Hush-a-bye baby, on the tree-top, The Scotch have a simple but very characteristic little ditty, "He-ba-laliloo," which is not very difficult to trace to the French "Hé bas! 'là le loup," which in turn brings our thoughts to bear upon a universal nursery story favorite, namely, "Little Red Riding Hood." Ba-loo, ba-loo, my wee thing, Oh, softly close thy blinkin' e'e, A sailor laddie o'er the sea. Hibernian mothers sing thus: Hush, baby dear, weep not awhile, And o'er thee shall bright treasures smile, Denmark is a country which, through our well-beloved princess, is so nearly connected with our own, that I make no apology for giving two of its lullabies amongst ours. Strange to say the Danish mothers are the only ones whose slumber songs contain any element of castigation about them: Sleep, sleep, little mouse! The field your father ploughs; The next one is a dozing song: Visse lull, my love, Had I such four, Four-and-twenty in each corner, Here is a verse of a somewhat lengthy old Danish lullaby : Sleep sweetly, little child; lie quiet and still; A NURSERY CRY FROM YORKSHIRE. Rabbit pie! rabbit pie! Come, my ladies, come and buy, This is a favorite old lullaby in the north of England, one which is, perhaps, still heard occasionally. The last word is pronounced bee. Hush-a-bye, lie still and sleep, All over England babies are crooned to sleep to these verses; sometimes the mother substitutes a tune of her own in lieu of the recognized one : Plump little baby clouds, Snowy cloud mothers With broad bosoms white, Tired little baby clouds Great brooding mother clouds Let their warm mother tears The sheep's in the meadow, The kye's in the corn, Thou's ower lang in thy bed, Bonny at morn, Canny at night, Thou's ower lang in thy bed, Bonny at morn. The bird's in the bush, The trout's in the burn; Canny at night, Thou's ower lang in thy bed, We're all laid idle Wi' keeping the bairn, The lass wi' net learn, The lad wi' net work. Canny at night, Bonny at morn, Thou's ower lang in thy bed, Bonny at morn. With the colliers' wives of Northumberland this funny song is a great favorite : UP THE RAW. Up the raw, down the raw, For shape and color, ma bonny hinney, Black as a craw,1 ma bonny hinney, Thou bangs them a', lass, every day. Bobby Shaftoe's bright and fair, Bonny Bobby Shaftoe. Yorkshire, which has that strange ditty Young lambs to sell, young lambs to sell! I never would cry — young lambs to sell. One can readily set the words of the following to the monotonous rhythm of a rocking-chair : Hey, my kitten, hey, my kitten, And here we go down, down, down, The next song scarcely merits a place amongst the songs of motherland, as it is evidently only used as a solace by husbands when left in charge of the nursery pet: There are several uncouth local terms in these verses which certainly require interpretation. The word "hinney" in Northumbrian parlance is an epithet of extreme endearment; it is a corruption of honey. "Canny" has not the same significance in the coal district as it has in Scotland, for over the Tweed it means nearness, and sometimes even niggardliness, whilst this side of the Border it stands for something very nice. "Clag-candy" is a sticky compound much in request among the juveThy mammy has gone to the mill, niles of the pitmen's country, and To grind thee some wheat, "double-japanded" is an expression To make thee some meat, which, although it may be underAnd so, my dear babby, lie still. standed" of most people, has yet a special meaning in the north, where ject of inquiry in this, history does not Why Tony Lumpkin should be the sub the large kitchen fireplaces are rendered lustrous by means of japanning from day to day. The sad and indeed almost tragic story of "Bobby Shaftoe" is another Northumbrian lullaby; it, however, is only such by courtesy, as the nursery is not the only place where its somewhat terse history is a favorite. BOBBY SHAFTOE. Bobby Shaftoe's gone to sea. Bobby Shaftoe's bright and fair, 1 Crow. say: Hush thee, my babby, Bye, baby bumpkin, Where's Tony Lumpkin? We can only conclude that Tony's My dear cockadoodle, my jewel, my joy, The lullabies of Malaga have long been celebrated for their extreme beauty. In the pretty Spanish tongue the word arrullo means both the cooing of doves and the lulling of children, so that we may think of the little dark-haired, large-eyed babies of the land of the Manzaneres being cooed into the land of Nod by some such tender little songs as the following: A dormir va la rosa De los rosales; A dormir va mi niña Porque ya es tarde. The next lullaby, which is a great favorite with the Romany mothers of Spain, refers to "the Moor as a very benignant sort of bogey: Isabellita, do not pine Because the flowers fade away; Little one, now close thine eyes, And within my cradle lying, Sleep, nor cry again to-night, Speaking of the gipsies of Spain reminds me of several beautiful slumber songs which have originated with the tent mothers. Here is the Romany version of a lullaby which, a few years ago, we might often have heard crooned over a tiny Romany babe at the door of the camp : Jaw to sutters, my tiny chal, Your die to dukker has jall'd abri, At rarde she will wel palal, Jaw to lutherum, tiny baw! Thy deya meerie tud did cam. ENGLISH VERSION. Sleep thee, little tawny boy! Thy mother's gone abroad to spae, NANI-NANI. Lullaby, my little one, Thou art mother's darling son; Or an angel sheathed in white. Sleep with mother; mother well Our good lord great Stephen was: Sleep, my baby, in thy bed, The slumber-suggesting word Naninani begins and ends most of the Roumanian lullabies; it recalls the pretty Italian verse which is chanted by the peasant women in some parts of Italy on Christmas day : Dormi, dormi nel mio seno, Fa la nina-nana-na. the most beautiful in the world; they are frequently used in other lands, although it must be admitted that they lose somewhat in the translation. GERMAN CRADLE SONG. Peacefully slumber, my own darling son; Close thy dear eyelids, and sweetly sleep on! All things lie buried in silence profound, Sleep, I will scare e'en the gnats floating round. 