“‘Yankee Doodle came to town For to buy a firelock: We will tar and feather him, And so we will John Hancock.’ “The similarity of the first lines of the above two examples, and the term ‘feather’ in the third line, seem to mark in the latter some knowledge of the former precedent. As, however, other writers have confirmed their early knowledge of ‘Lydia Locket,’ such as, “‘Lydy Locket lost her pocket In a rainy shower,’ &c., we seem led to the choice of reconciling them severally with each other. We conclude, therefore, that the Cavaliers, when they originally composed ‘Nankee Doodle,’ may have set it to the jig-tune of ‘Lydia Fisher,’ to make it the more offensive to the Puritans. In this view it was even possible for the British officer at Albany, in 1755, as a man skilled in music, to have before heard of the old ‘Nankee Doodle,’ and to have renewed it on that occasion. That the air was uniformly deemed a good retort on British royalists, we must be confirmed in from the fact that it was played by us at the battle of Lexington when repelling the foe, again at the surrender of Burgoyne, and finally at Yorktown surrender, when Lafayette, who ordered the tune, meant it as a retort on an intended affront.” The following is the first verse in the original _American_ Yankee Doodle song:— “Yankee Doodle, keep it up, Do it neat and handy: The boy to flog the British troops Is Yankee Doodle Dandy.” _HAIL COLUMBIA._ The following is Judge Hopkinson’s own account of the origin of “Hail Columbia:”—