two cartilages do not, however, meet in front. Place a finger on the Adam's apple, slide it down a little way, and the slight depression there met with locates the front opening, covered with yielding membrane, between the thyroid and cricoid cartilages.
On the broader part of the cricoid—that is, on the part in the back of the larynx—and rising inside the thyroid are two smaller cartilages, the arytenoid or ladle cartilages, named from the Greek arutaina, a ladle. Though smaller than either thyroid or cricoid, they are highly important, because they form points of attachment for the vocal cords. These (the vocal cords) are attached in front to the inner part of the angle formed by the two wings of the thyroid just back of the Adam's apple, and behind to a forward projecting spur at the base of each of the arytenoid cartilages, which for this reason often are spoken of as the "vocal process."
The vocal cords, as has been stated, lie parallel to each other, and the space between them is known as the glottis or chink of the glottis. Above the glottis and on opposite sides are two pockets or ventricles, and above these are the so-called false cords or ventricular bands. The pockets are, in fact,
bordered below by the vocal cords and above by the false cords. The false cords or ventricular bands (a name given to them by Mackenzie) are the lower edges of membranous folds that form the upper entrance to the larynx. Here are two pairs of small cartilages, the cartilages of Santorini and the cartilages of Wrisberg. Usually they are dismissed as of little or no importance. Yet they have, in connection with muscles located in that part of the larynx, their rôles to play in those numerous adjustments and readjustments which, as I shall show a little later on, are of the greatest importance in voice-generation. For I consider, as I also will show, that the numerous, indeed innumerable, and extremely subtle and exquisite changes of shape of which the larynx is capable within itself, have much to do with the actual creation of the tone which eventually issues from the lips; although I believe this statement to be contrary to all accepted authority. For the present, however, I must content myself with this mere statement.
The larynx is protected above by a lid, a flexible, leaf-shaped cartilage, the epiglottis. The gullet, or food-passage to the stomach, is situated behind the larynx and windpipe, and the function of the epiglottis is to close the larynx and to act as a bridge
over which food passes from the mouth into the gullet. But for the epiglottis, food might get into the larynx and thence into the windpipe every time we swallowed, with what distressing and even disastrous effect any one who has ever "swallowed the wrong way" well knows. When open, on the other hand, the epiglottis forms a beautifully smooth cartilaginous curve, over which the sounding air, the tone, as it issues from the larynx, is guided to the resonance cavities above the larynx, which are the cavities of the mouth and of the nose. While parts of these cavities are solid, like the roof of the mouth, other parts, like the soft palate, are pliable; while the tongue is so astoundingly mobile that it constantly can alter the resonance cavity of the mouth as to dimension and shape.
The larynx is swathed and lined with membrane and muscle. These membranes and muscles are named after the cartilages to which they are attached, between which they lie, or which they operate. There is no reason why they should be enumerated now. The function of the muscles of the larynx is stated by all authorities with which I am familiar to be twofold—to open and close the glottis (the space between the vocal cords), and
to regulate the tension of the vocal cords, because the vibrations of these are considered the determining factor of vocal pitch. Sir Morell Mackenzie, however, in describing the muscles of the larynx in a passage couched in untechnical language, unconsciously gives a hint of another purpose for which the complexity of muscles in the larynx may exist. After speaking of the "innumerable little fingers of the muscles which move the vocal cords," he continues: "These fingers (which prosaic anatomists call fibres), besides being almost countless in number, are arranged in so intricate a manner that every one who dissects them finds out something new, which, it is needless to say, is forthwith given to the world as an important discovery. It is probable that no amount of macerating or teasing ever will bring us to 'finality' in this matter; nor do I think it would profit us much as regards our knowledge of the physiology of the voice if the last fibrilla of tiny muscle were run to earth. The mind can form no clearer notions of the infinitely little than of the infinitely great, and the microscopic movements of these tiny strips of contractile tissue would be no more real to us than the figures which express the rapidity of light and the vast stretches of astronomical time and distance.
Moreover, no two persons have their laryngeal muscles arranged in precisely the same manner—a circumstance which of itself goes a considerable way toward explaining the almost infinite variety of human voices. The wonderful diversity of expression in faces which structurally, as we may say, are almost identical, is due to minute differences in the arrangement of the little muscles which move the skin. The same thing holds good of the larynx."
These are significant words. The distinguished physician who wrote them might just as well have said that the generally prevailing theory that in voice-production the muscles of the larynx exist solely to open and close the glottis and to regulate the tension and hence the vibration of the vocal cords, is incorrect. For they also exist in order to shape and reshape the entire larynx within itself according to the note to be produced, and the opening or closing of the glottis with the degree of tension of the vocal cords resulting therefrom is but one detail in the coördination of adjustments and readjustments which prepare the vocal tract to produce the tone the singer hears in his mind. Nearly every authority on the physiology of voice-production believes that the vocal tone is produced solely