The ‘Children’s Crusade’ and the ‘Children of Bethlehem’ are ‘mysteries,’ but not in the sense of Debussy’s impressionistic _Martyre_, or Hahn’s mediæval Christmas ‘Miracle.’ The ‘Children’s Crusade’ has been set to a libretto after Marcel Schwob’s poetic story; the ‘Children at Bethlehem,’ to a poem by Gabriel Nigond. Both scores are musically full of color and rich in pictorial detail, employing the folk-song thematically. Their great effect lies in the introduction of the children’s chorus as a strong factor in the musical development of the oratorio. The criticism has been made,[90] in particular with regard to the ‘Children’s Crusade,’ that the picturesque mingling of male choruses, female choruses, solo voices, humming choruses, echo choruses, voices from above and from the distance, together with the choruses of children and full orchestra in a succession of nerve-stimulating episodes, seems due to deliberate calculation, speculating on the emotional and nervous sensibility of the general public, and that as a consequence the music lacks genuine intimacy and warmth. Be this as it may, the composer has been superlatively successful in creating works whose performance awakens widespread pleasure and appreciation. In _Saint-François d’Assisi_, set to a poem by Gabriel Nigond after ‘The Little Flowers of St. Francis,’ Pierné again uses Christian legendary material. His music portrays, with less of austere dignity and serious depth than Tinel’s famous ‘Franciscus,’ yet with a more melodious facility of touch, the life-cycle of the sermonizer of the birds and founder of the order which bears his name. Like its predecessors, it has much spiritual charm and delicacy of expression; as in them, the standpoint of tonal effect is kept well in view and--another resemblance--the score has been successful, though not, perhaps, in the same degree as the others. Still, Pierné’s writing has not the dramatic power and individual flavor to be found in the works of some of his _confrères_. II Notable among these is Florent Schmitt, a pupil of Gabriel Fauré (who, by the way, has contributed to French choral literature some charming shorter works--_La naissance de Vénus_, _Les Djinns_, and _Madrigal_). _Danse des Devadesis_ is especially notable for brilliant color and subtly suggestive rhythms. Florent Schmitt’s _Tragédie de Salomé_ in its symphonic form is well known to the American concert-goer, but the same cannot be said of his ‘Psalm XLVII,’ for orchestra, organ, chorus and solo voices, though it exists in an edition with English text, and is a musically distinctive and original work. Its keynote is praise and joy, and it bids ‘the people clap their hands’ and proclaims that ‘the fields of the earth belong to the Lord’ with real dramatic effect and vigor.