body of the pipe, in a line with the slit just described, which experiment would be attended with the same result on the pitch of the sound as if the tube were shortened at each hole in succession. Thus the same short succession of agreeable sounds as those of the Pan's-pipe, or any pleasant admixture of them, would be obtainable from one tube, and a rude model produced of an instrument which in its more finished form subsequently became the Flute-à-bec. Familiar examples of this kind of perforated tube are presented by the wooden and tin toy-whistles of the present day.
When the first 'squeaker' was made, such as country lads still delight to construct of osiers in spring-time, a primitive model of a pipe of the third kind mentioned above, a Reed-pipe, was produced. It consisted of a 'vibrator' and a tube; the former sounded by being agitated by compressed wind from an air-cavity, the breath from the human mouth. Reed-pipes, although freely used as separate wind-instruments in ancient times—the Bag-pipe among the number—were not introduced into organs until the fifteenth century, so far as can be ascertained, and need not therefore be further considered in this place.
A series of pipes of the second class (receiving air from below), would be less conveniently under the immediate control of the mouth than their predecessors; hence a wooden box was devised (now the wind-chest), containing a row of holes along the top, into which were placed the lower ends of the pipes; and the wind was sometimes provided by two attendants, who blew with their mouths alternately into pliable tubes, the one while the other took breath. An antique organ supplied in this manner is sculptured under a monument in the Museum at Arles, bearing the date of xx.m.viii.[1]
Fig. 2.
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This piece of carving is of the highest interest as showing the ancient organ at its first step from a state of the utmost simplicity—dismounted indeed from the breast of the player, yet still supplied by the mouth, and before the application of bellows; and it has not previously appeared in any English article on the organ.
The pipes are held in position by a cross-band, just as were those of the earlier Syrinx. The carving represents the back of the instrument, as is indicated not only by the 'blowers' being there, but also by the order of the pipes, from large to small, appearing to run the wrong way, namely, from right to left instead of the reverse. The pipes of the early organs are said to have sounded at first altogether, and those which were not required to be heard had to be silenced by means of the fingers or hands. Fig. 3..jpg)
An arrangement so defective would soon call for a remedy; and the important addition was made of a slide, rule, or tongue of wood, placed beneath the hole leading to each pipe, and so perforated as either to admit or exclude the wind as it was drawn in or out. Kircher gives a drawing, here reproduced, to show this improvement.
The wind was conveyed to the chest through the tube projecting from the right-hand side, either from the lips or from some kind of hand-bellows. In each case the stream would be only intermittent.
Another drawing given by Kircher (said to be that of the Hebrew instrument called Magrephah), exhibits the important addition of two small bellows, which would afford a continuous wind-supply, the one furnishing wind while the other was replenishing.
Fig. 4.
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It is very doubtful, however, whether this is an authentic representation. The pipes are picturesquely disposed, but on account of their natural succession being so greatly disturbed for this purpose, and their governing slides doubtless also similarly intermixed, the task to the organist of always manipulating them correctly must have been one of extreme difficulty, if not impossibility. Nevertheless, as soon as the apparatus received the accession of the two little bellows placed to the rear of the wind-box, in lieu of two human beings, the small instrument arrived at the importance of being essentially a complete and independent, albeit a primitive Pneumatic organ.
Whether the two bellows produced as unequal a wind as is sometimes supposed, is perhaps scarcely apparent. At the present day the working of the two 'feeders' of the popular house-instrument—the Harmonium—when the Expression-stop is drawn, demonstrates that it is quite possible to supply air from two separate sources alternately without any appreciable interruption
- ↑ From Dom Bedos, 'L'Art du facteur d'Orgues' (Paris 1766).
