1880.] Rev. n. B. Eaweis on Old Violins. 30i 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



Friday, February 20, 1880. 



William Spottiswoode, Esq. M.A. D.C.L. Tres. R.S. Vice-President, 



in the Chair. 



The Rev. H. R. Haweis, M.A. 



Old Violins. 



[Among other violins exhibited, were two by Stradiuarius — one belong- 

 ing to the Emperor of Russia, the other lent by his Royal Highness 

 the Duke of Edinburgh — a Gaspar di Salo bass, found in the late 

 Tarisio's bedroom with his corpse. The South Kensington Museum, 

 and Messrs. Hart, Adam, Amherst, Hill, Enthoven, Cox, &c., also lent 

 valuable instruments.] 



The lecturer began by saying that the collection of violins and 

 basses now before the audience, weighing but a few ounces each, 

 represented several thousands of pounds worth. The variety in shape 

 and style of the viol tribe, ancient and modern, showed the inex- 

 haustible fascination it possessed over the mind. 



" I deal to-night," he said, " with the construction, the history, 

 and the sound of the violin. To begin with the wood. At Brescia 

 makers use pear, lemon, and ash ; at Cremona, maple, sycamore, and, 

 of course, pine. The wood came into the markets of Mantua, Brescia, 

 Cremona, Venice, Milan, from the Swiss Southern Tyrol, unlimited in 

 supply, often mighty timbers of great age — plentiful then, scarcer 

 now. The makers had their pick ; they tested it for intensity and 

 quality. Cut strips of wood and strike them, you will see how they 

 will vary in musical sound. When a good acoustic beam was found 

 the maker kept it for his best work. In Joseph Guarnerius and 

 Stradiuarius the same pine tree crops up at intervals of years, A 

 good maker will patch and join and inlay to retain every particle of 

 tried timber. Old wood is oddly vocal. As I sat in my room sur- 

 rounded by these instrmnents I could not cough or move without 

 ghostly voices answering me from the sixteenth, seventeenth, and 

 eighteenth centuries ; and even the old-seasoned backs and bellies of 

 unstrung violins are full of echoes." 



Vol. IX. (No. 72.) t 



