V The old Italian method is now considered to have possessed some merits which are not shared by modern scientific systems. Yet a certain degree of mystery still surrounds the old method. Welcome as its revival would be to many teachers and students, great difficulty is met with in determining of just what it consisted. Many analyses and explanations of the old method have indeed been suggested. But as these consist almost entirely of attempts to find in it some means for the direct conscious management of the vocal organs, they have necessarily brought forth little that is of value. All the mystery surrounding the old method is dispelled by the understanding that it did not treat the vocal problem as capable of solution by mechanical means. The old Italian method was simply an amplification of the system of vocal education which had been in course of development for nearly a thousand years. It embodied no new conception of vocal management, but continued to treat the control of the voice as a purely instinctive matter. Its chief contribution to the technical training of the voice was the adoption of _vocalises_ and exercises specially designed for this purpose. Even that was a matter of rather slow development. During the early decades of the seventeenth century vocal teachers continued to select passages from standard musical works which lent themselves readily to the technical exercise of the voice, just as the teachers of the preceding century had done. Gradually it came to be seen that greater satisfaction could be obtained from the use of compositions arranged to bring in the various technical points and vocal embellishments one or two at a time. Thus the voice could be led by an easy gradation to the mastery of every technical difficulty and its training was rendered easier and more expeditious. But the general scheme of instruction continued to be patterned after the traditional model. A complete musical education, not only the special cultivation of the voice, was the goal. The plan of combining the preliminary training in vocal management with instruction in the rudiments of music continued to be followed as late as 1750. Many famous masters employed assistant teachers to perform the drudgery of the initial stages of instruction, considering that their own high degree of culture entitled them to deal only with advanced students. This custom continued for at least one hundred years, and Tosi (1723) speaks of it as a system so well established as to need no comment.