The earliest specimens go to confirm this, for whereas some of them are extremely bucolic and uncouth, others are refined and even sensuous in character. Alternating in grave and gay, the music suggests diverse origin. Musical notation, as we know it to-day, is a comparatively modern invention. It is the result of centuries of research and experiment. It is doubtful if the music that Gurth, the swineherd of Cedric the Saxon, may have hummed to himself in his long and solitary vigils could indeed be expressed in it. The scales then in popular use were different in essential respects from ours, and that there are even yet vestiges of the old peasant music still remaining I feel persuaded. For instance, many years ago in an outlying district of Sussex I heard an old man singing a folk song to a roomful of approving companions. I listened with the interest of curiosity, but beyond the fact that it seemed to be in a minor key I gained little. Of the language I failed to understand one word. One thing, however, struck me, and this was that even in the final cadence there was no leading note[3], and that the style of note-succession reminded me of Scotch music. As nearly as I could approximate it, the key suggested G minor, and the final notes sounded like the following:-- [Illustration] This, of course, may have been the idiosyncracy of the singer, but each verse, as I heard it, was consistent one with the other. Doubtless such an authority as Mr. Cecil Sharp would be able to give an explanation of so interesting an experience. It should be borne in mind that music, for long ages, was transmitted from one individual to another through the ear alone. The invention of a musical notation, even of the most primitive kind, being comparatively recent. The art of reading from it, in the Middle Ages, was practically restricted to the monks, whose creation it was. Even to this day musical sight-reading is only mastered by comparatively few of a large population. On this important point, the majority of the people of England are certainly not musical. We shall later on deal with the earliest known examples of English vocal and instrumental music. For the moment we will consider the means at the disposal of the music-minded in medi[ae]val days. To the human voice we need not refer, since it is little susceptible of change from age to age. Musical instruments were few in number and of a crude order in general. The bagpipe, hornpipe and others of a similar kind, together with stringed instruments in the earliest stage of development, being in most general use. The viols, lute, virginals, recorders, and many others, belong to a much later period. The violin, as we know it, only arrived at perfection in the seventeenth century, when Stradivarius, Amati and Guanarius were making their marvellous instruments. But that they had instruments and even used them in combination is shewn by the following lines from Chaucer:--