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THE HINDUS.

Jacob Grimm in his work on German mythology points out an old tradition, preserved in Swedish and Scotch national ballads, of a skilful harper who constructs his instrument out of the bones of a young girl drowned by a wicked woman. Her fingers he uses for the tuning screws, and her golden hair for the strings. The harper plays, and his music kills the murderess. A similar story is told in the old Icelandic national songs; and the same tradition has been preserved in the Faroe islands, as well as in Norway and Denmark.

May not the agreeable impression produced by the rhythmical flow of the waves and the soothing murmur of running water have led various nations, independently of each other, to the widespread conception that they obtained their favourite instrument of music from the water? Or is the notion traceable to a common source dating from a pre-historic age, perhaps from the early period when the Aryan race is surmised to have diffused its lore through various countries? Or did it originate in the old belief that the world, with all its charms and delights, arose from a chaos in which water constituted the predominant element?

Howbeit, Nareda, the giver of water, was the offspring of Brahma the creator; and Odin had his throne in the skies. Indeed, many of the musical water-spirits appear to have been originally considered as rain deities. Their music may, therefore, be regarded as derived from the clouds rather than from the sea. In short, the traditions respecting spirits and water are not in contradiction to the opinion of the ancient Hindus that music is of heavenly origin, but rather tend to support it.

The earliest musical instruments of the Hindus on record have, almost all of them, remained in popular use until the present day scarcely altered. Besides these, the Hindus possess several Arabic and Persian instruments which are of comparatively modern date in Hindustan: evidently having been introduced into that country scarcely 1,000 years ago, at the time of the Muhammadan irruption. There are several treatises on music extant, written in Sanskrit, which contain descriptions of the ancient instruments.

Of these the Bh?rata N?tya S'astra by Bh?rata Muni , and the Sangita Ratn?kara, are probably the oldest and most valuable. The latter, according to information supplied by the late Major C. R. Day, is an exhaustive work, consisting of seven ?dhyayas, compiled by Sarnga Deva, son of Sotala Deva, King of Karnata, and grandson of Bhaskara, a Kashmirian .

The harp has long been obsolete. If some Hindu drawings of it can be relied upon, it had at an early time a triangular frame and was in construction as well as in shape and size almost identical with the Assyrian harp.

Many instruments of Hindustan are known by different names in different districts, and there are many varieties. On the whole, the Hindus possess about fifty instruments. To describe them properly would fill a volume. Some, which are in the Museum, will be found well described and illustrated in the previously mentioned work by the late Major C. R. Day, which, in addition to affording much valuable information to the student and collector, contains a lengthy bibliography of Indian music and musical instruments.

THE PERSIANS AND ARABS.

Of the musical instruments of the ancient Persians, before the Christian era, scarcely anything is known. It may be surmised that they closely resembled those of the Assyrians, and probably also those of the Hebrews.

Not a few fanciful stories are traditionally preserved among the Arabs testifying to the wonderful effects they ascribed to the power of their instrumental performances. One example will suffice. Al-Farabi had acquired his proficiency in Spain, in one of the schools at Cordova which flourished as early as towards the end of the ninth century, and his reputation became so great that ultimately it extended to Asia. The mighty Caliph of Bagdad himself desired to hear the celebrated musician, and sent messengers to Spain with instructions to offer rich presents to him and to convey him to the court. But Al-Farabi feared that if he went he should be retained in Asia, and should never again see the home to which he felt deeply attached. At last he resolved to disguise himself, and ventured to undertake the journey which promised him a rich harvest. Dressed in a mean costume, he made his appearance at the court just at the time when the caliph was being entertained with his daily concert. Al-Farabi, unknown to everyone, was permitted to exhibit his skill on the lute. Scarcely had he commenced his performance in a certain musical mode when he set all his audience laughing aloud, notwithstanding the efforts of the courtiers to suppress so unbecoming an exhibition of mirth in the royal presence. In truth, even the caliph himself was compelled to burst out into a fit of laughter. Presently the performer changed to another mode, and the effect was that immediately all his hearers began to sigh, and soon tears of sadness replaced the previous tears of mirth. Again he played in another mode, which excited his audience to such a rage that they would have fought each other if he, seeing the danger, had not directly gone over to an appeasing mode. After this wonderful exhibition of his skill Al-Farabi concluded in a mode which had the effect of making his listeners fall into a profound sleep, during which he took his departure.

