistress gave it to me." "That is not possible," cried the king. "If you do not tell me the truth I will have your head cut off!" Caterina related all that had happened to her since the time when she was a rich maiden. At Court there was a very wise lady, who said: "Caterina, you have suffered much, but now you will see happy days, and since the gold crown made the balance even, it is a sign that you will live to be a queen." "She shall be a queen," cried the king, "I will make her a queen! Caterina and no other shall be my bride." And so it was. The king sent to his bride to say that he no longer wanted her, and married the fair Caterina, who, after much suffering in youth, enjoyed her age in full prosperity, living happy and content, whereof we have assured testimony.
The most suggestive passages in this ingenious story are those which refer to the relative positions ofa man and his fate, and of one fate to another. On these points something further is to be gleaned from an Indian, a Servian, and a Spanish tale, all having a family likeness amongst themselves, and a strong affinity with our story. The Indian variant is one of the collection due to the youthful energies of Miss Maive Stokes, whose book of "Indian Fairy Tales" is a model of what such a book ought to be. The Servian tale is to be found in Karadschitsch's "Volksmaerschen der Serben;" the Spanish in Fernan Caballero's "Cuentos y Poesias Populares Andaluses." The chief characteristics of the personal fates, as they appear in folk-lore, may be briefly summarised. In the first place, they know each other, and are acquainted up to a given point with one another's secrets. Thus, in the Servian story, a man who goes to seek his fate is commissioned by persons he meets on the road to ask it questions touching their own private concerns. A rich householder wants to know why his servants are always hungry, however much food he gives them to eat, and why "his aged, miserable father and mother do not die?" A farmer would have him ask why his cattle perish; and a river, whose waters bear him across, is anxious to know why no living thing dwells in it. The fate gives a satisfactory answer to each inquiry.
The fates exercise a certain influence, one over the other, and hence over the destinies of the people in their charge. Caterina's mistress' fate intercedes for her with her own fate. The attention of the fates is not always fixed on the persons under them: they may be prevented from hearing by fortuitous circumstances, such as the "seven coverings or veils" ofCaterina's fate, or they may be asleep, or absent from home. Their home, by the by, is invariably placed in a spot very difficult to get at. In the Spanish variant, the palace of Fortune is raised "where our Lord cried three times and was not heard"—it is up a rock so steep that not even a goat can climb it, and the sunbeams lose their footing when trying to reach the top. A personal fate is propitiated by suitable offerings, or, if obdurate, it may be brought to reason by a well-timed punishment. The Indian beats his fate-stone, just as the Ostyak beats his fetish if it does not behave well and bring him sport. The Sicilian story gives no hint of this alternative, but it is one strictly in harmony with the Italian way of thinking, whether ancient or modern. Statius' declaration:
Fataque, et injustos rabidis pulsare querelisCælicolas solamen erat ...
Fataque, et injustos rabidis pulsare querelisCælicolas solamen erat ...
Fataque, et injustos rabidis pulsare querelis
Cælicolas solamen erat ...
was frequently put into practice, as when, upon the death of Germanicus, the Roman populace cast stones at the temples, and the altars were levelled to the ground, and the Lares thrown into the street. Again, Augustus took revenge on Neptune for the loss of his fleet, by not allowing his image to be carried in the procession of the Circensian games. It is on record that at Florence, in 1498, a ruined gamester pelted the image of the Virgin with horse dung. Luca Landucci, who tells the story, says that the Florentines were shocked; but in the southern kingdom the incident would have passed without much notice. The Neapolitans have hardly now left off heaping torrents of abuse on San Gennaro if he failsto perform the miracle of liquefaction quick enough. Probably every country could furnish an illustration. In the grand procession of St Leonhard, the Bavarians used from time to time to drop the Saint into the river, as a sort of gentle warning.
The physical presentment of the personal fate differs considerably. According to the Indian account, "the fates are stones, some standing, and others lying on the ground." It has been said that this looks like a relic of stock and stone worship: which is true if it can be said unreservedly that anyone ever worshipped a stock or a stone. The lowest stage of fetish worship only indicates a diseased spiritualism—a mental state in which there is no hedge between the real and the imagined. No savage ever supposed that his fetish was a simple three-cornered stone and nothing more. If one could guess the thoughts of the pigeon mentioned by Mr Romanes as worshipping a gingerbeer bottle, it would be surely seen that this pigeon believed his gingerbeer bottle to be other than a piece of unfeeling earthenware. It is, however, a sign of progress when man begins to picture the ruling powers not as stones, or even as animals, but as men. This point is reached in the Servian narrative, where the hero's fortune is a hag given to him as his luck by fate. In the Spanish tale, the aspect of the personal fate varies with its character: the fortunate man's fate is a lovely girl, the fate of the unfortunate man being a toothless old woman. In thePentameroneof Giambattista Basile, Fortune is also spoken of as an old woman, but this seems a departure from the true Italian ideal, which isneither a stone nor a luck-hag, nor yet a varying fair-and-foul fortune, but a "bella, alta Signora:" the imposing figure that surmounts the wheel of fortune on the marble pavement of the Cathedral of Siena. It is a graver conception than the gracefully fickle goddess of Jean Cousin's "Liber Fortunæ":
. . .On souloit la pourtraire,Tenant un voile afin d'aller au gré du ventDes aisles aux costez pour voler bien avant.
