were sent in, and the committee charged
with the duty of examining and deciding
upon their merits found that nine-tenths of
them were beneath mediocrity, few above
mediocrity, and not one really available for
the purpose. A new song, however, did crop
up in due time nobody knows by whom
written adapted to a psalm tune:

   John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave,
      But his soul is marching on.

During the Civil War this song became to
a certain extent national in the North,
because it was expressive of the strong
feeling entertained on the subject of
slavery; but it never superseded Yankee
Doodle, which still holds its place, in spite
of the ridiculous associations connected
with the words, as the tune of all others
that touches the heart of an American,
wherever he may be, and rouses his honest
pride in the greatness and glory of the Union.

Auld Lang Syne is the third immortal
lyric that has established itself—no one
knows how—in the heart of a noble
people, and become the living symbol
of kindly feeling, conviviality, friendship,
and love of country. The first
appearance in print of a song with anything
like this title was in 1716, in Watson's
Collection of Scots Poems. It is called
Old Long Syne, and consists of two parts
in ten stanzas, in which there does not
occur a Scottish word or idiom, except the
one word "syne." It is tainted with the
mythological and pagan affectation of the
time, and speaks of " Cupid" and the
"Gods," like other songs and poems of
this brilliant but not very natural period
of our literary history. Eight years afterwards
Allan Ramsay tried his hand at
improving it, and had the good taste to
substitute the Scottish vernacular Auld Lang
Syne for the hybrid Old Long Syne of
Watson's Collection. But in other respects
his emendations scarcely deserve the name.
He could not emancipate himself from the
thraldom of " Cupid," nor, though a master
of the Scottish dialect, as he has shown in
the Gentle Shepherd and other pieces,
could he manage to fit a Scottish song to
the truly Scottish phrase that had hit his
fancy. What hold could a song have on
the people's heart composed of five stanzas
no better than this?

          Methinks around us on each bough
             A thousand Cupids play;
          While through the groves I walk with you,
              Each object makes me gay.
          Since your return the sun and moon
             With brighter beams do shine,
          Streams murmur soft notes while they run,
             As they did Lang Syne!

The force of inanity could go no further.
Fortunately a greater genius took up
the happy phrase, and, in the year 1788,
appeared, for the first time, the noble
song that appears in every edition of the
poems of Robert Burns, and which is
universally attributed to his pen. He,
however, did not claim it as his own, but
emphatically disclaimed it. He first
mentioned it in a letter to his friend, Mrs.
Dunlop. "Apropos," he wrote to that lady, "is
not the Scotch phrase ' Auld Lang Syne '
exceedingly impressive? There is an old
song and tune which has often thrilled
through my soul. You know I am an
enthusiast in old Scotch song. I give you
the verses on the other sheet. . . . Light be
the turf on the breast of the Heaven-inspired
poet who composed this glorious fragment.
There is more of the fire of native genius
in it than in half-a-dozen of modern English
Bacchanalians." Nearly four years afterwards,
when he had become connected with
Mr. George Thomson in the re-publication
of the Ancient Melodies of Scotland, he
wrote to that gentleman, enclosing him the
song of Auld Lang Syne, presumably the
same version which he had sent to Mrs.
Dunlop, informing him that the enclosure
was " a song of the olden times, which has
never been in print, nor even in
manuscript, until I took it down from an old
man's singing. The air," he added, "is
but mediocre, but the song is enough to
recommend any air." The question arises,
did Burns really obtain a fragment of this
song from an old man, and send it, as he
received it, to Mrs. Dunlop? Or did he
enlarge or amend this fragment into the
song which he forwarded to Mr. Thomson,
and which is always printed among his
works? No decision is possible, though
all will admit, from internal evidence, that
if the song were not Burns's own, there
previously existed some mysterious poet in
Scotland who could write as good a song as
Burns could. Burns was an excellent judge
of melody, and, lest he should be thought
guilty of unfair disparagement to the air
of Auld Lang Syne, it should be stated
that the tune to which it is now sung is
not the one on which Burns passed judgment,
but an old cathedral chant, which
dates from the Roman Catholic period, and
of which the authorship is wholly unknown.
The tune is excellent, and the words are
married to it in the bonds of a true and
indissoluble union. It is a stirring and a
pleasant sight to see the enthusiasm of a
hundred or two of Scotsmen at a public