feldom found fuccefs: he has been obliged, in order to exprefs paffion, to imitate words by founds, which though it gives the pleasure which imitation always produces, yet it fails of exciting those lafting affections, which it is in the power of founds to produce. In a word, no man ever understood harmony fo well as he; but in melody he has been exceeded by feveral.

[The following OBJECTIONS to the preceding ESSAY having been addreffed to Dr. SMOLLETT (as EDITOR of the BRITISH MAGAZINE, in which it first appeared); that Gentleman, with equal candour and politeness, communicated the MS. to Dr. GOLDSMITH, who returned his ANSWERS to the OBJECTOR in the NOTES annexed.-EDIT.]

PERMIT me to object against fome things advanced in the paper on the fubject of THE DIFFERENT SCHOOLS OF MUSICK. The author of this article seems too hafty in degrading the harmonious * Purcel from the head of the English School, to erect in his room a foreigner (Handel), who has

*Had the Objector faid melodious Purcel, it had teftified at leaft a greater acquaintance with mufic, and Purcel's peculiar excellence. Purcel in melody is frequently great: his fong made in his last sickness, called Rofy Bowers, is a fine inftance of this; but in harmony he is far fhort of the meanest of our modern compofers, his fulleft harmonies being exceedingly fimple. His Opera of Prince Arthur, the words of which were Dryden's, is reckoned his fineft piece. But what is that, in point of harmony, to what we every day hear from modern mafters? In short, with refpect to genius, Purcel had a fine one: he greatly improved an art but little known in England before his time; for this he deferves our applaufe; but the prefent prevailing tafte in mufic is very different from what he left it, and who was the improver fince his time we shall fee by and by.

not

The gentleman,

not yet formed any School *. when he comes to communicate his thoughts upon the different Schools of Painting, may as well place Rubens at the head of the English painters, because he left fome monuments of his art in England. He fays that Handel, though originally a German

* Handel may be faid as jufly as any man, not Pergolefe excepted, to have founded a new School of Mufic. When he firft came into England his mufic was entirely Italian: he compofed for the Opera; and though even then his pieces were liked, yet did they not meet with univerfal approbation. In those he has too fervilely imitated the modern vitiated Italian tafte, by placing what foreigners call the point d'orgue too closely and injudiciously. But in his Oratorios he is perfectly an original genius. In thefe, by fteering between the manners of Italy and England, he has ftruck out new harmonies, and formed a fpecies of mufic different from all others. He has left fome excellent and eminent scholars, particularly Worgan and Smith, who compofe nearly in his manner; a manner as different from Purcel's as from that of modern Italy. Confequently Handel may be placed at the head of the English school.

The Objector will not have Handel's fchool to be called an English fchool, because he was a German. Handel in a great measure found in England thofe effential differences, which characterize his mufic: we have already shown that he had them not upon his arrival. Had Rubens come over to England but moderately killed in his art; had he learned here all his excellency in colouring, and correctness of defigning; had he left several scholars excellent in his manner behind him; I should not fcruple to call the school erected by him, the English school of Painting. Not the country in which a man is born, but his. peculiar ftyle, either in painting or in mufic-that constitutes him of this or that fchool. Thus Champagne, who painted in the manner of the French school, is always placed among the painters of that fchool, though he was born in Flanders, and fhould confequently, by the Objector's rule, be placed among the Flemith painters. Kneller is placed in the German school, and Oftade in the Dutch, though born in the fame city. Primatice, who may be truly faid to have founded the Roman fchool, was born in Bologna; though, if his country was to determine his fchool, he should have been placed in the Lombard. There might feveral other inftances be produced; but thefe, it is hoped, will be fufficient to prove that Handel, though a German, may be placed at the head of the English school.

(as

(as moft certainly he was, and continued fo to his laft breath), yet adopted the English manner *. Yes, to be fure, juft as much as Rubens the painter did. Your correfpondent, in the course of his difcoveries, tells us befides that fome of the best Scotch ballads ("The Broom of Cowdenknows," for inftance) are still afcribed to David Rizzio. This Rizzio must have been a moft original genius, or have poffeffed extraordinary imitative powers, to have come, fo advanced in life as he did, from Italy, and ftrike fo far out of the common road of his own country's mufick.

*Handel was originally a German; but by a long continuance in England he might have been looked upon as naturalized to the country, I don't pretend to be a fine writer: however, if the gentleman dislikes the expreffion (although he muft be convinced it is a common one), I with it were mended.

