Scan 83
Catalogue of the Stearns Collection of Musical Instruments, 1918
8 lines. Read by computer on 29 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1"That every ship in the fleete in the Time of Fogs, which continually happen with little wind and calmes, shall keepe a reasonable noise with Drum and Trumpet, or otherwise to keepe themselves cleere one of the other."
3While poets have sung the praises of the violin, the harp, the lute, and flute, and other instruments, it has been reserved for George Meredith to apostrophize the drum, specifically the bass-drum.
5"There is no instrument whose sound proclaims such vast internal satisfaction as the drum. I know not whether it be that the sense we have of the corpulency of this instrument predisposes us to imagine it supremely content: as when an alderman is heard snoring, the world is assured that it listens to the voice of his own exceeding gratulation. A light heart in a fat body ravishes not only the world but the philosopher. If monotonous, the one note of the drum is very correct. Like the speaking of great Nature, what it means is implied by the measure. When the drum beats to the measure of a common human pulsation, it has a conquering power: inspiring us neither to dance nor to trail the members, but to march as life does, regularly, and in hearty good order, and with a not exhaustive jollity. It is a sacred instrument." "Sandra Belloni," Ch. IX.
7Of the significance of the drum in modern life little need be said. As in the life of the savage, it expresses and incites military ardor, it speaks of death, and, in the orchestra it becomes eloquent. The modern drum, with the exception of the kettle-drum, which may be tuned, in its essentials is in advance of the earliest types only in its greater perfection of structure.
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