These were the songs which, about the middle of the ninth century, arose on festal or ferial days in the cloister church of St. Gall. How much store the fathers of this convent set upon beauty and edification in song appears from the old regulations in which distinct pronunciation of words and uniformity of rendering are enjoined, and hastening or dragging the time sharply rebuked.” Schubiger goes on to say that three styles of performing the chant were employed; _viz._, a very solemn one for the highest festivals, one less solemn for Sundays and saints’ days, and an ordinary one for ferial days. An appropriate character was given to the different chants,—_e. g._, a profound and mournful expression in the office for the dead; an expression of tenderness and sweetness to the hymns, the Kyrie, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei; and a dignified character (cantus gravis) to the antiphons, responses, and alleluia. Anything that could disturb the strict and euphonious rendering of the song was strictly forbidden. Harsh, unmusical voices were not permitted to take part. Distinctness, precise conformity of all the singers in respect to time, and purity of intonation were inflexibly demanded. Special services, with processions and appropriate hymns, were instituted on the occasion of the visit to the monastery of the emperor or other high dignitary. All public observances, the founding of a building, the reception of holy relics, the consecration of a bell or altar,—even many of the prescribed routine duties of conventual life, such as drawing water, lighting lamps, or kindling fires,—each had its special form of song. It was not enthusiasm, but sober truth, that led Ekkehard V. to say that the rulers of this convent, “through their songs and melodies, as also through their teachings, filled the Church of God, not only in Germany, but in all lands from one sea to the other, with splendor and joy.”