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Breathes There The Man (H H Clutten) [2.75Mb playing time 1:57 mins]
The music was written to accompany a tenor (I think) voice. I didn't risk performing it myself, so i scored the lead for cello,
but because it pretty much followed the top line of the piano, it added nothing to the piece, so I scrapped it.
There is no date on the sheet music, but the publisher's 'By Special Appointment' announcement would seem to put it between 1873 and 1901.
Following an eight bar intro, the lyric is a well known excerpt from Scott's "The Lay of the Last Minstrel" (he should be so lucky)
nb. pelf n. Wealth or riches, especially when dishonestly acquired.
"Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
(If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;)
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung."
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