Note 63 — PART I PLAYFUL EXPERIMENTATION

In a celebrated Chinese poem the effect of music is thus described: “Now soft as whispered words, now soft and loud together—like pearls falling on marble—now coaxing as the call of birds, now complaining like a brook, and now like a mountain stream bursting its icy bounds.” When we recall the great difference in form between Chinese music and our own, the similarity of emotional effect is astonishing.