Now, to the upright and impartial6 mind—which is mine—all the diversions of Heathen[Pg 293]dom—which is the British—are of equal ethnological value. And it is true that some human beings can be more vulgar in the act of discussing etchings, editions of luxury, or their own emotions, than other human beings employed in swearing at each other across the street. Therefore, following a chain of thought which does not matter, I visited very many theatres whose licenses7 had never been interfered8 with. There I discovered men and women who lived and moved and behaved according to rules which in no sort regulate human life, by tradition dead and done with, and after the customs of the more immoral9 ancients and Barnum. At one place the lodging-house servant was an angel, and her mother a Madonna; at a second they sounded the loud timbrel o'er a whirl of bloody10 axes, mobs, and brown-paper castles, and said it was not a pantomime, but Art; at a third everybody grew fabulously11 rich and fabulously poor every twenty minutes, which was confusing; at a fourth they discussed the Nudities and Lewdities in false-palate voices supposed to[Pg 294] belong to the aristocracy and that tasted copper12 in the mouth; at a fifth they merely climbed up walls and threw furniture at each other, which is notoriously the custom of spinsters and small parsons. Next morning the papers would write about the progress of the modern drama (that was the silver paper pantomime), and "graphic13 presentment of the realities of our highly complex civilisation14." That was the angel housemaid. By the way, when an Englishman has been doing anything more than unusually Pagan, he generally consoles himself with "over-civilisation." It's the "martyr-to-nerves-dear" note in his equipment.
I went to the music-halls—the less frequented ones—and they were almost as dull as the plays, but they introduced me to several elementary truths. Ladies and gentlemen in eccentric, but not altogether unsightly, costumes told me (a) that if I got drunk I should have a head next morning, and perhaps be fined by the magistrate15; (b) that if I flirted16 promiscuously17 I should probably get into trouble; (c) that I had better tell my wife everything[Pg 295] and be good to her, or she would be sure to find out for herself and be very bad to me; (d) that I should never lend money; or (e) fight with a stranger whose form I did not know. My friends (if I may be permitted to so call them) illustrated18 these facts with personal reminiscences and drove them home with kicks and prancings. At intervals19 circular ladies in pale pink and white would low to their audience to the effect that there was nothing half so sweet in life as "Love's Young Dream," and the billycock hats would look at the four-and-elevenpenny bonnets20, and they saw that it was good and clasped hands on the strength of it. Then other ladies with shorter skirts would explain that when their husbands
"Stagger home tight about two,
An' can't light the candle,
We taik the broom 'andle
An' show 'em what women can do."
Naturally, the billycocks, seeing what might befall, thought things over again, and you heard the bonnets murmuring softly under the[Pg 296] clink of the lager-glasses: "Not me, Bill. Not me!" Now these things are basic and basaltic truths. Anybody can understand them. They are as old as Time. Perhaps the expression was occasionally what might be called coarse, but beer is beer, and best in a pewter, though you can, if you please, drink it from Venetian glass and call it something else. The halls give wisdom and not too lively entertainment for sixpence—ticket good for four pen'orth of refreshments22, chiefly inky porter—and the people who listen are respectable folk living under very grey skies who derive23 all the light side of their life, the food for their imagination and the crystallised expression of their views on Fate and Nemesis24, from the affable ladies and gentlemen singers. They require a few green and gold maidens25 in short skirts to kick before them. Herein they are no better and no worse than folk who require fifty girls very much undressed, and a setting of music, or pictures that won't let themselves be seen on account of their age and varnish26, or statues and coins. All animals like salt, but some prefer rock-[Pg 297]salt, red or black in lumps. But this is a digression.
Out of my many visits to the hall—I chose one hall, you understand, and frequented it till I could tell the mood it was in before I had passed the ticket-poll—was born the Great Idea. I served it as a slave for seven days. Thought was not sufficient; experience was necessary. I patrolled Westminster, Blackfriars, Lambeth, the Old Kent Road, and many, many more miles of pitiless pavement to make sure of my subject. At even I drank my lager among the billycocks, and lost my heart to a bonnet21. Goethe and Shakespeare were my precedents27. I sympathised with them acutely, but I got my Message. A chance-caught refrain of a song which I understand is protected—to its maker28 I convey my most grateful acknowledgments—gave me what I sought. The rest was made up of four elementary truths, some humour, and, though I say it who should leave it to the press, pathos29 deep and genuine. I spent a penny on a paper which introduced me to a Great and Only who[Pg 298] "wanted new songs." The people desired them really. He was their ambassador, and taught me a great deal about the property-right in songs, concluding with a practical illustration, for he said my verses were just the thing and annexed31 them. It was long before he could hit on the step-dance which exactly elucidated32 the spirit of the text, and longer before he could jingle34 a pair of huge brass35 spurs as a dancing-girl jingles36 her anklets. That was my notion, and a good one.
