POETIC ORIGINS AND THE BALLAD
CHAPTER I THE BEGINNINGS OF POETRY
Certain [Indian] societies require that each member have a special song; this song is generally of the man's own composition, although sometimes these songs are inherited from a father or a near relative who when living had been a member of the society. These individual songs are distinct from songs used in the ceremonies and regarded as the property of the society, although the members are entitled to sing them on certain occasions. When this society holds its formal meetings a part of the closing exercises consists of the simultaneous singing by all the members present of their individual songs. The result is most distressing to a listener, but there are no listeners unless by chance an outsider is present, for each singer is absorbed in voicing his own special song which is strictly his own personal affair, so that he pays no attention to his neighbour, consequently the pandemonium to which he contributes does not exist for him.
The foregoing paragraph from Miss Alice C. Fletcher's account of Indian music [1] reads like a travesty of the accepted view of primitive song, its character and authorship. There is the familiar primitive "horde," engaged in festal singing, without onlookers. Yet instead of collaborative composition, improvisation, and communal ownership of the ensuing "ballad," we have individual authorship and ownership, and individual singing. This is the testimony of a specialist who has spent many years among the people of whom she writes, studying and recording their songs and their modes of composition. Easily recognizable is the homogeneous primitive group, singing in festal ceremony; but this group does not conduct itself in the way which literary historians have insisted that we should expect.
The songs of primitive peoples have received much attention in recent years, especially the songs of the American Indians. An immense amount of material has been collected and made available; and this has been done in a scientific way, with the help of countless phonographic and other records. Instead of having to rely on the stray testimonies of travellers, explorers, historians, and essayists, the student of primitive poetry has now at his disposal an amount of data unavailable to his predecessors. He need not linger among the fascinating mysteries of romantic hypotheses, but can supply himself with the carefully observed facts of scientific record.[2]
In this matter it cannot be valid to object that we should not look among North or South American Indians, or Eskimos for "beginnings." It cannot reasonably be said that these tribes are too advanced, too highly civilized, to afford trustworthy evidence as to aboriginal modes. As a matter of fact, we can go little farther back, in the analysis of culture, than these people, if we are to stay by what can be demonstrated. When we have learned what we can learn from the primitive tribes on our own continent, in South America, Africa, Australia, Oceania, we know very nearly all that we can surely know. If we go to the prehistoric, we are conjecturing, and we ought to label our statements "conjecture." In general, gradations of "primitiveness" among savage peoples are difficult to make. A social group may show the simplest or least organized social structure, and yet be relatively advanced in musical and artistic talent. Another group may show advance in social organization, yet be backward in song and story. And certainly even the most advanced of the Indian communities (with the exception of civilized Mexico and Peru) are every whit as primitive as the mediaeval peasant communes, from whose supposed ways we are constantly asked to learn as regards poetic beginnings.[3]
If, as we are told, prehistoric song-modes are reflected in the folkdances and festal throngs of mediaeval peasants and villagers, or in the singing of nineteenth-century Corsican field laborers, Styrian threshers, Gascon vintage choruses, Italian country-folk, Silesian peasants, Earoe Island fishermen, and harvest-field songs everywhere,[4] they ought to be reflected yet more in the song-modes of the American Indians.
I. "COMMUNAL" AUTHORSHIP AND OWNERSHIP
At the present time the accepted or orthodox view, i. e., among literary critics, hardly among anthropologists, concerning the authorship of primitive song and the "beginnings of poetry" is reflected in such passages as the following, from a recent work by Professor Richard Green Moulton:[5]
The primary element of literary form is the ballad dance. This is the union of verse with musical accompaniment and dancing; the dancing being, not exactly what the words suggest to modern ears, but the imitative and suggestive action of which an orator's gestures are the nearest survival. Literature, where it first appears spontaneously, takes this form: a theme or story is at once versified, accompanied with music, and suggested in action. When the Israelites triumphed at the Red Sea, Miriam "took a timbrel in her hands; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and dances." This was a ballad dance; it was a more elaborate example of the same when David, at the inauguration of Jerusalem, "danced before the Lord with all his might." And writers who deal with literary origins offer abundant illustrations of folk-dances among the most diverse peoples in an early stage of civilization.
In this passage and in his diagrams showing literary evolution [6] Professor Moulton gives the "ballad dance" the initial position in the chronology of musical and literary history, characterizing it as the "primitive literary form "— the ballad dance, moreover, according to the usual view, of the throng. Individual composition of and proprietorship in song is of secondary development; and when this stage has been reached, "folk-song" has passed into " artistry."
The following passages make clear the position of Professor A. S. Mackenzie[7]: "Inasmuch as dancing is the most spontaneous of all the arts, it may be regarded as the earliest. Linked with inarticulate vocal cries it fell under the spell of measure or order, and slowly grew more rational" . . . "impulsive motions and sounds prepare the way for voluntary movements of the body and the voice. When these are controlled by rhythm, the rudiments of dancing and music have emerged, though they remain inseparable for many a year" ..." It was such extemporaneous efforts [tribal improvisation] that gave rise to the first verses which bear any resemblance to what we are accustomed to call poetry. The first artist served his apprenticeship as an improviser under festal stimulus, before he learned to compose more worthy verse in retirement. Not only among the higher tribes but even in Europe the primitive custom of extemporizing coexists alongside the more advanced custom of composing with deliberation apart from the throng" . . . "His [primitive man's] humble verse is in constant dependence upon the collective emotion produced by the choric dance "... "Apart from the festal dance it is difficult to find any definite traces either of poetic sources or of poetic forms, and we are driven to the conclusion that the earliest art impulse is essentially collective rather than individual, objective rather than subjective. No doubt primitive improvisation is the halting keynote of individuality, but it is speedily lost in the ethnic chorus. In vain do we look here for that poetry which is born of meditation in solitude and deliberately framed into metrical perfection."
Last, let some passages from Professor Gummere's The Beginnings of Poetry be cited. Professor Gummere was recognized as a leading scholar of the subject, and in view of his learning, ability, and his years of attention to the matter, his words may well have especial weight. Here are some characteristic sentences [8]: "Poetry begins with the impersonal, with communal emotion." "The ballad is a song made in the dance, and so by the dance. . . . The communal dance is the real source of the song." "The earliest 'muse' was the rhythm of the throng." "Festal throngs, not a poet's solitude, are the birthplace of poetry." "Overwhelming evidence shows all primitive poetical expression of emotion to have been collective." Let two quotations of greater length be given:
As the savage laureate slips from the singing, dancing crowd, which turns audience for the nonce, and gives his short improvisation, only to yield to the refrain of the chorus, so the actual habit of individual composition and performance has sprung from the choral composition and performance. The improvisations and the recitative are short deviations from the main road, beginnings of artistry, which will one day become journeys of the solitary singer over pathless hills of song, those "wanderings of thought" which Sophocles has noted; and the curve of evolution in the artist's course can show how rapidly and how far this progress has been made. But the relation must not be reversed; and if any fact seems established for primitive life, it is the precedence of choral song and dance. . . .
