About The Peace Jubilee

Boston, Mass., July I, 1872. Fbif.xd Poxd : - Would you like an echo of the " Jubilee times 'i " Next to seuing and hoariug roraarkable things ig listming to the description of them from pornon.il acquaintunces. lit'ineuiberiug tliis, I m led to sond you my impr. ssions of scsne and doings ub: ut Boton during these swelteriug, excited days. The first aTid greatest center of interest is, of couree, the great ïuusiunl CHrnival, bora of the braiii of a Boston band-leader, and now in a tage of glorious and asjurud sucocis. The spirit aud excitement of Gilmore 's " Peace Jubiloe " pervades eyery gtratum of society, every line of basinesj, and erery breaih of uir. The wtrole neighborhood of Boston, for at least ICO miles, is moved by one common impulse to see and hear and learn of th doings of this greatest of mmictil tetes. An effort that can draw forty to gixty thousand people from their rooi retrents daily for three weeks in succossion is not only an extraordinary but au inspirin occasion, An overmnstering influcnce wbicb maltes tbe feeblo and the sluifish goek wearines and effort, and dust, and perspiration, ar.d jamming, and even dangers, to compás an' esperience wliich probably will nerer come to thom again. Twico I have joined the well-dressed crowd which urges daily down Tremont street, au.l suffre!l iu ysclf to be engulfed in the majUtroia of uumitnity wbiuh eddies aruund and into that vast recptacle of porspiring human beinjjs which they cali the Coliseura. Saturday, June 29th, was " Oiln.ore's day " - that is, the day of Gilmore'8 "benefit" The hoor of the daily concert is 3 p. M. The san had rist-n unclouded, and tho day wat ono of thoee truly tropical ones which send the mero ry up aniong the nineties. What a day for a crowd ! At 2 r. m. I looked for soma conveyanoe over the mile or inore of bnrning Btreet which separates tho Coliseum from the business part of Boston. Alieady every street car on Tremont and Washington streets was crcwded ; ditto of a dozen oiher sorts of vehicles, ranging frora the elegant hack to the stage and wagon, and eandry other mongrcl afiairg exteuiporized by Yankee proprietors to turn the occasion to their best advantage. I could not seo a single person securing a seat ; everything was already full und every standing-place was occupied. I bethought mym:lf to take a rohicle moving in the ojijxjuite direction and thus find myself in possession at the terminus of the route, but, lo ' iive thou-vind other people had had the same thought, and cars and wagons moving away from tbs Coliseum were quite as densely packed as those moving toward it. At times, however, I noticed that one aftnr another drojped from the platform to the grouud, surrondering a titanding-place in the steaniing crowd. üne of thno abandoned niches I dexterously appropriatod, and found myself, after sundry halts and breakdowna, in the vicinity of tho great building. I bad secured what is considered a good Seat in the parquet, where one geta comprehensivo a view au possible of the vastnesii of the aswrublMge of people. It is rain toivttempt to convoy in few words an adequate idoa of the spoctacle preBented by iiïty thousand jieople m.is-i-.l in o :■ a-Kfiui,l.ip', nndiT sucu circurostancüs as these. Tho building covers about four and two-thirds acres - that is, about one-eigthli ihü aroa of the Ufiiversity campus. The platform occupied by the solo performers and tho leaders is about half way botwoen the middlo and tbe end oceupied by the chorus of 20,000 voices. From this focus tho ruddy and ribboned heads of the singers risc in a concave semi-circle for one hundred and fifty feet like tho shelving beach of the sea. This shelving shore extends around the buii■' ding, and by being interruptcd over the i floor of the parquet oonstitutei a gallery broad enough for twenty-eight linea of seata. I made for myaelf a oalculatioa oa the seating capaoity of this enormous array of plain white benches, and convinoed myself that they would seat 55,000 peoplo. On Thureday last the standing room under the gállenos was orowded with at least 10,000 more. The sight of the aasemblago, viewed either as a spectacle or psychological phenomenon, is something never bo forgotten. Tho appliances for musical effeot aro anned on. a scalo of corrosponding vastess. Imaginé á chorus of 20,000 voice pouring forth with all their powerg, Mason's hymn " Prom Groenland's Icy Mountains," and then 20,000 more vcices joining theni from the audience. Imagino the nocompanimont of an organ broad onough to reach the wholo length of the Methodist Church, and with a power answering to j tg sizo, and you may be able to thinlc, iniellectuaUy, the magnitude of tho roluino of musical sound whioh agitatod tho air lapt Thureday. But of all domonstrations of musical power the - ' - ■■ vaam fe t m i t - i t i V ál 4 J K' j ím Í L fV nWi V&A W " Anvil Chorua " is probably the greatest ever produced. Here we have the roll of tho human chorus, the alternating screams und thunders of the stcam-driven organ, tho half wild runs and odd caprices of 2,000 orchestral instrumenta, the ringing of bella, the umiting cf one hundred anvils beaten by fifties, and last of all tho wrll-timed booming of two dozen oannon, expíoded by electricity from a keyboard played by tho organist. No words can convey any adequate idea of the deraonstration. Yet two things must be said, at both which you may feel a little surprise. ïirst, the noüé is not oppressive. Indeed you do not feel that it is great - you know it must be, but the amphitheater is so vast that it seems less filled with sound than an OTdiriary church durir.g the performances of a full choir. Secondly, as a musical performance the whole Jubilee is only a partial suooess. There is too much noise-too great a 8puce - too wide an interval betweea performer and audience, to permit th8 nicent and most artistic execution of musical compositiona to reach the apprehension of the listener. Any first-olass conoert in Ann Arbor affords more musical enjoyment than all this Jubilee. In thia the stayers-at home may comfort themselves. There is little music which raisea the " goose pimples " on ooa's skin, es some of the musicians phrase it. It is the titblimity of vastness whioh moves one's soul - vastness of building - vastness of audience - vastness of organ - vastness of orchestra - vagtness of ohorus - vastness of conception in the originator - all orowding upon the warm imagination at one grand effort of thought, that elevates the soul and filis it with unwönted and gratif ving emotions. This is what tha Jubilee aims to be. It is an expression of Amffirnn Tatfncm in material vi'orks - ia the projects of enterprise - in the will and in the power to execute' It will inspire the world, as it hns already inspired it, with an adiuiring and almost reverent conviction of tho uneurpassed and unstirpassable magnitude of Amerioan enterprise and Auierioan abilities. Axn Arbob.