Scan 464
The violin: its famous makers and their imitators, 1909
2 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 386. See the scan on archive.org.
1Violinist. Fortune, however, did not smile upon him. He is described as being one of those itinerant musicians—perhaps the last of them—who in winter evenings went to taverns, and for a slender subsistence bore the insults of those disinclined to listen to their performance. This order of itinerant musicians may be described as having descended from the Fiddling minstrels, whom the wealthy in earlier times often retained in their houses, giving them coats and badges bearing the family arms. These musicians, in place of amusing the nobility, ultimately attended wakes and fairs. They were sometimes retained at the large inns, where the guest while eating, an old English writer says, was "offered music, which he may freely take or refuse, and if he be solitary the musicians will give him the good day, with music in the morning." In Puritan times this class of musician was thought to have so much increased as to need a special act for their suppression, which gave rise to Butler's creation, the "Champion Crowdero." Returning to our subject with Thomas Eccles, we have the following interesting account of the unfortunate Violinist, by a musician: "It was about the month of November, 1753, that I, with some friends, were met to spend the evening at a tavern in the City, when this man, in a mean but decent garb, was introduced to us by the waiter; immediately upon opening the door I heard the twang of one of his strings from under his coat, which was accompanied
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