The voice which, because of its great range, best illustrates the three-register division of the vocal scale, is the soprano. The average soprano ranges from [Music: C4-A5]; but combining the three types of soprano voices, the soprano compass is as given in the previous chapter, the extremes being, of course, exceptional. Among types of sopranos, the dramatic averages the greatest compass. The voice is heavier than florid soprano and incapable of being handled with the same agility. But it contains more low notes and almost as many high ones, unless in the latter respect one compares it with florid soprano voices of the phenomenal order. Otherwise, so far as the high notes are concerned, the difference lies in quality rather than in compass. The Inflammatus in Rossini's _Stabat Mater_, which is written for dramatic soprano, contains the high C, and no one who has heard Nordica sing it need be told of the noble effect a great dramatic soprano can produce with it. It is possible to sing the three highest notes of the chest register of dramatic soprano with the adjustment for the middle register; and the higher notes of the middle register with the adjustment for the head register. This option is not merely a convenience. Its artistic value is great. In loud phrases those optional notes which naturally lie in the chest register are delivered most effectively in that register; but in _piano_ phrases they are more effective when sung with the adjustment of the middle register. The same thing applies to those optional tones which naturally lie in the middle register. In loud phrases they are sung best in their natural register--the middle; in _piano_ phrases, in the head register. These are two capital illustrations of the value of the overlapping of registers and the necessity of training a voice to be equally at home in both registers on all notes that are optional.