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Scan 292
Old Violins And Their Makers, 1883
4 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 278. See the scan on archive.org.
1afterwards, in less than an hour, they are precipitated to the bottom, whence it follows that in mixing these colours with a varnish, it becomes necessary to shake up the liquid each time it is to be used, in order to put them for the moment in suspension. Besides, these lacs are always more or less muddy, have little transparency, and leave a useless thickness on the instrument. The Garancine lacs present the same difficulty, although they are more transparent. The coats of varnish applied by the old Creomnese makers are so translucent, and have so little thickness, that it was conjectured they must have used colouring matters of a more or less resinous description, which they rendered soluble, or, at least, mixable, in the essential oils. A great number of experiments, taken in conjunction with literary evidence, confirmed the conviction that the Italian violin makers must have used dragon's blood, red sandal wood, and gamboge.
3All these resinous colours are very soluble in alcohol, but not so much in the essential oils, except gamboge, which is soluble in them cold, and still more so if the essence in which it is placed be exposed to the sun. Dragon's blood dissolves slightly, but not sufficiently to give a satisfactory colour. Red sandal wood reduced to powder hardly colours them at all. The idea occurred of using the solvent action of alcohol as an intermediary. Alcohol marking 64deg., Government scale at 60deg. F. (containing about 7 parts of water to 93 of alcohol), mixes completely with the essential oils of rosemary, aspic, and lavender. Red sandal wood was then dissolved in this alcohol, and the solution mixed with one of these three essences, which preserved
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