To render this explanation perfectly intelligible, it will, perhaps, be necessary to describe succinctly the whole process of singing in company. At first, it has been conjectured, when manners were rude, and the language still in its infancy, singing, like dancing, required no great art, and was little more than those wild bursts of melody still common among the improvisatori of Arabia and other Eastern countries, but that from these humble beginnings lyrical poetry took its rise, preserving still the freedom of its original state, and rising, unshackled by the rigid laws of metre, to heights of sublimity and grandeur beyond which no human composition ever soared. By degrees some complex forms of verse obtained the preference,—such, for example, as those of Sappho and Alcæos,—and fixed and definite laws of metre were established. The Scolion, however, always preserved something of its original spontaneous character, at least in appearance, and the same thing may be predicated of all their festive lays. But before they gave loose to their gaiety, the deep religious sentiment which pervaded the whole nation required a pæan, or hymn, to be sung in honour of the gods, and in this every person present joined.[834] While thus engaged, each guest, it is supposed, held in his hand a branch of laurel, the tree sacred to Apollo.[835] To the pæan succeeded another air, which all present sang in their turn, holding this time a branch of myrtle,[836] which, like the laurel bough mentioned above, was called æsakos, or the “branch of song.”[837] The singing commenced with the principal guest, to whom the symposiarch or host delivered the Cithara[838] and æsakos, demanding a song, which, according to the laws of the table, no one could refuse. Having performed his part, the singer was, in turn, entitled to call upon his neighbour, beginning on the right hand, and delivering to him the Cithara and the myrtle branch. The second, when he had sung, handed it then to the third, the third to the fourth, and so on until the whole circle of the company had been made. It sometimes happened, though not often, that among the guests an individual, unskilled in instrumental music, was found, and, in this case, he sang without accompaniment, holding the æsakos in his hand.[839] ----- Footnote 834: Plut. Symp. i. 1. Athen. xiv. 24. Footnote 835: Hesych. v. ᾄσακος, ap. Ilgen. De Scol. Poes. p. 154. Footnote 836: Sch. Aristoph. Nub. 1339, 1346. Footnote 837: Potter, Antiq. ii. 403. Footnote 838: Sch. Aristoph. Nub. 1337, seq. Footnote 839: Ilgen, De Scol. Poes. p. 156. -----