As before observed, the varnish of Stradivari has, often as not, been worn, chipped or cracked off in, as some fanciers still call it, a picturesque manner or adornment, although from the highest prices being given for those specimens that have the least of it, the taste seems to be growing healthily in favour of perfection of preservation as far as is possible.
It would be out of reason to suppose that full consideration of the subject was omitted by a genius with such far reaching mental vision as Stradivari. That he gave all the necessary study and forethought to the effects of ordinary wear and such as was occasionally going on within his knowledge, there is evidence enough. He saw how the delicate work of his master, Nicolas Amati, was rapidly disappearing under sometimes rough and too often ruffianly usage. It was not in his power to prevent or interfere with this by any peculiarity of construction or quality of the varnish used by him. But this he doubtless knew—that the generally substantial work and total absence of any weak point of detail in design and execution was all that an artist could do. This strength shown over all of Stradivari's designs, even from the commencement, shows that in his grasp of the highest scale of requirement he was also anticipatory and in this wise, that he followed up the self evident principle in art, that the best combination of forms, proportions and masses will answer best for their permanence.
The numismatist knows full well how, on the coins used in various countries, the masters of basso-relievo had concentrated their skill on the subject. The balance of projection and depression for good and proper effect under different situations of light and shade, or even independently of them on occasion—is of paramount importance in all branches of art in their widest range. The omission of proper thoughtful attention in this direction is one of the obstacles to success among copyists in any direction of art. In architecture the imitator or restorer of some early English mouldings has often made ignominious failures from the non-application of knowledge of this kind: just a trifling variation from the original while in progress being deemed of little consequence, but when finished and left for exhibition under the truth testing rays of the sun, the qualities that should have been there are, as the saying is, "conspicuous by their absence." In full view of the above and with an intelligence unsurpassable, Antonio Stradivari so arranged his forms and masses in construction that under fair usage and wearing down of the projecting parts, the original beauty of the whole should be retained as long as possible. A fine Stradivari much worn still retains its air of distinction, and very much of its material must have disappeared under bad treatment to make it beyond recognition almost at a glance.
There can be very little question of there being more than mere admiration for the appearance. Simply viewed, there is the spice of romance in connection with it, the history is written in language more or less intelligible of the knocks and bruises inflicted, unwillingly in most instances, but not invariably so. And here attention may perhaps be appropriately drawn in these pages to what has been asserted by a few, very few, dealers and others, whose general intelligence should have been a guarantee against the dissemination of utter nonsense and which has even been in print! that—just think of this—Antonio Stradivari, the acknowledged master liutaro of Cremona in his own day, and of whose growing fame no one can foretell the limits—actually imitated wear and tear of varnish on his violins. I have not the print at hand, and so cannot give the exact words in which this scum from the boilings of a distorted imagination was conveyed; nor point to the first unfortunate who let it flow abroad. In all probability it came from the same old source, a desire to lift up to a high level worthless imitations of the master, confuse the public mind so as to make it more and more difficult to tell "t'other from which."
A fine specimen, and well known, of Stradivari's art was once lying on a table before me. An amateur of considerable attainments and honesty of purpose then present was dilating upon its many beauties and fine preservation; he, I soon found, had by some means become infected with the absurd notion of the varnish having been artistically pecked away by the original maker! Just fancy this—Raphael slitting a hole in his chef-d'œuvre to make it look old—Michael Angelo chipping some bits from the ceiling of the Sistine just before the scaffolding was removed, or Phidias snapping off a limb and browning the raw surface to please future connoisseurs.
They might all have done this with an equal deficiency of reason and consistency if we allow for one moment any possibility of the genius of such a stamp as that of Antonio Stradivari descending to such depravity. Those who have lent themselves to this incongruous notion, hastily generalising from insufficient particulars, have strangely overlooked the fact that the same kind of chipping is seen on the violins of other masters, Joseph Guarnerius, Carlo Bergonzi, and others of the Cremonese and Venetian School, besides—going far back—the older ones of Brescia and Pesaro, any number in fact over all Italy.
CHAPTER VI.
Some Modifications in Stradivari's Works—Variation in Finish of Details—The Interior of His Violins—The Blocks and Linings—Thicknesses of the Tables—Heads or Scrolls of His Different Periods.