Note 733 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY (continued 3)
Reading edition
In the fifth act of Dryden’s opera, King Arthur, is a harvest-song with this chorus:—
Come, boys, come! Come, boys, come!
And merrily roar out Harvest Home!
and the directions are that the actors shall sing this as they dance, a good communal trait. The words of this song grew popular, were varied, and became a ballad; it is in order for some one to show that harvest-home songs, like other popular verse, come from operas, plays, concerts, and the like.