The ball-room was filled with Fashion's throng,
It shone with a thousand lights,

And there was a woman who passed along,

The fairest of all the sights.

A girl to her lover then softly sighed,

'There's riches at her command.'

'But she's married for wealth, not for love,' he cried—
"Though she lives in a mansion grand-

'She's only a bird in a gilded cage,

A beautiful sight to see,

You may think she's happy and free from care,

She's not, though she seems to be.

'Tis sad when you think of her wasted life,

For youth cannot mate with age,

And her beauty was sold for an old man's gold,

She's a bird in a gilded cage.'

Then there are satiric songs, of which Beautiful Home on Hire

is a fair sample:

A few weeks ago I decided

To marry the girl of my heart,
Among other things I'd forgotten
Was getting the home for a start.
But where there's a will there's a way,

So I very soon had my desire,

Paid half a quid down an' a shilling a week
For a beautiful home-on Hire.

Chorus

For a beautiful rickety table,
Beautiful bandy chairs?

Beautiful bedstead that won't stand up,

So we're sleeping on the stairs.

Chest of drawers walked out of doors

As soon as we lit the fire

Beautiful Home, Beautiful Home,

Beautiful Home on Hire.

And we have in What Can I do for You? a farcical song, the sheer absurdity and ludicrousness of which compel a laugh:

I'm a quack with a medicinal pack

And a clack like a mother-in-law;
You, maybap, have seen me in a trap,
With a map and a cyclone jaw.

If you have asthma-as-pagaster,

I've got a remedy to cure you;

Aniseed, linseed, proceed, succeed

Fifteen drops on a little bit of duckweed-
It's a marvel, I assure you.

Chorus

Then what can I do for you to-day?

To look at your looks, I'm sorry to say,

You're troubled with ri-to-loo-ral-ay,

That hurts your parley-voo.

There is not much demand for sentimental songs. They occupy a small place in the programme of a night's entertainment at a music-hall, and are not applauded by the audience with that heartiness which greets the low-comedy songs. These sentimental ballads are written by a class of professional song-writers, with, perhaps, more knowledge of the rules of syntax and the laws of harmony than those who supply the comic element.

For the Children's Sake is an average specimen of the pathetic sentimental:

A mother was sitting in silence and grief,
Thinking of days past and gone,
Happy and peaceful days ne'er to return,
Well might she look all forlorn.

To save her old father from ruin-disgrace,
In marriage her poor heart was sold,
To a villain, a gambler, a drunkard, a brute,
Who wanted not her, but her gold.
Cruel and wretched was her wedded life,
Still as a mother, a true faithful wife.

Chorus.

For the children's sake,

She toils on day by day
Working her fingers to the bone,
Wearing her young life away.

So it will be till she falls asleep,

Never again to wake;

For she bears her cross like a mother true,
For the children's sake.

From mansion to garret-such now is her home,
A mattress of straw her bed,

No kind friend has she to cheer her lone heart
Since her loved father is dead;

Now over her needle she pauses to wipe

The bitter salt tear from her eye,

While two little mites whisper low in her ear-
'Dear mamma, oh pray do not cry.'

Fondly she kisses them, turns up the light,

And once more tries to look cheerful and bright.

Chorus-For the children's sake, &c.

The hour of midnight has long ago chimed,
Still that poor woman sits there,
Plying her needle and thread to a shirt,

For but an existence bare;

Tho' scarcely inside of those feverish lips

Had she tasted food all that day,

But still for the loved ones she worked bravely on,
Determined she would not give way:

Till, worn out, she falls asleep o'er the seams,

And the last button sews on-but in dreams.

Chorus-For the children's sake, &c.

The success of the average sentimental song, extolling in its own tawdry fashion the domestic joys and tragedies of the humble, depends more on the air to which it is set than on the words. If it has a catching melody to waltz time, with a strain of melancholy, it becomes popular; but if it relies mainly upon its sentiments, no matter how excellent morally, or how well expressed they may be, it has but a brief existence on the music-hall stage and is never sung in the streets on Saturday nights. No doubt the lofty sentiments and stilted language of these effusions with their gloss of art, ring false and unreal in the rude ears of the people.