. . .On souloit la pourtraire,Tenant un voile afin d'aller au gré du ventDes aisles aux costez pour voler bien avant.
. . .On souloit la pourtraire,
Tenant un voile afin d'aller au gré du vent
Des aisles aux costez pour voler bien avant.
Shakespeare had the Emblematist's Fortune in his mind when he wrote: "Fortune is painted blind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to signify to you, which is the moral of it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability, and variation: and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone, which rolls, and rolls, and rolls."
In hands less light than Cousin's, it was easy for the Fortune of the emblem writers to become grotesque, and to lose all artistic merit. The Italian Fortuna does not in the least lend herself to caricature. In Italy, the objects of thought, even of the common people, have the tendency to assume concrete and æsthetic forms—a fact of great significance in the history of a people destined to render essential service to art.
The "tall, beautiful lady" of the Sicilian story, reappears in a series of South Italian folk-songs which contains further evidence of this unconsciously artistic instinct. The Italian folk-poet, for the most part, lets the lore of tradition altogether alone. It does not lie in his province, which is purely lyrical. But he has seized upon Fortune as a myth very capableof lyrical treatment, and following the free bent of his genius, he has woven out of his subject the delicate fancies of these songs. A series in the sense of being designed to form a consecutive whole, they, of course, are not. No two, probably, had the same author; the perfect individuality of the figure presented, only showing how a type may be so firmly fixed that the many have no difficulty in describing it with the consistency of one man who draws the creation of his own brain.
Once in the gloaming, Fortune met me here;Fair did she seem, and Love was on me laid,Her hair was raised, as were it half a sphere,Flowered on her breast a rose that cannot fade.Then said I, "Fortune, thou without a peer,What rule shall tell the measure of thine aid?""The pathway of the moon through all the year,The channel of the exhaustless sea," she said.
Once in the gloaming, Fortune met me here;Fair did she seem, and Love was on me laid,Her hair was raised, as were it half a sphere,Flowered on her breast a rose that cannot fade.Then said I, "Fortune, thou without a peer,What rule shall tell the measure of thine aid?""The pathway of the moon through all the year,The channel of the exhaustless sea," she said.
Once in the gloaming, Fortune met me here;
Fair did she seem, and Love was on me laid,
Her hair was raised, as were it half a sphere,
Flowered on her breast a rose that cannot fade.
Then said I, "Fortune, thou without a peer,
What rule shall tell the measure of thine aid?"
"The pathway of the moon through all the year,
The channel of the exhaustless sea," she said.
One night, the while I slept, drew Fortune near,At once I loved, such beauty she displayed;A crescent moon did o'er her brows appear,And in her hand a wheel that never stayed.Then said I to her, "O my mistress dear,Grant all my wishes, mine if thou wilt aid."But she turned from me with dark sullen cheerAnd "Never!" as she turned, was all she said.
One night, the while I slept, drew Fortune near,At once I loved, such beauty she displayed;A crescent moon did o'er her brows appear,And in her hand a wheel that never stayed.Then said I to her, "O my mistress dear,Grant all my wishes, mine if thou wilt aid."But she turned from me with dark sullen cheerAnd "Never!" as she turned, was all she said.
One night, the while I slept, drew Fortune near,
At once I loved, such beauty she displayed;
A crescent moon did o'er her brows appear,
And in her hand a wheel that never stayed.
Then said I to her, "O my mistress dear,
Grant all my wishes, mine if thou wilt aid."
But she turned from me with dark sullen cheer
And "Never!" as she turned, was all she said.
I saw my Fortune midst the sounding seaSit weeping on a rocky height and steep,Said I to her, "Fortune, how is't with thee?""I cannot help thee, child" (so answered she),"I cannot help thee more—so must I weep."How sweet were those her tears, how sweet, ah me!Even the fishes wept within the deep.
I saw my Fortune midst the sounding seaSit weeping on a rocky height and steep,Said I to her, "Fortune, how is't with thee?""I cannot help thee, child" (so answered she),"I cannot help thee more—so must I weep."How sweet were those her tears, how sweet, ah me!Even the fishes wept within the deep.
I saw my Fortune midst the sounding sea
Sit weeping on a rocky height and steep,
Said I to her, "Fortune, how is't with thee?"
"I cannot help thee, child" (so answered she),
"I cannot help thee more—so must I weep."
How sweet were those her tears, how sweet, ah me!
Even the fishes wept within the deep.
One day did Fortune call me to her side,"What are the things," she asked, "that thou hast done?"Then answered I, "Dear mistress, I have triedTo grave them upon marble, every one.""Ah! maddest of the mad!" so she replied,"Better hadst writ on sand than wrought in stone;He who to marble should his love confide,Loves when he loves till all his wits are gone."
One day did Fortune call me to her side,"What are the things," she asked, "that thou hast done?"Then answered I, "Dear mistress, I have triedTo grave them upon marble, every one.""Ah! maddest of the mad!" so she replied,"Better hadst writ on sand than wrought in stone;He who to marble should his love confide,Loves when he loves till all his wits are gone."
One day did Fortune call me to her side,
"What are the things," she asked, "that thou hast done?"
Then answered I, "Dear mistress, I have tried
To grave them upon marble, every one."
"Ah! maddest of the mad!" so she replied,
"Better hadst writ on sand than wrought in stone;
He who to marble should his love confide,
Loves when he loves till all his wits are gone."
