Page:An adventure (1911).pdf/104



Whilst in the wood Miss Lamont heard sounds of a band of violins drifting past her from the direction of the house. The sounds were very soft and intermittent, and were lower in pitch than bands of to-day. She could afterwards write down from memory about twelve bars, but without all the inner harmonies.

She ascertained immediately afterwards that no band had been playing out of doors that afternoon at Versailles. It was a cold, wet winter's afternoon.

In March, 1907, the twelve bars were shown to a musical expert, who said (without having heard the story) that the bars could hardly belong to one another, but that the idiom dated from about 1780. He found a grammatical mistake in one bar. After hearing the story, he said that bands in the eighteenth century were lower in pitch than they are now. He suggested the name of Sacchini.

In March, 1908, Miss Lamont and a friend