The following instructions will suffice for your first experiments, and by them you may be able to get fairly good results; however, the theory of temperament, which is more thoroughly entered into in Lesson XII, must be studied before you can have a thorough understanding of the causes and effects.

After deciding, as per instructions on pitch which C you will tune first, place the tuning hammer (using the star head if pins are square) on the pin with the handle extending upwards or inclined slightly to the right. (The star head, which will fit the pin at eight different angles, enables the tuner to select the most favorable position.) To raise the pitch, you will, of course, pull the hammer to the right.  In order to make a string stand in tune, it is well to draw it very slightly above the pitch at which it is to remain, and settle it back by striking the key repeatedly and strongly, and at the same time bearing gently to the left on the tuning hammer.  The exact amount of over-tension must be learned by practice; but it should be so slight as to be barely perceptible.  Aim to get the string tuned with the least possible turning of the hammer.  The tension of the string should be evenly distributed over its entire length; that is, over its vibrating middle and its “dead ends” beyond the bridges.  Therefore it is necessary to strike the key strongly while tuning so as to make the string draw through the bridges.  By practice, you will gain control of the hammer and become so expert that you can feel the strings draw through the bridges and the pins turn in the block.

Having now tuned your three Cs, you will take 1C as a starting point, and by it, tune 1G a perfect fifth above.  Tune it perfect by drawing it gradually up or down until all pulsations disappear.  Now after making sure you have it perfect, flatten it until you can hear slow, almost imperceptible waves; less rapid than one per second.  This flattening of the fifth is called tempering, and from it comes the word “temperament.”  The fact that the fifth must always be tuned a little flatter than perfect, is a matter which always causes some astonishment when first learned.  It seems, to the uninitiated, that every interval should be made perfect; but it is impossible to make them so, and get a correct scale, as we shall see later on.

Now tune 2G by the 1G just tuned, to a perfect octave.  Remember that all octaves should be left perfect—­all waves tuned out.  Now try 2G with 2C.  If your octaves are perfect, this upper fifth will beat a little faster than the lower one, but the dissonance should not be so great as to be disagreeable.  Proceed to your next fifth, which is 2D, then its octave, 1D, then its fifth and so on as per directions on the system card.  You can make no chord trials until you have tuned E, an interval of a major third from C.