[Sidenote:  The cat.]

[Sidenote:  The cuckoo.]

The first of these divisions rests upon the employment of the lowest form of conventional musical idiom.  The material which the natural world provides for imitation by the musician is exceedingly scant.  Unless we descend to mere noise, as in the descriptions of storms and battles (the shrieking of the wind, the crashing of thunder, and the roar of artillery—­invaluable aids to the cheap descriptive writer), we have little else than the calls of a few birds.  Nearly thirty years ago Wilhelm Tappert wrote an essay which he called “Zooplastik in Toenen.”  He ransacked the musical literature of centuries, but in all his examples the only animals the voices of which are unmistakable are four fowls—­the cuckoo, quail (that is the German bird, not the American, which has a different call), the cock, and the hen.  He has many descriptive sounds which suggest other birds and beasts, but only by association of idea; separated from title or text they suggest merely what they are—­musical phrases.  A reiteration of the rhythmical figure called the “Scotch snap,” breaking gradually into a trill, is the common symbol of the nightingale’s song, but it is not a copy of that song; three or four tones descending chromatically are given as the cat’s mew, but they are made to be such only by placing the syllables Mi-au (taken from the vocabulary of the German cat) under them.  Instances of this kind might be called characterization, or description by suggestion, and some of the best composers have made use of them, as will appear in these pages presently.  The list being so small, and the lesson taught so large, it may be well to give a few striking instances of absolutely imitative music.  The first bird to collaborate with a composer seems to have been the cuckoo, whose notes

[Music illustration:  Cuck-oo!]

had sounded in many a folk-song ere Beethoven thought of enlisting the little solo performer in his “Pastoral” symphony.  It is to be borne in mind, however, as a fact having some bearing on the artistic value of Programme music, that Beethoven’s cuckoo changes his note to please the musician, and, instead of singing a minor third, he sings a major third thus: 

[Music illustration:  Cuck-oo!]

[Sidenote:  Cock and hen.]

As long ago as 1688 Jacob Walter wrote a musical piece entitled
“Gallina et Gallo,” in which the hen was delineated in this theme: 

[Music illustration:  Gallina.]

while the cock had the upper voice in the following example, his clear challenge sounding above the cackling of his mate: 

[Music illustration:  Gallo.]

The most effective use yet made of the song of the hen, however, is in “La Poule,” one of Rameau’s “Pieces de Clavecin,” printed in 1736, a delightful composition with this subject: 

[Music illustration:  Co co co co co co co dai, etc.]