Books › The Hawley Collection of violins, 1904 › scan 40
Scan 40
The Hawley Collection of violins, 1904
22 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. Printed page 28. See the scan on archive.org.
1is very ornate in purfling and carving on the walls and scroll. The violins of this decade, 1720 to 1730, have a peculiarity of tone which distinguishes them from Stradivari's earlier work and also that coming after 1730, in that it is more somber, without losing, however, the characteristic Stradivari quality. This tone is very effective for players of the type of Ernst and Rhode, who seem to require its note of pathos to inspire them. In 1730 Stradivari was 86 years old, and his burden of years began to press heavily upon him. For over sixty years he had remained faithfully at work, resolved that until time had so closed in on him that eye and hand should fail, he would continue at the bench. There is something grand in the contemplation of the long career of Stradivari. He whose work was to stand unsurpassed for uniformity of merit, both as regards tone and workmanship, was vouchsafed more years of usefulness than any other maker, and so gave to posterity a larger number of instruments of the highest class than any other liutaro before or after him. He must have had assistance in his work for many years prior to 1730, and no doubt he obtained it from both pupils and workmen employed for the purpose. The important features of the construction of his instruments, such as the cutting of the scroll, sound holes, purfling, edges and corners, as well as the varnishing and general adjustment, he did with his own hands, if we are to base judgment on the uniformity of the workmanship which he maintained at all times. The graduation of thicknesses and selection of wood must also have been done by him; so it is easily imagined how incessant the toil and constant the effort to have produced the number of instruments which left his hands. To work from early morn until the heat of the day, then to rest for perhaps two hours, after which steady work until too dark to see, must have been the daily routine of Stradivari's long life. The world affords few examples of greater industry than that of the life of Stradivari.
3"Not Bach alone, helped by fine precedent
4Of genius gone before, nor Joachim,
5Who holds the strain afresh incorporate,
6By inward hearing and notation strict
7Of nerve and muscle, made our joy today:
8Another soul was living in the air
9And swaying it to true deliverance
10Of high invention and responsive skill!
11That plain, white-aproned man
12Who stood at work
13Patient and accurate full four score years,
14Cherished his sight and touch by temperance;
15And, since keen sense is love of perfectness,
16Made perfect violins, the needed path
17For inspiration and high mastery,—
18Antonio Stradivari."
19GEORGE ELIOT.
21From 1730 Stradivari's work becomes more and more irregular. The workmanship is noticeably deficient in the perfection of past years. Still, however, it is more than fit to rank with the best of that of his contemporaries, if we exclude Joseph Guarneri. In the cutting of the scroll, purfling, and sound holes his unsteady hand and failing sight are most noticeable. Several writers in analyzing Stradivari's vio-
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