Although they cannot, of course, find their place as "symbols," inasmuch as music cannot be said to assume an outward and bodily form, yet the "patriotic hymns," as they are called, which are to be heard upon all occasions, by day and by night, screamed discordantly in chorus by a people that vaunts its musical capabilities, but invariably sings out of tune,--shouted by groups of workmen, assuming the nature of a very inharmonious glee in knots,--yelled at the top of voices in quartets, duos, and trios of wandering _gamins_,--screeched in ear-rending solos,--whistled by workmen,--bawled by little children, hummed by women, or played on hand-organs on the boulevards, and hunting-horns at the street corners,--may be also taken as expressions of sentiments. The "_Marseillaise_" is accepted as a traditionary musical accompaniment of all liberal, and especially republican revolutionary movements in France. As the revolutionary movement is incontestible, and as the establishment of the republic is looked upon as a _fait accompli_, nothing can be said upon its being chorussed incessantly,--much as, internally, many a musical ear may flinch from the torture committed upon it by the hideous disharmony of its executors,--much as the words may be repulsive to many feelings, and appear senseless in the mouths of the citizens of a republic established upon a basis of peace and order--much as many a heart may beat painfully, the flesh creep with a shudder upon many a body, and the hair stand on an end on many a head, on hearing that fearful melody, however finely it may be composed, which recalls to so many a mind the horrors of past days--scenes of pikes supporting bleeding heads, a parent dead upon the scaffold, or a narrow personal escape from death. But the Marseillaise has in general been accepted as the symbolical hymn of the republic, and people "make up their minds to it." The newly-composed hymn of the Girondins, as it is called, affords little cause for horror and dismay, more especially as it has been taken from a drama, in which the terrors of the first revolution have been placed upon the stage with a truth and force of nature sufficient to cause every soul that witnesses them to shudder with apprehension, at the barest thought of their possible return. The eternal recurrence at all times to the ear of the words, "_Mourir pour la patrie, c'est le sort le plus digne d'envie_," may raise a smile when heard from such mouths as often chorus it about, or may again appear an anomaly in the character officially assumed by the present republic--but the Girondin hymn is connected with no thought of past evil or of living terror. Both these melodies, then, are accepted without any repugnance, except the repugnance that the wearied ear must feel at hearing the same notes dinned into it at all times, in all places, and with every species of disharmony. But there are other melodies, from which the better-thinking mass draws back with horror