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MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. 43
ance not unlike the teeth of a saw. The performer strikes them
with a sort of plectrum resembling a brush, or with a small stick
called khen.
Occasionally
the ou is made
with pieces of
metal shaped
like reeds.
The ancient ou was constructed with only six tones which were attuned thus—
/, g, a c, d, f. The instrument appears to have become deteriorated in the course of time; for, although it has gradually acquired as many as twenty-seven pieces of metal, it evidently serves at the present day more for the production of rhythmical noise than for the execution of any melody. The modem ou is made of a species of wood called kicou or isicou: and the tiger rests generally on a hollow wooden pedestal about three feet six inches long, which serves as a sound-board.
The tc/iou, likewise an instrument of percussion, was made of the wood of a tree called kicou-mou, the stem of which resembles that of the pine and whose foliage is much like that of the cypress. It was constructed of boards about three-quarters of an inch in thickness. In the middle of one of the sides was an aperture into which the hand was passed for the purpose of holding the handle of a Avooden hammer, the end of which entered into a hole situated in the bottom of the tchou. The handle was kept in its place by means of a wooden pin, on which
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