and that science of sound known as counterpoint were placed by this
school of musical scholars and workers on a solid basis, which enabled
the great composers who came after them to build their beautiful tone
fabrics in forms of imperishable beauty and symmetry. For a long time
most of the great Italian churches had Belgian chapel-masters, and
the value of their example and teachings was vital in its relation to
Italian music.

The last great master among the Belgians, and, after Palestrina,
the greatest of the sixteenth century, was Orlando di Lasso, born in
Hainault, in the year 1520. His life of a little more than three score
years and ten was divided between Italy and Germany. He left the deep
imprint of his severe style, though but a young man, on his Italian
_confrères_, and the young Palestrina owed to him much of the largeness
and beauty of form through which he poured his genius in the creation of
such works as have given him so distinct a place in musical history. The
pope created Orlando di Lasso Knight of the Golden Spur, and sought to
keep him in Italy. Unconcerned as to fame, the gentle, peaceful musician
lived for his art alone, and the flattering expressions of the great
were not so much enjoyed as endured by him. A musical historian,
Heimsoeth, says of him: "He is the brilliant master of the North,
great and sublime in sacred composition, of inexhaustible invention,
displaying much breadth, variety, and depth in his treatment; he
delights in full and powerful harmonies, yet, after all--owing to an
existence passed in journeys, as well as service at court, and occupied
at the same time with both sacred and secular music--he came short of
that lofty, solemn tone which pervades the works of the great master of
the South, Palestrina, who with advancing years restricted himself more
and more to church music." Of the celebrated penitential psalms of Di
Lasso, it is said that Charles IX. of France ordered them to be written