One thought leads to another thought. I have a little instrument before me, dignified by the name “organ,”—a very little organ, but the name comes to it because it is one of the earliest of the race from which our present day organ has sprung. Was its inventor a genius? A poor human nomad wandering the wilds of Tartary, inspired to begin the foundations of that which was to be an empire of sound,—one of those “Who builded better than he knew,” Was he inspired, I wonder? True it is that the invention has been claimed for some emperor, but that is so natural an appropriation that we give no heed to it. Certainly it is the unknown man who is the true great man, though history has obliterated his name and graven a royal cartouche in its place. The mythical is always later than the real. This curious instrument: what a juggle of words it has led me to. The inspiration I have to talk of is done by inspiring,—its music is made as the lark’s music is, by inspirating. Note you how the bird sings by drawing in breath, by _inspiring_; and higher and higher he mounts, filling the air with melody for a half mile around him; soaring, singing and singing as he soars, never tiring for the hour together, because every effort invigorates the little body instead of exhausting its strength; he drinks in oxygen at every note, and so is refreshed by singing. Would that human singing were equally refreshing to the singer and the hearer! [Illustration: _Fig. 28._ _The Chinese Sheng._ (_Quarter Size._)] The _Sheng_ was formerly called the “bird’s nest,” and the peculiar arrangement of its pipes—the longest of which pipes exceed considerably the real sounding length—is held by the Chinese to represent the tail of the phœnix as she sits upon her nest; indeed, unless we accept the symbolism, the method shown in the construction is unaccountable.