Books › The reminiscences of a fiddle dealer, 1925 › scan 49
Scan 49
The reminiscences of a fiddle dealer, 1925
8 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 25. See the scan on archive.org.
1An Unpromising Purchase
3and not lose heart even when my expectations did not seem likely to be realized, and this has been put to the test many times in the course of my experience.
5Of course I had a decided advantage over the dealers at this time, as I had another business and was not depending on the sale of these or any other fiddles. I would not for a moment wish my readers to think that the dealers were chary of buying because they did not see the possible value of the best of the instruments. Far from it; they knew just as well as I did what they were, but they were in such an unfinished state, that it meant a lot of work putting them in order. Besides instruments of that class sold slowly and generally at a low price, so, like Vuillaume, they concluded that the game was not worth the candle.
7The dealers too were enabled from their knowledge of fiddles to pick up good bargains at sales, and were offered second and third class Italian fiddles at a very low price by the owners who were forced to sell. All this, however, has been changed these many years. Italian instruments have quite reasserted themselves, though, now, as at the time of which I write, Italy was about the last place where one could purchase them. They were all taken to other countries.
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.