MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS - online book

The History And Development Of Musical Instruments From The Earliest Times.

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	MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS.	105
	To avoid misapprehension, it is necessary to mention that the name regal (or regals, rigols) was also applied to an instru­ment of percussion with sonorous slabs of wood. This con­trivance was, in short, a kind of harmonica, resembling in shape as well as in the principle of its construction the little glass harmonica, a mere toy, in which slips of glass are arranged according to our musical scale. In England it appears to have been still known in the beginning of the eighteenth century, Grassineau describes the " Rigols " as " a kind of musical instru­ment consisting of several sticks bound together, only separated by beads. It makes a tolerable harmony, being well struck with a bail at the end of a stick.'' In the earlier centuries of the middle ages there appear to have been some instruments ot percussion in favour, to which Grassineau's expression " a tolerable harmony" would scarcely have been applicable. Drums, of course, were known; and their rhythmical noise must have been soft music, compared with the shrill sounds of the cymbalum;
	a contrivance consisting of a number of metal plates suspended on cords, so that they could be clashed together simultaneously ; or with the clangour of the cymbalum constructed with bells

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