Music and Musicians of the Walloon Provinces of Belgium

Extract

Before touching on the musical side of my paper it may be well to point out that the population of Belgium is divided into two sections; the Flemings of Teutonic origin speaking a language which is practically Dutch, and the Walloons, of Celtic origin, speaking French and Walloon. The latter occupy the S.W. provinces of Liège, Namur, Hainault, S. Brabant, and W. Luxembourg, and speak a Romance dialect, very akin to northern French of the thirteenth century. Roughly speaking, the Flemish dialect predominates in the proportion of nine to eight, so that it cannot be said that there is much difference between the two populations in point of numbers. But the two races are quite distinct, as much so as Welch and English, and for the same ethnical reasons. The very word Walloon has the same signification as the word Welch, both meaning foreigner. Neither Fleming nor Walloon belies his origin. The former is fair, phlegmatic, and inclining more to the reflective than the active life. The latter is dark, sanguine, lively and energetic. The Walloons were always to the fore in revolutionary struggles, especially those which culminated in the overthrow of the Dutch in 1830. But they were already very unruly as far back as the fifteenth century, as you may learn in a very pleasant way from the pages of Scott's novel, “Quentin Durward,” or from Michelet's “Louis XI.”