145. On the same principle—the disregard of semitones—must be explained the occasional answering of a major by a minor third, or a minor by a major, in the course of a subject. This must not be confounded with the regularly allowed substitution of a major for a minor third, at the end of a subject, spoken of in § 69.
In all the above passages the alterations in the answer are marked with an asterisk. Students are advised not to imitate such freedoms as these, but in all cases to preserve the position of the semitones, except, of course, at the moment of modulation.
146. Before leaving the subject of tonal answers, it must be added that we occasionally (we might also say exceptionally) find the dominant key answered by the supertonic, instead of by the tonic. Sometimes this is in an incidental modulation, as in the following passage—
![\new ChoirStaff <<
\new Staff \relative a' { \clef alto \key d \major \time 4/4 \partial 2
r8^\markup \bold "S" a a a |\[ b4 fis8_"N.B." gis a4 \] r8 d, |
cis a g'! a16 g fis8 d_"&c." }
\new Staff \relative d'' { \key d \major
r8^\markup \bold "A" d d d |\[ fis4 cis8 dis e4 \] r8 a, |
gis e d' e16 d cis8 a } >>](http://upload.wikimedia.org/score/0/x/0xcv5il2s84hz1luedaz8o1mcxsjhc4/0xcv5il2.png)
Here the answer at the "N.B." is, to say the least of it, unusual. The subject appears to commence in the dominant, and to modulate into the tonic; and the regular answer would certainly have been
