Fitness instructor carves his girlfriend’s name into the Colosseum.
Merry Company on a Terrace, by Jan Steen, c. 1670. © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fletcher Fund, 1958.
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Miscellany
Humpback whales, which have a sonic range of at least seven octaves, create songs between the length of a modern ballad and a symphony movement, possibly because their attention span is similar to that of humans. Their tunes also contain repeated refrains that form melodic rhymes, suggesting that, like humans, they use these as mnemonic devices.
The god of music dwelleth out of doors.
—Edith M. Thomas, 1887Lapham’sDaily
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