It will be seen that this incident is almost identical with one recorded as having happened about twelve hundred years earlier at the court of Alexander the Great, and which forms the subject of Dryden's "Alexander's Feast." The distinguished flutist Timotheus successively aroused and subdued different passions by changing the musical modes during his performance, exactly in the same way as did Al-Farabi.

AMERICAN INDIAN.

If the preserved antiquities of the American Indians, dating from a period anterior to our discovery of the western hemisphere, possess an extraordinary interest because they afford trustworthy evidence of the degree of progress which the aborigines had attained in the cultivation of the arts and in their social condition before they came in contact with Europeans, it must be admitted that the ancient musical instruments of the American Indians are also worthy of examination. Several of them are constructed in a manner which, in some degree, reveals the characteristics of the musical system prevalent among the people who used the instruments. And although most of these interesting relics, which have been obtained from tombs and other hiding-places, may not be of great antiquity, it has been satisfactorily ascertained that they are genuine contrivances of the Indians before they were influenced by European civilisation.

Some account of these relics is therefore likely to prove of interest also to the ethnologist, especially as several facts may perhaps be found of assistance in elucidating the still unsolved problem as to the probable original connection of the American with Asiatic races.

Among the instruments of the Aztecs in Mexico and of the Peruvians none have been found so frequently, and have been preserved in their former condition so unaltered, as pipes and flutes. They are generally made of pottery or of bone, substances which are unsuitable for the construction of most other instruments, but which are remarkably well qualified to withstand the decaying influence of time. There is, therefore, no reason to conclude from the frequent occurrence of such instruments that they were more common than other kinds of which specimens have rarely been discovered.

The Mexicans possessed a small whistle formed of baked clay, a considerable number of which have been found. Some specimens are singularly grotesque in shape, representing caricatures of the human face and figure, birds, beasts, and flowers. Some were provided at the top with a finger-hole which, when closed, altered the pitch of the sound, so that two different tones were producible on the instrument. Others had a little ball of baked clay lying loose inside the air-chamber. When the instrument was blown the current of air set the ball in a vibrating motion, thereby causing a shrill and whirring sound. A similar contrivance is sometimes made use of by Englishmen for conveying signals. The Mexican whistle most likely served principally the same purpose, but it may possibly have been used also in musical entertainments. In the Russian horn band each musician is restricted to a single tone; and similar combinations of performers--only, of course, much more rude--have been witnessed by travellers among some tribes in Africa and America.

Rather more complete than the above specimens are some of the whistles and small pipes which have been found in graves of the Indians of Chiriqui in Central America.

Again, at the public ceremonies which took place on the accession of a prince to the throne the new monarch addressed a prayer to the god, in which occurred the following allegorical expression:--"I am thy flute; reveal to me thy will; breathe into me thy breath like into a flute, as thou hast done to my predecessors on the throne. As thou hast opened their eyes, their ears, and their mouth to utter what is good, so likewise do to me. I resign myself entirely to thy guidance." Similar sentences occur in the orations addressed to the monarch. In reading them one can hardly fail to be reminded of Hamlet's reflections addressed to Guildenstern, when the servile courtier expresses his inability to "govern the ventages" of the pipe and to make the instrument "discourse most eloquent music," which the prince bids him to do.

The musician is likely to speculate what could have induced the Peruvians to adopt so strange a series of intervals: it seems rather arbitrary than premeditated.

