Editor will proceed in the pious talk of collecting the remaining valuable relics-for many fuch, we are told, exift-of one for whom he expreffes fo great and well founded a veneration. ART. V. PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS of the Royal Society of London. 7 s. 6d. fewed. Davis. 1779. IT MUSIC. T is fortunate that the gifted mufical infant, who is the fubject of this curious Article, fhould meet with a cotemporary hiftorian so well qualified, and fo extensively and advantageously known in the literary world, as Dr. Burney, to record his marvellous mufical talents and attainments, to which he has himself been an eye-witnefs. Having had repeated opportunities of hearing and ftudying this extraordinary child; and after having afcertained his age by a recourfe to the parish register; he prefaces his own obfervations on him by a relation, among others, of the following extraordinary facts, preceding his acquaintance with him; and thefe are founded on evidence, the authenticity of which cannot reafonably be difputed. When he was only a year and a half old, he would leave his food to attend to an organ built by his father; a plain man, who could barely play a few eafy tunes upon it: and when he was two years old, he had acquired fuch a knowledge of the conftruction of that inftrument, or of the fituation of the keys of it, as to touch the key-note of his favourite tunes, in order to point out the particular tune which he wanted his father to play to him. Soon after this, he would strike the two or three first notes of a tune, not being able to name it, when he thought that the key-note alone did not fufficiently explain which he wifhed to have played. At the precife age of two years and three weeks, he, on a fudden, commenced practical musician himself, to the great furprize of his father, then working in a room above; and who, on coming immediately down ftairs, heard and faw him playing (affifted by an elder brother, whom he had engaged to blow the bellows) the first part of God fave great GEORGE our King: -a melody, which had the moft frequently been adminiftered to him as a narcotic by his mother, during the first year of his life,' and which he had often been accustomed to hear his father play. It seems too that his nerves, by this time on the full ftretch, had been exceffively agitated, on hearing the fuperior performance of Mrs. Lulman, a musical lady, who came to try his father's organ. The next day, fays Dr. Burney, he made him felf master of the treble of the fecond part; and, the day after, he attempted the bafe, which he performed nearly correct in every particular, REV. Mar. 1780. P except except the note immediately before the close; which being an octave below the preceding found, was out of the reach of his little hand.' When he was two years and four months old, (in November 1777) having heard a voluntary performed on his father's organ, by Mr. Mully, a mufic-mafter;- as foon as he was gone, the child feeming to play on the organ in a wild and different manner from what his mother was accustomed to hear, she asked him what he was doing? And he replied, "I am playing the gentleman's fine thing." But he was unable to judge of the refemblance: however, when Mr. Mully returned a few days after, and was afked, whether the child had remembered any of the paffages in his voluntary, he answered in the affirmative;-and for a confiderable time after, he would play nothing elfe but thefe paffages.' At this time, fays Dr. Burney, fuch was the rapid progrefs he made in judging of the agreement of founds, that he played the Eafter-Hymn with full harmony; and in the last two or three bars of Hallelujah, where the fame found is fuftained, he played chords with both hands, by which the parts were multipled to fix, which he had great difficulty in reaching on account of the fhortnefs of his fingers.'-In making a base to tunes which he had recently caught by his ear, whenever the harmony displeafed him, he would continue the treble note till he had formed a better accompaniment." When Dr. Burney heard him, we apprehend he was about three years and three or four months old. About this time, on first hearing the voice of Signior Pacchierotti, he did not seem fenfible of the fuperior tafte and refinement of that exquifite performer;-refinements indeed are not to be expected in the infancy of any art-but he called out very foon after the air was begun-" He is finging in F."—This, adds Dr. Burney, is one of the aftonishing properties of his ear, that he can diftinguish at a great diftance from any inftrument, and out of fight of the keys, any note that is ftruck, whether A, B, C, &c. In this I have repeatedly tried him, and never found him miftaken even in the half notes; a circumftance the more extraor dinary, as many practitioners and good performers are unable to diftinguish by the car, at the opera or elsewhere, in what key any air or piece of mufic is executed. But this child, Dr. Burney obferves, was able to find any note that was ftruck in his hearing, when out of fight of the keys, at two years and a half old, even before he knew the letters of the alphabet.-This faculty accidentally difcovered itself in January 1778. While his father was playing the organ, a particular note hung, or in the organ-builders language, ciphered; fo that the tone was continued without the preffure of the the finger. The very maker of the inftrument could not find out what note it was: but the infant, who was then amusing himfelf with drawing on the floor-for this child of Apollo is a painter too, as well as mufician-left that employment, and going to the organ, immediately laid his hand on the note that ciphered. His father next day purposely caused several notes to cipher fucceffively; all which he inftantly difcovered: and at laft he weakened the fprings of two keys at once, which, by preventing the valves of the wind cheft from clofing, occafioned a double cipher; both of which he directly found out. Another part of his wonderful prematurity was the being able, at two years and four months old, to tranfpofe into the moft extraneous and difficult keys whatever he played; and now, in his extemporaneous fights, he modulates into all keys with equal facility.' Our teftimony is by no means neceffary to corroborate that of Dr. Burney; yet it may not be amifs here to obferve that, in September 1778, when he was about three years and nine weeks old, we had repeated occafions of obferving, on his being interrupted in his voluntary playing, (of which he was very fond) by a requeft to play a particular tune; whenever he complied, he fet off