The German principle, on the other hand, is that all vowels (and the German language has a greater number of them than the Italian) must be cultivated equally, the difficult ones all the more because they are difficult. Herr Hey has found in practice that not only can the vowels which at first sound dull and hollow, like U, be made as sonorous as A (Ah), but that, by practising on U, the A itself is rendered more sonorous than it can ever become by exclusive practice on it alone. Not only does the German method in this way secure a greater variety of sonorous vowel sounds, useful for the expression of different dramatic moods, but the registers are equalized, and there is a great gain in the power and endurance of the voice, which is of immense importance to-day in grand opera. Prof. Stockhausen, the distinguished vocal teacher, recently remarked in the _Frankfurter Zeitung_ that "the _mezza voce_ is the natural song, the constant loud singing being only a struggle with unequal weapons against our modern orchestra." No doubt he is right. But the orchestra has become such an important factor in modern opera that musicians would be unwilling to have it reduced in size--the tendency being, in fact, the other way; and at the same time opera is such an expensive luxury that it can only be made to pay in a very large theatre, which obliges the singers to have stentorian voices. Consequently, the German method, which develops the power and the sonority of the voice on _every_ vowel, is the method of the future, all the more because the English language, which is the world language of the future, is even more difficult for vocal purposes than the German, and calls for similar treatment. In the treatment of consonants, the German method marks a still greater advance on the Italian method. Professor Ehrlich thinks that the reason why Italians care so much for melody and so little for harmony is because they are too indolent to make the mental effort which is required to follow a complicated harmonic score. They are, certainly, too lazy to pronounce any harsh or difficult consonants, and the Italian language therefore presents a picture of sad effeminate degeneracy compared with the more vigorous Latin and even Spanish. Now the English language and the English character have much more of German vigor and masculine strength than of the Italian _dolce far niente_: hence, the English vocal style of the future will have to be modelled after the German style, which, instead of shirking difficult consonants boldly tackles and utilizes them. It will never be possible to sing so sweetly in the English and German languages as in Italian; but it is possible to sing with much more vigor, dramatic definiteness, and variety of emotional expression.