have had seven or eight
stops,--that is, so many different _kinds_ of tones,--which
would place them nearly on a par with our own. Others think
that they possessed seven or eight _keys_; that is, so many
_tones_ only. It has been a point of dispute as to what
function the water performed in working it. Vitruvius is
rather hazy on this point, saying only that it is
'suspended' in the instrument. The water, when the organ was
played, was in a state of agitation, as if boiling.

"There are medals still in existence which were awarded to
victors in organ contests, on which this instrument is
represented with two boys blowing or pumping; but the
representation is too small to clear up any doubtful
points."

But, without devoting further space to the music that was in vogue
prior to the Christian era, I proceed to notice that our first
reliable account of it, as a system, commences with the fourth
century; at which time St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, arranged the
sacred chants that bear his name, and which were to be sung in the
cathedrals.

In the year 600 St. Gregory improved upon these chants, inventing the
scale of eight notes. His system is the basis of our modern music.

From the close of the eleventh to the commencement of the fourteenth
century, minstrels, _jongleurs_, or troubadours, were the principal
devotees of music. They seem to have been its custodians, so to speak;
and to their guild many of the knights belonged. Some of the kings and
nobles of the time were also, in a sense, troubadours; such as, for
instance, Thibault of Navarre, and William the Ninth of Poitou.

These roving musicians, who generally united the qualities of the
poet, the musical composer, and performer, were treated with much
favor by princes and all the nobility, and were everywhere warmly
welcomed for a long period. It is, however, far from pleasant to have
to say that this for a long time noble class of musicians, to whom we
owe so much for the preservation unbroken for three hundred years of
the chain of musical life, as well indeed, also, as that of general
literature, spoiled perhaps by the excessive praises and indulgences
accorded them, became at last quite dissolute, and fell from their
high position. All royal favors were finally withdrawn from them, and
orders for their restriction were issued from the throne.

Mr. B.W. Ball (in that faithful exponent of art,