502 



NA TURE 



\pct. 5, 1876 



have been 8,296,496, and in the latter 8,577,954 animals 

 left wounded. 



Then with regard to the holders of gun licences. !t 

 does not seem an excessive estimate to suppose that 

 each wounds on an average two animals (birds, almost 

 exclusively, in this case) a week throughout the year of 

 fifty-two weeks. A great proportion of holders of these 

 licences no doubt do not exercise their privilege every 

 week. Many of them do so only with the object of pro- 

 tecting their crops ; but the season for fruit and garden 

 vegetables goes on all the summer, say from May to 

 September, and the harvest lasts six weeks, while for 

 some three weeks before that begins the corn is ripening, 

 and is then most attractive to sparrows. A single shot 

 into a flock of sparrows will wound many more than it 

 kills, and such shots, as our ears tell us, are frequent 

 during the day. It does not seem possible to place the 

 average number of birds wounded by each holder of a 

 gun licence lower than we have done. We have there- 

 fore to multiply the number of holders by 104 (= 52 X 2), 

 and then we find that in 1873-4 there must have 

 been 13,731,744, and in 1874-5, 15,004,912 animals left 

 wounded by this class of persons. 



Adding the two sets of numbers, we have a grand total 

 for the former of these years, 22,028,2 40, and for the 

 latter, 23,582,866 wounded; while this increase of over 

 1,500,000 in one twelvemonth forbids our supposing that 

 the next Report would show much, if any, diminution. 



Just as before we purposely abstained from distressing 

 our readers by dwelling on the effects of all this wound- 

 ing, so now we purposely abstain from using any strong 

 language, or calling those who shoot by bad names. This 

 is not meant to be a sensational article. We are sure in 

 our own mind that sportsmen are not by nature cruel — 

 very far from it. Yet, if we may trust our figures, here 

 are the plain facts that acute pain of uncertain duration 

 was, in the year ending March 31, 1874, inflicted upon 

 over twenty-two ynillions of animals, and in the following 

 year upon over twenty-three millions and a half in the 

 British Islands. We are not aware that we possess any 

 bias that would make us exaggerate our estimates to pro- 

 duce these resuhs. Our only object is to attempt as near 

 an approximation to the truth as we can. The figures 

 stand for themselves, and if anyone thinks he can furnish 

 fairer averages let him give his data for them. We are, 

 as it is, willing to guard against any unconscious exagge- 

 ration and to knock off more than 10 per cent, of our 

 grand totals, so as to say roundly that only twenty 

 millions have suffered in each year. But we would invite 

 our readers to reflect on the proportion which even that 

 number bears to the number of animals which during the 

 same time have been subjected to experiment by the 

 physiologists of this country. The latter have been by 

 many excellent persons held up to obloquy as monsters 

 of cruelty. If this has been done justly what must they 

 think of those who use the gun ? 



BLASERNA ON MUSICAL SOUND 



The Theory of Sound in its Relation to Music. By Prof, 



Pietro Blaserna, of the Royal University of Rome. 



With Numerous Woodcuts. International Scientific 



Series. (London : Henry S. King & Co., 1876.) 



/~\F the many valuable works which have appeared in 



^-^ the International Scientific Series, none deal with 



a better subject than that of Prof. Blaserna. " The 



student of physics," he says truly in his Preface, " does 

 not go much into the study of musical arguments, and our 

 artists do not sufficiently understand the very important 

 bearing that the laws of sound have upon many musical 

 questions." 



The first three chapters of the book hardly call for de- 

 tailed notice. They reproduce the familiar facts of acoustics 

 lucidly and succinctly. Vibration, its transmission and 

 velocity, echo, noise as contrasted with musical sound 

 reinforcement by sympathy, sounding-boards and reso- 

 nators, complete the first division of the su bject. The 

 second begins with measurements of vibration, graphi- 

 cally or by means of the siren. The limits of audible 

 sounds are thus determined to lie between 16 and 38,000 

 per second ; of the human voice between the 61 vibrations 

 of double B is the bass, and the 1,305 of the soprano F 

 in alt. 



The importance of uniform pitch is adverted to. Its 

 invariable rise, in the course of years, is explained by the 

 "tendency of manufacturers of musical instruments, espe- 

 cially those made of brass, to raise the pitch continually, 

 in order to give a greater brilliancy of tone to their in- 

 struments ; " an indictment in which the players might 

 justly have been included as well as the manufacturers. 



The harmonic series, and its demonstration by means 

 of the sonometer, conclude the fourth chapter. The 

 laws of ratios, of interference, and of beats, with their 

 resultant notes, occupy the fifth. From these the ancient 

 Greek scale, attributed to Pythagoras, is built up, and 

 compared with our modern scale, the youngest member 

 of which, the minor third, " was only adopted in the 

 seventeenth century, with many reservations, together 

 with the harmony of the sixth, from which it can be easily 

 derived." 



Of the harmonic seventh (rather awkwardly termed 

 throughout "the seventh harmonic") it is judiciously 

 observed that " to an ear accustomed to our music, it 

 may appear unpleasant ; but an unprejudiced examination, 

 according to the opinion of some— an opinion with which 

 I entirely agree — shows that it is rather strange than un- 

 pleasant ; that in certain special cases it affords very good 

 discords and passing chords, and that the strangeness 

 arises rather from our want of familiarity with it than 

 from its inherent nature. Without wishing to push too 

 far forward, and to prophecy what will happen in the 

 future, it may be observed that the systematic introduc- 

 tion of the harmonic seventh into music would produce 

 in it a very deep and almost incalculable revolution, a 

 revolution which does not seem justifiable, because, for 

 our magnificent musical system, another would be sub- 

 stituted, perhaps as magnificent, but certainly not better, 

 and probably worse, at any rate more artificial.". 



Helmholtz's double siren is described at some length, 

 and illustrated by numerical examples, carrying the 

 student on to chords of three or more notes ; the marked 

 difference in character between the major and minor com- 

 mon chords being attributed to the disturbing effect of the 

 resultant notes in the latter, which is absent in the former. 

 Even Mozart shows " a certain reluctance to use the 

 minor as a closing chord. It may be that the most highly 

 gifted musical natures have, as it were, felt beforehand 

 that which theory has since been able to explain in a 

 simple and conclusive way." Discords and their contrast 

 with concordant intervals lead to a comparison of music 