Here it is enough to show that rhythmical verse came directly from choral song, and that neither the choral song, nor any regular song, could have come from the recitative.
It is natural for one person to speak, or even to sing, and for ninety-nine persons to listen. It is also natural for a hundred persons, under strong emotion, to shout, sing, dance, in concert and as a throng, not as a matter of active and passive, of give and take, but in common consent of expression. The second situation . . . must have preceded.[9]
He reminds us again in an article on Folk-Song [10] that "It is very important to remember that primitive man regarded song as a momentary and spontaneous thing."
To come farther down in the history of song, a favorite picture with Professor Gummere is of European peasant folk in the Middle Ages, improvising "ballads" in song and dance, and thus — by virtue of the simple homogeneous character of their life — establishing a type of balladry superior to, and having more vitality than, anything of the kind having its origin in individual authorship. It is a long gap, that between aboriginal song and dance and the English and Scottish ballads of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; yet it is a gap we are asked to bridge. Undoubtedly, if that " most ancient of creative processes," the communal throng chorally creating its song from the festal dance, existed among the mediaeval peasants and produced work of the high value of the English and Scottish ballads, the same "ancient method" should prevail among that yet more primitive people, the American Indians.
That it is an absurd chronology which assumes that individuals have choral utterance before they are lyrically articulate as individuals, seems — extraordinarily enough — to have little weight with theorists of this school. Did primitive man sing, dance, and compose in a throng, while he was yet unable to do so as an individual? We are asked to believe this. Are we to assume that he was inarticulate and without creative gift, till suddenly he participated in some festal celebration and these gifts became his? Professor Gummere cites as evidence, so important as to deserve italics. Dr. Paul Ehrenreich's statement concerning the Botocudos of South America, "They never sing without dancing, never dance without singing, and have but one word to express both song and dance." [11] Much the same thing, save as regards limitations of vocabulary, might have been said by a traveller among the ancient Greeks, with whom dance was generally inseparable from music and verse. Nothing is proved by this characteristic of the Botocudos, if it is a characteristic; any more than anything is proved by the fact that the far more aboriginal Akkas of South Africa [12] have songless dances, or by the fact that danceless songs — a circumstance hard to fit into the accepted view of primitive poetry — have been reported among the Andamanese, the Australians, the Maori of New Zealand, Semang of Malaysia, Seri of Mexico, and Eskimo of the Arctic, as well as among practically all North American tribes that have been studied in detail. According to the testimony of Miss Fletcher, there are many songs sung by Indian societies in which there is no dancing.[13]
Such songs are spoken of as "Best Songs." In the account quoted at the opening of this volume, of the simultaneous singing of individual songs by the members of a certain society as the closing act of a meeting, the members are sitting as they sing. Their individual songs are, in a sense, credentials of membership. Each song is strictly individual, and refers to a personal experience. "In most societies," says Miss Fletcher, "as well as in the ceremonies of the tribe, the songs are led by a choir, or by persons officially appointed as leaders. The members of the society frequently join in the song. I do not recall anyone performing a dramatic dance and singing at the same time. While all dances are accompanied by song, many songs are sung without dancing. Some of the dancing is not violent in action, the movement is merely rhythm and swaying. In such dances, the dancers sing as they move. Occasionally, as I recall, the song for a dance which is dramatic and vigorous, bringing all the body into play, will be sung by the choir (men and women seated about the drum). Some of the people sitting and watching the dance may clap their hands in rhythm with the drum. This, however, is playfulness by some privileged person and indicates enjoyment."
Surely the individual does everything he can do, or chooses to do, as an individual, before, or contemporary with, his ability to do the same as a member of a throng. The testimonies of travellers as to communal singing and dancing among savage or peasant communities prove nothing at all as to origins; certainly they do not prove that collective poetic feeling and authorship preceded individual feeling and authorship. Testimonies as to tribal song ought to outnumber testimonies as to individual song, since the spectator is chiefly interested in tribal ways. He would be struck by and record tribal ceremonies, rituals, and songs, where individual singing would escape attention or seem unimportant. Besides, choruses would no doubt be more numerous than solos, and bound up with more important occasions; much as solo dances are infrequent, among savage tribes, compared to mass dancing. To reiterate, however, testimony no matter how great its quantity, that savage peoples sing and dance in throngs, or improvise while doing so, proves nothing as to the priority of communal over individual feeling, authorship, and ownership.
The evidence concerning primitive song which should have greatest weight is not that of travellers and explorers, interested chiefly in other things than song, but that of special scholars, who have recorded and studied available material with a view to its nature, its composition, and its vitality. Among these there seems to be neither doubt nor divergence of opinion; and their testimony is at variance with the now established tradition of the literary historian. The general social inspiration of song is not to be denied. In a broad sense, all art is a social phenomenon — the romanticists to the contrary. Song is mainly a social thing at the present time, and it was yet more prevailingly social among our remote ancestors. Rather is it proposed to subject to examination the following specific hypotheses: the inseparableness of primitive dance, music, and song; the simultaneous mass-composition of primitive song; mass-ownership of primitive song; the narrative character of primitive song; the non-existence of the primitive artist. Far from certain, also, is the hypothesis of the birth of rhythmic or musical utterance from rhythmic action, if this be conceived as a form of limb or bodily motion.
In citations of illustrative material, primary use is made of American Indian material. It is this material, on the whole, which has been collected and studied most carefully. Coming as it does from homogenous primitive peoples, in the tribal state, having one standard of life, and as yet unaffected by the poetic modes of civilization, it should have importance for the questions under discussion. Parallel material — of which liberal use is made — available from South America, Africa, Australia, and Oceania, yields, however, the same evidence.
II. INDIVIDUAL AUTHORSHIP AND OWNERSHIP
That American Indian song is of individual composition, not the product of group improvisation, much evidence may be brought to support. It will be seen also, from the illustrative material cited, that the Indian has a feeling of private ownership in his song. It would be reasonable, therefore, to assume that, as far back as we can go in primitive society, there should be a sense of individual skill in song-making, as of individual skill in running, hurling a dart, leaping, or any other human activities. There is something absurd in singling out musical utterance as the one form of expression having only social origin or social existence.
A large number of Indian songs are said to have come into the mind of the Indian when he was in a dream or a trance (surely not a "communal" form of experience!).
