WELSH BARDS AND MUSIC. 34! 



become familiar to us, fo might thefe Welfh melodies 

 be agreeable to the ears of the Welfli people of the 

 early periods, and fo is the uncouth mufic of favage 

 tribes to their own people at the prefent day. As 

 fingular an inflance as can perhaps be adduced in 

 proof of this, is related in Kepler's celebrated work 

 " Harmonices MimdiJ* He fays, that whilfl he was 

 at the houfe of the Turkifh ambaffador at Prague, 

 he one day attended the prayers. One of the 

 priefts fang fome part of the folemnity in the fol- 

 lowing notes, which, when he retired, Kepler wrote 

 down : 





"t"' "^ W ^ ^ '^ 



3^l£^3:-pgEE^^ 



This kind of melody, Kej)ler fays, appeared by no 

 means fortuitous, but was evidently derived from a 

 depraved fyftem. 



Dr.Burney doubls the antiquity of the counterpoint 

 of this Welfh manufcript. He fays further ; " That 

 the ancient inhabitants of Wales were great encou- 

 ragers of poetry and mufic, cannot be difputed, as 

 many fpecimens of Cambro-Britifh verfification of 

 undoubted antiquity ftill fubfift j and that thefe 



z 3 poems. 