There where I lay asleep came Fortune in,She came the while I slept and bid me wake,"What dost thou now?" she said, "companion mine?What dost thou now? Wilt thou then love forsake?Arise," she said, "and take this violin,And play till every stone thereat shall wake."I was asleep when Fortune came to me,And bid me rise, and led me unto thee!
There where I lay asleep came Fortune in,She came the while I slept and bid me wake,"What dost thou now?" she said, "companion mine?What dost thou now? Wilt thou then love forsake?Arise," she said, "and take this violin,And play till every stone thereat shall wake."I was asleep when Fortune came to me,And bid me rise, and led me unto thee!
There where I lay asleep came Fortune in,
She came the while I slept and bid me wake,
"What dost thou now?" she said, "companion mine?
What dost thou now? Wilt thou then love forsake?
Arise," she said, "and take this violin,
And play till every stone thereat shall wake."
I was asleep when Fortune came to me,
And bid me rise, and led me unto thee!
These songs come from different villages; from Caballino and Morciano in Calabria, from Corigliano and Calimera in Terra d'Otranto; the two last are in the Greek dialect spoken in the latter district. There are a great many more, in all of which the same sweet and serious type is preserved; but the above quintet suffices to give a notion of this modern Magna-Græcian Idyll of Fortune.
Footnote 1:In a Breton variant the "Bon Dieu" is the first to offer himself as sponsor, but is refused by the peasant, "Because you are not just; you slay the honest bread-winner and the mother whose children can scarce run alone, and you let folks live who never brought aught but shame and sorrow on their kindred." Death is accepted, "Because at least you take the rich as well as the poor, the young as well as the old." The German tale of "Godfather Death" begins in the same way, but ends rather differently, as it is the godson and not the father who is shown the many candles, and who vainly requests Death to give him a new one instead of his own which is nearly burnt out. A poem by Hans Sachs (1553) contains reference to the legend, of which there are also Provençal and Hungarian versions.
Footnote 2:Laura Gonzenbach was the daughter of the Swiss Consul at Messina, where she was born. At an early age she developed uncommon gifts, and she was hardly twenty when she made her collection of Sicilian stories, almost exclusively gathered from a young servant-girl who did not know how to write or read. It was with great difficulty that a publisher was found who would bring out the book. Fräulein Gonzenbach married Colonel La Racine, a Piedmontese officer, and died five or six years ago, being still quite young. A relation of hers, from whom I have these particulars, was much surprised to hear that theSicilianische Märchenis widely known as one of the best works of its class. It is somewhat singular that the preservation of Italian folk-tales should have been so substantially aided by two ladies not of Italian origin: Fräulein Gonzenbach and Miss R. H. Busk, author of "The Folk-lore of Rome."
. . .A nurse's songOf lullaby, to bring her babe asleep.
. . .A nurse's songOf lullaby, to bring her babe asleep.
. . .A nurse's song
Of lullaby, to bring her babe asleep.
Infancy is a great mystery. We know that we each have gone over that stage in human life, though even this much is not always quite easy to realise. But what else do we know about it? Something by observation, something by intuition; by experience hardly anything at all. We have as much personal acquaintance with a lake-dwelling or stone age infant as with our proper selves at the time when we were passing through the "avatar" of babyhood. The recollections of our earliest years are at most only as the confused remembrance of a morning dream, which at one end fades into the unconsciousness of sleep, whilst at the other it mingles with the realities of awaking. And yet, as a fact, we did not sleep through all the dawn of our life, nor were we unconscious; only we were different from what we now are; the term "thinking animal" did not then fit us so well. We were less reasonable and less material. Babies have a way of looking at you that makes you half suspect that they belong to a separate order of beings. You speculate as to whether they have not invisible wings, which drop off afterwards as do the birth wings of the young ant. There is one thing, however, in which the baby is very human, very manlike. Of all newborncreatures he is the least happy. You may sometimes see a little child crying softly to himself with a look of world woe on his face that is positively appalling. Perhaps human existence, like a new pair of shoes, is very uncomfortable till one gets accustomed to it. Anyhow the child, being for some reason or reasons exceedingly disposed to vex its heart, needs much soothing. In one highly civilised country a good many mothers are in the habit of going to the nearest druggist for the means to tranquillise their offspring, with the result that these latter are not unfrequently rescued from the sea of sorrows in the most final and expeditious way. In less advanced states of society another expedient has been resorted to from time immemorial—to wit, the cradle song.
Babies show an early appreciation of rhythm. They rejoice in measured noise, whether it takes the form of words, music, or the jingle of a bunch of keys. In the way of poetry I am afraid they must be admitted to have a perverse preference for what goes by the name of sing-song. It will be a long time before the infantine public are brought round to Walt Whitman's views on versification. For the rest, they are not very severe critics. The small ancient Roman asked for nothing better than the song of his nurse—
Lalla, lalla, lalla,Aut dormi, aut lacta.
Lalla, lalla, lalla,Aut dormi, aut lacta.
Lalla, lalla, lalla,
Aut dormi, aut lacta.
