"_Bell._--Shall's have a _catch_, my hearts?
_Calve._--Aye, good lieutenant.
_Black._--Methinks a _soldier_[3] should sing nothing else;
_catch, that catch may_ is all our life, you know."
[Footnote 3: Drayton (James I.'s reign) in his "Battle of Agincourt,"
l. 1199, has--"The common Souldiers free-mens _catches_ sing"--of the
French before the battle (_free_men is a corruption of _three_men).]
[In _Bonduca_, a play of B. and F's., altered for operatic setting by
Purcell in 1695, there is a catch in three parts, sung by the Roman
soldiers.]
In Sir William Davenant's (Davenant flourished 1635) comedy _The
Wits_, Snore, one of the characters, says--
"It must be late, for gossip Nock, the _nailman_,
Had catechized his maids, and _sung three catches
And a song_, ere we set forth."
Samuel Harsnet, in his _Declaration of Egregious Impostures_, 1603,
mentions a 'merry catch,' 'Now God be with old Simeon' (for which see
Rimbault's Rounds, Canons, and Catches of England), which he says was
sung by _tinkers_ 'as they sit by the fire, with a pot of good ale
between their legs.'
And in _The Merry Devill of Edmonton_, 1631, there is a comical story
of how Smug _the miller_ was _singing a catch_ with the _merry Parson_
in an alehouse, and how they 'tost' the words "_I'll ty my mare in thy
ground_," 'so long to and fro,' that Smug forgot he was singing a
catch, and began to quarrel with the Parson, 'thinking verily, he had
meant (as he said in his song) to _ty his mare in his ground_.'
Finally, in _Pammelia_, a collection of Rounds and Catches of 3, 4,
5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 parts, edited by Thomas Ravenscroft, and
published in 1609, there is a curious preface, which states that
'Catches are so _generally affected_ ... because they are so consonant
to _all ordinary musical capacity_, being such, indeed, as all such
_whose love of musick exceeds their skill_, cannot but commend.' The
preface further asserts that the book is 'published only _to please
good company_.'
To go on to _instrumental_ music among the lower classes of
Elizabethan and Shakespearian times; there is an allusion in the above
quoted passage from Morley (1597) to the habit of playing on an
instrument in a barber's shop while waiting one's turn to be shaved.
This is also referred to in Ben Jonson's _Alchemist_ and _Silent
Woman_. In the latter play, Cutberd the barber has recommended a wife
to Morose. Morose finds that instead of a mute helpmate he has got one
who had 'a tongue with a tang,' and exclaims 'that cursed _barber_! I
have married his _cittern_ that is common to all men': meaning that as
the barber's cittern was always being played, so his wife was always
talking.
There is a poem of the 18th century which speaks of the old times,
'In former time 't hath been upbrayded thus,
That _barber's musick_ was most _barbarous_.'
However true that may have been--at all events it is certain that in
the 16th and 17th centuries it was customary to hear instrumental
music in a barber's shop, generally of a cittern, which had four
strings and frets, like a guitar, and was thought a vulgar
instrument.[4]
[Footnote 4: The Cittern of the barber's shop had four double strings
of wire, tuned thus--1st, E in 4th space of treble staff; 2nd, D a
tone lower; 3rd, G on 2nd line; 4th, B on 3rd line. The instrument had
a carved head. See _L.L.L._ V. ii., lines 600-603, of Holofernes'
head. Also the frontispiece, where the treble viol and viol-da-gamba
have carved heads, both human, but of different types. Fantastic
heads, as of dragons or gargoyles, were often put on these
instruments.]
Another use of instrumental music was to entertain the guests in a
tavern. A pamphlet called _The Actor's Remonstrance_, printed 1643,
speaks of the _decay_ of music in taverns, which followed the closing
of theatres in 1642, as follows:--"Our music, that was held so
delectable and precious [_i.e._, in Shakespeare's times], that _they
scorned to come to a tavern under twenty shillings_ salary _for two
hours_, now wander [_i.e._, 1643] with their instruments under their
cloaks--I mean, such as have any--into all houses of good fellowship,
saluting every room where there is company with, 'Will you have any
music, gentlemen?'"
Finally, in Gosson's "Short Apologie of the Schoole of Abuse," 1587,
we find that "London is so full of unprofitable pipers and fiddlers,
that a man can no sooner enter a tavern, than two or three cast of
them hang at his heels, to give him a dance before he depart." These
men sang ballads and catches as well. Also they played during dinner.
Lyly says--"Thou need no more send for a fidler to a feast, than a
beggar to a fair."
All this leads to the just conclusion, that if ever a country deserved
to be called 'musical,' that country was England, in the 16th and 17th
centuries. King and courtier, peasant and ploughman, each could 'take
his part,' with each music was a part of his daily life; while so far
from being above knowing the difference between a minim and a
crotchet, a gentleman would have been ashamed not to know it.
In this respect, at any rate, the 'good old days' were indeed better
than those that we now see. Even a _public-house song_ in Elizabeth's
day was a canon in three parts, a thing which could only be managed
'first time through' nowadays by the very first rank of professional
singers.