"We often hear of the music being _wedded_ to the words of a song, and it is very curious to find so wonderfully neat and perfect a metaphor being used by people who are far from suspecting its perfection. This is in fact, precisely what takes place when a good song is composed--the music is _wedded_ to the verse, though the expression is often used by those who think that the music has nothing to do but to express again, more forcibly perhaps, whatever feeling is expressed by the verse, who think, in other words, that the music is enslaved, not wedded, to the poetry. "But music is not restricted to the expression of the feeling of certain verses or of any other feeling or feelings. The poetry and the music have each their independent character and their measure of independent beauty, and this independent beauty and character is in no sense destroyed by the union. The music has far more to do than merely express again or emphasise whatever feeling is expressed by the verse. It may accompany the verse, adorn the verse, brighten the verse, show up the character of the verse in a new light, and, in turn, be much improved by the association; but on the other hand, if destitute of independent beauty, the music can never become beautiful by being _wedded_ to something. "It will now have become clear, what according to the view of music that I have endeavoured to explain, is the task of a song composer. He has far more to do than to express again in tones the feeling of the song. He has to furnish a composition that, in the first place, has life; and, in the domain of art, to have life is to have beauty. "Secondly, it must have no incompatibility of temperament with the text, but must be such as can once for all be wedded to the text with happy results. "It is needless to say that a composer who takes this view, or has a subconscious appreciation of the facts on which this view is based, will not, if he cares for his text, be satisfied with the first outworn rubbish that comes to hand, by way of musical setting. He will regret whatever is totally wanting in naturalness and freshness. "He will not, like the composer of drawing-room ballads, capture some wretched cadence, threadbare with much use, and trick it out, dragging up the melody into long high notes, crowing and shouting as though he had discovered America, whereas all he has really discovered is an old shoe lying by the roadside that once, perhaps, belonged to a prince, but after being stolen by the valet was given to a beggar, and so through a succession of beggars, the last of whom left it by the side of the high road."