(J. J. L.*)
KETTERING, a market town in the eastern parliamentary division of Northamptonshire, England, 72 m. N.N.W. from London by the Midland railway. Pop. of urban district (1891), 19,454; (1901), 28,653. The church of SS Peter and Paul, mainly Perpendicular, has a lofty and ornate tower and spire. The chief manufactures are boots, shoes, brushes, stays, clothing and agricultural implements. There are iron-works in the immediate neighbourhood. The privilege of market was granted in 1227 by a charter of Henry III.
KETTLE, SIR RUPERT ALFRED (1817-1894), English county court judge, was born at Birmingham on the 9th of January 1817. His family had for some time been connected with the glass-staining business. In 1845 he was called to the bar, and in 1859 he was made judge of the Worcestershire county courts, becoming also a bencher of the Middle Temple (1882). He acted as arbitrator in several important strikes, and besides being the first president of the Midland iron trade wages board, he was largely responsible for the formation of similar boards in other staple trades. His name thus became identified with the organization of a system of arbitration between employers and employed, and in 1880 he was knighted for his services in this capacity. In 1851 he married; one of his sons subsequently became a London police magistrate. Kettle died on the 6th of October 1894 at Wolverhampton.
KETTLEDRUM[1] (Fr. timbales; Ger. Pauken; Ital. timpani; Sp. timbal), the only kind of drum (q.v.) having a definite musical pitch. The kettledrum consists of a hemispherical pan of copper, brass or silver, over which a piece of vellum is stretched tightly by means of screws working on an iron ring, which fits closely round the head of the drum. In the bottom of the pan is a small vent-hole, which prevents the head being rent by the concussion of air. The vellum head may thus be slackened or tightened at will to produce any one of the notes within its compass of half an octave. Each kettledrum gives but one note at a time, and as it takes some little time to alter all the screws, two or three kettledrums, sometimes more, each tuned to a different note, are used in an orchestra or band. For centuries kettledrums have been made and used in Europe in pairs, one large and one small; the relative proportions of the two instruments being well defined and invariable. Even when eight pairs of drums, all tuned to different notes, are used, as by Berlioz in his “Grand Requiem,” there are still but the two sizes of drums to produce all the notes. Various mechanisms have been tried with the object of facilitating the change of pitch, but the simple old-fashioned model is still the most frequently used in England. Two sticks, of which there are several kinds, are employed to play the kettledrum; the best of these are made of whalebone for elasticity, and have a small wooden knob at one end, covered with a thin piece of fine sponge. Others have the button covered with felt or india-rubber. The kettledrum is struck at about a quarter of the diameter from the ring.
The compass of kettledrums collectively is not much more than an octave, between
; the larger instruments, which it is inadvisable to tune below F, take any one of the following notes:—