Glorious things of thee are spoken,
Zion, city of our God!
He whose word cannot be broken
Formed thee for his own abode:
On the Rock of Ages founded,
What can shake thy sure repose?
With salvation’s walls surrounded,
Thou may’st smile at all thy foes.
See, the streams of living waters,
Springing from eternal love,
Well supply thy sons and daughters,
And all fear of want remove:
Who can faint while such a river
Ever flows their thirst to assuage?
Grace, which like the Lord the Giver,
Never fails from age to age.
Round each habitation hov’ring,
See the cloud and fire appear
For a glory and a cov’ring,
Showing that the Lord is near.
Thus deriving from their banner
Light by night and shade by day;
Safe they feed upon the manna
Which he gives them when they pray.
Bless’d inhabitants of Zion,
Wash’d in the Redeemer’s blood!
Jesus, whom their hopes rely on,
Makes them kings and priests to God.
’Tis his love his people raises
Over self to reign as King,
And, as priests, his solemn praises
Each for a thank-offering brings.
Saviour, if2 of Zion’s city
I, through grace, a member am,
Let the world deride or pity,
I will glory in thy name:
Fading is the worldling’s pleasure,
All his boasted pomp and show;
Solid joys and lasting treasure
None but Zion’s children know.
WILLIAM COWPER
(1731–1800)
Cowper’s life was a tragic one, yet it is not for tragedy that we turn to his poems. His poetry, at its best, is the poetry of pleasure, of the plain, ordinary pleasures which every man can enjoy. Again, though Cowper himself was always on the verge of insanity, his poetry is essentially the poetry of the sane. He is in every way a paradox: a recluse who became the spokesman of a great popular religious and democratic movement; and an oddity, an eccentric, a refugee from society, who, perhaps more than any other English poet, expressed the aspirations of the average man of his time.
NORMAN NICHOLSON: A Choice of Cowper’s Verse (Faber and Faber, 1975)
Both the hymns printed below form part of the Olney Hymn Book, to which Cowper contributed no fewer than sixty-eight. A convert of the Evangelical Revival, he had gone to live in Olney, Buckinghamshire, to be near the Revd John Newton, who, having worked in the slave trade, was now the enormously influential Rector of Olney. Cowper became his lay helper, and at the weekly prayer meetings Newton and Cowper took it in turns to produce a new hymn each week. Best known for his fervent hymns that compare favourably with those of Watts and Wesley, Cowper initially trained as a lawyer but, unable to handle stress, suffered attacks of acute melancholia. Convinced that he was damned, he attempted suicide and spent periods of his life in mental asylums. For more than thirty years he was cared for by Mary Unwin, a clergyman’s widow, to whom he was deeply attached. When she fell ill in 1767, Cowper’s aunt sent him a letter of comfort; Cowper responded by writing some verses for her: ‘I began to compose them yesterday morning before day break,’ he informed her in a covering letter, ‘but fell asleep at the end of the first two lines. […] When I awaked again, the third and fourth lines were whispered to my heart in a way which I have often experienced.’ The poem in question was ‘Walking with God’. Another woman in his life was a neighbour, Lady Austin, who supplied him with the story for the celebrated John Gilpin’s Ride. She also encouraged him to write The Task (1785), his wonderful blank verse poem of some 5,000 lines, in which he describes the beauties of country life and fulminates against those that indulge in blood sports (Cowper derived much pleasure from petting his own animals, which included three hares, five rabbits, two guinea-pigs, two dogs, a magpie, a jay and other birds). Tirocinium; or, A Review of Schools, was published in 1785, and is referred to in Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park. His finest poem, ‘The castaway’, describes the drowning of a sailor, and ends with this eloquent expression of his own suffering:
No voice divine the storm allayed,
No light propitious shone;
When, snatched from all effectual aid,
We perished, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,
Am whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.
‘DUNDEE’1
Light shining out of darkness
God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never-failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs
And works his sovereign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take;
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and will break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace:
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain:
God is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
‘CAITHNESS’1
Walking with God2
Oh! for a closer walk with God,
A calm and heavenly frame;
A light to shine upon the road
That leads me to the Lamb!
Where is the blessedness I knew
When first I saw the Lord?
Where is the soul-refreshing view
Of Jesus and his word?
What peaceful hours I once enjoyed!
How sweet their memory still!
But they have left an aching void,
The world can never fill.
Return, O holy Dove, return!
Sweet messenger of rest!
I hate the sins that made thee mourn,
And drove thee from my breast.
The dearest idol I have known,
Whate’er that idol be,
Help me to tear it from thy throne,
And worship only thee.
So shall my walk be close with God,
Calm and serene my frame;
So purer light shall mark the road
That leads me to the Lamb.
ANNE HUNTER
(1742–1821)
The very favourable reception which has for some years past been given to Lyric Poetry, whether ancient or modern, induces me to offer this small volume to the public, consisting chiefly of Odes, Ballads, and Songs: and I have been further encouraged to take this step, by the success which has attended some of the latter description of composition, already well known to the musical world. My little book will, I hope, escape the censure of being tedious; what other merit it may have besides its brevity, and whether its contents will bear to be read, as well as to be sung, my readers must now be left to judge for themselves.
