in music, signifies a certain degree of tension, or the sound produced by a vocal string in a given degree of tension, or by any sonorous body when put in vibration.

Tonic, says Roffeau, is likewise the name given by Aristoctenus to one of the three kinds of chromatic music, whose divisions he explains, and which was the ordinary chromatic of the Greeks, proceeding by two semitones in succession, and afterwards a third minor.

Tonic Dominant. See Dominant.

TONNAGE and POUNDAGE, an ancient duty on wine and other goods, the origin of which seems to have been this: About the 21st of Edward III. complaint was made that merchants were robbed and murdered on the seas. The king thereupon, with the consent of the peers, levied a duty of 2s. on every ton of wine, and 12d. in the pound on all goods imported; which was treated as illegal by the commons. About 25 years after, the king, when the knights of shires were returned home, obtained a like grant from the citizens. Tonnage, citizens and burgesses, and the year after it was regularly granted in parliament. These duties were diminished sometimes, and sometimes increased; at length they seem to have been fixed at 3s. tonnage and 1s. poundage. They were at first usually granted only for a limited term of years, as, for two years in Ric. II.; but in Henry VI.'s time they were granted him for life by a statute in the 31st year of his reign; and again to Edward IV. for the term of his life also; since which time they were regularly granted to all his successors for life, sometimes at the first, sometimes at other subsequent parliaments, till the reign of Charles I.; when, as the noble historian expresses it, his ministers were not sufficiently solicitous for a renewal of this legal grant. And yet these imposts were imprudently and unconstitutionally levied and taken, without consent of parliament, for 15 years together; which was one of the causes of those unhappy discontented, justifiable at first in too many instances, but which degenerated at last into dangerous rebellion and murder. For, as in every other, so in this particular case, the king (previous to the commencement of hostilities) gave the nation ample satisfaction for the errors of his former conduct, by passing an act, whereby he renounced all power in the crown of levying the duty of tonnage and poundage, without the express consent of parliament; and also all power of imposition upon any merchandise whatever. Upon the restoration this duty was granted to King Charles II. for life, and so it was to his two immediate successors; but now, by three several statutes, 9 Ann. c. 6. Geo. I. c. 12. and 3 Geo. I. c. 7. it is made perpetual, and mortgaged for the debt of the public.