Mr. Charles Reade describes as the invention of Italy, namely "the four corners."20 The same author in speaking ofthe order of invention remarks that he is puzzled "to time the Violono, or as we childishly call it (after its known descendant) the Double Bass. If I were so presumptuous as to trust to my eye alone, I should say it was the first of them all." With this opinion I entirely agree, and I am also in unison with Mr. Reade in believing that the large Viola (played on or between the knees) was the next creation, the design of which was that of the Violono or Double Bass already referred to. The next and most important step was
in all probability to make the common Geige or three-stringed Fiddle of the same shape as these Tenor and Contralto Viols, thus handing to us the present-shaped Violin. In the MS. notes of Lancetti, reference is made to a three-stringed Violin in the collection of Count Cozio di Salabue, which throws some light upon the question as to three-stringed Violins, of the form of the Italian Viola, having been made prior to the introduction of those with four strings tuned in fifths. The instrument to which Lancetti refers was dated 1546, and was attributed to Andrea Amati. Until the beginning of the present century, this instrument remained in its original condition, when it was altered by the Brothers Mantegazza of Milan into a Violin with four strings. Mention of this curious and valuable fact furnishes us with the sole record of a three-stringed Violin having been in existence during the nineteenth century, and also supplies the link needful to connect the old type of Fiddle with the perfect instrument of the great Italian makers. When or where the four-stringed Violin tuned in fifths first appeared in Italy is a question the answer to which must ever remain buried in the past. It may have seen the light in Mantua, Bologna, or Brescia. The last-mentioned town is usually associated with its advent, and to Gasparo da Salo is given the credit of its authorship.
20 "Cremona Violins," Pall Mall Gazette, 1872. This reference applies to the corners and corner-blocks as made by Gasparo and all makers to the present time, in contradistinction to those seen in the Viol da Gamba and early German Viols.
SECTION II
The Construction of the Violin
The construction of the present form of the Violin has occupied the attention of many scientific men. It cannot be denied that the subject possesses a charm sufficiently powerful to induce research, as endeavour is made to discover the causes for the vast superiority of the Violin of the seventeenth century over the many other forms of bow instruments which it has survived. The characteristic differences of the Violin have been obtained at the cost of many experiments in changing the outline and placing the sound-holes in various incongruous positions. These, and the many similar freaks of inventors in their search after perfection, have signally failed,
a result to be expected when it is considered that the changes mentioned were unmeaning, and had nothing but novelty to recommend them. But what is far more extraordinary is the failure of the copyist, who, vainly supposing that he has truthfully followed the dimensions and general features of the Old Masters, at last discovers that he is quite unable to construct an instrument in any way deserving of comparison with the works of the period referred to. The Violin has thus hitherto baffled all attempts to force it into the "march of progress" which most things are destined to follow. It seems to scorn complication in its structure, and successfully holds its own in its simplicity. There is in the Violin, as perfected by the great Cremonese masters, a simplicity combined with
elegance of design, which readily courts the attention of thoughtful minds, and gives to it an air of mystery that cannot be explained to those outside the Fiddle world. Few objects possess so charming a display of curved lines as the members of the Violin family. Here we have Hogarth's famous line of beauty worked to perfection in the upper bouts,1 in the lower bouts, in the outer line of the scroll, in the sound-hole. Everywhere the perfection of the graceful curve is to be seen. It has been asserted by Hogarth's enemies that he borrowed the famous line from an Italian writer named Lomazzo, who introduced it in a treatise on the Fine Arts. We will be
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more charitable, and say that he obtained it from the contemplation of the beauties of a Cremonese Violin.
1 A technical term for the sides.
In looking at a Violin we are struck with admiration at a sight of consummate order and grace; but it is the grace of nature rather than of mechanical art. The flow of curved lines which the eye detects upon its varied surface, one leading to another, and all duly proportioned to the whole figure, may remind us of the winding of a gentle stream, or the twine of tendrils in the trellised vine.
Often is the question asked, What can there be in a simple Violin to attract so much notice? What is it that causes men to treat this instrument as no other, to view it as an art picture, to dilate upon its form, colour, and date? To the uninitiated such devotion appears to be a species of monomania, and attributable to a desire of singularity. It needs but little to show the inaccuracy of such hypotheses. In the first place, the true study of the Violin is a taste which needs as much cultivation as a taste for poetry or any other art, a due appreciation of which is impossible without such cultivation. Secondly, it needs, equally with these arts, in order to produce proficiency, that spark commonly known as genius, without which, cultivation, strictly speaking, is impossible, there being nothing
to cultivate. We find that the most ardent admiration for the Violin regarded as a work of art, has ever been found to emanate from those who possessed tastes for kindred arts. Painters, musicians, and men of refined minds have generally been foremost among
the admirers of the Violin. Much interest attaches to it from the fact of its being the sole instrument incapable of improvement, whether in form or in any other material feature. The only difference between the Violin of the sixteenth century and that of the nineteenth lies in the arrangement of the sound-bar (which is now longer, in order to bear the increased pressure caused by the diapason being higher than in former times), and the comparatively longer neck, so ordered to obtain increased length of string. These variations can scarcely be regarded as inventions, but simply as arrangements. The object of them was the need of adapt-
ing the instrument to modern requirements, so that it might be used in concert with others that have been improved, and allow the diapason to be raised. Lastly, it must be said that, above all, the Violin awakens the interest of its admirers by the tones which it can be made to utter in the hands of a skilful performer. It is, without doubt, marvellous that such sounds should be derivable from so small and simple-looking an instrument. Its expressiveness, power, and the extraordinary combinations which its stringing admits of, truly constitute it the king of musical instruments. These somewhat desultory remarks may suffice to trace the origin of the value set upon the Violin both as a work of art and as a musical instrument.
We will now proceed to consider the acoustical properties of the Violin. These are, in every particular, surprisingly great, and are the results of many tests, the chief of which has been the adoption of several varieties of wood in its construction. In Brescia, which was in all probability the cradle of Violin manufacture, the selection of the material of the sides and back from the pear, lemon,
and ash trees was very general, and there is every reason to believe that Brescia was the first place where such woods were used. It is possible that the makers who chose them for the sides and backs of their instruments considered it desirable to have material more akin to that adopted for the bellies, which was the finest description of pine, and that the result was found to be a tone of great mellowness. If they used these woods with this intention, their calculations were undoubtedly correct. They appear to have worked these woods with but few exceptions for their Tenors, Violoncellos, and Double Basses, while they adopted the harder woods for their Violins, all which facts tend to show that these rare old makers did not consider soft wood eligible for the back and sides of
the leading instrument; and later experiment has shown them to have arrived at a correct conclusion on this point. The experiments necessary to
