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24 CHI TESE :MUSIC. OTHER SIGNS OF NOTATION. Most of the instruments required in ritual music have a particular kind of musical notation adapted to the exigencies of their conformation. For instance, a piece written for the ch'in presents a complicated combination of strokes difficult to learn and to decipher. Still it is an ingenious and abbreviated kind of notation. Neither time nor movemen t are ever mentioned at the beginning of a piece; and crescendos, decrescendos, legatos, etc., are utterly unknown to the Chinese. OF SIN GING. It is difficult to give a correct idea of Chinese vocal music. Few foreigners are able to imitate Chinese vocalisation. The sounds seem to proceed from the nose; the tongue, the teeth, and the lips have veq little to do, except for the enunciation of some labial words. Besides, men and women generally sing in the kind of voice known as voix de tete. Chinese singing is always in unison, and usually serves as an accompaniment to the guitar. In ritual ceremonies the singing is of a tender and plaintive character, in a kind of minor key. It is also in unison, and therefore bears a striking resemblance to the first Christian vantu.s pla,11/tis. It is generally accompanied by a kind of minuet dancing, in which the different attitudes and evolu tions of the performers must express to the eye what the voices and instruments convey at the same time to the ear. A remarkable peculiarity in the Buddhistic service is that although all the chanters utter the same words and follow the same rhythm, still each sings in the key most convenient to his own voice. In theatres the singing is mostly a kind of " recitative" couched in pompous and metH– phorical language. OF HARMONY AND CHORDS. The Chinese have nothing like our harmony, taken in the sense of chords,' coun terpoint, etc. The only collection of different but simultaneous sounds recognised by them is that µroduced by playing two strings (at a distance of a fourth, a fift h, or an octave) together on the ,;h'in, the se~ or the guitar.