The Great and Only possessed37 a voice like a bull, and nightly roared to the people at the heels of one who was winning triple encores with a priceless ballad38 beginning deep down in the bass30: "We was shopmates—boozin' shopmates." I feared that song as Rachel feared Ristori. A greater than I had written it. It was a grim tragedy, lighted with lucid33 humour, wedded39 to music that maddened. But my "Great and Only" had faith in me, and I—I clung to the Great Heart of the People—my people—four hundred "when it's all full, sir." I had not studied them for nothing. I[Pg 299] must reserve the description of my triumph for another "Turnover40."
There was no portent41 in the sky on the night of my triumph. A barrowful of onions, indeed, upset itself at the door, but that was a coincidence. The hall was crammed42 with billycocks waiting for "We was shopmates." The great heart beat healthily. I went to my beer the equal of Shakespeare and Molière at the wings in a first night. What would my public say? Could anything live after the abandon of "We was shopmates"? What if the redcoats did not muster43 in their usual strength. O my friends, never in your songs and dramas forget the redcoat. He has sympathy and enormous boots.
I believed in the redcoat; in the great heart of the people: above all in myself. The conductor, who advertised that he "doctored bad songs," had devised a pleasant little lilting air for my needs, but it struck me as weak and thin after the thunderous surge of the "Shopmates." I glanced at the gallery—the redcoats were there. The fiddle-bows creaked, and, with a jingle of brazen44 spurs, a forage-[Pg 300]cap over his left eye, my Great and Only began to "chuck it off his chest." Thus:
"At the back o' the Knightsbridge Barricks,
When the fog was a-gatherin' dim,
The Lifeguard talked to the Undercook,
An' the girl she talked to 'im."
"Twiddle-iddle-iddle-lum-tum-tum!" said the violins.
"Ling-a-ling-a-ling-a-ling-ting-ling!" said the spurs of the Great and Only, and through the roar in my ears I fancied I could catch a responsive hoof-beat in the gallery. The next four lines held the house to attention. Then came the chorus and the borrowed refrain. It took—it went home with a crisp click. My Great and Only saw his chance. Superbly waving his hand to embrace the whole audience, he invited them to join him in:
[Pg 301]But you'll learn to be wise when you're older,
And don't try for things that are out of your reach,
And that's what the girl told the soldier, soldier, soldier,
And that's what the girl told the soldier."
I thought the gallery would never let go of the long-drawn howl on "soldier." They clung to it as ringers to the kicking bell-rope. Then I envied no one—not even Shakespeare. I had my house hooked—gaffed under the gills, netted, speared, shot behind the shoulder—anything you please. That was pure joy! With each verse the chorus grew louder, and when my Great and Only had bellowed47 his way to the fall of the Lifeguard and the happy lot of the Undercook, the gallery rocked again, the reserved stalls shouted, and the pewters twinkled like the legs of the demented ballet-girls. The conductor waved the now frenzied48 orchestra to softer Lydian strains. My Great and Only warbled piano:
"At the back o' Knightsbridge Barricks,
When the fog's a-gatherin' dim,
The Lifeguard waits for the Undercook,
But she won't wait for 'im."
[Pg 302]
"Ta-ra-rara-rara-ra-ra-rah!" rang a horn clear and fresh as a sword-cut. 'Twas the apotheosis49 of virtue.
That lives at 'Ighgate 'Ill,
An' the Lifeguard walks with the 'ousemaid now,
An' (awful pause) she can't foot the bill!"
Who shall tell the springs that move masses? I had builded better than I knew. Followed yells, shrieks51 and wildest applause. Then, as a wave gathers to the curl-over, singer and sung to fill their chests and heave the chorus through the quivering roof—alto, horns, basses52 drowned, and lost in the flood—to the beach-like boom of beating feet:
"Oh, think o' my song when you're gowin' it strong
An' your boots is too little to 'old yer;
An' don't try for things that is out of your reach,
An' that's what the girl told the soldier, soldier, so-holdier!"
[Pg 303]
Ow! Hi! Yi! Wha-hup! Phew! Whew! Pwhit! Bang! Wang! Crr-rash! There was ample time for variations as the horns uplifted themselves and ere the held voices came down in the foam53 of sound—
"That's what the girl told the soldier."
Providence54 has sent me several joys, and I have helped myself to others, but that night, as I looked across the sea of tossing billycocks and rocking bonnets, my work, as I heard them give tongue, not once, but four times—their eyes sparkling, their mouths twisted with the taste of pleasure—I felt that I had secured Perfect Felicity. I am become greater than Shakespeare. I may even write plays for the Lyceum, but I never can recapture that first fine rapture55 that followed the Upheaval56 of the Anglo-Saxon four hundred of him and her. They do not call for authors on these occasions, but I desired no need of public recognition. I was placidly57 happy. The chorus bubbled up again and again throughout the[Pg 304] evening, and a redcoat in the gallery insisted on singing solos about "a swine in the poultry line," whereas I had written "man," and the pewters began to fly, and afterwards the long streets were vocal58 with various versions of what the girl had really told the soldier, and I went to bed murmuring: "I have found my destiny."
