Figure 89. BASS VIOL.
In the "Domestic Life of Thomas Jefferson" there is a description given of Monticello, which he built in 1770-1772, and a diagram of the lower rooms showing where each piece of furniture stood. It seems very sparsely fitted out, yet it had a great reputation for elegance. The house was but a story and a half high, and on the ground floor was a great hall, drawing-room, dining-room, tea-room, sitting-room, and two bedrooms besides the one occupied by Jefferson himself. In this latter room was a couch upon which Jefferson rested when studying, a dressing-table and mirror, a chair near the wall, and beside it a small bookcase. There was no closet, so in one corner was a rack upon which his clothes where hung. The chief ornament to the drawing-room was his daughter's, Mrs. Randolph's, harpsichord. Standing about were many busts, of Alexander of Russia, Hamilton, Voltaire, Turgot, and Napoleon, and portraits of Washington, Adams, Franklin, Madison, etc. The house was at least abundantly furnished with chairs, for Jefferson himself leaves an inventory which states that there were 36 of mahogany and 44 of gold leaf. Of small tea and card tables there were 13. In the dining-room, well toward its centre, stood Jefferson's chair and a candle-stand. His particular hobby was blooded horses, and he used only the finest Virginia stock.
This same harpsichord was, as early as 1785, in Jefferson's thoughts, and he writes to his daughter, Polly, from France, that she shall be taught to play on it, as well as to draw and dance, to read and talk French, "and such other things as will make you more worthy of the love of your friends." Even in remote places like Monticello, where everything had to be transported by cart, or at Johnson Hall, Sir John Johnson's home in the Mohawk valley, harpsichords, as well as other expensive luxuries, were to be found. Sir John's harpsichord was confiscated by the government in December, 1777, at the same time with the table which is now at the Historical Rooms in Albany. While musical instruments are only rarely mentioned in the inventories of the great body of the people, yet we have seen that they were here both of domestic manufacture and imported. Thomas Harrison, organist of Trinity Church, advertises in the "New York Mercury" for 1761 that he has "harpsichords and spinets imported and for sale."
The harp was not so often seen as other instruments, on account both of the great cost of the instrument and of the difficulty of tuning it. It was not until 1720 that the pedal harp was invented by a Bavarian named Hochbrücker. By means of the pedal working a small plate set with projecting pins, the performer was able to raise the pitch of each string a semitone. The mechanism was concealed in the front pillar, and each note was affected in all its octaves. Erard made farther improvements. The harp shown in [Figure 88] is in the Metropolitan Museum, New York. It is a very handsome one, painted blue, and resting on four claw feet. The pillar is fluted, and the ornaments, three medallions of dancing girls, with wreaths below, are executed in brass. It has forty-two strings of gut and seven pedals. It was made by Naderman, Paris, France, late in the eighteenth century. Naderman perfected the action of the first pedal harp invented by Hochbrücker. In the South Kensington Museum, London, England, is a harp which belonged to the ill-fated Marie Antoinette; it also was made by Naderman in 1780.
Figure 90. GLASS HARMONICA.
The harp in its various forms is an instrument of great antiquity. The Greeks and Romans, ever alive to the possibilities of everything that tended to grace and beauty, admired this instrument not only for its sweet sound but for its pleasing form. We must look to Egypt for the origin of the harp, as there are representations in their picture writings of stringed instruments of a bow-form that support the idea that the first conception of a harp was drawn from the tense string of a warrior's bow. This very primitive instrument was borne on the performer's shoulder and played horizontally. Between this crude instrument and the splendid vertical harps shown in the frescoes of the time of Rameses III., painted more than three thousand years ago, there is a chain of pictures showing so many varieties of forms that the growth from the bow-form into the triangular harp is explained. The Assyrians, like the Egyptians, had harps without a front pillar, but differing from them in using sound-holes, and having the sound body uppermost. We assign to King David the harp, but mediæval artists more frequently depicted him with the psaltery, a horizontal stringed instrument, the parent of the piano.
The harp has always been the instrument of the Celtic race, and harpists were held in peculiar veneration. For many a long year harpists traveled from one castle to another, sure always of a welcome and seat in a warm corner. In return they not only amused the company with their songs, but brought the news, and isolated and remote families often heard from the outer world by such uncertain means as these. For centuries the English harpers were protected in many ways, and no one has taken advantage of such a picturesque class with the skill of Sir Walter Scott. The most renowned one he introduced as a character was Blondel de Nesle, in the "Talisman," that wonderful picture of the days of the Crusades. The first greeting to the youth when he appeared at Richard's camp shows the estimation in which these knights of the harp were held.
"Blondel de Nesle!" Richard exclaimed joyfully "welcome from Cyprus, my king of minstrels! Welcome to the King of England, who rates not his own dignity more highly than he does thine.... And what news, my gentle master, from the land of the lyre? Anything fresh from the trouveurs of Provence? Anything from the minstrels of merry Normandy? Above all, hast thou thyself been busy?"
It is also said that Richard Cœur de Lion's place of confinement in Germany on his return from the Holy Land was discovered when Blondel sung beneath the Tower Tenebreuse a tenson which they had jointly composed, and to which the king replied.