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Scan 306
Old Violins And Their Makers, 1883
4 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 292. See the scan on archive.org.
1tion of what we now call Brazil wood, the old world was previously unacquainted. Even as late as forty years ago the vegetable colouring matters and dye woods in use did not exceed twenty in number, for the great modern development in the art of dyeing was mainly caused by the use of pure mordants, and the employment of colours derived from mineral compounds. Dragon's blood had, of course, been known, was imported from India in ancient times, and is mentioned by Pliny, but materials were very limited before the discovery of the New World, and even after that event curious commercial and other prejudices inimical to their use appear to have existed here and elsewhere. In the reign of Elizabeth, for example, the employment of logwood was prohibited, under heavy penalties, all of that dye-wood which was found in the country being ordered to be destroyed, and it was not until Charles II.'s time that the embargo was removed. The use of indigo was also forbidden here and on the Continent, being quaintly denounced as "food for the devil."
3Living in an age of great material progress, we are apt to overlook such facts, and to forget that for 200 years before the death of Stradivari, Italy was, probably, chiefly indebted for the few colouring and varnish recipes she possessed to the Jesuit fathers, whose missionaries culled them from oriental sources, such as India and China. Dragon's blood and sandal wood appear to have been the materials principally employed in colouring varnishes, and to these and their modifications the experiments I am now describing were mainly confined, although many were
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