Part 10

In South Kensington Museum there is a Recorder made of a dark wood, which is nothing else but a big flageolet. Its length is 2 ft. 2 in., and its bore is that of the modern flageolet and old flute--viz., conical, but with the wide end nearest the player's mouth.

Hamlet III, ii, 346. Enter Players with recorders.

Ham. O! the recorders: let me see one....

* * * * *

L. 351.

... Will you play upon this pipe?

Guildenstern. My lord, I cannot.

* * * * *

Ham. It is as easy as lying: govern these ventages with your finger and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music. Look you, these are the stops.

Guil. But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony: I have not the skill.

Ham. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me. You would play upon me: you would seem to know my stops; ... you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass; and there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ [the recorder], yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood! do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, you cannot play upon me.

The holes in a flute have always been called 'ventages,' because the 'wind' comes through them when the fingers are removed. They were 'governed' 'with the finger and thumb.' One of the illustrations from Mersennus [b. 1588] shows a conical flute with four holes in front and two at the back. These latter would, of course, be controlled by the thumbs, while the others would occupy two fingers on each hand. (Modern flageolets still keep a thumb hole at the back.) There were other beaked flutes of the same period, of a better class, which had several keys as well as the holes.

'The stops' referred to by Hamlet are merely the 'ventages.' The act of covering a hole with the finger or thumb was called 'stopping'; and further, one example of the Fistula Dulcis given by Mersennus has two different holes for the lowest note, one on the right and the other on the left, so that the instrument might be used either by a right-handed or left-handed person. One of these two duplicate holes was temporarily stopped with wax. [The passing play upon 'fret' in the last line should not be missed.]

In the next passage the meaning of stop as applied to Recorders is punned on by Hippolyta, who carries on the play from Lysander's horsebreaking metaphor.

Mids. V, i, 108. The Prologue speaks with all the punctuation wrong.

Theseus. This fellow doth not stand upon points.

Lysander. He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows not the stop....

Hippolyta. Indeed, he hath played on this prologue like a child on a recorder, a sound, but not in government.

That is--the Prologue has misplaced all his stops--like a young horse that refuses to stop--also like a child who has not learned to stop the holes on the flute a bec.

It is singular that the Virginal, which was the most popular of all the keyed instruments, is nowhere directly named in Shakespeare. There is, however, a reference to the action of the fingers on its keys in the following.

Winter's Tale I, ii, 125. Of Hermione, Queen of Leontes, King of Sicilia, and Polixenes, King of Bohemia.

Leon. ---- still virginalling Upon his palm?

The Virginal (generally known as 'a pair of virginals') was most commonly used by ladies for their private recreation, and from this circumstance is supposed to derive its name. Queen Elizabeth was fond of playing on it, but as it was in vogue before her time, there is no need to connect the name with the Virgin Queen. (Elizabeth's own Virginal is in South Kensington Museum.) Its keyboard has four octaves, and the case is square, like that of a very old pianoforte. The strings of the virginal were plucked, by quills, which were secured to the 'jacks' [see Sonnet cxxviii.], which in turn were set in motion by the keys. The strings were wire. The oldest country dance known, the Sellenger's (St Leger's) Round, of Henry VIII.'s time, was arranged by Byrd as a Virginal 'lesson' for 'Lady Nevell's booke.' Another well-known Virginal Book, that at the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge, commonly known as 'Queen Elizabeth's Virginal Book,' is being published by Breitkopf & Haertel.

The first music ever printed for the Virginals was 'Parthenia,' published in London, 1611. This collection contains principally Pavans and Galliards by Byrd, Bull, and Gibbons. The title 'Parthenia, or the Maydenhead of the firste musicke,' etc., with a picture of a young lady playing on the virginal, seems to confirm our explanation of the name of this instrument.

Next to the viol, the lute was the most popular stringed instrument. It was used both as a Solo instrument on which to play sprightly 'Ayres,' or as an accompaniment for the voice, or 'in consort' with other instruments. Naturally, it figured frequently in 'serenading' especially when a love song had to be sung outside a lady's window. The general shape of a Lute was that of a mandoline, but about four times as big. Like the mandoline, it had a flat belly, and a great basin-shaped back. But in every other respect it was entirely different. It was used more in the fashion of a guitar, and its strings (which were of gut) were plucked with the fingers.

Adrian Le Roy's book, published in Paris about 1570, says the six strings were tuned as follows--1st (minikin), C in third space, treble staff; 2nd (small mean), G on second line; 3rd (great mean), D under the staff; 4th (counter-tenor), B flat over the bass staff; 5th (tenor), F on fourth line; and 6th (base), C in second space.

Scipione Cerreto, however (Naples 1601), gives quite a different account of the Italian Lute of eight strings, the tuning of which seems to have extended the compass downwards to C under the bass staff. Thomas Mace (Musicks Monument, 1676) tells of several objections against the lute, the most noteworthy of which were--1st, that it was a costly instrument to keep in repair; 2nd, that it was out of fashion; and 3rd, that it made young people grow awry. Mace refutes these calumnies, the last of which no doubt was set about on account of the very awkward shape of the lute back, and the considerable size of the instrument. Hawkins (Hist. of Music, pp. 730 and 731) gives two pieces for the lute by Mace, or, rather, the same piece twice, first for one lute, then arranged for two. [Appendix.]

The five lower strings of the lute were 'doubled'--i.e., there were two of each pitch, duplicates, which helped the tone of the chords by 'sympathetic' vibration. So there were really eleven strings, but only six different pitches. There were eight frets on the fingerboard.