Many of the Chippewa songs, for example, are classified as " dream songs.?' Says Miss Densmore:[14]
Many Indian songs are intended to exert a strong mental influence, and dream songs are supposed to have this power in greater degree than any others. The supernatural is very real to the Indian. He puts himself in communication with it by fasting or by physical suffering. While his body is thus subordinated to his mind a song occurs to him. In after years he believes that
by singing this song he can recall the condition under which it came to him — a condition of direct communication 'with the supernatural.[15]
It is said that in the old days all the important songs were "composed in dreams," and it is readily understood that the man Who sought a dream desired power superior to that he possessed. A song usually came to a man in his " dream "; he sang this song in the time of danger or necessity in the belief that by so doing he made more potent the supernatural aid vouchsafed to him in the dream. Songs composed, or received, in this manner were used on the warpath, in the practice of medicine, and in any serious undertaking of life.[16]
Compare also: "There is no limit to the number of these [ghost-dance songs] as every trance at every dance produces a new one, the trance subject after regaining consciousness embodying his experience in the spirit world in the form of a song, which is sung at the next dance and succeeding performance until superseded by other songs originating in the same way. Thus a single dance may easily result in twenty or thirty new songs." [17] Testimony from Australia is contributed by A. W. Howitt: "In the tribes with which I have acquaintance, I find it to be a common belief that the songs, using that word in its widest meaning, as including all kinds of aboriginal poetry, are obtained by the bards from the spirits of the deceased, usually of their kindred, during sleep, in dreams. . . . The Birraark professed to receive his poetic inspiration from the Mrarts, as well as the accompanying dances, which he was supposed to have seen first in ghost land. ... In the Narrang-ga tribe there are old men who profess to learn songs and dances from departed spirits. These men are called Gurildras. ... In the Yuin tribe some men received their songs in dreams, others when waking." Specimen songs are cited.[18]
There is also abundant testimony as to private ownership. The following is from Le Jeune's Relation (1636): "Let us begin with the feasts of the Savages. They have one for war. At this they sing and dance in turn, according to age; if the younger ones begin, the old men pity them for exposing themselves to the ridicule of others. Each has his own song, that another dare not sing lest he give offense. For this very reason they sometimes strike up a tune that belongs to their enemies to aggravate them." [19] Of the Melanesians of British New Guinea we are told that their songs and dances are "strictly copyright." "The only legitimate manner for people to obtain the right to a dance or song not their own was to buy it." [20] Private ownership of songs prevails also among the American Indians.
The Chippewa have no songs which are the exclusive property of families or clans. Any young man may learn his father's songs, for example, by giving him the customary gift of tobacco, but he does not inherit the right to sing such songs, nor does his father force him to learn them.[21]
We learn further that the healer combines music and medicine. "If a cure of the sick is desired, he frequently mixes and rolls a medicine after singing the song which will make it effective." [22] And that "The songs of a Chippewa doctor cannot be bought or sold." [23]
So far as the two men who heard me were concerned, the argument was convincing, but there lingered even with them a reluctance to help me with certain songs because they belonged to other persons. Nearly all the Indians of my acquaintance recognize this proprietary interest in songs. A has no right to sing B's songs; B did not compose them, but they came down to him through his family, or from some chief who fought him, and B alone should say whether they might be given another.[24]
Miss Fletcher writes of the Omaha:
It would be a mistake to fancy that songs floated indiscriminately about among the Indians, and could be picked up here and there by any chance observer. Every song had originally its owner. It belonged either to a society, secular or religious, to a certain clan or political organization, to a particular rite or ceremony, or to some individual. . . . The right to sing a song which belonged to an individual could be purchased, the person buying the song being taught it by the owner.
These beliefs and customs among the Indians have made it possible to preserve their songs without change from one generation to another. Many curious and interesting proofs of accuracy of transmittal have come to my knowledge during the past twenty years, while studying these primitive melodies. . . . Close and continued observation has revealed that the Indian, when he sings, is not concerned with the making of a musical presentation to his audience. He is simply pouring out his feelings, regardless of artistic effects. To him, music is subjective: it is the vehicle of communication between him and the object of his desire.[25]
Now a few testimonies as to individual authorship. A first instance is from the songs of the Omaha. For the complete story of this song, the reader is referred to the a,ccount of Miss Fletcher:
At length the Leader stood up and said, "We have made peace, we have come in good faith, we will go forward, and Wa-kon'-da shall decide the issue." Then he struck up this song and led the way; and as the men and women followed, they caught the tune, and all sang it as they came near the Sioux village.[26]
Two instances from the Pawnee illustrate perfectly the poet musing in solitude on the meaning of nature,— like some Pawnee Wordsworth.
The " Song of the Bird's Nest " commemorates the story of a man who came upon a bird's nest in the grass:
He paused to look at the little nest tucked away so snug and warm, and noted that it held six eggs and that a peeping sound came from some of them. While he watched, one luoved and soon a tiny bill pushed through the shell uttering a shrill cry. At once the parent birds answered and he looked up to see. where they were. They were not far off; they were flying about in search of food, chirping the while to each other and now and then calling to the little ones in the nest. . . . After many days he desired to see the nest again. So he went to the place where he had found it and there it was as safe as when he had left it. But a change had taken place. It was now full to overflowing with little birds, who were stretching their wings, balancing on their little legs and making ready to fly, while the parents with encouraging calls were coaxing the fledglings to venture forth. "Ah!" said the man, "if my people would only leairn of the birds, and like them, care for their young and provide for their future, homes would be full and happy, and our tribe strong and prosperous."
When this man became a priest, he told the story of the bird's nest and sang its song; and so it has come down to us as from the days of our fathers.[27]
The "Song of the Wren" was made by a priest who noted that the wren, the smallest and least powerful of the birds, excelled them all in the fervor of its song. "Here," he thought, "is a teaching for my people. Everyone can be happy; even the most insignificant can have his song of thanks."
So he [the priest] made the story of the wren and sang it; and it has been handed down from that day,— a day so long ago no man can remember the time.[28] Instances testifying to individual not communal composition of song among the Chippewa are no less easily cited.
The following explanation of a certain song was given by an Indian:
The song belonged to a certain man who sang it in the dances which were held before going to war. When this man was a boy he had a dream and in his dream he heard the trees singing as though they were alive: they sang that they were afraid of nothing except being blown down by the wind. When the boy awoke he made up this song, in which he repeats what he heard the trees say. The true meaning of the words is that there is no more chance of his being defeated on the warpath than there is that a tree will be blown down by the wind.[29]
The singer stated that he composed this song himself when he was a child. The circumstances were as follows: His mother had gone to a neighbor's, leaving him alone in the wigwam. He became very much afraid of the owl, which is the particular terror of all small Indians, and sang this song. It was just after sugar making and the wigwams were placed together beside the lake. The people in the other wigwams heard his little song. The melody was entirely new and it attracted them so that they learned it as he sang. The men took it up and used it in their moccasin games. For many years it was used in this way, but he was always given the credit of its composition.[30] The rhythm of this song is peculiarly energizing, and when once established would undoubtedly have a beneficial physical effect. The surprising feature of this case, however, is that the song is said to have been composed and the rhythm created by the sick man himself.[31]
There are many instances of individual artistry among the Australians: —
"The makers of Australian songs, or of the combined songs and dances, are the poets, or bards, of the tribe, and are held in great esteem. Their names are known in the neighboring tribes, and their songs are carried from tribe to tribe, until the very meaning of the words is lost, as well as the original source of the song. It is hard to say how far and how long such a song may travel in the course of time over the Australian continent." [32]
It is interesting to note that many Indian songs are composed by women. The following are instances:
. . . They [the women] would gather in groups at the lodge of the Leader of the war party, and in the hearing of his family would sing a We'-ton song, which should carry straight to the far-away warriors and help them to win the battle . . . The We'-ton song here given was composed by a Dakota woman.[33] It is said that the following [Chippewa] song was composed and sung on the field of battle by a woman named Omiskwa'wegijigo'kwe ("woman of the red sky."), the wife of the leader, who went with him into the fight singing, dancing, and urging him on. At last she saw him kill a Sioux. Full of the fire of battle, she longed to play a man's part and scalp the slain. Custom forbade that Chippewa women use the scalping knife, although they carried the scalps in the victory dance.
