this song tells me
that the chorus, "So we'll trot along O," was so descriptive, both in
words and music, that one had from it all the sensations of a "joult."

Harry Clifton seems to have had three distinct lines--the comic song, of
which "Pretty Polly Perkins" may be considered the best example; the
Irish song; and the Motto song, inculcating a sweet reasonableness and
content amid life's many trials and tribulations. Although, no doubt,
such optimism was somewhat facile, it cannot be denied that a little
dose of silver-lining advice, artfully concealed in the jam of a good
tune and a humorous twist of words, does no harm and may have a
beneficial effect. The chorus of "A Motto for Every Man," for example,
runs thus:

We cannot all fight in this battle of life,
The weak must go to the wall.
So do to each other the thing that is right,
For there's room in this world for us all.

An easy sentiment; but sufficient people in the sixties were attracted
by it to flock to hear Harry Clifton all over England and Ireland, and
it is probable that most came away with momentarily expanded bosoms, and
a few were stimulated to follow its precepts.

Looking down this remarkable list of titles and first lines--which may
be only a small portion of Harry Clifton's output--I am struck by his
cleanliness and sanity. His record was one of which he might well be
proud, and I think that old Fletcher of Saltoun, who had views on the
makers of a nation's ballads, would probably have clapped him on the
back.

Another thing. If many of the tunes to these songs are as good as that
to "Polly Perkins," Harry Clifton's golden treasury should be worth
mining. The songs of yesterday, when revived, strike one as being very
antiquated, and the songs of the day before yesterday also rarely bear
the test; but what of the songs of the sixties? Might their melodies not
strike freshly and alluringly on the ear to-day? Another, and to-day a
better known, Harry--Harry Lauder--whose tunes are always good, has
confided to an interviewer that he finds them for the most part in old
traditional collections, and gives them new life. He is wise. John
Stuart Mill's fear that the combinations of the notes of the piano might
be used up was probably fantastic, but the arrival of the luckless day
would at any rate be delayed if we revived tunes that were old enough
for that process; and why should not the works of Harry Clifton be
examined for