This two-line lullaby constitutes one of the few but sufficing proofs which have come down to us of the existence among the people of old Rome of a sort of folk verse not by any means resembling the Latin classics, but bearing a considerable likeness to thecanti popolariof the modern Italian peasant. It may be said parenthetically that the study of dialect tends altogether to the conviction that there are country people now living in Italy to whom, rather than to Cicero, we should go if we want to know what style of speech was in use among the humbler subjects of the Cæsars. The lettered language of the cultivated classes changes; the spoken tongue of the uneducated remains the same; or, if it too undergoes a process of change, the rate at which it moves is to the other what the pace of a tortoise is to the speed of an express train. About eight hundred years ago a handful of Lombards went to Sicily, where they still preserve the Lombard idiom. The Ober-Engadiner could hold converse with his remote ancestors who took refuge in the Alps three or four centuries before Christ; the Aragonese colony at Alghero, in Sardinia, yet discourses in Catalan; the Roumanian language still contains terms and expressions which, though dissimilar to both Latin and standard Italian, find their analogues in the dialects of those eastward-facing "Latin plains" whence, in all probability, the people of Roumania sprang. But we must return to our lullabies.
There exists another Latin cradle song, not indeed springing from classical times, but which, were popular tradition to be trusted, would have an origin greatly more illustrious than that of the laconic effusion of the Roman nurse. It is composed in the person of the Virgin Mary, and was, in bygone days, believed to have been actually sung by her. Authorities differ as to its real age, some insisting that the peculiar structure of the verse was unknown before the 12thcentury. There is, however, good reason to think that the idea of composing lullabies for the Virgin belongs to an early period.
Dormi, fili, dormi! materCantat unigenito:Dormi puer, dormi! paterNato clamat parvulo:Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Lectum stravi tibi soli,Dormi, nate bellule!Stravi lectum foeno molli:Dormi mi animule.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Dormi, decus et corona!Dormi, nectar lacteum!Dormi, mater dabo dona,Dabo favum melleum.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Dormi, nate mi mellite!Dormi plene saccharo,Dormi, vita, meae vitae,Casto natus utero.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Quidquid optes, volo dare;Dormi, parve pupuleDormi, fili! dormi carae,Matris deliciolae!Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Dormi cor, et meus thronus;Dormi matris jubilum;Aurium caelestis sonus,Et suave sibilum!Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Dormi fili! dulce, materDuke melos concinam;Dormi, nate! suave, pater,Suave carmen accinam.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Ne quid desit, sternam rosis,Sternam foenum violis,Pavimentum hyacinthisEt praesepe liliis.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.Si vis musicam, pastoresConvocabo protinus;Illis nulli sunt priores;Nemo canit castius.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi, fili, dormi! materCantat unigenito:Dormi puer, dormi! paterNato clamat parvulo:Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi, fili, dormi! mater
Cantat unigenito:
Dormi puer, dormi! pater
Nato clamat parvulo:
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Lectum stravi tibi soli,Dormi, nate bellule!Stravi lectum foeno molli:Dormi mi animule.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Lectum stravi tibi soli,
Dormi, nate bellule!
Stravi lectum foeno molli:
Dormi mi animule.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Dormi, decus et corona!Dormi, nectar lacteum!Dormi, mater dabo dona,Dabo favum melleum.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi, decus et corona!
Dormi, nectar lacteum!
Dormi, mater dabo dona,
Dabo favum melleum.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Dormi, nate mi mellite!Dormi plene saccharo,Dormi, vita, meae vitae,Casto natus utero.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi, nate mi mellite!
Dormi plene saccharo,
Dormi, vita, meae vitae,
Casto natus utero.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Quidquid optes, volo dare;Dormi, parve pupuleDormi, fili! dormi carae,Matris deliciolae!Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Quidquid optes, volo dare;
Dormi, parve pupule
Dormi, fili! dormi carae,
Matris deliciolae!
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Dormi cor, et meus thronus;Dormi matris jubilum;Aurium caelestis sonus,Et suave sibilum!Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi cor, et meus thronus;
Dormi matris jubilum;
Aurium caelestis sonus,
Et suave sibilum!
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Dormi fili! dulce, materDuke melos concinam;Dormi, nate! suave, pater,Suave carmen accinam.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Dormi fili! dulce, mater
Duke melos concinam;
Dormi, nate! suave, pater,
Suave carmen accinam.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Ne quid desit, sternam rosis,Sternam foenum violis,Pavimentum hyacinthisEt praesepe liliis.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Ne quid desit, sternam rosis,
Sternam foenum violis,
Pavimentum hyacinthis
Et praesepe liliis.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Si vis musicam, pastoresConvocabo protinus;Illis nulli sunt priores;Nemo canit castius.Millies tibi laudes canimusMille, mille, millies.
Si vis musicam, pastores
Convocabo protinus;
Illis nulli sunt priores;
Nemo canit castius.
Millies tibi laudes canimus
Mille, mille, millies.
Everybody who is in Rome at Christmas-tide makes a point of visiting Santa Maria in Ara Cœli, the church which stands to the right of the Capitol, where once the temple of Jupiter Feretrius is supposed to have stood. What is at that season to be seen in the Ara Cœli is well enough known—to one side a "presepio," or manger, with the ass, the ox, St Joseph, the Virgin, and the Child on her knee; to the other side a throng of little Roman children rehearsing in their infantine voices the story that is picturedopposite.1The scene may be taken as typical of the cult of the Infant Saviour, which, under one form or another, has existed distinct and separable from the main stem of Christian worship ever since a Voice in Judæa bade man seek after the Divine in the stable of Bethlehem. It is almost a commonplace to say that Christianity brought fresh and peculiar glory alike to infancy and to motherhood. A new sense came into the words of the oracle—
Thee in all children, the eternal Child ...
Thee in all children, the eternal Child ...
