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THE DOCTOR.                 213
CHAPTER XCIV.
THE AUTHOR DISCOVERS CERTAIN MUSIC AL
CORRESPONDENCIES TO THESE HIS LUCU-
BRATIONS.
And music mild I learn'd that tells
Tune, time, and measure of the song.
HIGGINSN.
A TATTLE-DE-MOY, reader, was " a new-
fashioned thing" in the year of our Lord
1676, " much like a Seraband, only it had in
it more of conceit and of humour: and it
might supply the place of a seraband at the
end of a suit of lessons at any time." That
simple-hearted, and therefore happy old
man, Thomas Mace, invented it himself, be-
cause he would be a little modish, he said;
and he called it a Tattle-de-Moy, "because
it tattles, and seems to speak those very
words or syllables. Its humnour," said he,
"1 is toyish, jocund, harmless and pleasant;
and as if it were one playing with, or toss-
ing, a ball up and down; yet it seems to
have a very solemn countenance, and like
unto one of a sober and innocent condition,
or disposition; not antic, apish, or wild."
If indeed the gift of prophecy were im-
parted, or imputed to musicians, as it has
sometimes been to poets, Thomas Mace
might be thought to have unwittingly fore-
shown certain characteristics of the unique
opus which is now before the reader: so
nearly has he described them, when instruct-
ing his pupils how to give right and proper
names to all lessons they might meet with.
" There are, first, Preludes; then, second-
ly, Fancies and Voluntaries; thirdly, Pa-
vines; fourthly, Allmaines; fifthly, Airs;
sixthly, Galliards; seventhly, Corantoes;
eighthly, Serabands; ninthly, Tattle-de-
Moys; tenthly, Chichonas; eleventhly, Toys
or Jiggs; twelfthly, Common Tunes; and,
lastly, Grounds, with Divisions upon them.
"The Prelude is commonly a piece of
confused, wild, shapeless kind of intricate
play (as most use it), in which no perfect
form, shape, or uniformity, can be per-
ceived; but a random business, pottering
and grooping, up and down, from one stop,
or key, to another; and generally so per-
formed, to make trial, whether the instru-
ment be well in tune or not; by which
doing, after they have completed their
tuning, they will (if they be masters) fall
into some kind of voluntary or fancical play
more intelligible; which (if he be a master
able) is a way whereby he may more fully
and plainly show his excellency and ability,
than by any other kind of undertaking; and
has an unlimited and unbounded liberty, in
which he may make use of the forms and
shapes of all the rest."
Here the quasi-prophetic lutanist may
seem to have described the ante-initial
chapters of this opus, and those other pieces
which precede the beginning thereof, and
resemble
A lively prelude, fashioning the way
In which the voice shall wander.*
For though a censorious reader will pick
out such expressions only as may be applied
with a malign meaning; yet in what lhe may
consider confused and shapeless, and call
pottering and grooping, the competent ob-
server will recognise the hand of a master,
trying his instrument and tuning it; and
then passing into a voluntary whereby he
approves his skill, and foreshows the spirit
of his performance.
The Pavines, Master Mace tells us, are
lessons of two, three, or four strains, very
grave and solemn; full of art and pro-
fundity, but seldom used in " these our light
days," as in. many respects he might well
call the days of King Charles the Second.
Here he characterises our graver Chapters,
which are in strains so deep, so soothing,
and so solemn withal, that if such a Pavine
had been played in the hall of the palace at
Aix, when King Charlemagne asked the
Archbishop to dance, the invitation could
not have been deemed indecorous.
Allmaines are very airy and lively, and
generally in common or plain time. Airs
differ from them only in being usually
shorter, and of a more rapid and nimble
* KEATS.
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THE DOCTOR.