With reference to the _collective_ efforts of non-professional players, it may be remarked that, as individual vanity is _there_ held in some check, and as something like a painstaking preparation is customary, the auditor is in a less hazardous condition than where _one_ exhibitor has undisputed hold upon him,—besides which, the alternative of an _escape_ is more decidedly open. The _single_ cacophonist, secretly intending a “polacca,” may take you at unawares, after a quiet cup of tea, that has treacherously served to _mask_ his purpose. He may suddenly draw his lurking fiddle-case from beneath the very sofa whereon you are at ease—may summon that passive accomplice, his sister, to subservient office at the piano—and, putting his bow-arm into full exercise, bring you to “agony-point,” before you have had time to recover from your surprise. From the quartett or symphony-party, on the contrary, you have due notice beforehand and, if suspicious of discords that are not within the boundary of science, you can decline the invitation, and maintain the tranquillity of your nerves. The most desirable attainment for confederate Amateurs, next to a familiar acquaintance with their respective instruments, is that _self-knowledge_ which enables each to find contentedly his proper place, and ensures that all shall be “correspondent to command, and do their spiriting _gently_.” Then, by good discipline, under the direction of a well-educated musician, whose practical knowledge, added to his intimacy with the compositions of the best masters, gives him a moral influence and authority over an organized body of Amateurs, it is surprising what excellence of effect in musical execution may be produced. It has been sometimes, however, the bane of Amateur Societies to be subject to the control of some unwarrantably officious member, whose musical qualifications in nowise render him a proper person for the assumed dictatorial capacity: or, it may happen that accident brings into the employ of a Society of Amateurs one of those mere practical and executive professional Fiddlers, whose notions of art are only on a level with the quality of their manners. In either case, little benefit, and much less pleasure, is derived from submitting to such directorship. The Amateur, and the Fiddler, will each exercise alike his own weak judgment in the general appeal for the “time” of the music—each (the composer being _least_ thought of) preferring the time of an _allegro_ in the ratio of its adaptation to his own powers of execution. Of the two, the Professor is the more mischievous, as regards the production of bad consequences. Vain of his advantage over the Amateur, he never neglects to shew it by the rapidity with which he will _time_ the quick movements; creating thereby a bad habit in the Amateur, who, to keep up with the first-fiddle, is obliged _so_ to scramble through his part, as if it were the purpose of the composer to represent _a race_.