here results an easy accommodation of the pulse of attention,
although even in the subjective rhythm there has already occurred
an objective influence capable of affecting us sensibly.[4]

+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| [4] Paul Verrier, Essai sur les Principes de la MA(C)trique |
| Anglaise (Paris, 1909), Deuxieme Partie, Livre II, ch. x, |
| pp. 56, 57; and cf. p. 90, n. 1. |
+--------------------------------------------------------------+

Thus we have always at hand both a more or less efficient bodily
metronome in the pulse and in respiration, and also a "cerebral
metronome" capable not only of easy adjustment to different rates of
speed but also of that subtlest of modulations which psychologists call
the 'elastic unit,' and which musicians, though not so definitely or
surely, recognize as _tempo rubato_.

The sense of rhythm, as has been said, differs remarkably in different
individuals--just as the sense of touch, of smell, of hearing.[5] To
some, rhythm appears chiefly as a series of points of emphasis or
stresses alternating with points of less emphasis or of none at all;
such are called, in scientific jargon, 'stressers.' To others the
principal characteristic of rhythm is the time intervals; such are
called 'timers.' But this is a practical, not a philosophical
distinction. For it is the _succession_ of points of emphasis which
even the most aggressive stresser feels as rhythmic; and succession
implies and involves a temporal element. The stresser's only difficulty
is to feel the approximate _equality_ of the interval. The essential
thing, however, is to understand that, while time is the foundation of
speech-rhythm, stress is its universal adjunct and concomitant.[6]

+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| [5] A simple experiment will illustrate this. Place two |
| persons back to back, so that they cannot see each other, |
| and have them beat time to an audible melody; as soon as the |
| music ceases they will begin to beat differently. (Verrier, |
| II, p. 65.) The difficulty of keeping even a trained |
| orchestra playing together illustrates the same fact. |
| |
| [6] "If rhythm means anything to the average individual, it |
| means motor response and a sense of organized time."