But it needs a more mighty59 intellect to write the Songs of the People. Some day a man will rise up from Bermondsey, Battersea or Bow, and he will be coarse, but clearsighted, hard but infinitely60 and tenderly humorous, speaking the people's tongue, steeped in their lives and telling them in swinging, urging, dinging verse what it is that their inarticulate lips would express. He will make them songs. Such songs! And all the little poets who pretend to sing to the people will scuttle61 away like rabbits, for the girl (which, as you have seen, of course, is wisdom) will tell that soldier (which is Hercules bowed under his labours) all that she knows of Life and Death and Love.
And the same, they say, is a Vulgarity!
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收听单词发音
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1
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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3
ordained
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| v.任命（某人）为牧师( ordain的过去式和过去分词 )；授予（某人）圣职；（上帝、法律等）命令；判定 | |
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improper
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| adj.不适当的，不合适的，不正确的，不合礼仪的 | |
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inciting
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| 刺激的，煽动的 | |
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impartial
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| adj.(in,to)公正的，无偏见的 | |
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7
licenses
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| n.执照( license的名词复数 )v.批准，许可，颁发执照( license的第三人称单数 ) | |
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8
interfered
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| v.干预( interfere的过去式和过去分词 )；调停；妨碍；干涉 | |
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9
immoral
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| adj.不道德的，淫荡的，荒淫的，有伤风化的 | |
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10
bloody
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| adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染 | |
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11
fabulously
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| 难以置信地，惊人地 | |
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12
copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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13
graphic
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| adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的 | |
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14
civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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15
magistrate
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| n.地方行政官，地方法官，治安官 | |
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16
flirted
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| v.调情，打情骂俏( flirt的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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promiscuously
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| adv.杂乱地，混杂地 | |
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18
illustrated
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| adj. 有插图的，列举的 动词illustrate的过去式和过去分词 | |
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19
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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20
bonnets
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| n.童帽( bonnet的名词复数 )；（烟囱等的）覆盖物；（苏格兰男子的）无边呢帽；（女子戴的）任何一种帽子 | |
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21
bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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22
refreshments
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| n.点心,便餐;(会议后的)简单茶点招 待 | |
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23
derive
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| v.取得；导出；引申；来自；源自；出自 | |
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24
nemesis
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| n.给以报应者，复仇者，难以对付的敌手 | |
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25
maidens
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| 处女( maiden的名词复数 )； 少女； 未婚女子； （板球运动）未得分的一轮投球 | |
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26
varnish
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| n.清漆；v.上清漆；粉饰 | |
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27
precedents
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| 引用单元； 范例( precedent的名词复数 )； 先前出现的事例； 前例； 先例 | |
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28
maker
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| n.制造者，制造商 | |
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29
pathos
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| n.哀婉，悲怆 | |
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30
bass
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| n.男低音(歌手)；低音乐器；低音大提琴 | |
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31
annexed
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| [法] 附加的，附属的 | |
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32
elucidated
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| v.阐明，解释( elucidate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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lucid
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| adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的 | |
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34
jingle
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| n.叮当声，韵律简单的诗句；v.使叮当作响，叮当响，押韵 | |
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35
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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36
jingles
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| 叮当声( jingle的名词复数 )； 节拍十分规则的简单诗歌 | |
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37
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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38
ballad
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| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
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39
wedded
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| adj.正式结婚的；渴望…的，执著于…的v.嫁，娶，（与…）结婚( wed的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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40
turnover
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| n.人员流动率，人事变动率；营业额，成交量 | |
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41
portent
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| n.预兆；恶兆；怪事 | |
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42
crammed
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| adj.塞满的，挤满的；大口地吃；快速贪婪地吃v.把…塞满；填入；临时抱佛脚( cram的过去式) | |
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43
muster
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| v.集合，收集，鼓起，激起；n.集合，检阅，集合人员，点名册 | |
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44
brazen
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| adj.厚脸皮的，无耻的，坚硬的 | |
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45
mashing
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| 捣碎 | |
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46
tart
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| adj.酸的；尖酸的，刻薄的；n.果馅饼；淫妇 | |
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47
bellowed
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| v.发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的过去式和过去分词 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫 | |
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48
frenzied
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| a.激怒的；疯狂的 | |
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49
apotheosis
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| n.神圣之理想；美化；颂扬 | |
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50
poultry
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| n.家禽，禽肉 | |
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51
shrieks
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| n.尖叫声( shriek的名词复数 )v.尖叫( shriek的第三人称单数 ) | |
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52
basses
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| 低音歌唱家，低音乐器( bass的名词复数 ) | |
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53
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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54
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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55
rapture
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| n.狂喜；全神贯注；着迷；v.使狂喜 | |
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56
upheaval
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| n.胀起，(地壳)的隆起；剧变，动乱 | |
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57
placidly
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| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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58
vocal
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| adj.直言不讳的；嗓音的；n.[pl.]声乐节目 | |
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59
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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60
infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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61
scuttle
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| v.急赶，疾走，逃避；n.天窗；舷窗 | |
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