The popular nineteenth-century American pianist writes an eight-bar exercise based on Pleyel's Hymn, titling it A One Finger Pedal Study for Pianoforte and signing at the upper-right corner.

William Mason was the son of composer Lowell Mason, a leading figure in American church music, and his younger brother, Henry Mason, was a co-founder of the piano manufacturers Mason & Hamlin. Although William enjoyed great success concertizing across Europe and America at the start of his career, he so much disliked the itinerant lifestyle that he decided to settle in New York City. He was one of the first American pianists to offer solo concerts. He co-founded a concert series with Theodore Thomas to introduce new European chamber music to American audiences and became quite the in-demand piano teacher. One imagines he might have used this very exercise with his students.