an extraordinary feature in musical history. All previous
variations in pitch--and they have comprised as much as a fourth in
the extremes--having been due either to transposition, owing to the
requirements of the human voice, or to national or provincial
measurements. The manufacture of brass instruments is a distinct
craft, although some of the processes are similar to those used by
silversmiths, coppersmiths, and braziers.

I have only time to add a few words about the percussion instruments
which the military band permits to connect with the wind. Drums are,
with the exception of kettle drums, indeterminate instruments, hardly,
in themselves, to be regarded as musical, and yet important factors of
musical and especially rhythmic effect. The kettle drum is a caldron,
usually of brass or copper, covered with a vellum head bound at the
edge round an iron ring, which fits the circle formed by the upper
part of the metal body. Screws working on this ring tune the vellum
head, or vibrating membrane as we may call it, by tightening or
slackening it, so as to obtain any note of the scale within its
compass. The tonic and dominant are generally required, but other
notes are, in some compositions, used; even octaves have been
employed. The use Beethoven made of kettle drums may be regarded among
the particular manifestations of his genius. Two kettle drums may be
considered among the regular constituents of the orchestra, but this
number has been extended; in one remarkable instance, that of Berlioz
in his Requiem, to eight pairs. According to Mr. Victor de Pontigny,
whose article I am much indebted to (in Sir George Grove's dictionary)
upon the drum, the relative diameters, theoretically, for a pair of
kettle drums are in the proportion of 30 to 26, bass and tenor;
practically the diameter of the drums at the French opera is 29 and
251/4 inches, and of the Crystal Palace band, 28 and 241/4 inches. In
cavalry regiments the drums are slung so as to hang on each side of
the drummers horse's neck. The best drum sticks are of whalebone, each
terminating in a small wooden button covered with sponge. For the bass
drum and side drum I must be content to refer to Mr. Victor de
Pontigny's article, and also for the tambourine, but the Provencal
tambourines I have met with have long, narrow sound bodies, and are
strung with a few very coarse strings which the player sounds with a
hammer. This instrument is the rhythmic bass and support