Use of instruments.-Saint Augustine the monk.

Clemens Alexandrinus says: "Though we no longer worship God with the clamour of military instruments, such as the trumpet, drum, and fife, but with peaceful words-this is our most delightful festivity: and if you are able to accompany your voices with the lyre or cithara, you will incur no censure." And afterwards he says: "Ye shall imitate the just Hebrew king, whose actions were acceptable to God." He then quotes the royal psalmist "Rejoice ye righteous, in the Lord, praise becometh the just, praise the Lord on the cithara, and on the psaltery with ten strings."

Eusebius, in his commentary on the sixtieth psalm, mentions these instruments; and in his exposition of the ninety-second psalm, says: When they are met, they act as the psalm prescribes; first, they confess their sins to the Lord. Secondly, they sing to his name, not only with the voice, but with the cithara, and upon an instrument of ten strings." Instruments, however, seem not to have had admission indiscriminately in the early ages of the church; the harp and psaltery only, as the most grave and majestic instruments of the time, were preferred to all others. Neither Jews nor Gentiles were imitated in the use of tabrets and cymbals in the temple service.

Bede tells us, that when Augustine the monk, and the companions of his mission, had their audience of king Ethelbert, in the isle of Thanet, they approached him in procession, singing litanies; and that, afterwards, when they entered the city of Canterbury, they sang a litany, and at the end of it, Allelujah.

But though this was the first time the Anglo-Saxons had heard the Gregorian chants, yet Bede likewise tells us that our British ancestors had been instructed in the rites and ceremonies of the Gallican church, by St. Germanus, and had heard him sing Allelujah many years before the arrival of St. Augustine. Sev

Musical school at Canterbury.-Introduction of the organ.

eral letters which passed between Bede and St. Augustine, are still extant.

"The principal difference," says Bishop Stillingfleet, “between the Roman and Gallic ritual, which the Britons had adopted before the arrival of St. Augustine, was in the church music, in which the Romans were thought to excel other western churches so far, that the goodness of their music was the principal incitement to the introduction of their offices."

It was then customary for the clergy to travel to Rome for improvement in music, as well as to obtain masters of that art from the Roman college. At length, the successors of St. Gregory, and of St. Augustine, his missionary, having established a school for ecclesiastical music at Canterbury, the rest of the island was furnished with masters from that seminary.

Alfred not only encouraged and countenanced the practice of music, but, in 886, founded a professorship at Oxford, for the cultivation of it as a science.

Several ecclesiastical writers mention the organ as an instrument that had very early admission into the church. To Pope Vitalian is ascribed its first introduction at Rome in the seventh century; and ancient annalists are unanimous in allowing, that the first organ that appeared in France was sent from Constantinople, as a present from the emperor Constantine Copronymus the sixth, in 757, to king Pepin; which, as well as Julian's epigram, gives the invention to Greece. The epigram runs thus: "I see reeds of a new species, the growth of another and a brazen soil; such as are not agitated by our winds, but by a blast that rushes from a leathern cavern beneath their roots; while a robust mortal, running with swift fingers over the concordant keys, makes them, as they smoothly dance, emit melodious sounds."

Organs became common in Italy and Germany, during the

Counterpoint.-Introduction of musical characters.

tenth century, as well as in England; about which time they had admission in the convents throughout Europe.

Counterpoint was invented, or at least greatly improved, by Guido, a monk of Arezzo, in Tuscany, about the year 1022.

The ancients have left us no rules for rhythm, time, or accent, in music, but those which concerned the words or verses that were to be sung. Before the invention, therefore, of characters for time, written music in parts must have consisted of simple counterpoint, note against note, or sounds of equal length. The invention of characters for time has been given by almost all writers on music of the last and present century, to John de Muris, who flourished about the year 1330. But three centuries prior to this, Magister Franco, of Cologne, speaks, in a treatise on the subject, of earlier authorities, as well as of his own improvements in the characters used for time. John de Muris then, though not the inventor of the cantus mensurabilis, seems, by his numerous writings, greatly to have improved it. Indeed, every species of note to be found in his tracts, except the minim, is described by Franco, as well as used in compositions anterior to his time, and mentioned by authors who wrote upon music before him. Nor is it possible to imagine that this art was invented and received by all Europe at once; like others, it had its beginning, improvements, and perfection, in different periods of time.

Dramas of the Greeks.-Oratorios.

Origin of the Opera.

THE opera first assumed its distinctive form in Italy. It may, however, be traced to the dramas of the ancient Greeks, which were performed with the accompaniment of musical instruments and singing. The religious dramatic representations of the middle ages, called mysteries and moralities, were performed under the sanction of the Romish church, and were the favourite entertainment of people of all conditions; from these the secular masque took its rise. Dances, songs, and choruses were introduced into these pageants, and by degrees they rose into the oratorio and opera.

The origin of the oratorio is ascribed by Italian writers to San Filippo Neri, who founded the order of the Oratory at Rome, in 1540. It was their practice to render the service of the church as agreeable as possible, in order to attract young people thither, and thus draw them away from stage-plays and other profane amusements. First, they introduced songs and choruses; and afterwards, scripture stories and incidents were formed into dramatic poems, which were recited and sung, with the accompaniment of instruments, before and after the sermon. They were founded on such narratives as the Good Samaritan, the Trials of Job, the Prodigal Son, &c. They soon acquired great popularity, and oratorios became common in the principal churches throughout Italy, where they are regularly performed to this day. These pieces are often performed in concert-rooms and theatres, but in no case is there the slightest approach to the dramatic representation of the opera.

During the sixteenth century, the Italian drama gradually

Invention of recitative.-The opera in England.

arose to a more regular form, and music seems to have been more or less employed in all entertainments of the kind. In the year 1597, the invention of recitative served to complete the union of music and the drama. This invention is claimed by Jacopo Peri of Florence, and by Emilio del Caviliere of Rome, who both speak of it as an attempt to revive the musical declamation of the Greeks and Romans. It is possible they may have equal claims to the invention, having been led to it by the same suggestive steps. It is but a narrow view of the matter to suppose that every similarity between the productions of genius is the effect of imitation.

THE OPERA IN ENGLAND.*

Down to the seventeenth century, the dramatic entertainments of England were interspersed with vocal and instrumental music. Gammer Gurton's Needle, the first regular English comedy, was "o accompanied. It was written in 1551.

This admixture of music is to be found in the plays of Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Shirley, Dryden, and other dramatists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and did not cease till the musical drama acquired a separate and independent existence.

Shakespeare, who was evidently a passionate lover of music, has introduced it in a number of his plays. The Tempest, even in its original form, may almost be considered a musical drama. Besides "Come unto these yellow sands," "Full fathom five thy father lies," Where the bee sucks," and other songs, it contains a masque with music, presented by the spirits of the enchanted

* The following sketch is abridged from "The History of the Musical Drama," by George Hogarth.