folk-song, it has ceased
to be that eternally changing, momentary, spontaneous, dance-begotten
thing which once flourished everywhere as communal poetry. Always in
flux, if it stopped it ceased to be itself. Modern lyric is
deliberately composed by some one, mainly to be sung by some one else;
the old communal lyric was sung by the throng and was made in the
singing. When festal excitement at some great communal rejoicing in
the life of clan or tribe "fought its battles o'er again," the result
was narrative communal song. A disguised and baffled survival of this
most ancient narrative is the popular ballad. Still more disguised,
still more baffled, is the purely lyrical survival of that old
communal and festal song; and the best one can do is to present those
few specimens found under conditions which preserve certain qualities
of a vanished world of poetry.

[Illustration: _RUSSIAN CURSIVE WRITING._
A public document of Kamtschatka, written on birch bark.]

It may be asked why the contemporary songs found among Indian tribes
of our continent, or among remote islanders in low stages of culture,
should not reproduce for us the old type of communal verse. The answer
is simple. Tribes which have remained in low stages of culture do not
necessarily retain all the characteristics of primitive life among
races which had the germs of rapidly developing culture. That communal
poetry which gave life to the later epic of Hellenic or of Germanic
song must have differed materially, no matter in what stage of
development, from the uninteresting and monotonous chants of the
savage. Moreover, the specimens of savage verse which we know
retain the characteristics of communal verse, while they lack its
nobler and vital quality. The dance, the spontaneous production,
repetition,--these are all marked characteristics of savage verse.
But savage verse cannot serve as model for our ideas of primitive
folk-song.

[Signature: F. B. Gummere]

SAMUEL FOOTE

(1720-1777)

The name of Samuel Foote suggests a whimsical, plump little man, with
a round face, twinkling eyes, and one of the readiest wits of the
eighteenth century. This contemporary of the elder Colman, Cumberland,
Mrs. Cowley, and the great Garrick, knew many famous men and women,
and they admired as well as feared his talents.

Samuel Foote was born at Truro in 1720. He was a young boy when he
first exhibited his power