Again, in South America sonorous stones are not unknown, and were used in olden time for musical purposes. The traveller G. T. Vigne saw among the Indian antiquities preserved in the town of Cuzco, in Peru, "a musical instrument of green sonorous stone, about a foot long, and an inch and a half wide, flat-sided, pointed at both ends, and arched at the back, where it was about a quarter of an inch thick, whence it diminished to an edge, like the blade of a knife.... In the middle of the back was a small hole, through which a piece of string was passed; and when suspended and struck by any hard substance a singularly musical note was produced." Humboldt mentions the Amazon-stone, which on being struck by a hard substance yields a metallic sound. It was formerly cut by the American Indians into very thin plates, perforated in the centre and suspended by a string. These plates were remarkably sonorous. This kind of stone is not, as might be conjectured from its name, found exclusively near the Amazon. The name was given to it as well as to the river by the first European visitors to America, in allusion to the female warriors respecting whom strange stories are told. The natives pretending, according to an ancient tradition, that the stone came from the country of "Women without husbands," or "Women living alone."

As regards the ancient stringed instruments of the American Indians our information is indeed but scanty. Clavigero says that the Mexicans were entirely unacquainted with stringed instruments; a statement the correctness of which is questionable, considering the stage of civilisation to which these people had attained. At any rate, we generally find one or other kind of such instruments with nations whose intellectual progress and social condition are decidedly inferior. The Aztecs had many claims to the character of a civilised community and the Tezcucans were even more advanced in the cultivation of the arts and sciences than the Aztecs. "The best histories," Prescott observes, "the best poems, the best code of laws, the purest dialect, were all allowed to be Tezcucan. The Aztecs rivalled their neighbours in splendour of living, and even in the magnificence of their structures. They displayed a pomp and ostentatious pageantry, truly Asiatic." Unfortunately historians are sometimes not sufficiently discerning in their communications respecting musical questions. J. Ranking, in describing the grandeur of the establishment maintained by Montezuma, says that during the repasts of this monarch "there was music of fiddle, flute, snail-shell, a kettle-drum, and other strange instruments." But as this waiter does not indicate the source whence he drew his information respecting Montezuma's orchestra including the fiddle, the assertion deserves scarcely a passing notice.

About the month of October the Peruvians celebrated a solemn feast in honour of the dead, at which ceremony they executed lugubrious songs and plaintive instrumental music. Compositions of a similar character were performed on occasion of the decease of a monarch. As soon as it was made known to the people that their Inca had been "called home to the mansions of his father the sun" they prepared to celebrate his obsequies with becoming solemnity. Prescott, in his graphic description of these observances, says: "At stated intervals, for a year, the people assembled to renew the expressions of their sorrow; processions were made displaying the banner of the departed monarch; bards and minstrels were appointed to chronicle his achievements, and their songs continued to be rehearsed at high festivals in the presence of the reigning monarch--thus stimulating the living by the glorious example of the dead." The Peruvians had also particular agricultural songs, which they were in the habit of singing while engaged in tilling the lands of the Inca; a duty which devolved upon the whole nation. The subject of these songs, or rather hymns, referred especially to the noble deeds and glorious achievements of the Inca and his dynasty. While thus singing, the labourers regulated their work to the rhythm of the music, thereby ensuring a pleasant excitement and a stimulant in their occupation, like soldiers regulating their steps to the music of the military band. These hymns pleased the Spanish invaders so greatly that they not only adopted several of them but also composed some in a similar form and style. This appears, however, to have been the case rather with the poetry than with the music.

The Mexicans possessed a class of songs which served as a record of historical events. Furthermore they had war-songs, love-songs, and other secular vocal compositions, as well as sacred chants, in the practice of which boys were instructed by the priests in order that they might assist in the musical performances of the temple. It appertained to the office of the priests to burn incense, and to perform music in the temple at stated times of the day. The commencement of the religious observances which took place regularly at sunrise, at mid-day, at sunset, and at midnight, was announced by signals blown on trumpets and pipes. Persons of high position retained in their service professional musicians whose duty it was to compose ballads, and to perform vocal music with instrumental accompaniment. The nobles themselves, and occasionally even the monarch, not infrequently delighted in composing ballads and odes.

