performer, who, with the fingers of the right hand plays the air, and with the left grasps the lower edge of the head in order to beat the bass as in the tambourine; which we find from the sculptures was played in the same manner by the ancient Egyptians." (2.) There were two kinds of cymbals by tseltsilim, formerly, as there are to this day in the East. The cymbal called tseltsiliy tirouah, cymbals of rejoicing, consisted of two flat pieces of metal or plates; the musician held one of them in his right hand, the other in his left, and smote them together as an accompaniment to other instruments; this cymbal and the mode of using it may be seen in modern military bands. The second kind of cymbals, called you baby tseltsiliy shima, cymbals of a high sound, (Psalm 150. 5,) consisted of four small plates, attached two to each hand, which the ladies as they danced, smote together. See CYMBAL.

Sir John Gardner Wilkinson, speaking of the cymbals of the ancient Egyptians observes, that "The same kind of instrument is used by the modern inhabitants of the country; and from them have been borrowed those very small cymbals played with the finger and thumb, which supply the place of castanets in the almeh dance. Indeed there can be no doubt that these were the origin of the Spanish castanet, having been introduced into that country by the Moors, and afterwards altered in form, and made of chestnut (castana) and other wood instead of metal. The cymbals of modern Egypt are chiefly used by the attendants of sheikhs' tombs, who travel through the country at certain periods of the year, to collect the charitable donations of the credulous or the devout among the Moslems, who thus, indirectly and unconsciously, encourage the idleness of these pretenders, in the hopes of obtaining some blessing from the indulgent saint. Drums and some other noisy instruments, which are used at marriages and on other occasions, accompany the cymbals, but these last are more peculiarly appropriated to the service of the sheikhs, and the external ceremonies of religion; and this is the more remarkable, as we find no instance in the paintings of Thebes, of their having been used at the festive meetings of the ancient Egyptians; and a female whose coffin contained a pair of cymbals, was described in the hieroglyphics of the exterior as the minstrel of a deity. We may therefore conclude, that this instrument belonged, as with the modern Egyptians, to the service of religion, though probably not so exclusively as the sacred sistrum."

The word Day minaaneim, (2Sam. 6. 5,) Sept. CELOTρa; Vulg. sistra, erroneously rendered in our version "cornets," appears to be derived from nua, to move, or to be shaken; Gr. σew, to shake. We We may, therefore, suppose that this was an instrument corresponding to the sistrum, by which word Jerome, in his Latin version, has rendered it. The sistrum was a rod of iron bent into an oval or oblong shape, or square at two corners and curved at the others, and furnished with a number of moveable rings; so that when shaken or struck with another rod of iron, it emitted the sound desired; it was very common in Egypt, and was used in the worship of Isis. Rabbi David Kimchi asserts that at the time of playing it, the performer moved his body in several contortions. Sistra were used by David and the people, at the time of dancing before the ark; and some suppose that women used them on mournful occasions, as they were used in the ceremonies of Osiris. The Shilti Haggeborim give no corresponding Greek name. The O shalishim, mentioned in 1Samuel 18. 6, and styled "instruments of music," or, as in the margin, "three-stringed instru

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ments," probably differed from the more common sistrum in being of a triangular form, and no doubt corresponded to the modern triangle. Some commentators have considered them as cymbals, and others as having three chords and ranking among the stringed instruments.

Sir John Gardner Wilkinson says, "Sistra were often held forth, generally by the queens and princesses, in the presence of the gods, as well as the emblematic instruments, surmounted by the head of Athor; and the privilege of bearing them in the temples was principally confined to those who held the office of pallacides."

The sistrum" was generally from about eight to sixteen, or eighteen inches in length, and entirely of bronze or brass. It was sometimes inlaid with silver, gilt, or otherwise ornamented; and being held upright, was shaken, the rings moving to and fro upon the bars. These last were frequently made to imitate snakes, or simply bent at each end to secure them; and I have met with an instance of their being connected with each other by cross pieces, besides the unusual addition of two intermediate bars." Wilkinson.

"In the Egyptian room of the British Museum, there is a bronze sistrum; the handle cylindrical, with the head of Athor on each side, full-faced, cow-eared, and surmounted by a cornice flanked by uræi with the otf, one of which is lost; at the top the full-faced head of the terrestrial Athor, placed on the symbol of resplendence, between disks bearing lion-headed urai and vultures holding signets in their claws; at the sides are the lion-headed deity Pasht-Merephtah, one of the types of Athor, seated in a naos, and the female goddess attached to the upper and lower regions, holding in each hand a to sistrum. These subjects are in outline and are supposed to be stamped. There are three perforations for wires. It was found in the temple, of the western lake of Karnak.” The sistrum never appears in the pictures of musical concerts among the Egyptians; it seems sometimes to have been used as a bell in private houses to summon the attendants, and it is frequently found in the hand of the mistress of the mansion.

