employed were mostly iambic and anapaestic tetrameters.[793] But as it is impossible, in the case of Greek performers, to imagine dancing without a musical accompaniment, the verses must have been given in recitative. Fifthly, in the parabasis to the Birds the nightingale is asked to lead off the anapaests with the flute; and the scholiast remarks that ‘the parabasis was often spoken to the accompaniment of the flute’.[794] This statement means that the anapaestic tetrameters, which constitute the parabasis proper, were given in recitative. Lastly, there is the fact that the terms ‘speech’ and ‘song’ are both used of anapaests, implying that they occupied an intermediate position.[795] For these and other similar reasons it appears probable that recitative was employed in passages written in the metres already specified, that is to say, in iambic, trochaic, and anapaestic tetrameters and in regular anapaestic dimeters. It seems too that on certain rare occasions it was used in lyrical passages.[796] It may be interesting to collect together in this place such information as we possess concerning the musicians and musical instruments employed in the Greek drama. The instrument generally used for the accompaniment both of the singing and of the recitative was the flute.[797] The harp had formerly been employed very frequently. But it was found that the flute, being a wind instrument, harmonized better with the human voice.[798] However, the harp was occasionally introduced. In the Frogs Aeschylus calls for the harp, when he is going to give a specimen of the lyrics of Euripides. Similarly, in the parody of the choruses of Aeschylus, the recurrence of the refrain ‘phlattothrat’ points to an accompaniment on the harp. A harpist is depicted on the Naples vase, side by side with the flute-player.[799] In the beginning of the Birds, when the chorus makes its entrance, the regular chorus of twenty-four birds is preceded by four others, the flamingo, cock, hoopoe, and gobbler. These were apparently musicians; and the instrument which they played must have been the harp; since later on, when the parabasis is going to begin, Procne has to be sent for specially to play the flute-accompaniment.[800] As regards the number of musicians and instruments, the ordinary provision for a tragedy or comedy was a single flute-player. In the Delphic inscriptions of the third century, which give the names of the performers in the various contests at the Soteria, we find that in every dramatic exhibition only one flute-player was provided. Works of art never depict more than one; and one is the number mentioned by the grammarians.[801] But extra music might be supplied in special cases. Harpists, as we have seen, were occasionally employed, and as many as four of them seem to have been used in the Birds. Probably in the same way, when a special effect was to be produced, the number of the flute-players might be augmented. As to the costume of the