The verses of these music-hall poets are first printed on slips of

paper of the most vivid colour, and sold at twenty or two dozen a penny, by hawkers to the crowds waiting outside the cheap parts of the music-halls for the opening of the doors. Subsequently, collections of the most popular of them are brought out in sheets, which are sold at a penny also. Both the slips and the sheets have an immense circulation. Thus the people obtain the words of the latest music-hall songs; and the airs they pick up in the music-halls or from the barrel-organs in the streets. The life of a popular musichall song is fleeting, but not more so, perhaps, than a popular novel. For a few months it is sung by the people in their homes and at their outings on holidays. Its air is the favourite melody of every barrel-organ in the kingdom. Long before its words and its music have lost their fascination for the working-classes they become a terrible infliction to the general public. In time, however, the song becomes, from repetition, a sheer horror, even to those who on its first appearance fell most completely under its sway. Indeed, a stage of aversion so acute is reached that a street gamin would run the risk of being murdered if he were to whistle a bar, or sing a stave, of a music-hall song which a few months before made every heart throb with excitement.

But while their vogue lasts, the lines of these music-hall songs are familiar on a million lips. In this respect at least the unread poets of the intellectual classes might well be envious of these humble wooers of the music-hall Muses. There is, however, one advantage which the higher poets enjoy. The intellectual classes are intimately acquainted not only with the names of their poets, but with their personal appearance, their habits and family life, thanks to social tittle-tattle, the literary gossip of the newspapers, and the enterprise of the illustrated journals, although, whatever knowledge theymay possess of the works of these poets is usually obtained mainly from reading a few criticisms in the Press. On the other hand the people are profoundly acquainted with the works of their poets, but they know nothing of the poets personally. The names of the writers of the music-hall songs are given in the printed collections of these effusions, but the people heed them not. In their minds the songs are associated solely with the vocalists who sing them in the music-halls. 'Sir,' said Dr. Johnson, referring to Kenrick the critic, he is one of the many who have made themselves public without making themselves known.' Such is the position of the poets of the people. It is not, however, for glory they write, but for a subsistence. This indeed is fame,' cried one on receiving a guinea for a song, when he expected only five shillings and a drink.

MICHAEL MACDONAGH.

THE GROWTH OF THE JAPANESE NAVY

THE naval reputation of Japan is now firmly established in England, and it is recognised, both by our own officers and by the limited. portion of the public which bestows intelligent attention on the subject, that, in the Japanese navy, we find ships, officers, and men, worthy, in homogeneity of design, construction, and armament, in fighting strength, in bravery and professional skill, to take their place in the foremost fighting line, alongside the best ships of our own navy, against any adversary or combination of adversaries in the world with which we can ever be brought into collision. Last year an object lesson was afforded to us in the visit of two powerful cruisers to take part in the naval celebrations in honour of his Majesty's Coronation, and they presented no unworthy appearance among the warships of all naval powers in the world that assembled at Spithead. Lately, the illustrated papers have contributed to give us some idea of the fleet reviewed a few months ago at Kobe by the Emperor, the largest fleet that has ever at any time assembled in Far Eastern waters, one of the largest, perhaps, that has ever been assembled in any waters. From time to time, Londoners have had the opportunities of seeing for themselves and forming their own opinions of the sturdy Japanese bluejackets while holiday making in the streets, either in small groups or in large bodies visiting such entertainments as the Military Tournament, when they marched from the docks in formal array under the command of their own officers. Ships and men have alike met with high admiration, the enthusiastic encomiums passed on both by experts have been heartily endorsed by unprofessional onlookers, and unqualified assent given by all to the proposition that we have an ally, the efficiency of whose co-operation in naval warfare can be as confidently relied on as the faith of the Japanese Government in observing the stipulations of the treaty to which it has given its solemn assent. Apart from satisfaction at the substantial benefit which that alliance undoubtedly gives to us, all Englishmen may well take a pride in the rapid development and present efficiency of the Japanese navy. Many of the most powerful ships composing it have been built in England, and it may surprise some to learn that the work done in private