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Scan 241
Old violins, 1905
14 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 219. See the scan on archive.org.
1There was an interesting John Lott, richly varnished. A romantic interest must always attach itself to this fine maker on account of his early Bohemian life, recorded by Charles Reade in a memoir called "Jack of All Trades."
3Charles Reade, who knew Lott intimately, tells us how at one time he travelled through Europe with a menagerie and became famous as the keeper of a most clever but vicious elephant called Djek, who, after killing ever so many men, had to be demolished herself with a cannon, and was then cut up for elephant steaks to feed the town.
5It was only after the loss of Djek that John Lott came again to London and took up the fiddle trade, which he had learned in boyhood.
7Joseph Hill, Lockey Hill, and Banks, were also well seen at South Kensington in 1885. There was also a matchless Urquhart, very venerable—Anno 1666—the date of the great fire of London, which happily spared it!
9The Stradivarius case contained Mr Hill's interesting 1732 Strad (now Ysaÿe's violin), which, although made so late in his life, was signed by the old man, who after 1730, as a rule, had left off signing his instruments.
11A truly serio-comic chapter might be written on the huge prices given for frauds. A friend of mine gave £200 forty years ago for a supposed Strad (which was only a Lupôt) at a time when £40 was a long price for the clever Frenchman.
13A violin professor I know sold a very poor Strad the other day, but made a very good thing out of it.
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