, drawing down the pallet B, which admits air (or
wind) to the pipes.

No tubular-pneumatic action is entirely satisfactory when the distance
between the keys and the organ is great. This is often due to a law of
nature rather than to imperfection of design or workmanship.

Pneumatic pulses travel slowly--at a speed which does not reach 1,100
feet per second. In large organs where necessarily some of the tubes
are short and some have to be long, it is impossible to secure
simultaneous speech from all departments of the instrument, and in
addition to this the crisp feeling of direct connection with his pipes,
which the old tracker action secured for the organist, is lost.

It is generally thought amongst the more advanced of the builders and
organists qualified to judge, that the tubular-pneumatic action will
sooner or later be entirely abandoned in favor of the electro-pneumatic
action. Certain it is that the aid of electricity is now called in in
practically every large instrument that is built in this country, and
in an increasing proportion of those constructed abroad.

THE CRYING NEED FOR ELECTRIC ACTION.

The instance of St. Paul's Cathedral cited above shows the demand that
existed at that time for means whereby the organ could be played with
the keyboards situated at some distance from the main body of the
instrument. In the Cathedrals the organ was usually placed on a screen
dividing the Choir from the Nave, completely obstructing the view down
the church. There was a demand for its removal from this position
(which was eventually done at St. Paul's, Chester, Durham, and other
Cathedrals). Then in the large parish churches the quartet of singers
in the west gallery where the organ was placed had been abolished. Boy
choirs had been installed in the chancel, leaving the organ and
organist in the west gallery, to keep time together as best they could.
In the Cathedrals, too, the organist was a long way off from the choir.
How glorious it would be if he could sit and play in their midst!
Henry Willis & Sons stated in a letter to the London _Musical News_, in
1890, that they had been repeatedly asked to make such arrangements but
had refused, "because Dame Nature stood in the way,"--which she
certainly did if tubular pneumatics had been used. The fact was that
up to this time all the electric actions invented had proved more or
less unreliable, and Willis, who had an artistic reputation to lose,
refuse