Da rief der in der Mitten Noch einmal: 'Deutschland hoch!' Und beide mit den dritten Riefen's, und lauter noch. Da ging ein Todesengel Er sah auf ihrem Munde Die Spur des Wortes noch, Wie sie im Todesbunde Gerufen: 'Deutschland hoch!' Da schlug er seine Flügel Und trug zum höchsten Hügel THE THREE COMRADES. Against the foe went marching Three comrades staunch and good, Who side by side together In many a fight had stood. The first a sturdy Austrian, And where was born the other? One day together, side by side, A storm of grape-shot threw. It smote them all together As they stood side by side, 'Hurrah! hurrah! for Austria!'. The first, death-stricken, cried. 'Hurrah for Prussia,' cried the next, His life-blood ebbing fast; Undaunted by his mortal wound, What cry escaped the last? He cried, 'Hurrah for Germany!' His comrades heard the sound As right and left beside him They sank upon the ground. 261 And as they sank, they nearer came, And once more cried the centre one, 'Hurrah for Germany!' The others echoed back the cry, And louder still than he. As through the tumult of the fight And on their lips the traces still 1. Of what their last joint cry had been- He spread his wings above the three, Max von Schenkendorf is another of those poets of the Liberation War who could smite as well as sing, and whose songs are still popular. We give a portion of one of the most spirited, the 'Student's War Song':Ich bin Student gewesen, Nun heiss ich Lieutenant, A student I was yesterday, Wake, every man, whose ear and heart Ye who with zeal have hitherto That teacheth best to think, And makes us whet our trusty swords, The song proceeds through a number of Das heiss ich rechte Fehde, I call the warfare worthy Where all their utmost do, All thoughts, all things, are turned to work This is one of the more familiar songs of Schenkendorf. His Soldier's Morning Song,' which is now a great favourite, will show how the German soldier has not ceased to foster the religious spirit which the trials and dangers of the Liberation War gave birth to : SOLDATEN-MOrgenlied. Erhebt euch von der Erde, Ihr Schläfer, aus der Ruh! Du reicher Gott in Gnaden, Schau her vom Himmelszelt! In dieses Waffenfeld. Und gieb uns heute Sieg! Ihn schaut der Engel Schaar. Auf jeden deutschen Mann; Du Freiheitstag, brich an! SOLDIER'S MORNING SONG. As we wake from dreams of laurels, O God, in grace abounding, Look down from heaven afar! For Thine, O Lord, the banners are, A morning yet of joy shall come, And angels share the sight; Which, unobscured, each German true Break, break, thou dawn of freedom, break; The Evening Song,' a companion to the foregoing and an equal favourite, has some very striking stanzas, and shows the reality of its inspiration by its loving reference to the general under whom Max von Schen kendorf was actually serving, and to the foe | hearts the same thoughts swelling as swell SOLDATEN-Abendlied. Ihr fernen theuren Seelen, Sich wohl im Mondenstrahl. Schlaf ruhig, Vater Röder, Aus deiner Krieger Zahl. In Schlacht und Ungemach; Auch du im Lager drüben Magst ruhig schlafen, Feind; SOLDIER'S EVENING SONG. To you, ye distant dear ones, We greet you, oh! we greet you in his German heart, and can lay him down And wish our glance your glance could meet Within the moonbeams cold. Sleep sweetly, father Röder, Our well loved general; Who bravely with us storm and rain Sleep sweetly, e'en in yonder camp, These Morning and Evening Songs of so fully Schenkendorf, however, do not exemplify the moral courage of the Germans in giving prominence among their war songs to compositions depicting the sad and mournful side of war as others we shall lay before our readers. The following one, for instance, is to be found without exception in every collection, great or small, and doubtless engraved also in the heart and memory of a vast majority of the German soldiery. It is The Good Comrade,' of Uhland. Surely there is some chord in the German heart, of which we are unable to feel the vibration, to make a little mournful ditty such as this so universal a favourite : There is something admirable in the spirit of the last four lines. How they bring before us the actual line of thought in a brave soldier's mind as he lies by the watchfire in the silent moonlight, and thinks of the past and the present, the friends he has left, the comrades around him, and even the foes to his front! It is a beautiful thought of peace amidst the din of conflict, and of generous love amidst the tumult of hate. The brave soldier-poet can honour his enemies, can wish them the rest which his own weary limbs can appreciate, can imagine Frenchmen lying by their watchfire opposite and feeling just in their French DER GUTE KAMERAD. Ich hatt' einen Kameraden, In gleichem Schritt und Tritt. Eine Kugel kam geflogen, Gilt's mir, oder gilt es dir ? Als wär's ein Stück von mir. Will mir die Hand noch reichen, Kann dir die Hand nicht geben, THE GOOD COMRADE. I had a faithful comrade once, The drum was beat, the charge was led, And he kept step with me. A bullet came, and