author, there is no connexion between the two first and two last, the one subject being Hope, the other a sort of amplification of the Madrigal, No. XXVIII., Wedded to will is witless. I should say they were the offspring of no common muse. CCLVII. The sturdy rock, for all his strength, The stately stag, that seems so stout, Is caught at length in fowler's net. Is soon deceived by subtle hook. There are two stanzas more in the original, but Alison has only adapted the foregoing to music. The Poem will be found entire in Percy's Reliques. It is taken from The Paradise of Dainty Devices, A.D. 1576, where it is subscribed M. T., which Ritson judges to be the initials of M. Thorn, whose name is elsewhere printed at length. Without at all detracting from Dr. Percy's merit as an antiquary, I hope I may here be allowed to smile at a very silly remark, made by him in his note upon this poem, wherein he says "that Richard Alison's Hour's Recreation is usually "bound up with three or four sets of Weelkes' Madrigals." Now the fact of the matter is this; the Doctor most likely had in his possession an odd alto part of Madrigals by sundry composers, accidentally bound in the same volume, (now in the British Museum,) among which are those by Alison and Weelkes, and he therefore took it for granted that there was some connexion between them. In equal ignorance, I suspect, of anceint musical matters, Ritson and others after him speak of a book which they call The Aberdeen Cantus, as being something very valuable; but which as far as I can understand is nothing more than a single Cantus or treble part book (being one voice only out of three or four) of a collection, printed in that town about the middle of the seventeenth century, and as far as music is concerned, utterly worthless. CCLVIII. There is a garden in her face, Where roses and white lilies show; Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow. Those cherries fairly do enclose Of orient pearls a double row; They look like rosebuds fill'd with snow. Her eyes like angels watch them still, Her brows like bended bows do stand: Threat'ning with piercing frowns to kill Till cherry ripe themselves do cry. The ancient cry of Cherry ripe has of late years obtained much celebrity from what most people suppose to be a modern song by that name, and written by the author of Paul Pry; but which is taken from Herrick's Hesperides. The following is the original. PAMMELIA*. "Musick's Miscellanie, or mixed varietie of pleasant Roundelays, and delightful Catches of three, four, five, "six, seven, eight, nine, ten parts in one. None so ordi 66 66 nary as musical; none so musical as not to all very pleasing and acceptable. London: printed by William Barley "for R. B. and H. W., and are to be sold at the Spread 66 Eagle at the great north door of St. Pauls, 1609. "To the well disposed to read, and to the merry disposed "to sing. * From two Greek words signifying Miscellaneous Harmony. Amongst other liberal arts, music for her part hath al"ways been as liberal in bestowing her liberal gifts as any 66 66 66 one whatsoever; and that in such rare manner for diversity, and ample measure for multiplicity, as more cannot "be expected, except it were more than it is respected: yet "in this kind only, it may seem somewhat niggardly and "unkind in never as yet publicly communicating, but always privately retaining, and as it were envying to all, "this more familiar mirth and jocund melody. But it may "be music hath hitherto been defective in this vein, be66 cause this vein indeed hath hitherto been defective in "music: and, therefore, that fault being now mended, this "kind of music also is now commended to all men's kind "acceptation. This did I willingly undertake, and have easily effected, that all might equally partake of that "which is so generally affected. Catches are so generally affected, I take it, quia non superant captum, because they are so consonant to all ordinary musical capacity, being "such indeed as all such whose love of music exceeds their "skill cannot but commend; such also, as all such whose "skill in music exceeds their love of such slight and light 66 fancies, cannot either contemn or condemn good art "in all for the more musical; good mirth and melody for "the more jovial; sweet harmony mixed with much va"riety; and both with great facility. Harmony to please, "variety to delight, facility to invite thee. Some toys, yet "musical without absurdity; some very musical, yet pleasing without difficulty; light, but not without music's delight; music's pleasantness, but not without easiness: "what seems old is at least renewed; art having reformed "what pleasing tunes injurious time and ignorance had "deformed. The only intent is to give general content, composed by art to make thee disposed to mirth. Accept, therefore, kindly what is done willingly, and pub"lished only to please good company." 66 This and the following collection called Deuteromelia are evidently compiled by the same person. If that person be Ravenscroft, as has been asserted, (see the account of that composer,) the fact must have been ascertained either from a later edition of one or other of these works, or from some source with which I am unacquainted. I have here given entire the title-pages and dedications as printed in the earliest editions extant, in which no clue to the editor's name is given, unless the letters R. B. and H.W. in the title of Pammelia have reference thereto, neither of which will agree with the name of Ravenscroft. Pammelia is said to be the earliest printed collection of catches, rounds, and canons in this country, and contains one hundred such compositions, which were no doubt those in highest favour at the time of its publication, the élite of all that had been written during the preceding half century. Several of them are now attributed to Tallis and Byrd; I know not by what authority, except it be that of a later edition as stated above, or of old manuscripts which may possibly be yet in existence. I have a manuscript book about seventy years old containing, amongst other catches, several of those in Pammelia, which by a memorandum in a different handwriting are stated to have been collected in 1580 by one John Lant, organist of Winchester Cathedral, who died 1615. Of these are Nos. CCLIX., CCLXII., CCLXIV., CCLXXI., and CCLXXIII., in this book. The records of that church do not even enable me to ascertain whether such a person was organist; but the writer of the memorandum must no doubt have seen the fact stated somewhere. After all, the works being mere collections, it is a matter of little consequence who was the compiler. |