with all its instruments furnished out by one and
the same maker, be he even so consummate a
trumpet-factor as M. Sax, stands a chance of
sounding something automatic. To the English
there will seem a tiresome family likeness in the
sound of his brazen horns, tubas, and trumpets,
detracting from the spirit and interest of the
united body. The seven Flamboroughs, if
gathered at one table, would not be the most
inspiriting party one could desire to meet.
Nor could any right-minded person wish his
cook to be represented by one taste or savour in
soup, fish, roast, boiled, and the rest of the
dishes which make up that sublime and
mysterious work of art — a modern dinner.

It is to these military bands of France, however,
in their renovated plight, that our redcoats,
and those who cherish their well-being
and well-doing, are invited to turn, for a reason
selfish yet not hostile. There may be something
for us to learn from the story of their past
inferiority, and the measures by which, in a large
degree, the reproach thereof has been wiped
away, not very long ago. — In a hundred years
or so, counted by the Horse Guards' clock, the
considerations and comparisons here put
forward, may absolutely produce some fruits. It
may come to be seen that if bands there are to
be in our army, the same should be good bands;
—if military players, that they should be treated
like military men and brethren.

Since the courtly days of Louis the Fourteenth's
fiddlers, who marched with the army,
military music — as a pamphlet by M. Albert
Perrin, translated by Mr. A. Matthison, reminds
us — had fallen into discredit in France. This was
all the worse, because every other description of
instrumental music had, during the interval,
risen in the scale of excellence.—The simple, old-
fashioned flourish of trumpets, and whistle of
fifes, and roll of drums, proved totally insufficient
to represent the musical requirements of the
times, though perhaps they might have furnished
noise enough to mount a breach withal. The
composition of an infantry military band, to have
any completeness, now demands — says a list in
M. Perrin's pamphlet, by no means extravagantly
made out — a bandmaster and his assistant, five
first class musicians — say the leading flute, clarionet,
oboe, horn, trombone — eight second class
musicians — ten third — fifteen fourth — in all, a
force of forty. A riding, or cavalry, band must
have its twenty-seven players. To train a
competent bandmaster, a special as well as an
elaborate musical education is required; a thorough
knowledge of constructive science, as thorough
an acquaintance with the peculiarities of every
instrument taking part in the corps. — The first-
class subordinates, again, who range under
such a commander, require an education little
less laborious than that which turns out a
Joachim or a Sainton; — though, as contributors to
a force, not directing it, nor exhibiting alone, and
further, as playing on instruments the interest
of which is limited, they are paid by shillings
where their more fortunate contemporaries
indicated pick up pounds, and should they be singers,
not show-players, hundreds. — This is one of the
inequalities, injustices, even, in the musical lot,
for which no remedy can be contrived ; and hence
it has arisen that the best bandmasters and
players in military bands have, all Europe over,
habitually added to their scanty gains and
fatiguing labours by taking service in theatrical
orchestras ; since without some such resource
subsistence would be barely possible to them.

Again, there is little or no prospect of
advancement or of fame for the persons undertaking
this ungracious musical occupation. Till the
measures of improvement and consideration for
which M. Perrin agitated were carried out, as
narrated in his pamphlet, the best-instructed band-
master in France only rated with a sergeant-
major, and, after the service of a quarter of a
century, could merely claim the pension of a private
soldier. There was no possibility of any higher
promotion, — no chance of any addition to the
pittance. Hence it was a common thing among those
who undertook the French musical service full of
zeal and talent, after a few years of wearisome and
ill-requited duty, with no chances of honour
beckoning them forward, to throw by their
instruments and to commence military life anew, by
entering the ranks as common soldiers, since such
entrance might lead to an advancement and
distinction denied them in their former occupation.

Another sore subject in France was the
shabbiness of the bandsman's uniform as compared
with the dress of his unmusical comrades.
Whereas the latter was striped with gold or
silver, the artist, as M. Perrin indignantly
memorialised, was striped with red worsted!
"What," he asked pathetically, "would
become of a band without its finery?" — Betwixt
smallness of pay, scantiness of prospect, and
shabbiness of attire, the military bands of
France had fallen into utter disrespectability
and discredit. — A special commission, at the
instance of those aggrieved, was appointed, in
1845, to consider what could be done to amend
matters — a commission composed of military
men and musicians. Soult, however, was then the
war minister, and, though the hero of Toulouse
had a fine eye for a Murillo, especially (if Mr.
Ford, of Handbook memory, is to be trusted)
when the picture came to him in the cheap and
ready channel of plunder, he cared nothing about
music. — So that by way of remedial measure, in
answer to the memorial, he presented the bandsmen
with knapsacks, with "some wooden cases
for their instruments, with a metronome, and a
universal pitch of B flat." It is true, that so early
as 1835 there had been the show of a government
military music-school in Paris. This many may
recollect by the hideous brayings and howlings
that assailed the ears of those who ascended the
steep Rue Blanche, and who passed a certain
sentried gateway, with the tri-coloured flag aloft.
But, owing to bad organisation (people actually
have been as capable of jobbing in immaculate
France as in perfidious England), the results were
so ridiculously bad, that the Gymnase, after some
twelve years and more of existence, was
suppressed. "Where," said M. Meyerbeer, on the