Song
at that time
if I had been a man
truly
a man
I would have seized.[34]
Odjib'we [a Chippewa] stated that his wife's brother was killed by the Sioux and that he organized a war party in return. The purpose of the expedition was to attack a certain Sioux village located on an island in Sauk river, but before reaching the village, the Chippewa met a war party of Sioux, which they pursued, killing one man. There were nine Chippewa in Odjib'we's party; not one was killed. They returned home at once and Odjib'we presented the Sioux scalp to his wife Dekum ("across") who held it aloft in the victory dance as she sung the following song.
Odjib'we
our brother
brings back.[35]
Thomas Whiffen quotes a song made by a Boro chieftain's daughter, a complaint of her treatment by her own tribe, having the iterative lines —
The chiefs daughter was lost in the bush
And no one came to find the spoor.[36]
Much farther evidence of the composition of songs by women might be cited.[37]
Excellent testimony on the questions of individual composition, the refrain, and the relation of the composer to the chorus comes from the Andamese.[38] "When an Andamese wishes to make a new song he waits till he feels inspired to do so, and will then, when alone and engaged on some occupation, sing to himself till he has hit on a solo and refrain which takes his fancy, and then improves it to his taste. His composition would ordinarily refer to some recent occurrence by which he had been affected," "At a dance the soloist stands at the dancing-board and (often in a falsetto voice) sings his solo and the refrain. (If he has sung the solo in falsetto, his voice will drop an octave at the refrain). If the chorus grasp the refrain at once, they sing it; if they do not grasp it, the soloist will repeat it two or three times till the chorus is able to take it up." "The solo is sung amid general silence, and the dance commences with the refrain, being also accompanied by a clapping of hands and thighs, and the stamping of the soloist's foot on the sounding board."
The preceding are specimen testimonies. They might be added to indefinitely from many sources. In accounts of African, Australian, or South American tribes, as well as of the North American Indians, one comes invariably upon the instance of the individual who makes a song — very often in solitude — and the song is recognized as his. The great mass of primitive songs sung in communal or other gatherings are either portions of religious rituals, didactic, or, still oftener, magical in nature. Far from being improvised for the occasion, they are sedulously repeated verbatim, the least deviation from the rote form being the occasion, not infrequently, of an entire recommencement of the ceremony. Ramon Pane gives the following testimony concerning the Haytians: [39] "They have all the superstitions reduced into old songs, and are directed by them, as the Moors by the Alcoran. When they sing these, they play on an instrument made of wood. ... To that music they sing those songs they have got by heart. The chief men play on it who learn it from their infancy, and so sing it according to their custom."
Substantially the same account is given by Peter Martyr d'Anghrera: [40] "When the Spanish asked whoever had infected them with this mass of ridiculous beliefs, the natives replied that they received them from their ancestors, and that they had been preserved from time immemorial in poems which only the sons of chiefs were allowed to learn. These poems are learned by heart, for they have no writing, and on feast days the sons of chiefs sing them to the people in the form of sacred chants." Thomas Whiffen, writing of the Amazonians,[41] speaks of "the traditional songs of the tribes which are sacred and unchangeable."
"They are the songs that their fathers sang, and one can find no evidence of the amendation or emendation of the score on the part of their descendants."
"The dance, like the tobacco palaver, is a dominant factor in tribal life. For it the Amazonian treasures the songs of his fathers and will master strange rhymes and words that for him no longer have meaning; he only knows that they are the correct lines, the phrases he ought to sing at such functions, because they have always been sung, they are the words of the time-honored tribal melodies."
Songs composed and sung by individuals and songs sung by groups of singers (or "throngs," if you prefer) are to be found in the most primitive of living tribes. That in the earliest stage there was group utterance only, arising from the folk-dance, is fanciful hypothesis. That primitive song is of group composition or collaboration, not individual composition, is quite as fanciful. Again, as far back as we can go in the genesis of song-craft, there are impromptu songs, the spontaneous utterance of present emotion, and there are traditional songs, survivals or revivals of the songs of the past.[42]
Among primitive peoples there is no such indissoluble connection between singing and dancing as the italicized observations of Dr. Ehrenreich are supposed to imply. Neither dancing nor song is invariably "choric" in savage any more than in civilized society. Solo dancing, for example, has been reported among the Semang of Perak, the Kwai, and the Andamanese, as well as among the American Indians and numerous other peoples. Koch-Grunberg mentions a dance among tribes north of the Japura where the men and the women dance together in pairs. As for solo singing, the citations given speak for themselves.[43] Even when the singing is choral, it is by no means always dance-song, nor accompanied by dancing. The Kaffirs are said to be fond of singing lustily together, but, if we may trust the observation, "a Kaffir differs from an European vocalist in this point, namely, that he always, if possible, sits down when he sings." [44] Surely these recumbent Kaffirs deserve italics as much as Dr. Ehrenreich's Botocudos.[45]
The conception of individual song can be shown to exist among the very lowest peoples. Professor Gummere's belief is that human beings get together for rhythmic movement, begin to sing, and thus song is born. But the same savage tribes that sing in groups tell stories in which individual songs appear. Among the myths of the wilder tribes of Eastern Brazil,[46] for example, there are many in which the composition and singing of songs by individuals form important incidents. This fact shows plainly that the authors of these myths were perfectly familiar with the conception of individual composition. Granting the manifestations of primitive singing and dancing throngs which seem so decisive to many scholars, they are capable of quite other interpretations than those which are usually assigned them.
III. THE "BALLAD" AS THE EARLIEST POETIC FOEM
And now what truth is in the assumption that the ballad-dance is the germ from which emerged the three separate arts, poetry, music, dance? A passage by Professor Moulton, affirming this, has been cited, and this passage presents without doubt, a view now widely accepted. The opinion is prevalent among folk-lorists and students of literature that since ballads come down to us by tradition, they represent poetry in its most primitive form.
