Page:Polynesian Mythology by George Grey (polynesianmythol00greyuoft).djvu/361

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Appendix.

says, that "it is impossible to obtain the intervals of their scale on our keyed instruments, but they may be perfectly effected on the violin."

Mr. Vincent[1] gives a most scientific description of an elaborate instrument made at Paris, exhibited at the Institut, on which the quarter tones were most correctly illustrated, and observes, that a much less interval than the quarter-tone, perhaps eight or ten times less, is discernible, as proved by a M. Delezenne,[2] 1827; and our own ears attest that universally in the modulations of the voice of the so-called savage tribes, and in the refined and anomalously-studied Chinese, there are intervals which do not correspond to any notes on our keyed instruments, and which to an untrained ear appear almost monotonous.

There is another matter with which incidentally we have to do, namely, an apparent difference of opinion between ancient authors themselves about the enharmonic. Plutarch[3] says that Aristoxenus (in a book not now extant) informs us that Olympus was the inventor of an enharmonic, but of a kind consisting of a scale in which certain notes, the "lichani" or "indicatrices," were omitted, and that the airs of Olympus were so simple and beautiful, that there was nothing like them.

\relative c' { \clef treble \omit Staff.TimeSignature \override Staff.BarLine.break-visibility = ##(#f #f #f) c4 s4 d4 s4 ees4 s4 g4 s4 aes4 s4 \stemUp c4 \revert Staff.BarLine.break-visibility \bar "||" }

This Scale would approximate to the Scotch, or rather to that given as Chinese by Dr. Paissell.[4]

But there is nothing repugnant in this, to the division of the intermediate half-note between this saltus; and, as

  1. ↑ "Notices et Extraits des MSS.," tom. xvi.
  2. ↑ "Mémoire de la Société Royale de Lille."
  3. ↑ Πεϱὶ Μουσικῆς.
  4. ↑ Burney, vol. i.
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