lyric, Smith did not know that he had composed it to the air of the English anthem, "God Save the King." The tune, however, is not certainly of English origin. The words of "God Save the King," and often the air as well, have been attributed to Henry Carey, who is supposed to have written the song about 1740.

AMERICA

My country, 'tis of thee,
Sweet Land of Liberty,
Of thee I sing;

Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrims' pride,
From every mountain-side
Let Freedom ring.

My native country, thee,
Land of the noble free,-
Thy name I love;

I love thy rocks and rills,
Thy woods and templed hills,
My heart with rapture thrills
Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees,
Sweet Freedom's song;
Let mortal tongues awake;
Let all that breathe partake;
Let rocks their silence break,-
The sound prolong.

Our fathers' God, to Thee,
Author of Liberty,

To Thee I sing;

Long may our land be bright
With Freedom's holy light;
Protect us by Thy might,

Great God, our King.

Samuel Francis Smith (1808-1895)

GOD SAVE THE KING

God save our gracious King!
Long live our noble King!
God save the King!
Send him victorious,
Happy and glorious,

Long to reign over us!
God save the King!

O Lord our God, arise!
Scatter his enemies,

And make them fall;
Confound their politics,

Frustrate their knavish tricks:
On Thee our hopes we fix-
God save us all!

Thy choicest gifts in store
On him be pleased to pour;
Long may he reign!
May he defend our laws,
And ever give us cause

To sing with heart and voice

God save the King!

Henry Carey ? (d. 1743)

The best American national songs date from about

the time of the Civil War, the one great crisis which has

stirred the nation to its depths. The words of most of the songs which the soldiers preferred have little merit beyond sincerity of feeling. "Dixie," the Confederate

favorite, was written for a negro minstrel show, on one Sunday in 1859 by an Ohioan, Dan Emmett. The words, like those of "Yankee Doodle," are trivial; but the more poetic version of General Pike, "Southrons, Hear Your Country Call You," never became popular with the soldiers. A Harvard professor of music has referred to "Dixie" as the best and most truly American of all our national airs. "Dixie" is as popular in the North as in the South; we respond to it as we do to no other patriotic air.

The Northern soldier's favorite, "John Brown's Body," is sung to an old negro camp-meeting tune. Since the authorship is still in dispute, it seems best to class "John Brown's Body" as a folk-song; the merits of the words are the merits of folk poetry-simplicity, naturalness, and directness.

JOHN BROWN'S BODY

John Brown's body lies a-mould'ring in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mould'ring in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mould'ring in the grave,
His soul is marching on!

Chorus:

Glory! Glory Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory Hallelujah!
His soul is marcl.ing on.

He's gone to be a soldier in the army of the Lord!
His soul is marching on.

John Brown's knapsack is strapped upon his back.
His soul is marching on.

His pet lambs will meet him on the way,
And they'll go marching on.

They'll hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree,

As they go marching on.

Now for the Union let's give three rousing cheers,
As we go marching on.

Hip, hip, hip, hip, Hurrah!

Mrs. Julia Ward Howe's poem, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," resulted from an attempt to fit more elevated words to the tune of "John Brown's Body," which is undoubtedly one of the best of our military airs. She wrote the poem one night in December, 1861, after a visit to McClellan's army. The leading idea in the poem, according to Mrs. Howe, is "the sacredness of human liberty." "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" differs from the great majority of the war poems, "My Maryland," for instance, in the almost complete absence of sectional bitterness. It has the permanent quality which makes it appropriate to every struggle for human liberty. "The music made the words of John Brown's Body' famous," says Colonel Nicholas Smith, "but Mrs. Howe's matchless battle song has made the melody immortal." In her poem the song, originally a hymn, has become a hymn again, a great religious processional.

THE BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord: He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;

He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword: His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps; They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps; I have read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps. His day is marching on.

I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel: "As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall

deal;

Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with His heel, Since God is marching on."

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat; He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat: Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer Him, be jubilant, my feet!

Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me: As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, While God is marching on.

Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910)

The "Marseillaise of the Confederacy," "My Maryland," now, after "My Old Kentucky Home," the best known of our state songs, was written in April, 1861, by James Ryder Randall. While teaching in Poydras College in Louisiana, Randall read an account of an attack