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If a party of German officers went fox-shooting in Leicestershire, and the villagers resisted the slaughter of the sacred animal, some of the leading villagers would be hanged and others flogged during the execution. Our National Anthem would begin: "God save our German king! Long live our foreign king!" The singing of "Rule, Britannia," would be regarded as a seditious act.
During the afternoon her mind was stored with serene impressions service in the venerable Cathedral; the fluting of an anthem by a boy with a birdlike voice; some strong words from the pulpit, not on the dry bones of doctrine, nor the doings of a barbarous people led by a vengeful demon of perplexing attributes whom they worshipped as a deity, but on the conduct of life a vital subject.
The universal stillness permits the softest natural sounds to be heard; and the buzz of the bee, or the wing of the humming-bird, reaches the ear like the loud notes of a general anthem. This temporary repose is full of meaning.
This opera was the first work that Handel had undertaken after his return to London, but its composition was interrupted by that of the Funeral Anthem for the Queen. Although she died on November 20, Handel did not receive the King's command to write the anthem until December 7, as George II was strangely undecided in making arrangements for the funeral.
On the highest corner of the square a platform was erected, on the right of which we were given the post of honour, and for some strange reason which I could not understand were asked to play the British National Anthem, when the whole Czech Army came to the "Present!" as General Gaida and his Staff, with the colours, entered the square. I felt that we were celebrating the birth of a nation.
I hope your anthem will be more lively, Lord Reggie. But of course it will. We always keep our sorrows for the drawing-room, and our chirpiness for church. For sheer godless merriment commend me to the grand chant. It always reminds me of the conspirators' chorus in the 'Huguenots. I used to hear it as a child. One hears so many things as a child, doesn't one?
At that moment the orchestra in the flower hidden balcony began to play the Mexican national anthem La Poloma, with its enchanting melody, and the well-known strains made a deep rhythmic run through the boy's blood. Outwardly the young masculine has no sentiment, but inwardly he is full of a sense of romance, that he would be shy to confess.
And I knew now that what I had hungered after in my best years was neither knowledge, nor honour, nor riches; nor to be a priest or a great creator in steel; no, friend, but to build temples; not chapels for prayers or churches for wailing penitent sinners, but a temple for the human spirit in its grandeur, where we could lift up our souls in an anthem as a gift to heaven.
But who shall say that anthem, even to its very end, was not heard in heaven! Here, in The Hague, other thoughts came to Ben of how Holland in later years unwillingly put her head under the French yoke, and how, galled and lashed past endurance, she had resolutely jerked it out again. He liked her for that.
Modern music has shown the same tendency: Strauss of Vienna writes waltzes in Arab rhythms, Grieg composes a Scotch symphony, Dvorak writes an American national anthem utilizing negro melodies.
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