Dixie's Land.
The following fanciful and ingenious interpretation of "Dixie" is sent us by a lady correspondent:
[for the Dispatch.]
the Enigma Solved.
"The owner of the copy-right of Dixie's Land has realized $4,000 by the sale of that song." This item of intelligence, which has gone the rounds of the newspapers, excited some surprise in the minds of those who simply consider Dixie's Land a song like other songs. "The air is pretty enough," they say, "but the words — why, they are perfectly absurd!
What can have given it such a sale?" Do you not know, questioner, that Dixie's Land has become the "National Anthem of Secession?" That it is called for in Southern Theatres, and received with cheers and applause, while Hail Columbia and the Star Spangled Banner are hissed down? What though it was composed by a Northern man? Did not Baptiste Lulli compose "God save the King," in honor of Louis the Fourteenth, and was not that splendid Anthem stolen, re-arranged, and anglicised for the glorification of "Great George, our King," by Handel? Why, Yankee Doodle itself was written, air and words, by a surgeon in the British army, during the Revolution, to express his supreme contempt for the Americans. But the Yankees captured the tune and aggravated the mortification of their baffled oppressors by playing it to them — reminding them that their defeat was sustained at the hands of an enemy whom they had contemptuously derided. Dixie's Land, then, belongs to the South by right of seizure, as do the forts, the arsenals, the mints, taken from the General Government by the seceding States.
And the words of that song. With feelings of unaffected hesitation and genuine reverence do I approach the discussion of this delicate subject. I crave the earnest attention of all true Southerners to the great discovery I am about to make public. That poem, lightly denounced as "meaningless" and "absurd" by unimaginative Submissionists and taunting Republicans — that poem is an allegorical prophecy, quelling suspicion of its true character by apparent literalness, but in reality profound, exact and awe-inspiring as the mysterious oracles of ancient sibyls, the wonderful "second-sight" revelations of Thomas the Rhymer and other Caledonian seers, or the still more amazing predictions of Merlin, which, delivered in King Arthur's time, are being even now fulfilled in England.
I do not speak unadvisedly or without being able to bring ample proof of the truth of my assertion. A very cursory examination of the song itself will be sufficient to convince any unprejudiced mind of its allegorical shape; and when it is considered that the words were composed more than a year ago, when the events to which it so evidently refers were yet in the womb of the future, and the man, whose star has now risen triumphantly above the political horizon, had scarcely been heard of beyond his own narrow circle, its prophetic character will appear undeniable.
To begin the analysis: The first verse simply, but forcibly, recalls to the mind of a Southerner on a foreign shore, "his own, his native land," where his childhood's happy days were spent; where the endearing ties of memory and association are still remembered; and then in the spirit of Allan Cunningham's well-known lines:--
‘ "It's hame, hame, hame, that I fain would be — Hame, hame, hame, in my ain countrie;"
’
the chorus bursts forth with a passionate wish to return to this beloved motherland; an earnest resolve to live and die in her bosom. This first verse is literal, and serves as a further mask to the obscurities which follow.
Now begins the allegory:
‘ "Old mistress married Will, the Weaver, William he was a gay deceiver-- Look away — look away, look away, Dixie Land!"
’
Here is wisdom. The figurative "old mistress" is Columbia, no longer, alas! a happy land, who, with blind confidence, places her fate in the hands of — of whom? Who is the second metaphorical personage? No other than Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States. The significant title, "Weaver," has been, from time immemorial, applied to spiders, and from them transferred to politicians--"weavers" of cunning plots.
The name, William, is added partly for the sake of alliteration, and partly (as in Scriptural prophecies dynasties are mentioned as single kings,) to unite into one person, influenced by the same motives, resolved to carry out the same line of conduct, the President and his principal adviser, his guiding spirit, whose given name, singularly enough it really is, and in a secondary sense, the whole Republican party is implied by that phrase.
This artful schemer's moral character is then summed up in one comprehensive phrase, which needs no comment; and the Southland is entreated to turn away her eyes from the sad spectacle of misplaced confidence — of affection doomed to base betrayal. Next follows a terse description of the fierceness of his countenance — the outward sign of a ferocious and pitiless disposition.
"This face was as sharp," &c.
The dark threats of coming storm — the warnings of approaching danger, which alarm all around her, are unnoticed, unfeared by the infatuated Columbia. And again the chorus peals out that longing patriotic cry — again avows that bold determination to stand by our altars and our fires — to die, if fate wills it, for our sunny land.
Sudden and awful is Columbia's awakening from her dream of peace and repose, when she is irrevocably in the power of her terrible master, whose very smile is as dreadful as the flash of a cannon. Aye! look a way, hapless children of a doomed mother! In her is no help! Protect yourselves! Raise your own banner! Keep your oft-reiterated vow to stand fast by your laws and liberties!
And then comes the catastrophe. Cold and pale, at last, lies the noble form of Columbia, victim of an ill-assorted union, of infatuated trust in designing politicians. Sadly to the sky still rises the wailing refrain--
‘ "Look away,--look away,--look away, Dixie Land."
’
But for us who survive, better days are dawning, Secessia, benignant goddess! smiles on our standard and stretches her protecting ægis over us. In the concluding couplet of the lay with which she has inspired her chosen bard, (for he "builded better than he knew, " and but dimly understood the vast import of his verses,) she assumes the protection of the South,--not only of the States who first invoked her aid, but of all others who may join them. A mistress of a different stamp from Columbia will this new protectress be. No divided counsels, no clashing interests mark her regime. Her cool-headed statesmen will legislate with dignified wisdom in the halls of her Capitol. Her soldiers, whose fame is above suspicion, and her sagacious and experienced military engineers, will guard her well-fortified coasts. Where is the doomed foe who shall dare attack them?
‘ "Now, here's a health to the next old Missus And to all the gals that want to kiss us!"
’
Virginia! Kentucky! Tennessee! Will you not join your sisters? Do you not yearn to bestow upon them an embrace of sisterly love? Will you not fly from the baleful sway of William the Weaver, and take refuge in Secessia's open arms?
‘ "in Dixie's Land take up your stand, To live and die in Dixie."
’
Can any one now fail to see that, in the verses of this deservedly popular song, an epitome is given of the events which, since last November, have shaken this land? The election of Lincoln, the decay and dismemberment of the United States, the threats of civil war, and the rise of a new power in the South, are all foretold, and even an invitation to join this nascent empire extended to the surrounding States! The most skeptical must at least confess that these verses contain such an extraordinary series of coincidences as was never before heaped together by the hand of chance.
There are those, we are told, in Secessia's own domain — some even in the eloquent Preston's gallant little State--who doubt Secessia's infallibility, and secretly acknowledge the Weaver's right to rule over them, though public opinion obliges them to wrap their views in such a mantle of dubiously as this adapted epigram expresses:
‘ "God bless our President the South's defender!
God bless — no harm in blessing the Pretender!
Which that pretender is — Davis or Lincoln, bless us all!--is quite another thing!"
’
(Pardon, shade of Byrom!)
Surely, these double-dealing malcontents cannot now listen to the spirit-stirring strains of Dixie, or recall the immortal verse to which that noble air is united, without yielding to the conviction that Secessia must be, because she was foretold. Let them, then, throw off the hateful mask, cast aside all doubts, all fears, and bravely espouse the good cause.
May Secessia's real character, her aims and tendencies, become widely known, as they deserve to be; and may the great people of the Southern and the Border States join heart and hand to resist the wiles of scheming politicians, who would betray and enslave them.
