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STORIES OF
one age to another, and that is all Had it not been for Madame Poitrine, the wife of a Picardy farmer, who used it as a lullaby for the infant Dauphin at the Court of Versailles, the song would have died out. Marie Antoinette took a fancy to her baby's cradle song, and sung it herself, and " Malbrouck s'en va-t-en guerre" was soon heard in Versailles, Paris, and later throughout the length and breadth of France. Beaucharchais introduced it in his " Mariage de Figaro" in 1784, and the melody greatly con-tributed to the popularity of that opera. It was then constantly introduced into French vaude-villes. Beethoven used it in his Battle Sym-phony in 1813 as symbolical of the French army. It is well known on this side of the Channel as " We won't go Home till Morning/' and " For He's a Jolly Good Fellow." The piece was made the subject of an opera bouffe in four acts, with words by Siraudin and Bus-nach, and music by Bizet, Jonas Legonix, and Delibes, which was brought out at the Athence, December 13th, 1867. So far Grove's "Dic-tionary." But the " Chanson de Malbrouck" is some hundreds of years older than the song that Madame Poitrine, the Dauphin's wet nurse, sang at Versailles. A writer in the" Dictionnaire Universel" gives not only the melody, but the
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