in the key he happened to be playing in at the time; and though he thus often became befet with a numerous host of flats or fharps, he played with equal facility as in the natural keys. He indeed evidently appeared to poffefs a most intimate knowledge of all the keys, and of their powers; or had present in his mind, a priori, the precife tone which any particular key would produce when put down; and put it down accordingly with as much confidence, as that of a compofitor at the prefs, when he lays hold of a particular letter; or of a painter dipping his pencil into a particular colour. But the compofitor and painter have the actual letter or colour dif played before them; whereas in the cafe of young Crotch, the found which he feeks is only potential, or in fieri; and has no natural connection with the black or white keys before his eyes. But he did not often condefcend to make use even of his eyes on the occafion. To us it did not appear the leaft extraordinary part of his performance, that he frequently played for a long time together without once looking at the inftrument, though playing on the most aukward keys; which were therefore now evidently become as familiar to him from feeling, as originally from fight. Dr. Burney has taken notice of the fame circumftance. The laft qualification which Dr. Burney points out as extraordinary in this infant-múfician, is his being able to play an extemporary bafe, though certainly not correct according to the rules of counterpoint, to eafy melodies performed by another P 2 perfon perfon on the fame inftrument. In this cafe, he obferves that if the fame paffages are not frequently repeated, the changes of modulation must be few and flow; otherwife correctness cannot be expected, even from a profeffor. He found him as ready too at finding a treble to a bafe, as a bafe to a treble, if played in flow notes, even in chromatic paffages. Thus, fays the Author, if, after the chord of C natural is ftruck, C be made fharp, he foon finds out that A makes a good bafe to it; and, on the contrary, if after the chord of D, with a fharp third, F is made natural, and A is changed into B, he inftantly gives G for the / bafe.' From a variety of experiments which Dr. Burney tried upon this infant contrapuntift, he felects the following as an example; in which the Doctor played the upper part, and left it to the feelings and genius of young Crotch to follow his lead, and attend him with a proper base. Some have confidered harmony as a mere creature of art; but this infant's ready and fpontaneous adoption of it furnishes a proof that its principles are innate in man: though art has greatly improved and refined upon them, fo as to render modern harmony a very complicated and difficult fcience, full of conventional, as well as natural, beauties. The fpecimens that have been exhibited by this young, untutored, and unprejudiced mind are fuch, as cannot be afcribed to a fervile imitation of what he had heard and remembered; but muft owe their origin to certain pleasurable fenfations, excited in him by particular combinations of founds; and inftinctively prompting and directing him to the natural accompaniment to a given melody. Inftruction is here out of the queftion. He had never had any, nor was capable of fubmitting or giving attention to any. Dr. Burney mentions fome other inftances of mufical prodigies; and particularly the two fons of the Rev. Mr. Wefley; the youngest of which, before he was fix years old, arrived at fuch knowledge in mufic, that his extemporary performance on keyed inftruments, like Mozart's, was fo mafterly in point of invention, modulation, and accuracy of execution, as to furpafs, in many particulars, the attainments of moft profeffors at any period of their lives.'-An account of these two young muficians is propofed foon to be given to the Public, by the Hon. Mr. Barrington. ASTRO ASTRONOMY and OPTICS. Article 8. Difquifitio, &c. A Differtation on the periodical Time of the Comet which appeared in the Year 1770. By J. A. Lexell, Member of the Academy of Sciences at Petersburgh. The obfervations made on the comet of 1770 by M. Meffier, during four months, were found by M. Eric Profperin, the Royal Aftronomer in Sweden, not to be reconcileable with a parabolic orbit. The latter therefore recommended the inveftigation of the true elements of its orbit on the hypothefis of its moving in an ellipfis. This task has been executed, in the prefent paper, by M. Lexell; who from his laborious calculations has found reafon to conclude, that the period of its revolution is not more than about five years and feven months; that time agreeing beft with the obfervations. He accounts for its not having fince appeared, by obferving that its orbit must probably have been affected or altered by the attraction of Jupiter; with which planet he finds that it must have been in conjunction on May 27, 1767: its distance from Jupiter being then only the 58th part of its diftance from the fun; and that in the following conjunction, it would be 491 times nearer to Jupiter than to the fun: fo that, having regard to their respective maffes, the action of Jupiter upon it would be 224 times greater than that of the fun; from which cause a total change in its orbit must ensue. He has nevertheless taken the pains to calculate a table, fhewing, for every month in the year, in what part of the heavens this quick-revolving or Mercurial comet is to be looked for; on the fuppofition that its periodical time is comprised within the limits of five or fix years. Article 11. Obfervations on the total (with Duration) and annular Eclipfe of the Sun, taken on the 24th of June 1778, on Board the Efpagne, being the Admiral's Ship of the Fleet of New Spain, &c. By Don Antonio Ulloa, F. K. S. Commander of the faid Squadron, &c. Some curious appearances that attended this eclipfe deferve to be particularly noticed; not however without premising that the term annular, used both by Don Ulloa and the tranflator of this Article from the original French, may convey an erroneous idea of the nature of the eclipfe, and perplex the reader who has been accustomed to affix a different fignification to this term. The phrase, annular eclipfe, has, we apprehend, been hitherto ufually, if not folely, applied to those central conjunctions of the fun and moon, in which the apparent diameter of the moon, then in Apogao, is not fo great as that of the fun, then in Pe rigao: fo that in the middle of the eclipfe, a portion of the fun's circumference neceffarily remains vifible, in the form of a luminous ring. To obferve fuch an eclipfe, which was vifible |