‘The Author to the Reader’: in Poems, by MRS JOHN HUNTER (1802)
Anne Hunter, the eldest daughter of Robert Home, an army surgeon, had by the age of twenty-three already made a name for herself as a poetess: The Lark, an Edinburgh periodical, published her poem ‘Flower of the forest’, in 1765. She married the famous surgeon John Hunter, who, with his brother William, founded the first school of anatomy in London. She gave birth to four children in five years but only two survived infancy. She held regular literary p
arties at her home, and formed friendships with Elizabeth Montagu, Elizabeth Carter, Mary Delany, Horace Walpole and Hester Thrale. Her husband did not approve of these salon meetings, and when he died in 1793 she was poorly provided for by his will. She benefited, however, from the sale of her husband’s furniture and library, received a pension from the Queen, and when Parliament in 1799 voted £15,000 for the creation of the Hunterian Museum, she began to live in some comfort. She published two volumes of poetry: Poems (1802) and The Sports of the Genii (1804). She lived in London till her death on 7 January 1821.
It was in London during his visit in 1791 that Haydn met Anne Hunter, and he stayed in a house at 18 Great Pulteney Street, where the violinist-impresario Johann Peter Salomon lived, opposite John Broadwood’s pianoforte shop, near to the Hunters’ home in Leicester Square. A friendship developed between the composer and Anne, and had it not been for her influence, Haydn might possibly never have tried his hand at putting English texts to music. When Haydn set her ‘O tuneful voice’, a poem of unequivocal love and devotion, shortly before his second departure from London, she was a widow, and it is possible that there was more than friendship in their liaison. Haydn possessed a light tenor voice, and would often accompany himself and sing his canzonettas in royal and aristocratic circles.
JOSEPH HAYDN: from Several Songs of Various Kinds
Song
[O tuneful voice] (?1795/1806)
O Tuneful voice, I still deplore
Those accents which, tho’ heard no more,
Still vibrate on my heart;
In echo’s cave I long to dwell,
And still would hear the sad farewell,
When we were doom’d to part.
Bright eyes, O that the task were mine,
To guard the liquid fires that shine,
And round your orbits play;
To watch them with a vestal’s care,
To feed with smiles a light so fair,
That it may ne’er decay.
The spirit’s song (1795/1804)
Hark what I tell to thee,
Nor sorrow o’er the tomb,
My spirit wanders free,
And waits till thine shall come.
All pensive and alone,
I see thee sit and weep,
Thy head upon the stone,
Where my cold ashes sleep.
I watch thy speaking eyes,
And mark each precious tear;
I catch thy parting sighs,
Ere they are lost in air.
Hark what I tell to thee, &c. &c.
JOSEPH HAYDN: from VI Original Canzonettas. First Set (1794)
A mermaid’s song
[The mermaid’s song]
Now the dancing sunbeams play
On the green and glassy sea;
Come, and I will lead the way,
Where the pearly treasures be.
Come with me, and we will go
Where the rocks of coral grow;
Follow, follow, follow me.
Come, behold what treasures lie
Deep below the rolling waves,
Riches hid from human eye
Dimly shine in ocean’s caves;
Stormy winds are far away,
Ebbing tides brook no delay;
Follow, follow, follow me.
Song
[Recollection]
The season comes when first we met,
But you return no more;
Why cannot I the days forget,
Which time can ne’er restore?
O days too sweet, too bright to last,
Are you indeed for ever past?
The fleeting shadows of delight,
In memory I trace;
In fancy stop their rapid flight,
And all the past replace:
But, ah, I wake to endless woes,
And tears the fading visions close!
Song
[A pastoral song]1
My mother bids me bind my hair
With bands of rosy hue,
Tie up my sleeves with ribbons rare,
And lace my bodice blue.
For why, she cries, sit still and weep,
While others dance and play?
Alas! I scarce can go or creep,
While Lubin is away.
’Tis sad to think the days are gone,
When those we love were near;
I sit upon this mossy stone,
And sigh when none can hear.
And while I spin my flaxen thread,
And sing my simple lay,
The village seems asleep, or dead,
Now Lubin is away.
Song
[Despair]
The anguish of my bursting heart
Till now my tongue hath ne’er betray’d,
Despair at length reveals the smart
No time can cure, no hope can aid.
My sorrows verging to the grave,
No more shall pain thy gentle breast;
Think, death gives freedom to the slave,
Nor mourn for me when I’m at rest.
Yet if at eve you chance to stray
Where peaceful sleep the silent dead,
Give to your soft compassion way,
Nor check the tear by pity shed.
Where’er the precious drop may fall,
I ne’er can know, I ne’er can see;
And if sad thoughts my fate recall,
A sigh may rise, unheard by me.
Song
[Pleasing pain]
Far from this throbbing bosom haste,
Ye doubts and fears, that lay it waste;
Dear anxious days of pleasing pain
Fly, never to return again.
But, ah! return ye smiling hours,
By careless fancy crown’d with flowers;
Come, fairy joys, and wishes gay,
And dance in sportive rounds away.
