New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1920-08-01


memory and affection. "Thev DOM
write songs like that now" said r.
nF companion as we walked awav he
lore their impression should be wined
away by murderous assault on Schn.
bert or else on List.
What is become of the sentiments,
ana patriotic balladry of yesteryearr
me st. Petersburg music incident came
back to my mind when a dav or TWO
ago | read book written by Harold
vincent Milligan published by C.
schlrmer), which told the story of the
HE of Stephen Collins Foster. Per-
maps half of the melodies in the not
pourri were by that sentimental sonc.
stcr, but none of them sang of patriot-
ism or the glory of war; yet they were
of kind which contain as much NJ
the quality of Immortality as any popu-
lar song'struck from the anvil of arts
TIC emotion which generally calls to
life the atrophied faculty of folksone
creation. The best of them were COM
POSED from ten to twenty years before
the War of the Rebellion, but Foster
ilved during nearly three fourths of the
period of fratricidal strife, and though
he tried his hand at some war ballads.
prompted no doubt by his associate,
George Cooper. with whom he collab-
Grated IN eighteen songs published in
1865. But Fosters vein of melody had
long been exhausted, and instead of
drawing regular income from their
copyrights Gas he had done during the
years of his greatest popularity he
now sold his songs for small sums in
cash as fast as he could after he wrote
them He had gone into q decay, in
tellectually and physically, became
merely repetitious and had no resource
OF technical knowledge to fall back upon
or with which 10 open a new vein. The
climax in his fortune or misfortune
seems to have been reached in 1862,
when. for an unexplained, but easily
conceived. reason a contract with Firth,
Pond & Co. upon which he had lived
for nine years, during which the pub
fishers managed all his business and
undertook all his compositions, was
cancelled, and he began to peddle his
songs to any publisher who would buy
them. Says Mr.. Mllligan:
'Perhaps the music publishing bust
ness was hard hit by the war. and the
publishers were no doubt clad 10 get
Fosters songs for small cash payment.
wnllc stephen, without q regular in
come ana with no business AGILITY or
experience was clad to part with them
tor whatever he could get. For most
o. them ne did not receive more than
SO, which was all to the advantage Of
the publisher. as any song with his
Aame on the title page was almost Ger
tam 10 have some sale, and there was
always the chance that it might run
into hundreds of thousands, as many
o. the earlier ones had. If this theory
Is correct 1t would account in large
measure for the poverty and distress
o. his last years, otherwise inexpli-
cable"
Why inexplicable? Consider the
Facts Of mis- output Of songs. In 1860.
the year when he was thrown upon his
own resources so far as the manage
ment Of his business was concerned.
ne wrote eleven songs. He was thirty
four years old, had a wife and daugh-
ter. but whether or not they came to
New York with him is not clear. The
hrSt effect of this disagreement with
Firth, Pond & Co. was to stir him to
greater activity than he had dis
played n ten years. He produced iif-
teen songs in 1850, when he resolved
to quit the drudgery of bookkeeping
and devote himself to song writing; he
wrote one song each in 1856 and 1857;
in 1858 and 1859 he brought out six
each year; thirteen in 1861, sixteen in
1862. and in 1S63-the last year of his
life Che died on January IS, 1854 he
wrote forty-eight. In all he brought
out 40 songs.
This fact, coupled with statement
in the extravagant style common to all
eulogists Though Mr.. Miligan is
something more and better than that
invites to bit of sidewise excursion
"Stephen Foster says Mr. Milligan in
his preface, "occupies a unique posi-
ton in the history C music, not only
of this country. but o. the world. No
other single Individual produced so
many OF those songs which are called
'folksongs,' by which is meant songs
that so perfectly express the mood and
spirit Of the people that they become q
part Of the life Of all the folk and
speak as the voice, not OF one ind
vidual, but Of all We fear that MIR
Miligan is here expanding the United
States into the world. Granted that
the Christy Minstrels had great
vogue in London between 1850 and
1860, that they performed at command
before Queen Victoria, that Thackeray
recorded the fact that a vagabond with
corked face and banjo had with a
little song moistened his spectacles
more than thousands Of tragedy queens
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