Tuning-Fork on the Mechanism of the Human Voice. 351 



makers had, up to this period, observed nearly the same funda- 

 mental pitch for the tuning-fork. 



The following Table, with which I have been supplied by the 

 kindness of my friend Mr. A. J. Ellis, will show the truth of the 

 statement that the pitch of C has been arbitrarily raised, in 

 various degrees in different countries, since the time of Handel, 

 and also that the Italian-Opera pitch is such as to render a great 

 deal of vocal music impossible to be sung by any vocalists except 

 those who possess an unusually extended compass ; also that the 

 scale of the Society of Arts is too high for general use, and has 

 failed to produce that uniformity which was designed by its 

 members; and the question resolves itself into whether the slight 

 difference in the brilliancy of instrumental music is compensated 

 for by the increase of difficulty and injury to the human organs 

 of voice. We all know that the performance of the most favour- 

 ite overture, executed by the most perfect of orchestras, faded 

 into comparative insignificance when the tones of a Pasta, a 

 Malibran, or a Jenny Lind reached the ear. 



Table of the Varieties of Pitch. 

 When any note but C is the pitch note, the pitch of C is cal- 

 culated from it according to the semitonic temperament of twelve 

 equal semitones if not otherwise expressed, or according to the 

 mesotonic temperament or system of perfect major thirds. 



No. 



Authority. 



Dr. Smith, organ of Trinity College, Cambridge, 

 ! " 58 ; 5?fe= — d =262 (mesotonic) 



Pitch notes. 



2. Usual organ pitch 



3. Handel's tuning-fork, 1740 (mesotonic) 416 



5. Theoretical pitch, Hullah and Tomlinson, 1842. 



6. Philharmonic (1812-42) 433"' 



10. French normal diapason (1859) 435 



14. Stuttgardt Congress of Musicians (1834) ! 440 



17. Vienna Orchestra, 1834 (Schleibler) i 440-S7 



18. Berlin Orchestra, 1834 (Schleibler) j 441-625 



19. 'Society of Arts, London (I860) I 



21. jltalian Opera, 1860 (Society of Arts' Report)... j 455 



233-42 



240-00 



247-35 



256 



257-47 



25866 



261-63 



26214 



262-59 



264 



270-55 



_ N.B. — The pitch is here considered as the number of double 

 vibrations in a second. In France and Germany the number of 

 single vibrations is usually taken, and hence the preceding figures 

 would be doubled. Thus the French normal diapason is called870. 