And the mother, sublimely though she appears against the horizon of antiquity, yet rose to a higher rank—because the highest—at the founding of the new faith. Especially in art she left the second place that she might take the first. The sentiment of maternal love, as illustrated, as transfigured, in the love of the Virgin for her Divine Child, furnished the great Italian painters with their master motive, whilst in his humble fashion the obscure folk-poet exemplifies the selfsame thought. I am not sure that the rude rhymes of which the following is a rendering do not convey, as well as can be conveyed in articulate speech, the glory and the grief of the Dresden Madonna:
Sleep, oh sleep, dear Baby mine,King Divine;Sleep, my Child, in sleep recline;Lullaby, mine Infant fair,Heaven's KingAll glittering,Full of grace as lilies rare.Close thine eyelids, O my treasure,Loved past measure,Of my soul, the Lord, the pleasure;Lullaby, O regal Child,On the hayMy joy I lay;Love celestial, meek and mild.Why dost weep, my Babe? alas!Cold winds that passVex, or is 't the little ass?Lullaby, O Paradise;Of my heartThough Saviour art;On thy face I press a kiss.Wouldst thou learn so speedily,Pain to try,To heave a sigh?Sleep, for thou shalt see the dayOf dire scath,Of dreadful death,To bitter scorn and shame a prey.Rays now round thy brow extend,But in the endA crown of cruel thorns shall bend.Lullaby, O little one,Gentle guestWho for thy restA manger hast, to lie upon.Born in winter of the year,Jesu dear,As the lost world's prisoner.Lullaby (for thou art boundPain to know,And want and woe),Mid the cattle standing round.Beauty mine, sleep peacefully;Heaven's monarch! see,With my veil I cover thee.Lullaby, my Spouse, my Lord,Fairest ChildPure, undefiled,Thou by all my soul adored.Lo! the shepherd band draws nigh;Horns they plyThee their Lord to glorify.Lullaby, my soul's delight,For Israel,Faithless and fell,Thee with cruel death would smite.Now the milk suck from my breast,Holiest, best,Thy kind eyes thou openest.Lullaby, the while I sing;Holy JesuNow sleep anew,My mantle is thy sheltering.Sleep, sleep, thou who dost heaven impartMy Lord thou art;Sleep, as I press thee to my heart.Poor the place where thou dost lie,Earth's loveliest!Yet take thy rest;Sleep my Child, and lullaby.
Sleep, oh sleep, dear Baby mine,King Divine;Sleep, my Child, in sleep recline;Lullaby, mine Infant fair,Heaven's KingAll glittering,Full of grace as lilies rare.
Sleep, oh sleep, dear Baby mine,
King Divine;
Sleep, my Child, in sleep recline;
Lullaby, mine Infant fair,
Heaven's King
All glittering,
Full of grace as lilies rare.
Close thine eyelids, O my treasure,Loved past measure,Of my soul, the Lord, the pleasure;Lullaby, O regal Child,On the hayMy joy I lay;Love celestial, meek and mild.
Close thine eyelids, O my treasure,
Loved past measure,
Of my soul, the Lord, the pleasure;
Lullaby, O regal Child,
On the hay
My joy I lay;
Love celestial, meek and mild.
Why dost weep, my Babe? alas!Cold winds that passVex, or is 't the little ass?Lullaby, O Paradise;Of my heartThough Saviour art;On thy face I press a kiss.
Why dost weep, my Babe? alas!
Cold winds that pass
Vex, or is 't the little ass?
Lullaby, O Paradise;
Of my heart
Though Saviour art;
On thy face I press a kiss.
Wouldst thou learn so speedily,Pain to try,To heave a sigh?Sleep, for thou shalt see the dayOf dire scath,Of dreadful death,To bitter scorn and shame a prey.
Wouldst thou learn so speedily,
Pain to try,
To heave a sigh?
Sleep, for thou shalt see the day
Of dire scath,
Of dreadful death,
To bitter scorn and shame a prey.
Rays now round thy brow extend,But in the endA crown of cruel thorns shall bend.Lullaby, O little one,Gentle guestWho for thy restA manger hast, to lie upon.
Rays now round thy brow extend,
But in the end
A crown of cruel thorns shall bend.
Lullaby, O little one,
Gentle guest
Who for thy rest
A manger hast, to lie upon.
Born in winter of the year,Jesu dear,As the lost world's prisoner.Lullaby (for thou art boundPain to know,And want and woe),Mid the cattle standing round.
Born in winter of the year,
Jesu dear,
As the lost world's prisoner.
Lullaby (for thou art bound
Pain to know,
And want and woe),
Mid the cattle standing round.
Beauty mine, sleep peacefully;Heaven's monarch! see,With my veil I cover thee.Lullaby, my Spouse, my Lord,Fairest ChildPure, undefiled,Thou by all my soul adored.
Beauty mine, sleep peacefully;
Heaven's monarch! see,
With my veil I cover thee.
Lullaby, my Spouse, my Lord,
Fairest Child
Pure, undefiled,
Thou by all my soul adored.
Lo! the shepherd band draws nigh;Horns they plyThee their Lord to glorify.Lullaby, my soul's delight,For Israel,Faithless and fell,Thee with cruel death would smite.
Lo! the shepherd band draws nigh;
Horns they ply
Thee their Lord to glorify.
Lullaby, my soul's delight,
For Israel,
Faithless and fell,
Thee with cruel death would smite.
