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Cedar, a sweete wood good for seelings, chests, boxes, bedsteads, lutes, virginals, and many things els, as I haue also said before. Some of our companie which haue wandered in some places where I haue not bene, haue made certeine affirmation of Cyprus, which for such and other excellent vses is also a wood of price and no small estimation.

"The Queen is playing upon the virginals, and she playeth best when alone; so stand you here by this tapestry, and you shall have pleasure beyond payment," said the Duke's Daughter.

Queen Elizabeth, also, amused herself not only with the lute, the virginals, and her voice, but also with the violin. These, however, were amateurs, and the earliest professional violinist known was Mrs. Sarah Ottey, who was born about 1695, and who about 1721-22 performed frequently at concerts, giving solos on the harpsichord, violin, and bass viol.

"I have been busy with State affairs, I have not sat on cushions, listening to royal fingers on the virginals. Still, I ask you, do you think there is a reason why from her height she should stoop down to rescue you or give you any joy? Wherefore should the Queen do aught to serve you? Wherefore should she save your lover?" It was on Angele's lips to answer, "Because I saved her life on May Day."

The young lady's virginals, her guitar, her embroidery frames, her books, her "babies," which the maids had packed, although it was long since she had played with them; the young gentleman's guns and whips, tennis rackets, bows and arrows, and a mass of heterogeneous goods; there seemed no end to the two children's personal property, and it was well that the old house was sufficiently spacious to afford a wing for their occupation.

To this group belonged the virginal, or virginals, the clavicembalo, the harpsichord, or clavecin, and the spinet. Stops were added, as in the organ, that varied effects might be produced, and a second keyboard was often placed above the first. The case was either rectangular, or followed the outlines of the harp, a progenitor of this clavier type.

Many of these volumes were great folios bound in the most expensive way and extensively illustrated. The planters even in the 17th century were not insensible to the refining and elevating influence of music. Inventories and wills show that many homes contained virginals, hand lyres, violins, flutes and haut boys. The cornet also was in use.

In the eleventh century, when musical notation came into being, a monochord was used to teach singing. The clavichord followed in due course, and by a rapid process of development regals, organs, and virginals evolved.

It was a sin to hang garlands on a Maypole, to drink a friend's health, to fly a hawk, to hunt a stag, to play at chess, to wear love-locks, to put starch into a ruff, to touch the virginals, to read the Fairy Queen.

And my lady, too, bringing forward her beetle-browed misses to skirl and play upon the virginals, as if she said, 'Pick and choose. They are no more comparable to Lucy than an owl is to a cygnet, and so they may carry their black brows to a farther market."