THE PIPE AND TABOR 105 



escaped destruction. Mr. Galpin has a copy of 

 it in his wonderful collection, and has allowed 

 me to play on it.^ 



Mersenne,* in speaking of the performance of 

 an Englishman, John Price, may give to some 

 unwary reader the impression that the said John 

 could play a continuous scale of three octaves. 

 But it is quite clear that Mersenne included the 

 faint D an octave below the lowest harmonic note, 

 so that Price could produce an interval of three 

 octaves but a continuous scale of only two octaves. 

 This is not impossible. I can play two out-of-tune 

 shrieking notes above my high A, or 1 2th note, so 

 that I can, after a fashion, get within one note of 

 John Price, and I live in hopes of acquiring yet 

 another and tjring with him. The uppermost 

 sounds are made by what was technically known as 

 pinching, i.e. crooking the thumb and forcing the 

 nail into the top hole, so that only a minute stream 

 of air escapes. An old pipe of mine shows the 

 mark of the pinching thumb nail. Mr. Forsyth 

 speaks of "an instrument with only a few notes" 

 as being "much restricted in the way of 

 compass^": this is not quite just to the taborer's 

 pipe. 



In relation to Mr. Forsyth's discussion on the 

 diauloi, it should be remembered that the 

 double pipe still exists in Russia. It is described 



» See also MabiUon, Catalogue descHptif et analytique du Mtisie 

 instrumental du Conservatoire royal de Bruxelle, 1909, Vol 2, p. 281. 



^ Harmonie Universelle, contenant la theorie et la pratique at la 

 musique, by M. Mersenne, Fol. 1636-7, Vol 11, p. 232. 



' Stanford and Forsyth History of Music, 1916, p. 44. 



a 



