Melodrama, anyone?

Ever wonder what people did for entertainment before there was television? Before there was radio? Before there were movies? Well, in the late Victorian era, they sat around weeping into their hankies reading stuff you would not believe, like the following unforgettable saga of Bessie and her Basil.


CURFEW MUST NOT RING TONIGHT
by Rose Hartwick Thorpe (1850-1939)

Slowly England’s sun was setting o’er the hilltops far away,
Filling all the land with beauty at the close of one sad day;
And its last rays kissed the forehead of a man and maiden fair,--
He with steps so slow and weary; she with sunny, floating hair;
He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she, with lips all cold and white,
Struggling to keep back the murmur, “Curfew must not ring to-night!”

“Sexton,” Bessie’s white lips faltered, pointing to the prison old,
With its walls tall and gloomy, moss-grown walls dark, damp and cold,--
“I’ve a lover in the prison, doomed this very night to die
At the ringing of the curfew, and no earthly help is nigh.
Cromwell will not come till sunset;” and her lips grew strangely white,
As she spoke in husky whispers, “Curfew must not ring to-night!”

“Bessie,” calmly spoke the sexton (every word pierced her young heart
Like a gleaming death-winged arrow, like a deadly poisoned dart),
“Long, long years I’ve rung the curfew from that gloomy, shadowed tower;
Every evening, just at sunset, it has tolled the twilight hour.
I have done my duty ever, tried to do it just and right:
Now I’m old, I will not miss it. Curfew bell must ring to-night!”

Wild her eyes and pale her features, stern and white her thoughtful brow,
As within her secret bosom, Bessie made a solemn vow.
She had listened while the judges read, without a tear or sigh,
“At the ringing of the curfew, Basil Underwood must die.”
And her breath came fast and faster, and her eyes grew large and bright;
One low murmur, faintly spoken. “Curfew must not ring to-night!”

She with quick step bounded forward, sprang within the old church-door,
Left the old man coming slowly, paths he’d trod so oft before.
Not one moment paused the maiden, But with eye and cheek aglow,
Staggered up the gloomy tower, Where the bell swung to and fro;
As she climbed the slimy ladder, On which fell no ray of light,
Upward still, her pale lips saying, “Curfew shall not ring to-night!”

She has reached the topmost ladder, o’er her hangs the great dark bell;
Awful is the gloom beneath her, like the pathway down to hell.
See! the ponderous tongue is swinging; ’tis the hour of curfew now,
And the sight has chilled her bosom, stopped her breath, and paled her brow.
Shall she let it ring? No, never! Her eyes flash with sudden light,
As she springs, and grasps it firmly: “Curfew shall not ring to-night!”

Out she swung,-- far out. The city seemed a speck of light below,--
There twixt heaven and earth suspended, as the bell swung to and fro.
And the sexton at the bell-rope, old and deaf, heard not the bell,
Sadly thought that twilight curfew rang young Basil’s funeral knell.
Still the maiden, clinging firmly, quivering lip and fair face white,
Stilled her frightened heart’s wild throbbing: “Curfew shall not ring tonight!”

It was o’er, the bell ceased swaying; and the maiden stepped once more
Firmly on the damp old ladder, where, for hundred years before,
Human foot had not been planted. The brave deed that she had done
Should be told long ages after. As the rays of setting sun
Light the sky with golden beauty, aged sires, with heads of white,
Tell the children why the curfew did not ring that one sad night.

O’er the distant hills comes Cromwell. Bessie sees him; and her brow,
Lately white with sickening horror, has no anxious traces now.
At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands, all bruised and torn;
And her sweet young face, still hagggard, with the anguish it had worn,
Touched his heart with sudden pity, lit his eyes with misty light.
“Go! your lover lives,” said Cromwell. “Curfew shall not ring to-night!”

Wide they flung the massive portals, led the prisoner forth to die,
All his bright young life before him. Neath the darkening English sky,
Bessie came, with flying footsteps, eyes aglow with lovelight sweet;
Kneeling on the turf beside him, laid his pardon at his feet.
In his brave, strong arms he clasped her, kissed the face upturned and white,
Whispered, “Darling, you have saved me, curfew will not ring to-night.”

(From Ringing ballads, including Curfew must not ring tonight, Rose Hartwick Thorpe, 1887)


I see the young Susan Lucci as Bessie, the young Brad Pitt as Basil, Winston Churchill as the sexton, and Margaret Thatcher as Cromwell.

