Page:American Journal of Psychology Volume 21.djvu/345

Rh and are familiar with modulation, often flat in course of rehearsal to a semitone or more below the initial pitch; solo singers are frequently off pitch. Now suppose that we had no system of notation, but were limited to phonograph records of actual performance; and suppose that these records were examined by help of a specially tuned harmonical, and the exact pitch of every tone noted. Would not the examiner be justified in attributing to us the conception of adiatonic intervals?

Mention must be made, finally, of the chapter on Rhythm, in which the author corrects the exaggerated views of certain previous writers. It is not true, he declares, that primitive man has developed rhythm to a plane higher than that attained by civilization; neither is it true that his conception of rhythm is wholly at variance with ours. The fact is that, to the Indian, the drum is primary. The dance is the vehicle of the expression of his deepest feelings; dance and song almost always go together; to drum is instinctively with him to set the tempo and mark the rhythm for a dance. Habitually and irresistibly he drums with steadiness, according to a set plan, varying the stroke only when some uncommon feature of the dance calls for a change of step or tempo. But now comes the development of melody; there is conflict between voice and drum, and the voice weakens. "Melody> therefore, became distorted; it was hindered in its natural development, struggling always to assert its spontaneous freedom, and always restrained by the habit of the drum, which the Indian would abandon no more readily than he would abandon any other of his numerous traditions. . . . Both, drumbeat and song, are ingenuous expressions of his nature. One is extremely primitive, the other comparatively advanced, and as he is still primitive he clings to his cheerful noise, understanding it, aroused by it, while his musical soul toils darkly on toward an expression that aims ever at and sometimes attains symmetry. All of which is to say that he drums as he does because he knows no better."

Difficulty arises, then, only when the attempt is made to square up the time-value of the notes sung with that of the drum-rhythm. A singer "will start his drum in 9-8, for example, and begin bravely to sing against it in 4-4; but after a few measures of success he breaks away, and from then on the value of his notes can be expressed only approximately." The drum may be as steady as a metronome; but if the series of beats is plotted out in relation to the voice, a visual illusion of irregularity of rhythm must necessarily be produced. This view is, without any question, to be preferred to the rival theory.

This is one of the most interesting, as well as one of the best appointed books upon popular science that appeared during the winter holiday season of 1909. As the title indicates, it gives Carl Hagenbeck's own account of his life and fortunes, from the first modest establishment in the Spielbudenplatz at Hamburg to the creation of the great Zoological Park at Stellingen. Methods of capture, methods of transportation, of housing, of feeding, of training animals are set forth in an admirably direct and simple manner; and the narrative is interspersed with anecdotes of exciting events in the career of Mr. Hagenbeck himself or of his travellers and associates.