There has been a late invention of what is called a Harp Guitar, but it does not seem to merit the name of an improve ment. The compass of the instrument is increased by some long strings ; but it appears to us, that the simplicity, which is the characteristic of the guitar, is thus unnecessarily violated. We have few, if any, makers or performers of note in this Cranch; though some ladies sweep the notes with considerable grace and effect. The plectrum is out of use ; the thumb and fingers of the right hand touching the strings while the fingers of the left move among the frets.
Thisgenus of instruments includes an immense variety, chiefly of very remote antiquity ; the name of the guitar, we are confident, was borrowed, not as some assert from the Spanish, nor from the Latin cithara ; but from the very ancient Hindu word sittarah, or sitter, which exclusively applies to an instrument with a very long neck, and mounted with four very small steel wires passing over a low bridge, that stands on a piece of tough untanned sheep's skin, spread over the surface of half a gourd or callibash. We have every reason to suppose the sitter was unknown in Europe until. Alexander visited India. The scale of the sitter is very confined, though the performers do not neglect the scope given by the neck, which is nearly a yard long, and about an inch and a quar ter in breadth, to produce many very un pleasant notes, high in alt, on the first wire : sliding their forefingers up. as high as they.can reach, and shifting with one finger only, among the frets, which are extremely numerous. The octachord, or lyre, of Pythagoras, had but eight notes; the pandoron was also of the lute kind ; the bandora was the same : the chelys was more like our modern guitar ; the theorboi or arch-lute, is still in use in Ita ly, and stems to have been the basis of the harp guitar before mentioned. It has, however, two necks, of which the longest is appropriated to the bass-notes: if we are correctly informed, it is ex tremely difficult to perform well on the theorbo ; but the sweetness of its tones compensates for the trouble of attaining perfection. The lute much resembles the guitar, and is supposed to be equally ancient ; it has six rows of strings, and is performed like the rest of this genus.
The lyre is held tithe even mote an cient than the sitter ; though we have lit tle or no information whereon we can depend, as to its scale, or its mode of performance. This instrument is seen on many ancient coins and statues, especially of Apollo. We have several fabulous ac counts of its origin, and of improvements in days of yore ; but we cannot take up on us to follow the track of a long list of heathens, to whom much merit in this particular has been ascribed, since no be. Refit or particular gratification would re sult to the generality of our readers, nor would the instrument be better describ ed, for it is a known truth, that all our acquaintance with it is from represents timi only.
We now come to the Dulcimer it is nothing mere than a small triangular flat box, in which is a shallow sounding board, having two bridges that approximate to each other as they retire from the per former. Over these bridges the wires are stretched in the usual way. The mode of performance is by mean' of two little sticks, armed with small knobs, partly of cork, and partly of hard wood, so as to make the tone more or less soft ; it is at the utmost but a low sounding in strument, though of a pleasant tone. The scale is various, but commonly about three octaves; some have double wires. The people in the northern part of Hin dostan have a kind of dukimer macle °filet steel bars, varying from two feet to only a few inches in length ; these are all fixed by means of wedges into a slit between two battens, and protrude horizontally over a small box, which serves m a sound ing board. The note of each is neces sarily fixed, so that this instrument is al ways in tune. The sounds are produced tither by a kind of plectrum, applied to the ends of the bare ; or they may be touched by small knobbed sticks. Many of the natives in that part perform the common airs of Ifindostan very pleasing ly on this kind of dulcimer. The tones are not unlike those of very small chimes.
The sticado, or rigots, is of this species, and consists of a long wedge-formed box, at the bottom of which two ridges are made longitudinally ; on these nar row flat pieces of sonorous wood, of glass, or of metal, flat below and arched above, are placed side by side, but not in contact so that the longest pieces from the lowest notes gradually become more acute, as the pieces are shorter to wards the narrow end of the box. The notes of this instrument are prodaced like the former : the scale varies but rarely exceeds two octaves and a half. The tones' are peculiarly articulate, whence many have erroneously called it the stoc. cato : and as it was formerly much in use among rustics, who could easily construct the whole apparatus, the additional de signation of pastorale was given. • The when touched with sticks, resemble this instrument more than any other. The glasses are of vari ous sizes, according to the grave or acute notes they are to yield. Some sets am well in tune, but others require to have more or less water pourd in, to beim; them to their proper pitch. Some per formers execute difficult pieces with wonderful adroitness, though but very few "can produce the rim tone, i. e. by touching the rims with their fingers' ends, so quick and so effectually, as to vie, in point of execution, with the sticado mode. The cistrum, or citron, was an instrument of this species, formerly in use among the Egyptian priests; we do not know sufficient of it to give any par ticular description, though it appears to be the parent of this genus.