Beautiful music by John Rutter

After subjecting treating you in recent posts to a ditty by a banjo-playing Lord Pudding substitute and an unbelievable solo by Barney Fife, finding music of quality and virtuosity has been a bit difficult. But I believe I have found some. The musical performances in today’s post should make you forget all about those earlier ones.

Here are several very old sets of words that have been set to music by a man named John Rutter. Click on the titles below to hear his beautiful music.

1. “Pie Jesu Domine, eis requiem” (performed by the Monteverdi Choir)

Here are the Latin words they sang, and an English translation:

Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem,
Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem,
Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem, sempiternam.

Blessed Lord Jesus, grant them rest,
Blessed Lord Jesus, grant them rest,
Blessed Lord Jesus, grant them eternal rest.


2. “The Lord bless you and keep you” (performed by St. Paul Cathedral Choir, London)

The words, originally in Hebrew, are from one of the oldest books in the world, the book of Numbers (the fourth of five books in the Torah), chapter 6, verses 24-26. They are more than three thousand years old:

The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make His face to shine upon you
To shine upon you and be gracious
And be gracious unto you
The Lord bless you and keep you
The Lord lift His countenance upon you,
The Lord lift His countenance upon you
And give you peace, and give you peace;
And give you peace, and give you peace,
Amen.


3. "For the beauty of the earth" (performed by St. Paul Cathedral choir, London)

The words were written by British hymnist and poet F. S. Pierpoint (1835-1917) and first appeared in Orby Shipley’s Lyra Eucharistica, second edition, in 1864.

For the beauty of the earth,
For the beauty of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For the beauty of each hour
Of the day and of the night,
Hill and vale, and tree and flower,
Sun and moon and stars of light,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For the joy of human love,
Brother, sister, parent, child,
Friends on earth, and friends above,
Pleasures pure and undefiled,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For each perfect gift of thine,
To our race so freely given,
Graces human and divine,
Flowers of earth and buds of heaven,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.


4. "What sweeter music" (performed by King’s College Choir, Cambridge)

The words were written by Robert Herrick (1591-1674) and were originally published under the title “A Christmas Caroll, sung to the King in the Presence at White-Hall”:

What sweeter musick can we bring
Than a Caroll, for to sing
The Birth of this our heavenly King?
Awake the Voice! Awake the String!
Dark and dull night, flie hence away,
And give the honour to this Day,
That sees December turn’d to May.

Why does the chilling Winter’s morne
Smile, like a field beset with corne?
Or smell like a Meadow newly-shorn,
Thus, on the sudden? Come and see
The cause, why things thus fragrant be:
’Tis He is born, whose quickening Birth
Gives life and luster, public mirth,
To Heaven, and the under-Earth.

We see Him come, and know him ours,
Who, with His Sun-shine and His showers,
Turns all the patient ground to flowers.
The Darling of the world is come,
And fit it is, we finde a roome
To welcome Him. The nobler part
Of all the house here, is the heart:

Which we will give Him; and bequeath
This Hollie, and this Ivie Wreath
To do Him honour, who’s our King,
And Lord of all this Revelling.

What sweeter musick can we bring,
Than a caroll for to sing
The Birth of this our heavenly King?


Read about John Rutter here and see his photo here.

I wandered with the sneering crowd...or Welcome, sweet Springtime (part 3)

I cannot take credit for the following, but it made me laugh:

There once was a poet named Will
Who tramped his way over a hill
And was speechless for hours
Over some stupid flowers
This was years before TV, but still.


To redeem myself, here’s a better poem, plus some forsythia, a few dandelions for Putz, and a goldfinch thrown in for good measure.

Nothing Gold Can Stay
by Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

(Photograph © by James G. Howes, 2003)




At the house where we lived from 1999 until 2003, goldfinches arrived in profusion. They loved the thistle seed we put out for them. But ever since we moved seven years ago from there to our current house, thirty miles to the north, I had not seen a single goldfinch until yesterday, when a pair of them visited our Leyland cypress trees.

This post is my way of saying “thank you” to them.

Spring, by the way, is also pink and purple:

Bougainvillea:
Azaleas:
Wood-violets:(Wood-violet photo by Maia C. on Flickr)

But if yellow is your thing, see the previous post for daffodils.

