Chap. IV. IN ANIMALS. 89 



the cause of what is called " expression ' in music. 

 Upon this point Mr. Litchfield, who has long attended 

 to the subject of music, has been so kind as to give me 

 the following remarks: — " The question, what is the es- 

 sence of musical ' expression ' involves a number of ob- 

 scure points, which, so far as I am aware, are as yet 

 unsolved enigmas. Up to a certain point, however, any 

 law which is found to hold as to the expression of the 

 emotions by simple sounds must apply to the more de- 

 veloped mode of expression in song, which may be taken 

 as the primary type of all music. A great part of the 

 emotional effect of a song depends on the character of 

 the action by which the sounds are produced. In songs, 

 for instance, which express great vehemence of passion, 

 the effect often chiefly depends on the forcible utterance 

 of some one or two characteristic passages which demand 

 great exertion of vocal force; and it will be frequently 

 noticed that a song of this character fails of its proper 

 effect when sung by a voice of sufficient power and range 

 to give the characteristic passages without much exer- 

 tion. This is, no doubt, the secret of the loss of effect 

 so often produced by the transposition of a song from 

 one key to another. The effect is thus seen to depend 

 not merely on the actual sounds, but also in part on the 

 nature of the action which produces the sounds. Indeed 

 it is obvious that whenever we feel the ' expression ' of 

 a song to be due to its quickness or slowness of move- 

 ment — to smoothness of flow, loudness of utterance, and 

 so on — we are, in fact, interpreting the muscular actions 

 which produce sound, in the same way in which we in- 

 terpret muscular action generally. But this leaves un- 

 explained the more subtle and more specific effect which 

 we call tihemusical expression of the song — the delight 

 given by its melody, or even by the separate sounds which 

 make up the melody. This is an effect indefinable in 

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