I faid that they were afcribed to David Rizzio. That they are, the Objector need only look into Mr. Ofwald's Collection of Scotch Tunes, and he will there find not only The Broom of Cowdenknows, but alfo The Black Eagle, and several other of the beft Scotch tunes afcribed to him. Though this might be a fufficient anfwer, yet I must be permitted to go farther, to tell the Objector the opinion of our beft modern musicians in this particular. It is the opinion of the melodious Geminiani, that we have in the dominions of Great Britain no original music, except the Irith; the Scotch and English being originally borrowed from the Italiaus. And that his opinion in this respect is juft (for I would not be fwayed merely by authorities), it is very reafonable to fuppose, first, from the conformity between the Scotch and antient Italian mufic. They, who compare the old French Vaudevilles, brought from Italy by Rinuccini with those pieces afcribed to David Rizzio, who was pretty nearly cotemporary with him, will find a strong refemblance, notwithstanding the oppofite characters of the two nations, which have preferved those pieces. When I would have them compared, I mean I would have their baffes compared, by which the fimilitude may be moft exactly feen. Secondly, it is reasonable from the antient mufic of the Scotch, which is ftill preferved in the Highlands, and which bears no refemblance at all to the mufic of the Low-country. The highland tunes are fung to Irish words, and flow entirely in the Irish manner. On the other hand, the Lowland mufic is always fung to English words.

A

A mere fiddler, a fhallow coxcomb, a giddy, infolent, worthlefs fellow, to compofe fuch pieces as nothing but genuine fenfibility of mind, and an exquifite feeling of thofe paffions, which animate only the finest fouls, could dictate; and in a manner too fo extravagantly diftant from that, to which he had all his life been accuftomed !It is impoffible. -He might indeed have had prefumption enough to add fome flourishes to a few favourite airs, like a cobler of old plays, when he takes it upon him to mend Shakspeare. So far he might go; but farther it is impoffible for any one to believe, that has but juft ear enough to diftinguish between the Italian and Scotch mufic, and is difpofed to confider the fubject with the leaft degree of attention. March 18, 1760.

S. R.

THERE can be perhaps no greater entertainment

than to compare the rude Celtic fimplicity with modern refinement. Books however feem incapable of furnishing the parallel; and to be acquainted

David Rizzio was neither a mere fiddler, nor a fhallow coxcomb, nor a worthlefs fellow, nor a ftranger in Scotland. He had indeed been brought over from Piedmont, to be put at the head of a band of mufic, by King James V. one of the most elegant princes of his time, an exquifite judge of mufic, as well as of poetry, architecture, and all the fine arts. Rizzio, at the time of his death, had been above twenty years in Scotland: he was fecretary to the queen, and at the fame time an agent from the pope; fo that he could not be so obscure as he has been reprefented.

VOL. IV.

GG

with

with the antient manners of our own ancestors, we fhould endeavour to look for their remains in those countries, which, being in fome measure retired from an intercourfe with other nations, are ftill untinctured with foreign refinement, language, or breeding.

The Irish will fatisfy curiofity in this respect preferably to all other nations I have feen. They in feveral parts of that country ftill adhere to their antient language, dress, furniture, and fuperftitions; feveral cuftoms exift among them, that still speak their original; and in fome refpects Cæfar's defcription of the Antient Britons is applicable to them.

Their bards, in particular, are ftill held in great veneration among them: thofe traditional heralds are invited to every funeral, in order to fill up the intervals of the howl with their fongs and harps. In these they rehearse the actions of the ancestors of the deceased, bewail the bondage of their country under the English government, and generally conclude with advifing the young men and maidens to make the beft ufe of their time, for they will foon, for all their prefent bloom, be ftretched under the table, like the dead body before them.

Of all the Bards this country ever produced, the laft and the greatest was CAROLAN THE BLIND. He was at once a poet, a mufician, a compofer, and fung his own verfes to his harp. The original natives never mention his name without rapture; both his poetry and mufic they have by heart; and even fome of the English themselves, who have been tranfplanted there, find his mufic extremely pleafing. A fong beginning "O Rourke's noble fare will "ne'er be forgot," tranflated by Dean Swift, is of his compofition; which, though perhaps by this means the best known of his pieces, is yet by nọ means the most deferving. His fongs in general