Of the ballads we need say little. Strangely enough not one of them is of the finest quality, or truly representative of Schubert, except that one which was the first of his songs to be published, and one of the half dozen to be most widely known--the ‘Erl King.’ It is strange, and disappointing, when we consider the perfection of this early attempt, that Schubert left the ballad, one of the most attractive of song forms, to his contemporary, Löwe, a man who had not a tenth part of his talent. ‘The King of Thule’ is one of the best of the remainder, but it is immensely surpassed by Liszt’s setting. The ‘Fisher Boy’ is charming, but being in the strophic form, is no contribution to the development of the form. ‘The Young Nun,’ fine as it is, is too rhetorical to satisfy a true lover of Schubert. In his more declamatory style Schubert often fails even to be interesting. ‘The Singer,’ to words by Goethe, is workmanly declamation such as any man of talent might have written. The Ossian songs, of which ‘Kolma’s Complaint’ is the best, reflect the somewhat strained verbosity of the words, and fail to convince with their beauty. The same is true of Schubert’s setting to Klopstock’s scena, ‘Hermann and Thusnelda.’ Pomp and circumstance drown out the music. For the true Schubert we must leave the larger forms and return to the shorter lyrics, which reveal the composer’s highest glory--the greatest beauty in the simplest terms. VI The writing of songs during Schubert’s time, and immediately before, was carried on on an amazing scale. It is not unusual to find composers of the time writing thousands of them. These songs have practically vanished from modern song-programs. But many of them were extremely popular at the time, and remain staples in the repertories of singing societies. Not a few of them have become folk-songs second to none in popularity. The simple form of most of these little lyrics almost precludes their having any importance in the history of song development, but it would be a pity if they were lost altogether to the student of singing.