being made on every hand in the South indicate that if the present-day folk-songs of the negro are to be preserved, they must be collected now. Should they be permitted to become a lost record of the race? In the present work some of the popular songs that are current among the negroes of the Southern States are given. They are highly representative. They may be classified into two general divisions: The religious songs or spirituals, and the secular songs. The secular songs are again divided into two classes, the general social songs, and work-songs, phrases and "shanties". For the most part collections of negro folk-songs in the past have been limited to the old spirituals. The present-day religious songs and the social productions are equally interesting and valuable. The particular nature and characteristics of these songs are discussed in connection with the examples. They are flexible and have various forms, they consist of broken and unbroken melodies, they have stately and rapid minor cadences. Musical notes can give only a skeleton of the real melody that accompanies the words; the peculiar qualification of the negro singers to render their melodies defies art to exactly symbolize it. The words of the songs are given as they are sung, and the reader must needs employ an imagination kindred in vividness to that which is reflected in the songs themselves if he would comprehend their essential qualities. The characteristic quality is often found in an improvised arrangement of words which makes the dominant feeling that of mingling words and cadencies successfully. The meaningless phrases and refrains do not hinder the expression of feeling through the minor chords. Simple emotion, inherent melody, and colloquial language are combined with fine and differentiating imagery and humor in an under-meaning common to the folk-song. An element of melancholia may be felt underlying many of the songs. But with all alike, vigor of expression, concreteness and naturalness of mental imagery, and simplicity of language and thought are combined with striking folk-art. The negro's projective mental imagery assumes that the hearer's comprehension can easily grasp the full picture of description, moral maxims, and dramatic dialogues, all combined in a single verse, and that he can do it without confusion. Here may be seen much of the naked essence of poetry with unrefined language which reaches for the negro a power of expression far beyond that which any modern refinement of language and thought may approach. Rhythm, rhyme, and the feeling of satisfaction are accompanying inherent qualities. The natural poetic spirit and the power of the imagination in the negro are worthy of study.