t they forgot to criticise; and, after
recovering from what seemed a trance of delight, they could only say
that this "music of the heart" was beyond the touch of criticism.

I have spoken of the origin and the character of these songs. Those
who so charmingly interpreted them deserve most particular notice. The
rendering of the Jubilee Singers, it is true, was not always strictly
in accordance with artistic forms. The songs did not require this; for
they possessed in themselves a peculiar power, a plaintive, emotional
beauty, and other characteristics which seemed entirely independent of
artistic embellishment. These characteristics were, with a most
refreshing originality, naturalness, and soulfulness of voice and
method, fully developed by the singers, who sang with all their might,
yet with most pleasing sweetness of tone.

But, as regards the judgment passed upon this "Jubilee melody" from a
high musical stand-point, I quote from a very good authority; viz.,
Theo. F. Seward of Orange, N.J.:--

"It is certain that the critic stands completely disarmed in
their presence. He must not only recognize their immense
power over audiences which include many people of the
highest culture, but, if he be not entirely incased in
prejudice, he must yield a tribute of admiration on his own
part, and acknowledge that these songs touch a chord which
the most consummate art fails to reach. Something of this
result is doubtless due to the singers as well as to their
melodies. The excellent rendering of the Jubilee Band is
made more effective, and the interest is intensified, by the
comparison of their former state of slavery and degradation
with the present prospects and hopes of their race, which
crowd upon every listener's mind during the singing of their
songs; yet the power is chiefly in the songs themselves."

It would not do, of course, to assume that to the almost matchless
beauty of the songs and their rendering was due alone the intense
interest that centred in these singers. They were on a _noble
mission_. They sang to build up education in the blighted land in
which they themselves and millions more had so long drearily plodded
in ignorance; and it was a most striking and yet pleasing exhibition
of poetic justice, when many of those who really, in a certain sense,
had been parties to their enslavement, were forced to pay tribute to
the signs of geni