For the small parts that require levelling, small pieces of glasspaper attached to a stick of pine shaped according to requirement will be found useful.
The fresh wood will of course be projecting some way beyond the edges or course of the line of the sound holes, the exact outline of which it is most desirous to continue.
This is about to be attended to by James, who thinks it a small matter to continue the line with his sharp knife, but his master happened to catch sight of his first strokes and sees his intention in time. "Stop!" he calls out, "not another stroke; just take a tracing of the opposite or corresponding part of the other sound hole and trace it down, don't trust to your eye unless you consider yourself an artist of experience and able to actually draw with your knife.
"You must attend to another thing besides the tracing of the contour. When you cut up to the line that you take as a guide, you must see that you make the walls of the opening at the same angle downwards, and your fresh wood in every respect of form an exact continuation of the old work."
The repair so far as the wood work is concerned is finished. It has now to receive the varnishing and touching up in detail for matching so as to arrest as little attention as possible as a repair.
"There are two fiddles, sir, that a party brought here yesterday. They seem very far gone; one of them has lost quite a quarter of the upper table, it has had a bad smash and the pieces have not been saved."
"Well, James," is the reply, "there is only one course to pursue, that is, to put a fresh piece of wood, join it as neatly as possible and match the varnish. I think we have a piece of old stuff sent us by an Italian dealer that will suit that exactly." The store of odds and ends of pine is rummaged over and the piece, with some pencil notes on it of date, etc., brought out and compared with the fractured fiddle. "Could not be better, James," says the chief. "Now take off that table, or what remains of it, and pare the ragged edges at the part near the sound hole.
"At that part you had better shave it at an angle from the upper surface and make a corresponding start on the fresh wood; they must both fit to a nicety, and when so the old wood will overlap the fresh stuff. You will take care to have the upper surface of the fresh wood a little above the level of the old, to allow of finishing down to a good level when the time comes for the final touches."
This is all seen to, the large slice of wood is for the present left square at the top, it is thick enough to represent the appearance of the slab of wood used by the original maker before the table was cut into form. There is some gouging to be done and shaping of the parts adjoining the old wood.
It has, of course, been necessary to provide a sort of mould for fitting and pressing from above the thin shaved edge of the old material on to the new. Precaution, however, is taken to firstly glue the parts that are to be brought together at the joint. This will prevent the shaved surfaces from slipping when pressure is applied.