The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1872-06-29
1onalosonbille Gblef.
The Jubilee.

While nearly every city OF tne
United States is seething with the ex-
element of the political campaign,
there is one quiet little spot, situated,
geographically, on remote inlet OF
orr north eastern coast, but intellect
ually, as everybody knows, at the eX-
act center of the solar sytem, where
the quarrels of factions do not reach
and the merits of candidates and plat
forms have not yet been discussed.
Conkling and Carpenter, Sumner and
Wilson, Grant and Greeley, Benjamin
Butler, Dawes, Bingham, John Coch-
rane, and Zacllariah Chandler, are
names for the present unheard and
totally forgotten in this brick elyslum,
where the air is full of harmony ana
the Atlantic gales are laden with the
songs of Mozart and Lowell Mason.
The happy inhabitants reck little of
problems that veX the rest OF the
world; the Washington Treaty, the
Baltimore Convention, the baliOtlng
in November, the tariff, the taxes,
touch not the serene repose of their
souls. Ifthey have anxiety, it is lest
they may not all get into the pine
Coliseum next Monday; if they
breathe a prayer, it is for the safe
transportation of the big drum, which
could not be got out of Portland till
they had taken down the house it was
built in, and could not be carried to
Boston on anything smaller than an
ocean steamer. The Jubilee is the
one subject of New England thought,
and till it is over the sympathles OF
all that section of the United States
will be far apart from those of the rest
of mankind.
When somebody congratulated Mr..
Gilmore in 1869, at the close OF the
first performance of his first great
musical gathering, the celebrated
band master grasped the speakers
hand, and exclaimed, in fresh glow
of enthusiasm, :" Sir, there is nothing
left for me now except to get up an
other Jubilee twice as big as this one"
1t seemed an extravagant bit of brag-
gadocio but Mr.. G ilmore has done
it. Nay, he has done more. He has
gone across the ocean, and put some
of his faith into the emperors, and
queens, and other high toned persons /;
and while we are all telling him not to
make fool of himself by asking for
the unattainable, he brings back the
most famous bands of the European
armies, and half score of the great
artists of the Old World. Lord Gran
vile sends Dan Godfrey with the
Grenadiers to sOOthe us into amend
ing the supplementary Treaty. Pres
ideEt THEIRS contributes the fifty mu
sicians who, under one name or an
rother, have long been the chief repre-
-sentatiyes of French military music.
The Emperor William lends the band
sof the Kaiser Franz Grenadiers, and
.llis own private and particular coinet
,quartette besides. From Ireland is
coming great national band, OF
which we are told that it contains
forty men, all of them true patriots.
And finally, our own beloved Marine
Band of Washington leaves the nurse
anaids of Capitol-square disconsolate
for IL few days, and exalts it's horns
among its fellows of other nations.
Three years ago Mr.. Gilmore had a
thousand performers this year lie
means to have two thousand; then
his chorus mustered ten thousand
singers; now it will be twenty thous-
and; then it was a festival of peace
for the whole United States; now it
as celebration for all the civilized
world. Even unbelieving and stiff
necked New York clamors at the door
of the Coliseum and asks to be taken
in. The parties and the Pacific slope
send their societies to the mOnstrous
gathering; and every girl and halt
the young men in New England have
been practicing Handel and Hail
columbia and the Anvil Chorus fOr
the past six months.
How Mr.. Gilmore did it all is and
must probably forever remain great
mystery, though of the stupendous
effect of his labors we shall soon have
IA full opportunity to judge. The i'm
mediate aesthetic results of such huge
assemblies we do not highly value.
But their influence upon musical cul-
ture cannot be questioned, and the in
direct consequences of SO much en-
thusiasm over drums, and fiddles, and
trumpets, and trained voices, will be
of great importance TO popular art il
only the mistake be avoided of exag,
,gerating the grand until it becomes
grotesque.-N. I. Tribune.