an advance in the scale of civilization and taken their place in the world of harmony. Then the conclusions of my speculation on the probable cause of this evident similarity between the chorus melodies of the sailor and the negro were something like these?First, the similarity of the object; that is, the unifying of effort in labor, and thus to secure simultaneous action, as in rowing, pulling, hoeing, &c., &c., by the measured and rythmical occurrence of vowel sounds. Was not "Jim along Jo" recognized as a minstrel tune then? I'm not sure. Perhaps, again, minstrelsy took it from the folk tradition -- and that tradition may have been of (or shared with) a work-song. There is the idea (not here) that "Jim along Jo" is the same framework as "Haul Away Joe." Their prosody matches exactly. Interesting, too, that Cecil Sharp later uses "Haul Away Joe" as an example to argue why not many chanty tunes are of African-American origin. Well, he might be right. The tune might be of an Irish character, say. Of course, my take on this is that to say African-American means to imply a culture that had already absorbed influences from English, Irish, etc. African-Americans' songs are not expected to have come from Africa (just as the language is a dialect of English); what is relevant is who was singing these melodies/songs during the time under question. Jim along Josey was written by Edward Harper in 1840 in a play called 'The Free Nigger