We are told that ballads can best be studied by studying the poetry of races least civilized.[47]
Let us ask, first, in what sense the word "ballad" is used by those who derive poetry from it. Does Professor Moulton, for example, use the word ballad in its etymological sense of " dance song," leaving undetermined the character of the words, whether meaningless vocables, purely lyrical, or prevailingly narrative? Usually the classification "ballad" is employed of lyric verses having a narrative element. By "ballad" we are supposed to mean a narrative song, a story in verse, a short narrative told lyrically. It is a loose usage which permits scholars to use the word in the sense both of dance song and of lyrical narrative, in the same work; the ambiguity is unnecessary.[48] If ballad means something like dance song, or choral dance, or folk-dance accompanied by improvisation and refrain, the term ballad-dance is tautological; for all ballads involve dancing. One wishes for more precision. But this need not detain us here.
In whichever sense the term ballad be used, it is somewhat rash to place the ballad dance so certainly at the source of man's musical and poetical expression. We have just seen that there is individual composition and singing, song unaccompanied by dancing, and dance unaccompanied by song, as far down in the cultural scale as we can go. Certainly if ballad means, as usually it does, song-story, the ballad was not the earliest form of poetry; and primitive people never danced to ballads. The earliest songs we can get track of are purely lyrical, not narrative. The melody is the important thing; the words, few in number and sometimes meaningless, are relatively negligible. Moreover, these songs are on many themes, or have many impulses beside festal dances.
There are healers' songs, conjurers' songs, hunting songs, game-songs, love songs, hymns, prayers, complaints or laments, victory songs, satires, songs of women and children, and lyrics of personal feeling and appeal. The lullaby is an old lyric form. Who cares to affirm that lullabies were unknown to our aboriginal ancestors? Yet the lullaby has nothing to do with the singing and dancing throng. Nor has that other very early species, the medicine man or healer's solos; nor have gambling or game songs,[49] or love songs.[50]
Primitive labor songs are social, but they do not involve dancing, though some may have a certain relation to it, and they are not ballads. The class that is nearest the real ballad, in that it is based on happenings, or on the composer's experiences, is not by any means the largest or the most important group for primitive song. Songs of this latter type may be suggested by some event, or may present some situation; but they tell no story in the sense of real telling. That demands length, elaboration, completeness, beyond primitive powers. ' If we try to fix chronology, it is most plausible to begin with rhythmic action and with melody. Professor Gummere thinks that melody is born of rhythmic action. But vocal action of the singing type, i. e., melody, may well be as instinctive in man as in birds. Action and melody in singing may well have come together; for song interprets primarily feeling, emotion, not motion. In any case, words came later than melody, and real narrative later yet. As a lyrical species, the narrative song is a late, not an early, poetical development. If we look at what eertain evidence we have, primitive songs are very brief, the words are less important than the music, indeed they need hardly be present; and they rarely tell a story. No instances are known to me in which a primitive song tells a story with real elaboration or completeness. Nor need these songlets always have their origin in the choral — specifically in the improvisation and communal elaboration of a festal dance. Why, then, apply the term ballad to the brief and simple lyrical utterances, often nothing more than the repetition of a few syllables, or of one syllable, which — according to the evidence — make up the great body of primitive song?
But it is time to bring up a few illustrations.
First place may well be given to the words of Miss Alice Fletcher, who has had thirty-five years of acquaintance with Indian music:
The word "song" to our ears, suggests words arranged in metrical form and adapted to be " set to music," as we say. The native word which is translated "song" does not suggest any use of .words. To the Indian, the music is of primal importance, words may or may not accompany the music. When words are used in a song, they are rarely employed as in a narrative, the sentences are not apt to be complete. In eongs belonging to a religious ceremony the words are few and partake of a mnemonic character. They may refer to some symbol, may suggest the conception or the teaching the symbol stands for, rarely more than that. Vocables are frequently added to the Word or words to eke out the musical measure. It sometimes happens that a song has no words at all, only vocables are used to float the voice. Whether vocables alone are used or used in connection with words, they are never a random collection of syllables. An examination of hundreds of songs shows that the vocables used fall into classes; one class is used for songs denoting action, another class for songs of a contemplative character, and it is also noted that when once vocables are adapted to a song they are never changed but are treated as if they were actual words.[51]
She writes elsewhere to the same effect:
In Indian song and story we come upon a time when poetry is not yet differentiated from story and story not yet set free from song. We note that the song clasps the story as part of its being, and the story itself is not fully told without the cadence of the song. . . . The difference between spontaneous Indian melodies and the compositions of modern masters would seem to be not one of kind but of degree. . . . Many Indian songs have no words at all, vocables only being used to float the voice.[52]
The investigator of Ojibway song also finds the melody to be more important than the words, and has nothing to say of an inevitable relation between dancing and song.[53]
His [the Ojibway] poetry is not only inseparable but indistinguishable from music. . . . Among all civilized peoples the art of expression through verse is one thing, and the art of expression through modulated tones is quite another, linked though they often are by the deliberate intent of the composer, and always associated in the popular mind; in the Ojibway conception the two arts are not merely linked inseparably, they are fused in one. . . .
The Ojibway is more gifted in music than in poetry; he has wrought out a type of beautiful melody, much of it perfect in form; his verse, for the most part, has not emerged from the condition of raw material.
He does sing his new melody to meaningless syllables, tentatively correcting it here and there, but meantime experimenting with words that convey meaning; and the probability is that the precise sentiment of the words finally accepted is established by rhythmic considerations, those that fall readily into the scheme of accents appealing to him as the most suitable vehicle for the melody.
The melody and the idea are the essential parts of a Mide song. Sometimes only one or two words occur in a song. . . . Many of the words used in a Mide song are unknown in the conversational Chippewa of the present time.54
A number of Chippewa songs, as transcribed, have no words. Some of these songs originally may have had words and in a limited number of love songs the words partake so much of the nature of a soliloquy that they cannot conveniently be translated and given with the music. The words of most of the Chippewa songs are few in number and suggest rather than express the idea of the song. Only in the love songs and in few of the Mide songs are the words continuous.
Many tribes other than the North American Indians appear to have songs which they can no longer interpret. The survival in song of words the meaning of which is lost is world-wide. We are told of the savage tribes of New Guinea that " Most of the songs are without words or with words the meaning of which is lost." [55] Koch-Griinberg says that there are old dances among the Tukano with words no longer understood." [56] The same testimony is made concerning the Naga tribes, the Australian natives, the Zulu, and Brazilian tribes.[57]
Such evidence may be multiplied indefinitely. The brevity of Indian songs is striking. Many have few words, some one word, and some no words. The songs of other savage peoples show the same characteristic. There are one-word traditional poems among the African Kwai, and two-word traditional poems of the Botocudos and the Eskimos. These are not narrative songs, and they need not be dance songs; for savage peoples do not always dance their verses. They are not, then, "ballads." Nor need they have any relation to choral improvisation.
