It is generally and justly admitted that in no other branch of the art of music has greater progress been made since the last century than in the construction of musical instruments. Nevertheless, there are people who think that we have also lost something here which might with advantage be restored. Our various instruments by being more and more perfected are becoming too much alike in quality of sound, or in that character of tone which the French call _timbre_, and the Germans _Klangfarbe_, and which professor Tyndall in his lectures on sound has translated _clang-tint_. Every musical composer knows how much more suitable one _clang-tint_ is for the expression of a certain emotion than another. Our old instruments, imperfect though they were in many respects, possessed this variety of _clang-tint_ to a high degree. Neither were they on this account less capable of expression than the modern ones. That no improvement has been made during the last two centuries in instruments of the violin class is a well-known fact. As to lutes and cithers the collection at Kensington contains specimens so rich and mellow in tone as to cause musicians to regret that these instruments have entirely fallen into oblivion. As regards beauty of appearance our earlier instruments were certainly superior to the modern. Indeed, we have now scarcely a musical instrument which can be called beautiful. The old lutes, spinets, viols, dulcimers, &c., are not only elegant in shape but are also often tastefully ornamented with carvings, designs in marquetry, and painting. [Illustration] The player on the _viola da gamba_, shown in the next engraving, is a reduced copy of an illustration in “The Division Violist,” London, 1659. It shows exactly how the frets were regulated, and how the bow was held. The most popular instruments played with a bow, at that time, were the _treble-viol_, the _tenor-viol_, and the _bass-viol_. It was usual for viol players to have “a chest of viols,” a case containing four or more viols, of different sizes. Thus, Thomas Mace in his directions for the use of the viol, “Musick’s Monument” 1676, remarks, “Your best provision, and most complete, will be a good chest of viols, six in number, viz., two basses, two tenors, and two trebles, all truly and proportionably suited.” The violist, to be properly furnished with his requirements, had therefore to supply himself with a larger stock of instruments than the violinist of the present day. [Illustration] That there was, in the time of Shakespeare, a musical instrument called _recorder_ is undoubtedly known to most readers from the stage direction in Hamlet: _Re-enter players with recorders_. But not many are likely to have ever seen a recorder, as it has now become very scarce: we therefore give an illustration of this old instrument, which is copied from “The Genteel Companion; Being exact Directions for the Recorder: etc.” London, 1683.