zes at the end of her second year. It was not to
be a mere concert where each pupil was to come out and play such pieces
as they liked before a mixed audience. There was a long difficult
concerto, to be learned, and each was to play the same piece before the
severe and critical jury, and before such musicians and others as chose
to attend. It was held in the theatre attached to the Conservatory.
Besides that, there were three difficult questions to answer in harmony,
and a piece of music written in a most extraordinary manner was to be
sung at first sight.

In this country we now write vocal music in two clefs, known as the
bass and treble clefs. This makes it easy to read and any singer after
having mastered them both can get along without much difficulty. Some of
the more lazy ones think it hard to sing in even one and are quite upset
if they try to sing in any, save their own. What would the poor alto who
"didn't know anything about the bass clefs" think of singing at first
sight in seven different clefs. Camilla's trial piece at the examination
in solfeggio was a song that began in one clef, went a few bars and then
jumped into another, then into another and back again, then another and
so on in a manner perfectly bewildering and distracting. She had never
seen it before and went through it without missing a note. The result
was that she carried off the first diploma, and the jury and audience
were greatly pleased.

Then they placed a large basket before her in which were hundreds of
bits of folded paper. She was to take out three, open them, read them
aloud and give a verbal answer to each. The first question was something
about the relative minor of a certain major key and its signature. That
was easy enough and she answered at once without hesitation. The next
question nearly took her breath away. It was some deep and perplexing
thing about the construction of a chord. Many a music teacher would be
puzzled to answer it. She thought some wicked person had put it in the
basket just to annoy her. Nobody could answer such a tremendously hard
question. She paused perplexed. It would not do to fail, and calling up
her sturdy will she compelled herself to think it out. In a moment a
bright gleam passed over her face and she began to answer the question
slowly. Feeling more confident, she went on explaining the matter, and
suddenly went wrong. She caught herself at once and in a flash corrected
it and gave the right ans