Books › British Violin Makers: A Biographical Dictionary of British Makers of Stringed Instruments and Bows and a Critical Description of Their Work, 1920 › scan 226
Scan 226
British Violin Makers: A Biographical Dictionary of British Makers of Stringed Instruments and Bows and a Critical Description of Their Work, 1920
6 lines. Read by computer on 29 August 2026. Printed page 182. See the scan on archive.org.
1There are two virtues which a restorer must possess—they are the background of reverence, as it were—these are self-control and self-denial. A writer on Christian Art observes that "not only political but aesthetical regeneration is inseparably dependent on self-denial and self-control." This is literally true of the art of restoring violins. There are hundreds of old instruments in existence which have been repaired, or rather impaired, by bunglers who could not resist the temptation of "trying on" some of their "patents," or of discarding an old rib or two, or even the table, and substituting brand new work of more "scientific" construction. It can with truth be said of these old wrecks as Ruskin said of Fra Giocondo's loggia that they "have been daubed and damned by the modern restorer."
3I had not the privilege of knowing the great William Ebsworth in the flesh, but I know him in the spirit, and I know him in his works. There is no name in fiddle lore for which I feel a profounder respect, and there is nothing in fiddle craft that I admire more than his beautiful restorations.
5The Messrs. Hill—i.e. the present firm—are makers, repairers, experts, and authors of several works on celebrated violin makers and violins. Naturally, they have a great reputation. To say that they are worthily maintaining the reputation of their father is at once to say too much and too little. It is saying too much because no individual, or combination of individuals, can, in my opinion, ever equal the wonderful work which William Ebsworth Hill accomplished as a restorer of classical instruments. That work, whether viewed from the point of view of quantity or quality, stands unrivalled. Nor can any individual, or combination of individuals, ever again have the same opportunity of learning the mind of the great Italian masters as he had. The opportunity he enjoyed has visited the world only two or three times. It came once when Tarisio trudged the dusty roads of Italy: it came again when the pedlar sold his ill-gotten ware to the luthiers of Paris: it
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