Literary historians have dwelt too much, it seems to me, on the festal throng and communal improvisation and the folk-dance, when dealing with the "beginnings of poetry," until the whole subject has been thrown out of focus. The term ballad might well be left out of account altogether and reserved for the lyric species, appearing late in literary history, the "epic in little," or "short narrative told lyrically" exemplified in the conventional ballad collections. If we are to mean by ballads narrative songs like those of the middle ages, or narrative songs wherever they appear, we should certainly cease placing the ballad at the source of primitive poetry. The conception of a ballad as something improvised more or less spontaneously by a dancing throng should be given up. Even savage peoples do not compose characteristically in that way. And even among savage peoples, the presence of refrains need not "point straight to the singing and dancing throng." It is not proved that the ballad, in any sense, came first, or even that choral songs preceded solos. It is likely enough that choral songs and solos co-existed from the beginning, or even that solos preceded, for all that can be certainly known. The assumption that group power to sing, to compose songs, and to dance, precedes individual power to do these things,[58] is fatuously speculative. It rests neither on " overwhelming evidence " nor on probability. The individual ought to be able to engage in rhythmic motion, to compose tunes, and then to evolve words for these tunes, at least as early as he is able to do these things along with others of his kind. And let it be said again that it is safer to affirm that the primitive lyric, whether individual or choral, is not the ballad but the song — more strictly, the songlet.
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Footnotes Chapter 1
1. The Study of Indian Music. Reprinted from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. I, p. 233. 1915. According to Miss Fletcher, the Indians are sitting as they sing.
Compare a custom among the Karok, an Indian tribe of California (Stephen Powers, Contributions to North American Ethnology, vol. m, p. 29, Washington, 1877).
2 References of chief importance for the American Indians are Frederick R. Burton, American Primitive Music, with especial attention to the songs of the Ojibways, New York, 1909; Natalie Curtis, The Indian's Book, New York, 1900; and the following thorough studies: Frances Densmore, Chippewa Music, in Bulletins 45 (1910) and 53 (1913) of the Bureau of American Ethnology, and Teton Sioux Music, Washington (1918); Alice C. Fletcher, A Study of Omaha Indian Music, Papers of the Peabody Museum, vol. I, No. 5, 1893, Indian Story and Song, Boston, 1900, The Hako: a Pawnee Ceremony, 22 Report (1904), Bureau of American Ethnology, and The Study of Indian Music quoted supra; James Mooney, The Ohost-Dance Religion, 14 Report, Bureau of Ethnology, Part II, 1896. Excellent pieces of work are " Hopi Songs" and " ZuBi Melodies," by B. I. Gilman, published respectively in the Journal of American Ethnology and ArchcEology, vol. I, 1891, and vol. v, 1908, but nothing is said in these regarding the composition or presentation of the songs recorded. Many references are cited later, especially books, studies, or special articles dealing with South American, African, and Australian tribes.
3. See F. B. Gummere, The Beginnings of Poetry, J901, and The Popular Ballad, 1907. See also Primitive Poetry and the Ballad, Modern Philology, I, 1904.
4. Ibid.
5. The Modern Study of Literature, Chicago, 1915. From Chapter 1, "The Elements of Literary Form."
6. Ibid., pp. 18, 26.
7. The Evolution of Literature, 1911. For the quotations cited, see pp. 131, 147, 261, 263.
This view of the priority of the dance and of the dance song is found in Franz Böhme's Geschichte des Tanzes im Deutschland (1888) : "Tanzlieder waren die ersten Lieder," "Beim Tänze wurden die ältesten epischen Dichtungen (erzählende Volkslieder) gesungen," "Die älteste Poesie eines jeden Volkes ist eine Verbindung von Tanz, Spiel und Gesang."
Karl Bücher, Arbeit und Rhythmus (2nd ed. 1899), finds the origin of poetry in labor songs, and assigns to primitive labor the röle so often assigned to the primitive dance: ". . . es ist die energische, rhythmische Körperbewegung, die zur Entstehung der Poesie geführt hat, insbesondere diejenige Bewegung, welche wir Arbeit nennen. Es gilt dies aber ebensowohl von der formellen als der materiellen Seite der Poesie," p. 306.
8. The Beginnings of Poetry (1901), pp. 139, 321, 106, 212, 13, 93, etc. Later, by Professor Gummere, are The Popular Ballad (1907), and the chapter on Ballads in the Cambridge History of English Literature (1908); but these deal primarily with the English and Scottish ballads, not with the origins of poetry.
9. Pp. 80, 81. In Professor Gummere's article on "The Ballad and Communal Poetry," Child Memorial volume (Harvard studies and Notes, etc., 1896), he said: "Spontaneous composition in a dancing multitude — all singing, all dancing, and all able on occasion to improvise — is a fact of primitive poetry about which we may be as certain as such questions allow us to be certain. Behind individuals stands the human horde. . . . An insistent echo of this throng . . . greets us from the ballads." He added communal poetry to Wundt's (Veber Ziele und Wege der Volkerpsychologie) three products of the communal mind,— speech, myth, and custom. "Universality of the poetic gift among inferior races, spontaneity or improvisation under communal conditions, the history of refrain and chorus, the early relation of narrative songs to the dance" [the italics are added] are facts so well established that " it is no absurdity to insist on the origin of poetry under communal and not under artistic conditions." More difficulty lies in "the assertion of simultaneous composition. Yet this difficulty is more apparent than real."
Grosse, Anfange der Kunst (1894), ch. ix, finds the poetry of primitive peoples to be egoistic in inspiration, and gives examples of lyrics of various types which point to this. "Im Allgemeinen tragt die Lyrik der Jagervolker einen durchaus egoistischen Charakter. Der Dichter besingt seine personlichen Leiden und Freuden; das Schicksal seiner Mitmenschen entlockt ihm nur selten einen Ton." For Professor Gummere's discussion and rejection of Grosse's view, see The Beginnings of Poetry, pp. 381 ff.
For a present-day German view of primitive poetry, see Erich Schmidt, "Die Anfange der Literatur," Die Kultur der Gegenwart, Leipzig (1906), 1, pp. 1-27. For a French view, see A. van Gennep, La Formation des Ligendes, Paris (1910), pp. 210-211.
10 In Warner's Library of the World's Best Literature.
11 Ueber die Botoouden, Zeitschrift fur Ethnologie, xix, pp. 30 ff. Quoted in The Beginnings of Poetry, p. 95; also Democracy and Poetry (1911), pp. 231 ff. See note 45, infra, p. 26.
12 Some references for the Akkas are G. Burrows, On the Natives of the Upper Welle District of the Belgian Congo, Journal of the Anthropological Institute (1889), xxviu; Sir H. James, Geographical Journal, xvn, p. 40, 1906; G. A. Schweinfurth, Heart of Africa, N. Y., 1874, vol. n; H. von Wissmann, Meine Zweite Durchquerung Aequatorial-Afrikas, Frankfort, 1890; H. M. Stanley, In Darkest Africa, N. Y., 1891; H. Schlichter, Pygmy Tribes of Africa^ Scot. Geog. Mag., vm, etc.