The reader is probably aware that in one of the various hypotheses which have been advanced respecting the Asiatic origin of the American Indians China is assigned to them as their ancient home. Some historians suppose them to be emigrants from Mongolia, Thibet, or Hindustan; others maintain that they are the offspring of Phoenician colonists who settled in Central America. Even more curious are the arguments of certain inquirers who have no doubt whatever that the ancestors of the American Indians were the lost ten tribes of Israel, of whom since about the time of the Babylonian captivity history is silent. Whatever may be thought as to which particular one of these speculations hits the truth, they certainly have all proved useful, in so far as they have made ethnologists more exactly acquainted with the habits and predilections of the American aborigines than would otherwise have been the case. For, as the advocates of each hypothesis have carefully collected and adduced every evidence they were able to obtain tending to support their views, the result is that no stone has been left unturned. Nevertheless, any such hints as suggest themselves from an examination of musical instruments have hitherto remained unheeded. It may therefore perhaps interest the reader to have his attention drawn to a few suggestive similarities occurring between instruments of the American Indians and of certain nations inhabiting the eastern hemisphere.

Rattles, Pandean pipes made of reed, and conch trumpets, are found almost all over the world, wherever the materials of which they are constructed are easily obtainable. Still, it may be noteworthy that the Mexicans employed the conch trumpet in their religious observances apparently in much the same way as it is used in the Buddhist worship of the Tibetans and Kalmuks.

As regards the sonorous metal in the great temple at Tezcuco some inquirers are sure that it was a gong: but it must be borne in mind that these inquirers detect everywhere traces proving an invasion of the Mongols, which they maintain to have happened about six hundred years ago. Had they been acquainted with the little Peruvian bell they would have had more tangible musical evidence in support of their theory than the supposed gong; for this bell certainly bears a suggestive resemblance to the little hand-bell which the Buddhists use in their religious ceremonies.

As regards the musical accomplishments of the Indian tribes at the present day they are far below the standard which we have found among their ancestors. A period of three hundred years of oppression has evidently had the effect of subduing the melodious expressions of happiness and contentedness which in former times appear to have been quite as prevalent with the Indians as they generally are with independent and flourishing nations. The innate talent for music evinced by those of the North American Indians who were converted to Christianity soon after the emigration of the Puritans to New England is very favourably commented on by some old writers. In the year 1661 John Elliot published a translation of the psalms into Indian verse. The singing of these metrical psalms by the Indian converts in their places of worship appears to have been actually superior to the sacred vocal performances of their Christian brethren from Europe; for we find it described by several witnesses as "excellent" and "most ravishing."

In other parts of America the priests from Spain did not neglect to turn to account the susceptibility of the Indians for music. Thus, in central America the Dominicans composed as early as in the middle of the sixteenth century a sacred poem in the Guatemalian dialect containing a narrative of the most important events recorded in the Bible. This production they sang to the natives, and to enhance the effect they accompanied the singing with musical instruments. The alluring music soon captivated the heart of a powerful cazique, who was thus induced to adopt the doctrines embodied in the composition, and to diffuse them among his subjects, who likewise delighted in the performances. In Peru a similar experiment, resorted to by the priests who accompanied Pizarro's expedition, proved equally successful. They dramatised certain scenes in the life of Christ and represented them with music, which so greatly fascinated the Indians that many of them readily embraced the new faith. Nor are these entertainments dispensed with even at the present day by the Indian Christians, especially in the village churches of the Sierra in Peru; and as several religious ceremonies have been retained by these people from their heathen forefathers, it may be conjectured that their sacred musical performances also retain much of their ancient heathen character.

EUROPEAN INSTRUMENTS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.

Many representations of musical instruments of the middle ages have been preserved in manuscripts, as well as in sculptures and paintings forming ornamental portions of churches and other buildings. Valuable facts and hints are obtainable from these evidences, provided they are judiciously selected and carefully examined. The subject is, however, so large that only a few observations on the most interesting instruments can be offered here. Unfortunately there still prevails much uncertainty respecting several of the earliest representations as to the precise century from which they date, and there is reason to believe that in some instances the archaeological zeal of musical investigators has assigned a higher antiquity to such discoveries than can be satisfactorily proved.