It is not easy to discover the nature of a sound from written descriptions; but as far as we can judge, that of the sistrum was not very unlike that of the gong, for the Greeks complain of its harsh and jarring effect. It is still used by the Abyssinians in their religious ceremonies.

II. Wind Instruments.—Six of these are mentioned in the Scriptures: the organ, the flute and hautboy, dulcimer, horn and trumpet.

(1.) The "organ," y or ay uggab, (Gen. 4. 21;

Job 21. 12) may be considered as the ancient shepherd's pipe, corresponding very nearly to the syrinx, or the pipe of Pan, among the Greeks. It consisted at first of only one or two, but afterwards of about seven pipes made of reeds, and differing from each other in length. The uggab is represented by the Jewish writers as the most harmonious of all instruments, but they say no true account of it has survived. Professor Jahn says, the instrument called 'pi mashrokitha," flute," and used in Babylon, (Dan. 3. 5,) was of a similar construction to the uggab.

Dr. Burney remarks, "A syrinx or fistula panis, made of reeds tied together, exactly resembling that of the ancients, has been found to be in common use in the island of New Amsterdam, in the South Seas, as flutes and drums have been in Otaheite and New Zealand; which indisputably proves them to be instruments natural to every people in a state of barbarism. They were first used by the Egyptians and Greeks during the infancy of the musical art among them; and they seem to have been invented and practised at all times by nations remote from each other, and between whom it is hardly possible that there ever could have been the least intercourse or communication." The number of tubes which these instruments exhibit on ancient monuments varies from six to eleven.

The Syrinx. From a Grecian Sculpture. (2,3.) The hhalil, nechilah, and a nekeb, are wind instruments of the flute kind, made of various materials, such as wood, reeds, horns, and bones. As far as we may be permitted to judge from the three kinds of pipes now used in the East, the Hebrew instrument called Nehiloth in Psalm 5 is the one of the double kind. The Hhalil, usually rendered "pipe" in our version, is one of a simpler form, having a single stem, with an orifice through it. Both words are derived from roots which signify to bore through, while Nekeb answers to the one without an orifice. (Isai. 5. 12; 30.29; Jerem. 48. 36; Ezek. 28. 13.) In the Shilti Haggeborim the Hhalil is said to have been of three sorts, namely, the P keren, and two others resembling those which the Italians call piffero, and flauto. These instruments in the Gemara are classed together under the general epithet 18 abob. The Hhalil is described as oblong and hollow, and was common both to private houses and the sanctuary. Flutes and pipes are mentioned by ancient writers under a variety of names, the distinctions implied by which it is now impossible to discover. They acquired such different names rather perhaps from the disposition of parts producing variations of musical power, than from any marked distinctions of form. Ancient flutes were generally cylindrical tubes,

sometimes of equal diameter throughout, but often widened at the end into a funnel-shape resembling a clarionet. They were always blown like pipes at one end, never transversely; they had mouth-pieces, and sometimes plugs or stopples, but no keys to open or close the holes beyond the reach of the hands. The holes varied in number in the different varieties of the flute. They were sometimes made in joints, but connected by an interior nozzle, which was generally of wood. These flutes were sometimes double, that is, a person played on two instruments at once, either connected or detached; and among the Greeks and Romans the player on the double flute often had a leathern bandage over his mouth to prevent the escape of the breath at the corners. The ancient Egyptians used the double flute. The nay is a pipe or flute which is still a great favourite among Orientals, and appears to correspond in its form and use to the more common and simple instrument of ancient times. In the Berhani Kattea, a Persian work, it is said, "Na-i is a pipe, on which musicians play, and is called in Arabic, Mazmaron, or a flute; it is also a trumpet, on which they play in the field of battle, and this is called Nai-rūyīn, literally, brazen pipe, and is the same as the Nafir, which is a sort of small trumpet or kerna; it is likewise used for the kerna itself."

"The flute," says Sir John Gardner Wilkinson, "was at first very simple, and as Horace observes, 'with a few holes,' the number being limited to four, until Diodorus, of Thebes in Boeotia, added others; improving the instrument, at the same time, by making a lateral opening for the mouth. It was originally of reeds, but in process of time it increased in size, and in the number of its notes, and was made of better and more sonorous materials. It is impossible to say whether the Egyptians had one or several kinds of flutes, adapted, as with the Greeks, to different purposes, some to mournful, others to festive occasions; but it is evident that they employed the flute both at banquets and in religious processions. In the earliest sculptures, which are those in the tomb of an individual behind the Great Pyramid, between three and four thousand years old, is a concert of vocal and instrumental music, consisting of two harps, a pipe, a flute, and several voices; and during the reigns of the Pharaohs of the eighteenth dynasty, many other combinations frequently occur.

"The single pipe, ovpty or μovavλos, seems to have belonged principally, if not exclusively, to male performers; but as it is very rarely introduced into the sculptures, I conclude it was not held in great estimation.