13. In a letter to the author.
Among the Brazilian cannibal tribe, the Boros, the tribesman with a grievance enters the principal dance, stalks to a position in sight of all, and chants his solo standing stock still, with upraised hand. T. Whiffen, The North-West Amazons (1915), p. 196.
14 Frances Densmore, Chippewa Music, I, n. Bulletin 45 (1910) and 53 (1913), Bureau of American Ethnology. For examples see i, pp. 118 ff., Ii, pp. 37 ff. Also Teton Sioux Musio, Bulletin 61 (1918), p. 60.
15. Ibid., i, p. 118.
16. Ibid., n, p. 16.
17. James Mooney, The Ghost Dance Religion, 14 report Bureau of Ethnology, Part n (1896), p. 952. Many trance songs from many tribes are given, pp. 953-1101.
18. The Native Tribes of South-East Australia, London (1904), p. 416.
19. Jesuit Relations, Thwaites ed. Vol. ix, p. 111.
20 C. G. Seligman, The Melanesians of British New Guinea (1910), p. 151. George Browne, Melanesians and Polynesians (1910) p. 451.
There are many testimonies to the existence of other primitive artists beside the poet. Among the primitive Kwai or Bushmen, a strong sense of individual talent in artistry is said to exist. "The old Bushmen assert that the productions of an artist were always respected as long as any recollection of him was preserved in his tribe: during this period no one, however daring, would attempt to deface his paintings by placing others over them. But when his memory was forgotten, some aspirant after artistic fame appropriated the limited roof surface of the shelter, adapted for such a display of talent, for his own performances, and unceremoniously painted over the efforts of those who preceded him. If we calculate- that the memory of any artist would be preserved among his people for at least three generations, as every Bushman tribe prided itself on and boasted of the wall decorations of its chief cave, it would give a probable antiquity of about five hundred years to the oldest found in the Invani rock shelter." G. W. Stow, The Native Races of South Africa (1905), pp. 26, 27.
21 Chippewa Music, I, p. 2.
22 Ibid., I, p. 20
23. Ibid., p. 119. See also Teton Sioux Music, p. 60.
24. Burton, American Primitive' Music, p. 118
25 Alice C. Fletcher, The Indian in Story and Song, pp. 115-117.
26 Ibid., p. 22. The following passage from A Study of Omaha Indian Music, p. 25, by Alice C. Fletcher and Francis LaFlesche, also throws light on the composition of certain Indian songs:
Like the Poo-g'-thun, the Hae-thu-ska preserved the history of its members in its songs; when a brave deed was performed, the society decided whether it should be celebrated and without this dictate no man would dare permit a song to be composed in his honor. When a favorable decision was given, th£ task of composing the song devolved upon some man with musical talent. It has happened that the name of a man long dead has given place in a popular song to that of a modern warrior; this could only be done by the consent of the society, which was seldom given, as the Omahas were averse to letting the memory of a brave man die, . . . the songs were transmitted from one generation to another with care, as was also the story of the deeds the songs commemorated.
27 The Hako, A Pawnee Ceremony, in 22nd Report, Bureau of American Ethnology, Part il, p. 170. See also The Indian in Story and Song, p. 32, and Frances Densmore, Teton Sioux Music, p. 59.
28 The Hako, pp. 171-172. See also The Indian in Story and Song, p. 56.
29 Chippewa Music, I, p. 126, No. 112: "Song of the Trees."
30 Ibid., p. 135, No. 121: "lam afraid of the Owl."
31 Ibid., p. 95, No. 79: "Healing Song." Compare also Franz Boas on The Central Eskimo, Report Bureau of Ethnology, 18841885, p. 649: "Besides these old songs and tales there are a great number of new ones, and, indeed, almost every man has his own tune and his own song. A few of these become great favorites among the Eskimo and are sung like our popular songs."
32 A. W. Howitt, The Native Tribes of South-East Australia, London (1904), p. 414. See also Kurburu's song, composed and sung by a bard called Kurburu, p. 420. Howitt refers to one man who composed when tossing about on the waves in a boat — not a very "communal" method of composition. For other instances of individual composition see George Brown, Melanesians and Polynesians (1910), p. 423, C. G. Seligman, The Melanesians of British New Guinea (1910), pp. 152, 153, etc.
33 Fletcher, Indian Story and Song, Weton Song, pp. 81, 85.
So also in the Omaha tribe: "We'tonwaan is an old and untranslatable word used to designate a class of songs composed by women and sung exclusively by them."— Fletcher and LaFlesche, The Omaha Tribe, 27th Report, Bureau of American Ethnology, p. 421; ef. pp. 320-323 for other types of women's songs.
34 Chippewa Music, n, p. Ill, No. 31: "If I Had Been a Man."
35 Ibid., p. 121, No. 39: Song of De"kum. Several other songs composed by Dekum are given.
36. The North-West Amazons (1915), p. 197.
37. Compare Franz Boas, Chinook Lays, p. 224, Journal of American Folk-Lore, 1888: "The greater part of those I have collected were composed by women." He adds that for a greater number of tunes the "text is only a meaningless burden." For songs of the Kiowa composed by a woman, see J. W. Mooney, The Ghost-Dance Religion, 14 Report, Bureau of Ethnology, Part n, 1896, pp. 1083, 1085, etc. See also an article of interest by Alexander F Chamberlain, Primitive Woman as Poet, Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. xvi (1903), pp. 207 ff.; Biicher, Arbeit und Rhythmus (1899), ch. viii, p. 339, " Frauenarbeit und Frauendichtung"; J. C. Andersen, Maori Life in Ao-Tea (1907), p. 500.
R. H. Codrington writes of the Melanesians (The Melanesians: Studies in Their Anthropology and Folk-Lore, Oxford, 1891, p. 334): "A poet or poetess more or less distinguished is probably found in every considerable village throughout the islands; when some remarkable event occurs, the launching of a canoe, a visit of Btrangers, or a feast, song-makers are engaged to celebrate it and rewarded," etc.
38. Pointed out by Professor F. N. Scott, Modern Language Notes, April 1918. See M. V. Porter, Notes on the Language of the South Andaman Group of Tribes, Calcutta (1898), p. 67.
39 In Ferdinand Columbus's Life of Christopher Columbus, ch. 14.
40 De Orbe Novo, English trans, by MacNutt, New York (1912), vol. i, p. 172.
For the North American Indians, see, for example, Washington Matthews, Navaho Legends, Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society, 1897. An account of Navaho traditional songs ia given pp". 23-27. See also note 273, p. 254, Navaho Music, by Prof. J. C. Fillmore. Miss Fletcher gives similar testimony concerning Indian traditional lays.
41. The North-West Amazons (1915), pp. 208, 190. See also Theodor Koch-Grlinberg, Zwei Jahre unter den Indianern: Reisen in Nordwest Brasilien, 1903-1905. 2 vols., Berlin, 1910. "Die Texte die dem Aruak und dem Kobeua angehoren sind offenbar uralt und waren von den Sangern teilweise selbst nicht mebr zu deuten," vol. n, p. 131.
