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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. m. JUNE 3, m

Alexander Gardner, 1882), vol. iv. p. 579, we find:

" Timmer-tuned, adjective. Haying a harsh voice, one that is by no means musical, S. [Scottish, Scotland; also, still used in Scotland], from timmer, timber, q. [quasi, as if] having as little music as a piece of wood." Then in a sub-note :

"It has been remarked that this word, S.A. [Scotia Australia, South of Scotland], does not so properly denote a harsh untuneable voice [almost the identical words of Sir Walter Scott before quoted, "a voice whose untuneable harshness"] as the want of a musical ear ; being applied to one who is unable to sing in melody."

With this sub-note I perfectly agree, as will be seen by my note under 'Timmer- tuned ' in a little book I recent] y published, ' Desultory Notes on Jarnieson's Scottish j Dictionary ' (Glasgow, William Hodge & Co., 1899), of which I sent you a copy. At pp. 165, 166, you will find the following :

" Timmer-tuned, iv. 579. Having a harsh voice, one than is by no means 'musical.' Surely the latter is not a correct definition. A man may have the very keenest appreciation of music, and yet be ' timmer-tuned ' ; that is, he may be very fond of music, but may not have the faculty of expressing it upon any instrument, not even by the humble whistle. Many a ' timmer-tuned ' man much more thoroughly enjoys Ballad Music (words wedded to music) than other men who would go mad if called ' timmer-tuned 'enjoy, ^or pretend to enjoy, Mendelssohn's ' Lieder ohne Worte,' with regard to which, if you put a question as to the meaning to a dozen self-styled cognoscenti, you would get a dozen different interpretations, one saying it repre- sented the rippling of a brook, another a thunder- storm, another the sounds of a farmyard, another the wailing of an infant, another a battle-piece, and so on. To most people if they would only have the candour to confess it Mendelssohn's ' Songs without Words ' are simply ' Songs without Mean- ing,' or with a different meaning for each listener. A ' timmer-tuned ' man has this consolation, that at a concert he has much more real enjoyment than those who would murder you if you ventured to question their having the finest if not, indeed, the longest of ears, and whose main enjoyment at a concert seems to be to find fault. The sub-note in Jamieson says it is not so much a harsh untuneable voice as the want of a musical ear, and then he contradicts himself by saying it is applied to one who is unable to sing in melody. A ' timmer-tuned ' man may have a harsh voice, and may not be capable of expressing music, but he is quite capable of feeling it. If he has a harsh voice, he does not attempt to sing. The fault is in the inability to express the music that is in him, but, for all that, he need not necessarily have a harsh voice."

In Messrs. A. & C. Black's notice with re- gard to the Waverley novels, dated Edin- burgh, 5 October, 1866, which will be found in Allibone's 'Dictionary of Authors,' vol. ii. p. 1974, the following passage occurs :

"Sir Walter Scott, in 1829, carefully corrected and improved the text of the first issue to such an

extent that hardly a page remained without material alteration, and, besides, added the Notes and Intro- ductions. To this amended Edition he gave the name of the ' Author's Edition,' as being the only one he desired the Public to regard as bearing hts sanction and approval. All other Editions must, therefore, be regarded as imperfect in the Text, and incomplete in the Notes and Introductions."

In answer to MR. BOUCHIER'S query, I make bold to say that no other edition of Sir Walter Scott has any such extraordinary reading as " harsh-timbre." I have the edition of 1851, which is an exact reprint, chapter for chapter, page for page, and letter for letter, of the "Author's Edition" of 1829, which Messrs. A. & C. Black say was " carefully cor- rected " by Sir Walter himself. Surely that edition may be taken as the " authentic edi- tion." I have also Messrs. A. & C. Black's edition of 1860. In both of these editions it is "harsh timber tones." I have also the Border Edition," in which I am horrified to find that it is, as your correspondent says, "harsh-timbre tones." How Mr. Andrew Lang, a man born in Selkirk, the county town of the county in which Sir Walter Scott was always affectionately addressed as " The Shirra," could ever fall into such a mistake as this is to me simply incomprehensible. One is almost inclined to think that he must have entirely forgotten " puir auld Scotland " amongst "the fleshpots of Egypt," though one knows that he has not.

In Storrnonth's 'English Dictionary' we find :

" Timbre, also timber, tim'-ber (French, timbre, a clock, bell, crest ; from Latin, tympanum, a drum, a timbrel), the crest on a coat of arms ; in music, a property by which sounds of the same note and loudness, from two different instruments or voices, are distinguished from each other by a different quality."

In the 'Imperial Dictionary,' and in Sir George Grove's ' Dictionary of Music and Musicians,' the fuller definitions given equally tend to show that " timbre" is a totally inappropriate word to make use of.

Your correspondent says that he has heard of a wooden leg, a wooden head, a wooden manner, but never of a wooden voice. I well remember, when I was a youngster at Glasgow University, an actor named Hamblin (who is referred to in Mr. Walter Baynham's ' Glas-

fow Stage,' and whom I dare say Sir Henry rving will also recollect) as a member of the stock company of the Theatre Royal, Dunlop Street, Glasgow, between 1856 and 31 January, 1863, when the theatre was burnt down. He was nicknamed by "the gods," somewhat vulgarly, but very appropriately, " Wooden- guts," as he spoke as if from the centre of his corporation. We collegians used to call