Welcome, sweet Springtime (continued)

(Photograph by David Hopkins, Stanly County, North Carolina)


I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud
by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed -- and gazed -- but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Welcome, sweet Springtime, we greet thee in song!

I know we are almost a month past the vernal equinox, and maybe I am just easily entertained, but to my way of thinking, one of the funniest things I have ever seen on television was an episode of The Andy Griffith Show called “Barney and the Choir.” Here it is (in three parts, unfortunately, but without any commercials):

Barney and the Choir (10:07, Part 1 of 3)

Barney and the Choir (9:18, Part 2 of 3)

Barney and the Choir (4:48, Part 3 of 3)



The moral of the story, class, should be obvious: Just because all God’s chillun got a uvula doesn’t mean you should exercise yours, necessarily.

Eyjafjallajökull and Hrafn Gudmundsson, or how to increase one’s vocabulary overnight

“Volcano Costs Rise as Plume Spreads” screams the headline in an article by Paul Sonne, Daniel Michaels and Kaveri Niththyananthan at the Wall Street Journal’s online site. The subheading “Eruption in Iceland Intensifies Financial Woe for Aviation Industry and Disrupts Travel Plans for Millions of People” is no more comforting. As in all things tragic, the business sector imagines itself to be the true victim.

But ordinary, everyday people could be affected for a very long time. From the article itself:

The volcano continued erupting unabated throughout the day on Friday. Sigurour Gislason, a geochemist at the University of Iceland who collected ash samples Friday, said the plume could linger for days if the eruption continues at current levels.

Hrafn Gudmundsson, a forecaster at the Iceland Meteorological Office, said high-level winds would be constant through Saturday afternoon, carrying ash to the east and southeast. “No one knows, of course, how the volcano will develop, so that’s the big question,” he added. The volcano’s last eruption, in 1821, lasted a year. (italics mine)

(End of quoted material)

To see the effect of Eyjafjallajökull to date, click here.

For me, the volcano has a human face associated with it. I do hope Stephen has been able to return home from Helsinki to Daphne in Leeds.

Unfortunately, they’re always there.

My friend jinksy in England wrote a post a couple of weeks ago entitled “Spaces In Between” that reminded me (okay, my mind works in odd ways) of one of my all-time favorite stories:

During the Great Exhibition of 1851, places to stay were scarce in London because of the great crowds who came there to see the exhibits. Many Londoners began to advertise that rooms in their homes were available to rent. One woman, hoping to influence a potential client to rent her space, showed him a large window and said, “You could see the Crystal Palace if it were not for the houses in between.”

“Yes,” replied her visitor, “perhaps you could. But unfortunately, they’re always there -- the houses in between.”

Dr. William C. Finch, president of the university I attended, told that story in an Orientation Week speech welcoming us first-year students and exhorting us to strive for excellence in our studies during our stay. At several places in his speech, after having pointed out our own personal Crystal Palaces and reviewing several possible houses that might come in between, he repeated the exchange between the landlady and the potential lodger. It made such an impression on me that I still remember it after 52 years.

As I read jinksy’s post (which was really on another topic altogether), I thought again how “the houses in between” in our lives can turn into seemingly insurmountable obstacles that too often prevent us from achieving our goals and deter us from reaching our desired destination.

Unfortunately, they’re always there -- the houses in between.

That photo up there is not London in 1851. It is New York City in 2010 and it was taken by Micah Sloan, the son of a school friend of mine. Micah, who has lived in Manhattan for seven years, recently posted this photo on his Facebook page because he is proud of the view from the roof of his apartment building. I asked for and received his permission to use his photo in my post because it illustrates perfectly my point about the houses in between. Micah’s rooftop view includes the Empire State Building. See that big building with the shiny gold top in the center of the photo? That’s not it. I will let Micah tell you in his own words: “You see that needle sticking up on the right side of the building with the gold top? That’s the very tip of the Empire State Building.”

Your honor, I rest my case.

Now, to end this post with a marvelous example of how even the most unlikely person can overcome formidable obstacles, Lord Yorkshire Pudding of Pudding Towers, Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, has kindly consented to entertain us with a lovely little song, accompanying himself on none other than a long-sought Banjo of Mass Destruction that was smuggled out of Alabamistan by his daughter Frances, who is pretending to be studying there.

I’m so pleased that Pudding is finding ways to stay active in his retirement.