who could tell Lay dying on the ground. He tried to clasp my hand once more, The picture is a touching one, drawn by a master's hand in a few bold outlines; but This, as our readers will note, is a very different sort of song from those of Schenkendorf we have quoted. It has indeed a fine rhythmical swing, and much of what the newspapers call élan, as an elegant foreign equivalent for our native expression 'dash;' but it possesses no sort of moral grandeur. What does its utterance amount to? A great deal of personal and patriotic sentimentalism; a great deal of self-pity, as if to catch that of others; a great deal of affected desperation. In short, the rhythm is the main merit of the poem. We cannot feel that it sets forth in any sense the inspiration of a thoughtfully brave man. Though in. this we may be doing 'the poet of radicalism,' as Herwegh has been called, an injustice, beguiled thereto by the impossibility. of forgetting the merry Nadler's lines de scribing Herwegh's escape from the Hecker insurrection in which he had intended to be very prominent, but found in time discretion to be the better part of valour : Heiss fiel es dem Herwegh bei, Dass der Hinweg besser sei.* Wilhelm Hauff's Morgenroth' is truly beautiful and touching, and as a song of simple resignation is admirable; but still we must wonder at the spirit which makes it so familiar as a soldier's song. For its entire atmosphere is that of despondency; a mist of melancholy. pierced by no sun-ray of hope. It is such a song as an innocent man might sing who has been condemned to die at day-dawn, and feels he is past help; such a song as might have suited the feelings of that squadron of each cavalry regiment in the battle of St. Privat the other day who drew the lots which doomed them to a post of almost certain death: Morgenroth, Morgenroth! gone, a synonym for despair. And we should utterly condemn, even on the commonest grounds of policy, the wailing of so melancholy an utterance by soldiers in a war, were it not that most of us have known of men who went to battle already half slain with deep-rooted and well-grounded presentiment of death, and yet did prodigies of valour, though dying in the midst of victory. And so such a song may in a sense be right, nay, must be right, though it may not suit our feelings. For though the singer may despair, it is of his life, not of his causeof himself, not of his country; and the very thought of such magnanimous self-sacrifice is ennobling. Nor is it only the cultivated mind which dwells so tenderly on the sad side of warfare; we find it also in the simple Volkslied, the utterance, pathetic in its very rudeness, of the parting peasant as he leaves his home, which is, after all, a dirge as truly as the sweetest death-song of the stateliest swan. We trust our readers will take interest enough in the subject not to despise such rude Volkslieder as we set before them in illustration of our statements; and above all, we ask those unfamiliar with the German language, to look indulgently on the English dress in which we offer them. It is just the Volkslied which is most difficult to render, and the sort of song in which native pathos is most likely to be lost in a covering of commonplace. Here is one which has cost us trouble enough, and which still leaves a great deal to be desired. It is a song placed in the mouth of the last of Schill's soldiers before execution:* Zu Wesel auf der Schanz, Mich scheid't von aller Noth Wer's mit dem Tapfern hielt, * Some of our readers may need a reminder of Schill's history and valour, never to be forgotten in Germany, however irregular his conduct may be deemed. In the year 1809, while Prussia was groaning under the French yoke, he marched his regiment out from Berlin, ostensibly for exercise. He then proposed to them the tre mendous task of undertaking the liberation of Germany on their own account, and called on all who would follow him to volunteer. Not a man failed him. His band increased to about 1300 men, who fought bravely and obtained many successes; but they were brought to bay at last in the streets of Stralsund, where their gallant leader received his deathwound and most of his followers were slain. The rest were brought to Wesel, tried by court-martial as not being regularly commissioned troops, and shot. Wie Räuber und wie Mörder Geworfen in den Kerker; Das Leben war ihm gar Gesprochen ab. Mit meinem Führer zog Ich aus für Deutschlands Ehre ; Bei Stralsund auf dem Wall- Ich will Napoleon, Von dir gar kein Erbarmen; Verblutet liegen da Schon alle meine Kameraden; Mir nur ward Gnad' gegeben Mein Säbel und Gewehr Dass hier ein treuer Knab' At Wesel in the trench A brave young soldier stood: . The last who stood by Schill Too soon were captive made, And into prison-dungeon fast As thieves and murderers cast; So they and I Are doomed to die. To help my Germany, With my brave chief I rode; The French should slaughter Schill; From thee, Napoleon, Around me in their gore 'Twas little grace that I My carbine and my sword, The arms I used to wear, |