Music
Songs &c Collected in India The Music Arranged for the Guitar and Affectionately dedicated to Elizabeth Norman. June 3rd 1816. 4to, half green leather, a.e.g.; pp. [2 (title, dedication)], 134 (blank pages with ruled five-line staves bearing music), [9 (music)], [3 (two page index, blank)]; likely contemporary Japanese ink-wash of a seated man on yellow paper laid down on upper pastedown.
Despite the title this is not a collection of Indian melodies but rather folk songs, ballads, dances and regimental quick-steps (the latter suggesting the compiler was with the British Army in India). The music includes settings of poems (like Curran's "Deserter's Lamentation") and traditional numbers like "Oh Dear What Can the Matter Be?", along with the quick marches of the 4th East York Local Militia and the 14th Regiment (although this does not appear to be "�a ira"). The music is carefully and clearly transcribed, with words where appropriate, and bears the subtle variations which suggest collection from players and singers, not from the fixed example of written scores. The book is a labour of love, capturing ephemeral experience for a friend or lover, and in doing so shows us now the nature of entertainment in the early 19th century.