42. Improvisation exists among the Obongo, Australian, Fijiian, Andamanese, Zulu, Botocudo, and Eskimo tribes, as well as among the North American Indians. For an example of song and dance improvisation constituting a sort of game, see Whiffen, The NorthWest Amazons, p. 208. Traditional songs persist among the Kwai, Australian, Andamanese, Rock Vedda, Semang, Fijiian, Fuegian, Brazilian, and Eskimo tribes, as well as among the North American Indians.
43 See also citations in note 49.
44. J. E. Wood, Uncivilized Races of the World (Amer. ed., Hartford, 1870), p. 208.
45. We really know very little concerning the songs of the Botocudos. Dr. Ehrenreich's section dealing with them is very short, and he is chiefly interested in other things than song. These are the specimens he cites:—Gesang beim Tanz. Chor: "Weib jung, stehlen nichts." Ein Weib singt: "Ich, ich will nicht (stehlen)." "Der Hauptling hat keine Furcht "— Zeitschrift fur Ethnologie, vol. xix, pp. 33, 61.
Testimony concerning the songs of other Brazilian tribes may be found in J. B. Steere's Narrative of a Visit to the Indian Tribes of the Purus River, Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, 1901, pp. 363-393. The following are songs of the Hypurinas (cannibals), and are individualistic in character: "The leaf that calls my lover when tied in my girdle" (Indian girl's song); "I have my arrows ready and wish to kill you"; "Now no one can say I am not a warrior. I return victorious from the battle"; "I go to die, my enemy shall eat me."
The following are some songs of the Paumari, a "humble cowardly people who live in deadly fear of the Hypurinas"; "My mother when I was little carried me with a strap on her back. But now I am a man I don't need my mother any more "; "The Toucan eats fruit in the edge of my garden, and after he eats he sings "; "The jaguar fought with me, and I am weary, I am weary." The following they call the song of the turtle: "I wander, always wander, and when I get where I want to go, I shall not stop, but still go on."
Hunting songs of the Bakairf, of the Xingu river region, egoistic in character, are cited by Dr. Max Schmidt, Indianerstudien in ZentralbrasiUen, Berlin, 1905, pp. 421-424.
The "I" of these songs of South American tribes cannot always be "racial." The context shows that, sometimes, at least, it must be egoistic, as in the individualistic songs of the North American Indians, or in the solo songs of men or women with grievances among the Brazilian cannibals. See Whiffen, The North-West Amazons, pp. 196, 197, etc.
46 Illustrated in 0 Selvagem, the well-known collection of Josfi V. Couto de Magalhaes.
47 Professor W. H. Hudson, for example, in An Introduction to the Study of Literature (1911), p. 138, speaks of the ballads as "poetry of primitive models." He refers to the ballad, p. 136, as representing "one of the earliest stages in the evolution of the poetic art." So Professor W. M. Hart, English Popular Ballads (1916), p. 51, "Ballads are the one great and significant survival of . . . early universal poetry." Professor Gummere assures us (Old English Ballads, p. lxxxiv) that "the so-called narrative lyric, or ballad in stricter sense, was the universal form of poetry of the people."
48 In which sense, for example, does Professor G. P. Krapp (The Rise of English Literary Prose, 1915, Preface) use "ballad" when he writes, "Poetry of primitive origins, for example, the ballad, often attains a finality of form which art cannot better, but not so with prose "?
49 See Stewart Culin, Games of the North American Indian, 24 Report, Bureau of Ethnology (1907), for an account of singing in the Moccasin or Hidden-Ball game, pp. 335 ff. Mention is made of solo singing among the Chippewa, the Menominee, the Miami, the Seneca, the Wyandot. See also Edward Sapir, Song Recitative in Paiute Mythology, Journal of American Folk-Lore (1910), p. 455, vol. xxni: "Generally Indian music is of greatest significance when combined with the dance in ritualistic or ceremonial performances. Nevertheless the importance of music in non-ceremonial acts . . . should not be minimized."
---
There are solo-singing Bantu, Zulu, Fuegian, etc., witch-doctors and medicine men, as well as solo-singing North American Indian medicine men and gamesters. See also, for instances of solo singing, H. A. Junod, Les Ghantes et les Conies des Ba-Ronga, Lausanne, 1897; also G. Landtman, The Poetry of the Kiwai Papuans, Folk-Lore, vol. xxiv (1913); Howitt, The Native Tribes of South-East Australia; James Cowan, The Maoris of New Zealand; E. H. Gomes, Seventeen Years Among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo, as "The song of mourning is among some tribes sung by a professional wailer, generally a woman."
50. According to Whiffen, love Bongs, sacred songs, and nursery songs do not exist among the Boros, The North-West Amazons (1915), p. 208. But they are known among other tribes, though they play no conspicuous role, from the nature of things. See the references for primitive love songs and childhood songs in Mackenzie, The Evolution of Literature, pp. 140, 144, etc. They are known among the North-American Indians. See Frances Densmore, Teton Sioux Music, pp. 370 ff., 509, 492, 493 (lullaby); also many other writers on Indian song.
51. The Study of Indian Music, 1915, pp. 231-232.
52. Indian Story and Song, pp. 121, 124, 125.
53. Burton, American Primitive Music, pp. 106, 172, 173.
54 Frances Densmore, Chippewa Music, I (1910), pp. 14, 15, and n (1913.), p. 2. Similarly Washington Matthews, Journal of American Folk-Lore, 1894, p. 185, writes of traditional songs among the Navahos, "One song consists almost exclusively of meaningless or archaic vocables. Yet not one syllable may be forgotten or misplaced."
55. Henry Newton, In Far New Guinea (1914), p. 147.
56 Zwei Jahre unter den Indianern, etc. (1910), vol. n, p. 254.
57 T. Hodson, The Naga Tribes of Manipur (1911), p. 68; B. Spencer and F. J. Gillen, The Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899), p. 281; H. Callaway, Religious Systems of the Amazulu, etc. (1870); Whiffen, The North-West Amazons, pp. 190, 208.
58 Erich Schmidt ("Anfange der Literatur," p. 9, in Kultur der Gegewwart, Leipzig, 1906, i) writes: . . . schon weil keine Masse nur den einfachsten Satz unisona improvisieren kann und alle romantischen Schwarmereien von der urheberlos singenden "Volksseele" eitel Dunst sind, muss sich Sondervortag und Massenausbruch sehr friih gliedern. Einer schreit zuerst, einer singt und springt zuerst, die Menge maeht es ihm nach, entweder treulich oder indem sie bei unartikulierten Refrains, bei einzelnen Worten, bei wiederkehrenden Satzen beharrt.
In this connection, since it deserves to be cited somewhere, may be quoted a passage from von Humboldt: "The Indians pretend that when the araguatos [howling monkeys] fill the forests with their howling, there is always one that chants as leader of the chorus."— A. von Humboldt, Travels in the Equinoctial Regions of America, Bohn edition, vol. n, p. 70.