First Steps to Bell Ringing / Being an Introduction to the Healthful and Pleasant Exercise of Bell Ringing in Rounds and Changes upon Church Bells

The Project Gutenberg eBook, First Steps to Bell Ringing, by Samuel B. Goslin
By S. B. GOSLIN, F.M.S., etc.,
AUTHOR OF THE “A B C OF MUSICAL HAND BELL RINGING,” “THE MUSICAL HAND BELL RINGER’S INSTRUCTOR,” ETC., ETC.
“Let me in outline sketch them all, Perchance uncouthly.”
Longfellow’s “ Wayside Inn .”
SECOND EDITION.
COPYRIGHT. ENTERED AT STATIONERS’ HALL.
LONDON: JOHN WARNER & SONS, THE CRESCENT FOUNDRY, CRIPPLEGATE, E.C., AND M’CORQUODALE & CO., CARDINGTON STREET, HAMPSTEAD ROAD, N.W.
1881.
“List! the merry bells are ringing, And the choristers are singing.”
When such works as those written by the Rev. Mr. Ellacombe, and when every local bell history, or encyclopædia of any note, give full information both as to the early use, construction, and form of bells, it is needless to add another word upon such topics in such a production as this; and when, as is the case at the present time, so many good books are to be so easily obtained, on Change Ringing and Bells, with examples of the various methods or interchanging of positions, by fixed rules or courses, they would at first sight and thought appear to be subjects, which have been literally exhausted, and in which no room remains for further attempts at description in letter-press. However, such is not the fact, for the young beginner now, especially if no experienced guide can be secured, to give advice in person, is in the position of a schoolboy who is called upon to work out a calculation in decimals, before he clearly understands the rule or the method of pointing, unless he has the good fortune to find and secure a copy of “Wigram’s Change Ringing Disentangled,” or, “Troyte’s Change Ringing to Six Bell Work,” which with some amount of study, he may in time get on and become proficient.
The want of something more, as the first steps to ringing, has been felt and acknowledged by many persons at many times; and to supply this want is all that is now attempted—not in any way to disparage the well-known works of others more skilled in the art of ringing, but to lead upwards and onwards to those works by short and easy words and lessons, is the wish of the Author in the following pages.