'Tis now, my dearest, thy life's early May, Ah! but to-morrow is not as to-day; Trouble and care round thy curtains shall soar, Then, child, thou'lt slumber so sweetly no more ! Angels of Heaven as lovely as thou Float o'er thy cradle and smile on thee now; Later, when angels around thee shall stray, Careless how early, how late it may be, Mother's love wearies not, watching o'er thee. As a specimen of the Wiegenliëd in its original form the following could scarcely be surpassed : Tu lu! Kommst du denn nicht? And the little descendants of the vikings are thus lulled : Row, row to Baltnarock, How many fish are caught in the net ? Here is a specimen of a very pretty French lullaby: Il est tard, l'ange a passé, Et l'on n'entend, pour tout bruit, Mon fils, c'est moi; Il est tard, et ton ami, L'oiseau bleu, s'est endormi. The following melodious berceuse is well known throughout Brittany; Go to sleep, you little darling, And rock to and fro The tiny bambino of the Italian peasant hears these lines sung in the soft liquid accents of the Italian tongue : Sleep, my baby, sleep, my darling, A sample verse of a Sardinian logendorian 1 is here given : Oh! Ninna and Anninia ! God give thee joy. Sweet joy be thine; Sleep, brother mine. The Albanian song which follows is commendably short: De! de lambskin mine, Where didst thou this even dine? The Polish slumber song, to our ideas, does not seem sufficiently simple or child-like in style : 1 Lullaby. POLISH SLUMBER SONG. The stars shine forth from the blue sky, Dors, petit oiseau de la prairie; dors doucement, joli petit rouge-gorge! Dieu t'éveillera quand il sera temps. Le sommeil est à la porte et de: N'y a-t-il pas ici un doux enfant qui voudrait dormir-un petit enfant enveloppé dans ses langes, un bel enfant qui repose dans sa couverture de laine? Dors, petit oiseau ! Why dost thou weep, my child? From Macmillan's Magazine. Travellers very frequently hear mothers singing their children to sleep with very musical rhythm, and not rarely are the words in themselves veritable poems from slumberland. M. Xavier THE HUMORS OF A CANADIAN ELECTION. Marnier, on his journey to the North THIS title is not meant as an impertiPole, heard and noted down this charm-nence. There is not any intention here ing berceuse which a woman was sing- of attempting to pass a full judgment ing to her child in a remote part of on Canadian political life, or even, one northern Finland: would like to say, on Canadian Parliamentary elections. There are things to be said on the other side; and chiefly there is that thing which Mr. Bryce notices in the other American country as compared with Europe, the sort of righting force to be reckoned with, the hidden force making for justice and right, and saving American countries from being what they seem to be. Still, when all that is said, there is such gross, open, and palpable public corruption in Canada, and such cynical disbelief frequently expressed in the possibilities of anything better, that one is justified in giving a title to an account of a Canadian election which would be disgraceful if Canadians themselves on the whole did not justify it, either by their own corrupt acts, or by their indifference and submission to corruption, or by their connivance at it. He that is not against it is on its side. In Iceland a poor little motherless babe was thus sung to its saddened slumbers: Take me, bear me, shining moon, The Dutch widows have a sorrowful lullaby of their own which says: O hush thee, my child, Thy mother bends o'er thee, For she is forsaken and alone. With these Japanese and Hottentot lullabies I bring my songs of motherland to a close : JAPANESE LULLABY. Lullaby baby, lullaby baby, And from her village what will she bring? Nothing can be understood about Canada until geography and its consequences are admitted, and Canada is understood to be an American country. There is no pretence here to hint at its political future, but in the life of its people it is American. Its churches, colleges, schools, and philanthropic societies, are managed after a fashion which Europeans roughly understand as American; these institutions have The "daruma" is what English chil-ready intercourse or mutual understanddren call a tumbler, a figure which is ing between one side of the border and weighted at the bottom, so that, turn it the other. The speech, too, of Cahow you will, it always regains its equilibrium. A "daruma (which will never turn over) and a paper dog. The Hottentot mother sings: nadians bewrayeth them; hardly an "Americanism" but is as familiar to Nova Scotia as to New England; the |