Now the milk suck from my breast,Holiest, best,Thy kind eyes thou openest.Lullaby, the while I sing;Holy JesuNow sleep anew,My mantle is thy sheltering.
Now the milk suck from my breast,
Holiest, best,
Thy kind eyes thou openest.
Lullaby, the while I sing;
Holy Jesu
Now sleep anew,
My mantle is thy sheltering.
Sleep, sleep, thou who dost heaven impartMy Lord thou art;Sleep, as I press thee to my heart.Poor the place where thou dost lie,Earth's loveliest!Yet take thy rest;Sleep my Child, and lullaby.
Sleep, sleep, thou who dost heaven impart
My Lord thou art;
Sleep, as I press thee to my heart.
Poor the place where thou dost lie,
Earth's loveliest!
Yet take thy rest;
Sleep my Child, and lullaby.
It would be interesting to know if Mrs Browning ever heard any one of the many variants of this lullaby before writing her poem "The Virgin Mary tothe Child Jesus." The version given above was communicated to me by a resident at Vallauria, in the heart of the Ligurian Alps. In that district it is sung in the churches on Christmas Eve, when out abroad the mountains sleep soundly in their snows and a stray wolf is not an impossible apparition, nothing reminding you that you are within a day's journey of the citron groves of Mentone.
There are several old English carols which bear a strong resemblance to the Italian sacred lullabies. One, current at least as far back as the time of Henry IV., is preserved among the Sloane MSS.:
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere fode,How xalt thou sufferin be nayled on the rode.So blyssid be the tyme!Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere smerte,How xalt thou sufferin the scharp spere to Thi herte?So blyssid be the tyme!Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge all for Thi sake,Many on is the scharpe schour to Thi body is schape.So blyssid be the tyme!Lullay! lullay! lytel child, fayre happis the befalle,How xalt thou sufferin to drynke ezyl and galle?So blyssid be the tyme!Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge al befornHow xalt thou sufferin the scharp garlong of thorn?So blyssid be the tyme!Lullay! lullay! lytel child, gwy wepy Thou so sore,Thou art bothin God and man, gwat woldyst Thou be more?So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere fode,How xalt thou sufferin be nayled on the rode.So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere fode,
How xalt thou sufferin be nayled on the rode.
So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere smerte,How xalt thou sufferin the scharp spere to Thi herte?So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, myn owyn dere smerte,
How xalt thou sufferin the scharp spere to Thi herte?
So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge all for Thi sake,Many on is the scharpe schour to Thi body is schape.So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge all for Thi sake,
Many on is the scharpe schour to Thi body is schape.
So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, fayre happis the befalle,How xalt thou sufferin to drynke ezyl and galle?So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, fayre happis the befalle,
How xalt thou sufferin to drynke ezyl and galle?
So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge al befornHow xalt thou sufferin the scharp garlong of thorn?So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, I synge al beforn
How xalt thou sufferin the scharp garlong of thorn?
So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, gwy wepy Thou so sore,Thou art bothin God and man, gwat woldyst Thou be more?So blyssid be the tyme!
Lullay! lullay! lytel child, gwy wepy Thou so sore,
Thou art bothin God and man, gwat woldyst Thou be more?
So blyssid be the tyme!
Here, as in the Piedmontese song, the "shadow of the cross" makes its presence distinctly felt, whereasin the Latin lullaby it is wholly absent. Nor are there any dark or sad forebodings in the fragment:
Dormi Jesu, mater ridet,Quæ; tam dulcem somnum videt,Dormi, Jesu blandule.Si non dormis, mater plorat,Inter fila cantans orat:Blande, veni Somnule.
Dormi Jesu, mater ridet,Quæ; tam dulcem somnum videt,Dormi, Jesu blandule.Si non dormis, mater plorat,Inter fila cantans orat:Blande, veni Somnule.
Dormi Jesu, mater ridet,
Quæ; tam dulcem somnum videt,
Dormi, Jesu blandule.
Si non dormis, mater plorat,
Inter fila cantans orat:
Blande, veni Somnule.
Many Italian Christmas cradle songs are in this lighter strain. In Italy and Spain apresepioornacimentois arranged in old-fashioned houses on the eve of Christmas, and all kinds of songs are sung or recited before the white image of the Child as it lies in its bower of greenery. "Flower of Nazareth sleep upon my breast, my heart is thy cradle," sing the Tuscans, who curiously call Christmas "the Yule-log Easter." In Sicily a thousand endearing epithets are applied to the Infant Saviour: "figghiu duci," "Gesiuzzi beddu," "Gesiuzzi picchiureddi." The Sicilian poet relates how once, when the Madunazza was mending St Joseph's clothes, the Bambineddu cried in His cradle because no one was attending to Him; so the archangel Raphael came down and rocked Him, and said three sweet little words to Him, "Lullaby, Jesus, Son of Mary!" Another time, when the Child was older and the mother was going to visit St Anne, he wept because He wished to go too. The mother let Him accompany her on condition that He would not break St Anne's bobbins. Yet another time the Virgin went to the fair to buy flax, and the Child said that He too would like to have a fairing. The Virgin buys Him a tambourine, and angels descend to listen to His playing. Such stories are endless;some, no doubt, are invented on the spur of the moment, but the larger portion are scraps of old legendary lore. Not a few of the popular beliefs, relating to the Infant Jesus may be traced to the apocryphal Gospels, which were extensively circulated during the earlier Christian centuries. There is, for instance, a Provençal song containing the legend of an apple-tree that bowed its branches to the Virgin, which is plainly derived from this source. Speaking of Provence, one ought not to forget the famous "Troubadour of Bethlehem," Saboly, who was born in 1640, and who composed more than sixtynoëls. Five pretty lines of his form an epitome of sacred lullabies:
Faudra dire, faudra dire,Quauco cansoun,Au garçoun,A la façounD'aquelo desoum-soum.