So shall the moments gaily glide
O’er varying life’s tumultuous tide;
Nor sad regrets disturb their course,
To calm oblivion’s peaceful source.
Song
[Fidelity]
When hollow bursts the rushing wind,
And heavy beats the shower,
This anxious, aching bosom finds
No comfort in its power.
For ah, my love! it little knows
What thy hard fate may be;
What bitter storm of fortune blows,
What tempests trouble thee.
A wayward fate hath twin’d the thread
On which our days depend,
And darkling in the checker’d shade,
She draws it to an end.
But whatsoe’er may be thy doom,
The lot is cast for me;
Or in the world, or in the tomb,
My heart is fix’d on thee.
JOSEPH HAYDN: from VI Original Canzonettas. Second Set (1795)
Song
[The wanderer]
To wander alone when the moon faintly beaming
With glimmering lustre darts through the dim shade,
Where owls seek for covert, and night birds complaining,
Add sound to the horrors that darken the glade.
’Tis not for the happy, come daughter of sorrow,
’Tis here thy sad thoughts are embalm’d in thy tears,
Where lost in the past, nor regarding to-morrow,
There’s nothing for hopes, there’s nothing for fears.
CHARLES DIBDIN
(1745–1814)
My Lord,
The patronage with which you have been pleased to honour the productions of a minstrel who appreciated Melody as the soul of Music, and whose metrical attempts to portray the rough-hewn natural characters, and stimulate the gallant exertions, of a class to whom their Country is so infinitely indebted, entitles your Lordship, and the patriotic Board who have added their distinguished sanction of the following Selection, to the than
ks of all lovers of Old English Ballads, who retain what SHAKSPEARE calls a smack of predilection for home-brewed excellence […]
THOMAS DIBDIN: dedication of Songs by Charles Dibdin to The Right Honourable the Earl of Minto, 1 January 1841
The twelfth child of a parish clerk and a long-suffering mother, who gave birth to at least fourteen children, Charles Dibdin was exceptionally gifted and versatile, and throughout his life was active as singer, actor, violinist, organist, poet, painter, entrepreneur and song-writer. Self-taught as a composer, by the age of fifteen he was occasionally singing in the chorus at Covent Garden. Aged eighteen, he published A Collection of English Songs and Cantatas; the following year The Shepherd’s Artifice, for which he wrote both words and music, was premiered at Covent Garden, with Dibdin in the lead role. As an opera singer, he specialized in character parts, lacking the figure for main roles. He collaborated on many playhouse operas with the Irish librettist Isaac Bickerstaffe, and specialized in comic operas such as Lionel and Clarissa (1767). He left Covent Garden in the summer of 1768 and began a seven-year spell under Garrick at Drury Lane, where The Padlock was premiered in 1768, and in which Dibdin played Mungo, the first blackface role in British theatre. The only surviving operas he wrote with Bickerstaffe are The Recruiting Serjeant (1770) and Lionel and Clarissa. Librettist and composer also collaborated on The Seraglio (1776), whose influence on Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail has been much debated.
As he grew older, Dibdin became increasingly truculent. He married before he was twenty, soon left his wife for a pantomime dancer, Harriet Pitt, by whom he had two sons, and then abandoned her for a Drury Lane singer, Miss Wilde. Though Garrick was godfather to one of his sons, he refused to renew Dibdin’s contract when it expired, and the composer, deeply in debt, was forced to flee to France, where he wrote a number of libretti and dialogues in an effort to pay off his debts. Due to the worsening political situation in France, he returned in 1778 to London, where he was engaged once more at Covent Garden. With Charles Hughes he now turned his energies to creating a new theatre, the Royal Circus, where riding displays (Hughes had owned a riding school) alternated with short operas and ballets. The indefatigable Dibdin composed the entire repertory and also coached the children. He mismanaged the business side of the theatre, sustained substantial debts and spent a while in the debtors’ prison, where with undiminished energy he wrote a bitter book about his experiences, The Royal Circus Epitomised. Released, he attempted to emigrate to India, and to raise the money he made a nine-month tour of English towns, with programmes of ‘Reading and Music’, accompanying himself ‘on an instrument of a peculiar kind, combining the properties of the pianoforte and the chamber organ’, to which he attached bells, side-drum, tambourine and gong. He finally set sail for India, reached Dunkirk, where he became violently seasick, and disembarked at Torbay. From 1789 to the middle of 1805, he gave a series of one-man shows (he called them ‘Table Entertainments’) in London at several venues, including the King’s Street auction rooms, the Lyceum and the Polygraphic Rooms. The success was such that in 1792 he opened another theatre, the Sans-Souci, which had been built to his specifications, followed by the New Sans-Souci four years later. After the declaration of war against Napoleonic France in May 1803, the Government asked Dibdin to produce British war songs on a monthly basis, as a result of which he was given a pension of £200 by the Government. Though the pension was cancelled in 1807, he continued the shows for a few more seasons. His deep bass voice, however, had now faded, and to help him in his financial stress a dinner was arranged in his honour which raised £640. He struggled on for another few years but died destitute in his house in Arlington Street, Camden Town, paralysed by an unknown illness.
The Penguin Book of English Song Page 22