finest taste, often passes for a man of mirth
and wit, and for wonderful pleasant company. I need not observe, that
the emptiness of the drum very much contributes to its noise.

The lute is a character directly opposite to the drum, that sounds very
finely by itself, or in a very small concert. Its notes are exquisitely
sweet, and very low, easily drowned in a multitude of instruments, and
even lost among a few, unless you give a particular attention to it. A
lute is seldom heard in a company of more than five, whereas a drum will
show itself to advantage in an assembly of five hundred. The lutenists
therefore are men of a fine genius, uncommon reflection, great
affability, and esteemed chiefly by persons of a good taste, who are the
only proper judges of so delightful and soft a melody.

The trumpet is an instrument that has in it no compass of music or
variety of sound, but is notwithstanding very agreeable, so long as it
keeps within its pitch. It has not above four or five notes, which are
however very pleasing, and capable of exquisite turns and modulations.
The gentlemen who fall under this denomination, are your men of the most
fashionable education and refined breeding, who have learned a certain
smoothness of discourse, and sprightliness of air, from the polite
company they have kept; but at the same time they have shallow parts,
weak judgments, and a short reach of understanding: a playhouse, a
drawing-room, a ball, a visiting-day, or a Ring at Hyde Park, are the
few notes they are masters of, which they touch upon in all
conversations. The trumpet however is a necessary instrument about a
Court, and a proper enlivener of a concert, though of no great harmony
by itself.

Violins are the lively, forward, importunate wits that distinguish
themselves by the flourishes of imagination, sharpness of repartee,
glances of satire, and bear away the upper part in every concert. I
cannot however but observe that, when a man is not disposed to hear
music, there is not a more disagreeable sound in harmony than that of a
violin.

There is another musical instrument, which is more frequent in this
nation than any other; I mean your bass-viol, which grumbles in the
bottom of the concert, and with a surly masculine sound strengthens the
harmony, and tempers the sweetness of the several instruments that play
along with it. The bass-viol is an instrument of a quite different
nature to the trumpet, and may signify men of rou