It is not possible for me to go into any detail, with regard to the slow and marvellous development of that triumph of human skill, which is truly known as the king of instruments. From those simple pieces of reed, cut off just below the knot, which formed the pipes of the syrinx, to the complicated, elaborate and perfect machinery which is hidden beneath the organ case there, is the same degree of difference, as there is between the rough-hewn canoe of the savage, and the wonderful perfection of the liners, which run their weekly race across the broad Atlantic. It was not until the end of the 11th century, that the first rude steps were taken towards the formation of the modern keyboard; then it was that huge keys or levers began to be used, and these keys were from 3 to 5 inches wide, 1-1/2 inches thick, and from a foot and a half to a yard in length. Nevertheless, even the organ of the 4th century had its impressive powers, if we may place reliance on words attributed to the Emperor Julian, the Apostate, who wrote: "I see a strange sort of reeds; they must, methinks, have sprung from no earthly, but a brazen soil. Wild are they, nor does the breath of man stir them, but a blast leaping forth from a cavern of ox-hide, passes within, beneath the roots of the polished reeds; while a lordly man, the fingers of whose hands are nimble, stands and touches here and there, the concordant stops of the pipes; and the stops, as they lightly rise and fall, force out the melody." And in its growth, as in the growth of young children, the organ has had its share of infantile vicissitudes. Even as late as the 13th century it lay under the ban of the ecclesiastics, and was deemed too profane and scandalous for Church use. Again, in 1644, Parliament issued an ordinance which commanded "that all organs and the frames and cases wherein they stand in all Churches and Chappells aforesaid shall be taken away and utterly defaced, and none other hereafter set up in their places." "At Westminster Abbey," we are told, "the Soldiers broke down the organs and pawned the pipes at several Ale Houses for pots of Ale." It is difficult to understand this opposition to the organ, more especially as David in the last of his psalms enjoined the people "to praise God with stringed instruments and organs." True, indeed, Job, in one of his most pessimistic moods, placed it on record that "the wicked rejoice at the sound of the organ," but evidently Job had no soul for music--was so unmusical, in fact, that he is worthy to be associated with a certain eminent divine of the English Church, whose musical instinct was so deficient that he only knew "God Save the Queen" was being sung by the people rising and doffing their hats.