It appears certain that the most ancient European instruments known to us were in form and construction more like the Asiatic than was the case with later ones. Before a nation has attained to a fairly high degree of civilisation its progress in the cultivation of music, as an art, is very slow indeed. The instruments found at the present day in Asia are scarcely superior to those which were in use among oriental nations about three thousand years ago. It is, therefore, perhaps not surprising that no material improvement is perceptible in the construction of the instruments of European countries during the lapse of nearly a thousand years. True, evidences to be relied on referring to the first five or six centuries of the Christian era are but scanty; although indications are not wanting which may help the reflecting musician.

There are some early monuments of Christian art dating from the fourth century in which the lyre is represented. In one of them Christ is depicted as Apollo touching the lyre. This instrument occurs at an early period in western Europe as used in popular pastimes. In an Anglo-Saxon manuscript of the ninth century in the British Museum are the figures of two gleemen, one playing the lyre and the other a double-pipe. M. de Coussemaker has published in the "Annales Arch?ologiques" the figure of a crowned personage playing the lyre, which he found in a manuscript of the ninth or tenth century in the library at Angers. The player twangs the strings with his fingers, while the Anglo-Saxon gleeman before mentioned uses a plectrum.

The Anglo-Saxons frequently accompanied their vocal effusions with a harp, more or less triangular in shape, an instrument which may be considered rather as constituting the transition of the lyre into the harp. The harp was especially popular in central and northern Europe, and was the favourite instrument of the German and Celtic bards and of the Scandinavian skalds. In the next illustration from the manuscript of the monastery of St. Blasius twelve strings and two sound-holes are given to it. A harp similar in form and size, but without the front pillar, was known to the ancient Egyptians. Perhaps the addition was also non-existent in the earliest specimens appertaining to European nations; and a sculptured figure of a small harp constructed like the ancient eastern harp has been discovered in the old church of Ullard in the county of Kilkenny. This curious relic, which is said to date from a period anterior to the year 800, is illustrated in Bunting's "Ancient Music of Ireland." As Bunting was the first who drew attention to this sculpture his account of it may interest the reader. "The drawing," he says, "is taken from one of the ornamental compartments of a sculptured cross, at the old church of Ullard. From the style of the workmanship, as well as from the worn condition of the cross, it seems older than the similar monument at Monasterboice which is known to have been set up before the year 830. The sculpture is rude; the circular rim which binds the arms of the cross together is not pierced in the quadrants, and many of the figures originally in relievo are now wholly abraded. It is difficult to determine whether the number of strings represented is six or seven; but, as has been already remarked, accuracy in this respect cannot be expected either in sculptures or in many picturesque drawings." The Finns had a harp with a similar frame, devoid of a front pillar, still in use until the commencement of the last century.

Among the oldest representations of performers on instruments of the violin kind found in England those deserve to be noticed which are painted on the interior of the roof of Peterborough Cathedral. They are said to date from the twelfth century. One of these figures is particularly interesting on account of the surprising resemblance which his instrument bears to our present violin. Not only the incurvations on the sides of the body but also the two sound-holes are nearly identical in shape with those made at the present day. Respecting the reliance to be placed on such evidence, it is necessary to state that the roof, originally constructed between the years 1177 and 1194, was thoroughly repaired in the year 1835. Although we find it asserted that "the greatest care was taken to retain every part, or to restore it to its original state, so that the figures, even where retouched, are in effect the same as when first painted," it nevertheless remains a debatable question whether the restorers have not admitted some slight alterations, and have thereby somewhat modernised the appearance of the instruments. A slight touch with the brush at the sound-holes, the screws, or the curvatures would suffice to produce modifications which might to the artist appear as being only a renovation of the original representation, but which to the musical investigator greatly impair the value of the evidence. Sculptures are, therefore, more to be relied upon in evidence than frescoes.

EUROPEAN INSTRUMENTS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.

This ought to be borne in mind in examining the representations of musical instruments transmitted to us from that period.

As regards the wind instruments popular during the Middle Ages, some were of quaint form as well as of rude construction.

The most important wind instrument--in fact, the king of all the musical instruments--is the organ.

Another illustration is given of an organ of the 14th century .

EUROPEAN INSTRUMENTS OF THE MIDDLE AGES. .

