re men who were in the enjoyment of a patronage certainly
sufficient to enable them to follow their calling without privation of
any kind. Scarcity of pine and sycamore, good or bad, could not have
been the cause, since we find Italian cabinet-work of great beauty
that was manufactured at this same period. The plane-tree and pine
used by the Amati, Stradivari, and the chief masters in Italy, was
usually of foreign growth, and was taken from the Tyrol and Istria.
Its value was, therefore, in advance of Italian wood, but hardly so
much as to place it beyond the reach of the Cremonese masters. It is,
further, improbable that these masters of the art should have expended
such marvellous care and toil over their work, pieced as it frequently
was like mosaic, when for a trifling sum they could have avoided such
a task to their ingenuity by purchasing fresh wood. We are therefore
forced to admit that there must have been some cause of great weight
which induced them to apply so much time and labour, and that the
problem can only be accounted for by the solution before proposed,
viz., that external appearance was of less importance than the
possession of acoustic properties thoroughly adapted to the old
makers' purpose, and that the scarcity of suitable wood was such as to
make them hoard and make use of every particle. The selection of
material was hence considered to be of prime importance by these
makers; and by careful study they brought it to a state of great
perfection. The knowledge they gained of this vital branch of their
art is enveloped in a similar obscurity to that which conceals their
famous varnish, and in these branches of Violin manufacture rests the
secret of the Italian success, and until it is rediscovered the
Cremonese will remain unequalled in the manufacture of Violins.

We may now pass to the consideration of the various constituent parts
of a Violin. It will be found, if a Violin be taken to pieces, that it
is constructed of no less than fifty-eight separate parts, an
astonishing number of factors for so small and simple-looking an
instrument. The back is made of maple or sycamore, in one or two
parts; the belly of the finest quality of Swiss pine, and from a piece
usually divided; the sides, like the back, of maple, in six pieces,
bent to the required form by means of a heated iron; the linings,
which are used to secure the back and belly to the sides, are twelve
in number, sometimes made of lime-tree,