Music Trade Review

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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW.
EARLY 40,000 tests by the Forestry
Division of the Department of Agri-
culture'have established these facts: Sea-
soned timber is twice as strong as green,
but weakens with absorption of moisture;
large and small timbers have equal strength
per square inch if equally perfect; knots
weaken a column as well as a beam; long-
leafed pine is stronger than average oak;
bleeding does not impair timber. And still
one fellow told me the other day that his
boy swept up a half bushel of acorns, where
an oak piano of a certain make had stood
over night, and that was in Philadelphia.
*
There appears to be no market for old
wood cuts in London at the present day.
At a sale held recently several lots of them,
including the original blocks used in the
earliest editions of Bunyan's "Pilgrim's
Progress," and a collection designed and
engraved by Thomas and John Bewick,
went for not much more than the price of
firewood. Brother Thorns will not like to
learn this, because it lessens the value of
that collection of his which has been ac-
cumulating some s'teen years, more or less.
* *
"During a conversation with a leading
piano manufacturer," says a writer in the
World, " I mentioned the names of several
men whose instruments have become
famous all the world over, and was in-
formed, much to my surprise, that but one
"of these men could have ranked as a player.
The manufacturer spoken of died some
time ago, and was a skilful pianist. In the
firm surviving him there is no one who can
play. Another strange fact is that some of
the most expert tuners in this city cannot
read music, although their exactness in
tone harmony is the first necessity of their
profession." It does not necessarily fol-
low that to build a good piano a man
must be a musician, neither is it necessary
for a tuner to read music; and the same
could appropriately apply to the music
trade journalist. To succeed in a legitimate
way in either of the vocations, and in all
others, the grade of intelligence is the great
factor—that is a necessary qualification.
* *
*
This was told me by one who knew: A
New York physician, who numbers among
his patients many of the most fashionable
women in town, is an ardent lover of a
"gobd bottle'of old wine.
His dinner was
interrupted one evening last week by a call
to attend a lady living in a fashionable
street in the upper part of the city. The
physician*responded,*but*when"he"felt"[the
pulse of his patient the fumes of the wine
so addled his brain that he could not count
the beats. Provoked with himself, he ex-
claimed under his breath, as he thought,
"Drunk, by gad." The next morning the
full force of his dilemma dawned upon
him, but while he was deliberating as to
the best course to pursue, a note, nicely
perfumed and sealed, was handed to him.
To his astonishment he read: " I t grieves
me more than I can tell that you should
have discovered my sad condition last even-
ing; but I trust, for old friendship's sake,
it will remain a secret with you."
It was
from his patient of the night before.
The making of a piano a hundred and
more years ago was a very slow process,
says The Pianist: " I t was usually done by
contract, often allowing six months or even
a year's time, the purchaser paying so much
cash and the remainder in grain, geese or
chickens, and sometimes even cord wood.
They were made by musicians, schoolmas-
ters or those interested in playing the in-
strument, with no regular order, but each
according to his own idea. When a piano
was finished it was the occasion for a grand
festival. A procession was formed consist-
ing of a band of music, the w r agon bearing
the wonderful instrument gaily decorated
with garlands of flowers and bright stream-
ers, the maker of the instrument and' his
assistants bringing up the rear. When the
house of the purchaser was reached, the
burgomaster would make a speech, the
priest would bless the instrument, other
speeches would follow, and a banquet and
dance wind up the momentous occasion."
It sounds very pretty, doesn't it? and sup-
pose it were really true.
Great guns!
wouldn't it keep the boys busy if that plan
were in vogue nowadays? But soberly, we
question very much of the ancients ever
adopted this plan. Perhaps our exchange
may turn on a little more light.
Musical shots are the latest thing out in
the sensational line. A sharp-shooter of
the name of Pardon fires at the metal bars
of a series of bells. The ball, in striking
the bar, sounds the notes, and the shots fol-
low each other in such rapid succession and
with such accuracy that Pardon is capable
of "shooting" any tune required. This
will fill a long-felt want. A great deal of
new music deserves shooting.
We can all
agree upon that, and we would all favor a
Pardon surely. Truly, the right kind of a
Pardon.
* *
Some startling results, stated Lord Ray-
leigh the other day in a lecture at the Royal
Institution, London, have been obtained in
investigating the sensitiveness of the ear
to sounds. By one method he found that
the ear is capable of responding to an
amount of condensation and rarefaction in
the air equal to one twenty-millionth of an
atmosphere, though by other experiments
the amount seemed to be a tenth less. A
point of some difficulty is, how do we know
the direction of sounds? By trial he found
that pure sounds, such as those of a tuning
fork, tell their direction with certainty only
when at the right or left; while with other
sounds, such as those of the voice or of
clapping the hands, the ear could easily
judge the direction, wherever it was.
We
have always noted how easily encores were
heard. The recipients have no trouble in
telling which direction they proceed from.
* *
Mme. Modjeska, the Polish actress, who
was expelled from Russia, is still in Berlin.
She says the Government's refusal to let
her tour Russia means to her a loss of more
that 50,000 roubles. Through Mr. Breck-
inridge, United States Minister in Russia,
she has requested that her deposit of 2,000
roubles, deposited in Warsaw, be returned.
She says the United States Government
will support her suit for damages. She
says the speech which she made in Chicago
last year was quoted incorrectly in the
newspapers, on whose reports the order of
expulsion was based. Now the Modjeska
resembles others in this: how often do
some people find it to their advantage to
claim that they were misquoted? When she
was here scooping American dollars she
never found time to refute the report.
Now, when she desires to possess some of
Nicolas' roubles, why he is a much nicer
fellow than she said he was. . . . ,. .
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*
Smithville, Ga., in the live and liberal
County of Lee, has a brass band of several
years' standing, and this is the story the
local paper of that place tells of it: " A
flagman, almost out of breath, rushed into
the Academy of Music here the other night
while the Smithville brass band was prac-
ticing, and asked to see the leader. He
said that when the south-bound passenger
train, which is due here at 7.15 o'clock
p. M., got near enough to hear the band,
the engine pulling the train suddenly be-
came unmanageable, and stopped dead
still, listened a moment, gave a short and
unearthly shriek, reversed itself, and took
the back track for Macon in regular Nancy
Hanks style. As soon as it got out of hear-
ing of the band, it stopped, and a flagman
was sent ahead to ask the boys to cease
playing until they could get through the
town. Now, any engine that won't pass
through the city while our band is playing
is a freak of the first water, and should be
side-tracked and left for the rust to devour.
For sweet, heavenly music, give us brass
bands and bullfrogs. "
,
* •
*
The spectacle of two well-known trade
editors embracing each other the other day,
would have been more affecting if the by-
standers could have overlooked the fact that
a knife hilt was plainly visible protruding
from the top of the New Yorker's boot,
and that the Chicagoan's sinewy fingers
evinced a strong disposition to tighten
around the swan-like neck of his dear
friend.
Listening to a discussion among his offi-