“Greensleeves” is probably an “art” tune and not strictly folk-music. Hence in its passage downwards it has gradually got stripped of some of its subtilty, as it has been chiefly passed onward by tradition. This change will be noted further on. Other tunes that, coming from remote antiquity, still find a welcome with the people are, “John Anderson my Jo,” and “Scots wha hae,” while “Lillibulero,” and “Boyne Water,” though of lesser age, fall into the same category. We have even taken to our hearts tunes of other nationalities, and perhaps have more French airs among our popular music than of any other country. As every student of national song knows, “We won’t go home till morning” is but “Malbrook,” the favourite of Marie Antoinette, who learned it from the peasant woman called in to nurse her first child. “Ah vous dirai je” is known as “Baa baa black sheep” in every nursery, while “In my cottage near a wood” is a literal translation from an old French song to its proper tune. Such of these, or of this class, as are not folk-tunes have the same spirit, and it is this indefinable quality that causes folk-music to be so tenacious of existence. If it be good enough it is almost impossible for it to die and be totally forgotten. A tune may lie dormant for half a century, but it rises again and has its period of renewed popularity. One might name many a music-hall air, over which the people have for a period gone half wild, that is merely a resuscitation of a tune that has pleased a former generation. Thus such airs pass through strata of widely differing thought and mode of life. It is folk-music that appeals to the bed-rock temperament of the people. Artificial music can only do so to a culture, which may change its standards with a change of thought, and that which is the applauded of one generation becomes the despised of a succeeding one; musical history can furnish many such examples. These facts justify our appreciation of folk-music and elevate its study. I. DEFINITION The word “folk-song” is so elastic in definition that it has been freely used to indicate types of song and melody that greatly differ from each other. The word conveys a different signification to different people, and writers have got sadly confused from this circumstance. Even the word “song” has not a fixed meaning, for it can imply both a lyric with its music, and the words of the lyric only.