Faudra dire, faudra dire,Quauco cansoun,Au garçoun,A la façounD'aquelo desoum-soum.
Faudra dire, faudra dire,
Quauco cansoun,
Au garçoun,
A la façoun
D'aquelo desoum-soum.
George Wither deserves remembrance here for what he calls a "Rocking hymn," written about the year of Saboly's birth. "Nurses," he says, "usually sing their children asleep, and through want of pertinent matter they oft make use of unprofitable, if not worse, songs; this was therefore prepared that it might help acquaint them and their nurse children with the loving care and kindness of their Heavenly Father." Consciously or unconsciously, Wither caught the true spirit of the ancient carols in the verses—charming in spite, or perhaps because of their demure simplicity—which follow his little exordium:
Sweet baby, sleep: what ails my dear;What ails my darling thus to cry?Be still, my child, and lend thine ear,To hear me sing thy lullaby.My pretty lamb, forbear to weep;Be still, my dear; sweet baby, sleep.Thou blessed soul, what canst thou fear?What thing to thee can mischief do?Thy God is now thy Father dear,His holy Spouse thy mother too.Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep....Whilst thus thy lullaby I sing,For thee great blessings ripening be;Thine eldest brother is a king,And hath a kingdom bought for thee.Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep. &c., &c.
Sweet baby, sleep: what ails my dear;What ails my darling thus to cry?Be still, my child, and lend thine ear,To hear me sing thy lullaby.My pretty lamb, forbear to weep;Be still, my dear; sweet baby, sleep.
Sweet baby, sleep: what ails my dear;
What ails my darling thus to cry?
Be still, my child, and lend thine ear,
To hear me sing thy lullaby.
My pretty lamb, forbear to weep;
Be still, my dear; sweet baby, sleep.
Thou blessed soul, what canst thou fear?What thing to thee can mischief do?Thy God is now thy Father dear,His holy Spouse thy mother too.Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep....
Thou blessed soul, what canst thou fear?
What thing to thee can mischief do?
Thy God is now thy Father dear,
His holy Spouse thy mother too.
Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;
Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep....
Whilst thus thy lullaby I sing,For thee great blessings ripening be;Thine eldest brother is a king,And hath a kingdom bought for thee.Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep. &c., &c.
Whilst thus thy lullaby I sing,
For thee great blessings ripening be;
Thine eldest brother is a king,
And hath a kingdom bought for thee.
Sweet baby, then forbear to weep;
Be still, my babe; sweet baby, sleep. &c., &c.
Count Gubernatis, in his "Usi Natalizj," quotes a popular Spanish lullaby, addressed to any ordinary child, but having reference to the Holy Babe:
The Baby Child of Mary,Now cradle He has none;His father is a carpenter,And he shall make Him one.The lady good St Anna,The lord St Joachim,They rock the Baby's cradle,That sleep may come to Him.Then sleep thou too, my baby,My little heart so dear;The Virgin is beside thee,The Son of God is near.
The Baby Child of Mary,Now cradle He has none;His father is a carpenter,And he shall make Him one.
The Baby Child of Mary,
Now cradle He has none;
His father is a carpenter,
And he shall make Him one.
The lady good St Anna,The lord St Joachim,They rock the Baby's cradle,That sleep may come to Him.
The lady good St Anna,
The lord St Joachim,
They rock the Baby's cradle,
That sleep may come to Him.
Then sleep thou too, my baby,My little heart so dear;The Virgin is beside thee,The Son of God is near.
Then sleep thou too, my baby,
My little heart so dear;
The Virgin is beside thee,
The Son of God is near.