"The double pipe consisted of two pipes, perhaps occasionally united together by a common mouthpiece, and played each with the corresponding hand. It was

The Double Pipe. From a Painting at Herculaneum. common to the Greeks and other people, and from the mode of holding it, received the name of right and left pipe, the tibia dextra and sinistra of the Romans. The double, like the single pipe, was at first of reed, and afterwards of box, lotus thorn, and other sonorous wood;

or of horn, ivory, bone, iron, or silver. It was not only used on solemn occasions, but very generally at festive banquets, both among the Greeks and Egyptians. Men, but more frequently women, performed upon it, occasionally dancing as they played."

Egyptian Reud Pipes.

(4.) The iD sumponyah, is the "dulcimer" of Daniel 3. 5,10; the marginal reading has 'D' sephonya, the Greek cuμpwvia, or bagpipe. The Shilti Haggeborim describe the sumponyah as a bagpipe consisting of two shrill-toned fifes pressed through a leathern bag. Servius, in his Commentary on the Eneid, describes the symphonia as a sort of bagpipe, which agrees with the representations of Jewish writers. The bagpipe bore the same name among the Moors of Spain, and it is still called in Italy zampogna. The known antiquity of this instrument, together with its present existence in the East, appear to confirm the reference of the sumponyah to the bagpipe. The modern Oriental bagpipe is composed of a goat-skin, usually with the hair on, and in the natural form, but deprived of the head, the tail, and the feet. The pipes are usually made of reeds, terminated with tips of cow's horns, slightly curved; the entire instrument is primitively simple in its materials and construc

tion.

(5.) The horn or crooked trumpet, keren, (Josh. 6. 5,) was The Oriental Bagpipe. a very ancient instrument, made of the horns of oxen cut off at the smaller extremity. In progress of time, rams' horns were employed for the same purpose. This instrument was called also shophar, as we learn from Josephus and Jerome; and in the Septuagint it is styled σαλπιγξ κερατινη. Gesenius says, "That it was made of horn, or at least in the form of a horn (as our bugle horn), is evident from its being interchanged with keren." It is probable that, in some instances, it was made of brass, and it was much used in war. By the old Jewish writers, the shophar was supposed to have been a crooked ram's horn, and it was one of the many extraordinary instruments pretended to have been heard upon one occasion from Jericho to Jerusalem. It was used in the field of battle, on solemn occasions, and when the different anathemas were denounced at the feast of trumpets; its sound was accounted symbolical of the resurrection of the dead, "who (as the prophet Isaiah asserts,) shall arise with the sound of the trumpet."

(6.) The straight trumpet, is hhalsotserah, Greek σantys, was an instrument about a cubit in length, hollow throughout, and at the larger extremity shaped so as to resemble the mouth of a small bell. In times of peace, when the people or the rulers were to be assembled together, this trumpet was blown softly. (Numb. 10. 2.) When the camps were to move forward, or the people to march to war, it was sounded with a deeper note. (Numb. 31. 6; 2Kings 11. 14; 12. 13.) The shape of these trumpets, as they were used in the second Temple, we may still see on the triumphal arch of Titus, and on Jewish coins. They were made of silver. The Jewish writers remark that hhatsotseroth were, in many instances, identified with the shophar; yet they were longer, and made of various metals, and sometimes of wood. The shophar was blown to assem

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ble the congregation, to proclaim the stated festivals, such as the new moons, new year, and jubilee. The hhatsotseroth (being of silver), whenever the camps moved in the desert, "if they were sounded once only, the princes and heads of the congregation assembled; if they were blown with first a short, then with a lengthened sound, those who were situated towards the east first moved their camp. At the second blast, which was first lengthened, then shortened, those who were in the south followed the example, and so on, till all were in motion." We observe them on many other occasions; they were sounded before the ark, and used by Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun, and those who accompanied the singers in the Temple. In the Tabernacle and the Temple, the Levites were the lawful musicians, but, on other occasions, any one who chose might use musical instruments. There was, however, this exception: the holy silver trumpets were to be blown only by the priests, who, by the sounding of them, proclaimed the festival days, assembled the leaders of the people, gave the signal for battle, and for retreat. (Numb. 10. 1-10.)

"The Egyptian trumpet, oaλmy, like that of the Israelites, was about one foot and a half long, of very simple form, apparently of brass; and, when sounded, it was held with both hands, and either used singly, or as a part of the military band, with the drum and other instruments. The musicians were not distinguished by any particular dress from the rest of the soldiers. The trumpet was particularly, though not exclusively, appropriated to martial purposes. It was straight like the Roman tuba, or our common trumpet; but it is uncertain whether that used in the Egyptian cavalry was of another form, as in the Roman army, where the lituus, or clarion, bent a little at the end like an augur's staff, supplied the place of the tuba of the infantry. The Israelites had trumpets for warlike as well as sacred purposes, for festivals and rejoicings; and the office of sounding them was not only honourable, but was committed solely to the priests." (Numb. 10. 8; Josh. 6. 4.) Wilkinson.