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STORIES OF
above, and after the lapse of sixty years an inci-dent may get entangled with something else. Payne was a personal and intimate friend of Kemble's, and it does not seem at all probable that he would permit any one but the author to hack about the piece he was producing.
Before continuing with Payne's life/let me explain the origin of the melody, as related by the late Charles Mackay, who wrote to a Lon-don paper a long letter on the subject, affirming distinctly that Sir Henry Bishop did compose the air. Said Dr. Mackay," During the process of our (Sir Henry's and his own) work on the National Melodies of England, I was thrown into friendly and constant intercourse with that gentleman. During one of our many conversa-tions on well-known English melodies, I took occasion to ask for information on the subject of'Home, Sweet Home,'the authorship of which was often attributed to him and as often denied by many who claimed it as a national Sicilian air which Sir Henry had disinterred and re-arranged. He thereupon favoured me with the whole history. He had been engaged in his early manhood by the once eminent firm of Gouldmg, D'Almaine and Co., musical pub-lishers, of Soho Square, to edit a collection of National Melodies of all countries. In the
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