Not much more than a year ago the world was startled by the announcement of Professor Graham Bell's marvellous invention—the electric telephone—which rendered it possible to talk by telegraph.

The successful solution of a problem which had hitherto baffled all attempts excited universal interest, and has had the effect of directing considerable attention to the science of acoustics, particularly to that part of the subject which relates to the human, voice.

The method of determining absolute pitch, to which I shall ask your attention this afternoon, does not pretend to compete in point of accuracy or completeness with some of the other methods which have been employed, particularly in the last few years, with success. But I think it stands alone in the extreme simplicity and general availability of the means which it employs. Of course to determine the pitch of a note you must have the note, and you must also have some standard of time. I hardly want more than that. All that is necessary is two notes on the harmonium, and a watch, and by those means alone I am able to say how many vibrations in a second the notes make. To carry out the observations with ease requires a little more in the way of instrumental assistance, but the feasibility of the method does not at all depend upon this extra assistance.

When at the request of your Committee I promised to read a paper before this Association, I asked our secretary how long he wished it to occupy. He said, “About half an hour, or a little more.” My first thought was, how am I to extend what I shall have to say over half an hour? But on beginning to put together my materials, I very soon found that the difficulty would be, not to fill half an hour, but to compress all, or anything like all, that there was to be said on the subject within that space of time. I shall, therefore, have to ask your indulgence for the necessarily incomplete, if not superficial, way in which I shall be obliged to treat my subject; to do it full justice would fill not a paper but a volume.

The paper which I have the honour of reading before you today, I have called a sketch, as it would be impossible for me to do more than touch slightly on some salient points of Berlioz' life, and I am glad of the opportunity of so doing, having enjoyed his friendship and confidence for many years.

The object of the paper I am about to read is to introduce to your notice some of the principal Italian and Spanish treatises on music of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. It is a subject which has never been much attended to in this country, probably on account of the excessive rarity of the works in question; but which possesses a great deal of interest, when viewed in connection with the History of Musical Art. In order to illustrate the subject more fully, I have placed on the table a few of the rarest of these ancient treatises, from my own library, in hopes that some of those who are here to-day may care to examine them, and thus verify the observations I shall have to make concerning them.

The difficulties which beset architects in meeting the requirements demanded of them, have always had a tendency to increase rather than diminish with the growth of civilisation.

The ordinary phenomena of beats produced by two notes nearly in unison are well known. In fact, if the number of vibrations executed per second, or “the frequency” of that note be represented by n, and that of the upper note by n + m, then the number of beats per second will be equal to the difference of these numbers, viz., it will be equal to m. The phenomenon depends upon the fact that the more rapid motions of the higher note gradually gain upon those of the lower; and if at one moment the motions are coincident so as to augment the sound, then at the next moment the coincidence begins to fail. This failure of coincidence continues to increase as time goes on; and at last the movements pass into a phase of complete opposition, so that if the two notes are originally of the same intensity, they completely neutralise one another.

On receiving the invitation of the Council of this Institution to read a paper on Form in Musical Composition, my first impression was that so comprehensive a subject could scarcely be treated within prescribed limits, which would admit of little more than a dry and incomplete catalogue of the numerous kinds of musical composition to which the word form is applicable. It occurred to me, however, that by taking the subject as referring to movements of large scope, and comprising numerous component parts, I might select one form of such works, analyse it more fully than has been attempted in didactic treatises, and so present a paper of reasonable duration, and, as I hope, not without some features of interest. It will doubtless be anticipated that I have chosen for my remarks that most important form of instrumental composition known as the Modern Binary or Grand Duplex—the general form of the great majority of modern classical overtures, and of first (and frequently also of other) movements of symphonies, sonatas, and the whole range of concerted instrumental music. I premise that I purpose treating my subject chiefly from the scholastic point of view, not only as being most in accordance with the general objects of our meetings, but because the aesthetic or poetic aspect would lead us too far into the regions of speculation and romance.