Respecting the orchestras, or musical bands, represented on monuments of the Middle Ages, there can hardly be a doubt that the artists who sculptured them were not unfrequently led by their imagination rather than by an adherence to actual fact. It is, however, not likely that they introduced into such representations instruments that were never admitted in the orchestras, and which would have appeared inappropriate to the contemporaries of the artists. An examination of one or two of the orchestras may therefore find a place here, especially as they throw some additional light upon the characteristics of the instrumental music of mediaeval time.

In this group of crowned minstrels the sculptor has introduced a tumbler standing on his head, perhaps the vocalist of the company, as he has no instrument to play upon. Possibly the sculptor desired to symbolise the hilarious effects which music is capable of producing, as well as its elevating influence upon the devotional feelings.

A grand assemblage of musical performers is represented on the Portico della Gloria of the famous pilgrimage church of Santiago de Compostella, in Spain. This triple portal, which is stated by an inscription on the lintel to have been executed in the year 1188, consists of a large semi-circular arch with a smaller arch on either side. The central arch is filled by a tympanum, round which are twenty-four life-sized seated figures, in high relief, representing the twenty-four elders seen by St. John in the Apocalypse, each with an instrument of music. These instruments are carefully represented, and are of great interest as showing those in use in Spain about the twelfth century. A cast of this sculpture is in the Museum .

POST-MEDIAEVAL INSTRUMENTS.

Attention must now be drawn to some instruments which originated during the Middle Ages, but which attained their highest popularity at a somewhat later period.

Other celebrated lute-makers were:--

Ludwig Porgt, Regensburg, 1525. Hanns Gerle, Nuremberg, b. about 1505, d. 1599. Hans Neusedler, Nuremberg, d. 1563. Sebastian Rauser, Verona, working about 1590 to 1605. Mattheus Buchenberg, Rome, working about 1592-1619. Hanns Fichtholdt, Ingoldstadt , about 1612; his lutes, the backs of which are made with narrow strips of wood, in the Italian manner, were formerly much prized by connoisseurs. Paolo Belami, Paris, about 1612, probably an Italian. His lutes were highly valued. Joachim Tielke, Hamburg, b. 1641, d. 1719. Antonio Castaro, Rome, about 1615. Christofilo Rochi, Padua, about 1620. Sebastian Rochi, Venice, about 1620. Clays von Pommersbach, Cologne, probably during the sixteenth century. Magnus Tieffenbrucker, Venice, latter half of seventeenth century. Wendelin Tieffenbrucker, Padua, working about 1572-1611, and Leonhard Tieffenbrucker, Padua , during the sixteenth century; their lutes were rather flat and long in body. Michael Hartung, Padua, working about 1602 to 1624; he was a pupil of Leonhard Tieffenbrucker. Raphael Mest, F?ssen, working about 1610 to 1650; said to have been pupil of Michael Hartung. Johann Christian Hoffmann, Leipzig, working about 1710 to 1750; his lutes were exported to Holland and England. Martin Schott, Prague, latter half of seventeenth century. Sebastian Rauch, Prague, working about 1700 to 1724. Matthias Hummel, Nuremberg, end of seventeenth century. Sebastian Schelle, Nuremberg, working about 1700 to 1745; his lutes were much valued, not only in Germany, but also in other European countries.

Instruction books for the old Spanish guitar have been written by:--Ludovico Milan, Valencia, 1534; Sixtus Kargel, Mayence, 1569; Joannes Carolus, Lerida, 1626; Pietro Milioni, Rome, 1638; Lucas Ruiz de Ribayaz, Madrid, 1672, etc. The number of guitar manuals published during the 18th century is enormous. Germany alone contributed above fifty.

Its top generally terminated in a grotesquely-carved human head. The cithers made in England during the eighteenth century have generally at the top some inlaid ornamentation in ivory, mother-of-pearl, or fancy wood.

Although not well suited for the performance of harmonious combinations, since its wire strings are twanged with a quill, and therefore only such chords can be properly produced as are on strings following each other in uninterrupted succession, the cither, nevertheless, possesses considerable charms.

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