When they are old enough to understand the meaningof words, children are sure to be interested up to a certain point by these saintly fables, but, taken as a whole, the songs of the South give us the impression that the coming of Christmas kindles the imagination of the Southern mother rather than that of the Southern child. On the north side of the Alps it is otherwise; there is scarcely need to say that in the Vaterland, Christmas is before all the children's feast. We, who have borrowed many of the German yule-tide customs, have left out the "Christkind;" and it is well that we have done so. Transplanted to foreign soil, that poetic piece of extra-belief would have become a mockery. As soon try to naturalise Kolyada, the Sclavonic white-robed New-year girl. The Christkind in His mythical attributes is nearer to Kolyada than to the Italian Bambinello. He belongs to the people, not to the Church. He is not swathed in jewelled swaddling clothes; His limbs are free, and He has wings that carry Him wheresoever good children abide. There is about Him all the dreamy charm of lands where twilight is long and shade and shine intermingle softly, and where the earth's wintry winding-sheet is more beautiful than her April bride gown. The most popular of German lullabies is a truly Teutonic mixture of piety, wonder-lore, and homeliness. Wagner has introduced the music to which it is sung into his "Siegfried-Idyl." I have to thank a Heidelberg friend for the text:
Sleep, baby, sleep:Your father tends the sheep;Your mother shakes the branches small,Whence happy dreams in showers fall:Sleep, baby, sleep.Sleep, baby, sleep:The sky is full of sheep;The stars the lambs of heaven are,For whom the shepherd moon doth care:Sleep, baby, sleep.Sleep, baby, sleep:The Christ Child owns a sheep;He is Himself the Lamb of God;The world to save, to death He trod:Sleep, baby, sleep.Sleep, baby, sleep:I'll give you then a sheepWith pretty bells, and you shall playAnd frolic with him all the day:Sleep, baby, sleep.Sleep, baby, sleep:And do not bleat like sheep,Or else the shepherd's dog will biteMy naughty, little, crying spright:Sleep, baby, sleep.Sleep, baby, sleep:Begone, and watch the sheep,You naughty little dog! Begone,And do not wake my little one:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:Your father tends the sheep;Your mother shakes the branches small,Whence happy dreams in showers fall:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
Your father tends the sheep;
Your mother shakes the branches small,
Whence happy dreams in showers fall:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:The sky is full of sheep;The stars the lambs of heaven are,For whom the shepherd moon doth care:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
The sky is full of sheep;
The stars the lambs of heaven are,
For whom the shepherd moon doth care:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:The Christ Child owns a sheep;He is Himself the Lamb of God;The world to save, to death He trod:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
The Christ Child owns a sheep;
He is Himself the Lamb of God;
The world to save, to death He trod:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:I'll give you then a sheepWith pretty bells, and you shall playAnd frolic with him all the day:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
I'll give you then a sheep
With pretty bells, and you shall play
And frolic with him all the day:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:And do not bleat like sheep,Or else the shepherd's dog will biteMy naughty, little, crying spright:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
And do not bleat like sheep,
Or else the shepherd's dog will bite
My naughty, little, crying spright:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:Begone, and watch the sheep,You naughty little dog! Begone,And do not wake my little one:Sleep, baby, sleep.
Sleep, baby, sleep:
Begone, and watch the sheep,
You naughty little dog! Begone,
And do not wake my little one:
Sleep, baby, sleep.
In Denmark children are sung to sleep with a cradle hymn which is believed (so I am informed by a youthful correspondent) to be "very old." It has seven stanzas, of which the first runs, "Sleep sweetly, little child; lie quiet and still; as sweetly sleep as the bird in the wood, as the flowers in the meadow. God the Father has said, 'Angels stand on watch where mine, the little ones, are in bed.'" A correspondent at Warsaw (still more youthful) sends me the even-song of Polish children:
The stars shine forth from the blue sky;How great and wondrous is God's might;Shine, stars, through all eternity,His witness in the night.O Lord, Thy tired children keep:Keep us who know and feel Thy might;Turn Thine eye on us as we sleep,And give us all good-night.Shine, stars, God's sentinels on high,Proclaimers of His power and might;May all things evil from us fly:O stars, good-night, good-night!
The stars shine forth from the blue sky;How great and wondrous is God's might;Shine, stars, through all eternity,His witness in the night.
The stars shine forth from the blue sky;
How great and wondrous is God's might;
Shine, stars, through all eternity,
His witness in the night.
O Lord, Thy tired children keep:Keep us who know and feel Thy might;Turn Thine eye on us as we sleep,And give us all good-night.
O Lord, Thy tired children keep:
Keep us who know and feel Thy might;
Turn Thine eye on us as we sleep,
And give us all good-night.
Shine, stars, God's sentinels on high,Proclaimers of His power and might;May all things evil from us fly:O stars, good-night, good-night!
Shine, stars, God's sentinels on high,
Proclaimers of His power and might;
May all things evil from us fly:
O stars, good-night, good-night!
Is this "Dobra Noc" of strictly popular origin? From internal evidence I should say that it is not. It seems, however, to be extremely popular in the ordinary sense of the word. Before me lie two or three settings of it by Polish musicians.
The Italians call lullabiesninne-nanne, a term used by Dante when he makes Forese predict the ills which are to overtake the dames of Florence:
E se l'anteveder qui non m' inganna,Prima fien triste che le guance impeliColui che mo si consola connanna.
E se l'anteveder qui non m' inganna,Prima fien triste che le guance impeliColui che mo si consola connanna.
E se l'anteveder qui non m' inganna,
Prima fien triste che le guance impeli
Colui che mo si consola connanna.
Some etymologists have sought to connect "nanna" withneniæorνήνιτος, but its most apparent relationship is withνανναρισματα, the modern Greek name for cradle songs, which is derived from a root signifying the singing of a child to sleep. Theninne-nanneof the various Italian provinces are to be found scattered here and there through volumes of folk poesy, and no attempt has yet been made to collate and compare them. Signor Dal Medico did indeed publish, someten years ago, a separate collection of Venetian nursery rhymes, but his initiative has not been followed up. The difficulty I had in obtaining the little work just mentioned is characteristic of the way in which Italian printed matter vanishes out of all being; instead of passing into the obscure but secure limbo into which much of English literature enters, it attains nothing short of Nirvāna—a happy state of non-existence. The inquiries of several Italian book-sellers led to no other conclusion than that the book in question was not to be had for love or money; and most likely I should still have been waiting for it were it not for the courtesy of the Baron Giovanni di Sardagna, who, on hearing that it was wanted by a student of folk-lore, borrowed from the author the only copy in his possession and made therefrom a verbatim transcript. The following is one of Signor Dal Medico's lullabies: