Flute

a wind instrument of the pipe kind. It belongs to the same class as the fife, flageolet, piccolo, and boy's whistle. The sound is produced by a current of air striking the edge of a hole in the side of the tube. Scientists are not agreed as to the correct explanation of the vibrations of the air. The more ancient or direct form, well known to the Hebrews and to the Greeks, was held straight away from the player, who blew through a mouthpiece at the end. The modern or transverse flute is played by blowing through a mouthpiece in the side of the tube. The so-called German flute has six finger holes, and from six to twelve keys for semitones. Its compass is three octaves ranging from middle C upward. The piccolo is an octave higher. The tube of the flute is about twenty-seven inches long, and may be made of boxwood, ivory, ebony, silver, and even glass. The mountings are, of course, as expensive as the buyer may care to pay for. The flageolet is a small, direct flute. The fife is a single octave flute of the transverse sort. A skillful fifer, however, can reach two or possibly three octaves. By French writers, the direct or end flute is called the flute-a-bec, or the flute with a beak, in allusion to the beak-like mouthpiece at the end.