The Fisherman and his Flute which the illustrator to the latter author makes a trumpet. In La Fontaine’s French version the instrument is referred to as a ‘musette’ which, since his fable is titled “The Fishes and the Shepherd who Played the Flute” ("Les poissons et le berger qui joue de la flûte", X.10), must refer to the old piccolo oboe. Nevertheless, it was translated as bagpipe by Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea, in her rendering of his poem. La Fontaine had made of the story an artificial pastoral in which Tircis tried to charm the fishes to the hook of the shepherdess Annette but
Members of the western concert flute family or curved. The bass flute is pitched in the key of C, and one octave below the concert flute. Because of the length of its tube (approximately ), it is usually made with a curved headjoint, sometimes in a "J" shape, to bring the embouchure hole within reach of the player. It is usually only used in flute choirs, as it is easily drowned out by other instruments of comparable register, such as the clarinet. The contra-alto flute (also called contrabass flute in G) is in the key of G, pitched one octave below the alto flute, and a fourth