As intimated, you must clear the line by one-sixteenth inch, so that no risk is run by taking too much wood off, cleverly put on again, when matched by an expert, but which could hardly be done by you just yet.
Well, as you see, I have cleared the rough back from the main body of the still rougher oblong wood, and it must now be my business to cut this rough outline to its true form, which is done by looking at the flat side where this pencil outline is, and with a very sharp, flat-ground knife, specially made for violin makers, tool [19]. But before this is done, the main body must be reduced at the edges, on the convex or outer side, of course, to about the thickness of three-sixteenths of an inch good, which is a simple matter, if done with one and a quarter inch gouge [43], in this manner.
In the middle of the bench, which will be your general one, and five inches from the edge, cut a one-inch square right through the wood, and fit a long stop therein, the tighter the better, and somewhat rounded off at the inner corner facing you. This will serve to keep one end of back or belly rigid when the other end is provided for, as I do thus:—About fifteen inches from this square top, and to your right, clamp down a piece of hard wood, three inches broad, and a quarter of an inch thick, square with the bench, and on both sides. Then cut a square hole in it, five inches from bench side, to enable you to allow the rough button to lie whilst you operate on one side of the back, then on the other. This, as you must see, enables the wood upon which you are to work, perfect freedom from obstruction of any sort, whilst the gouge cuts roughly all round, as shown in plate 3.
So, leaving the convex side as it is for the present, I resume, as to cutting to the true outline with the knife. You can begin where you like, but I generally clear the right side first. I cut through the pencil line, not entirely obliterating it (which you will not find easy), because, after awhile, I have to efface it altogether with a file, to a perfect, smooth line. These square corners—these curves of top, middle, and lower bouts—all and everything must be well done, and no one thing outside of beauty left for the critical eye to gape at.
Turning the plate to the outer side, I press it flat, between the square let into the bench and the three-inch slip clamped about fifteen inches apart, as spoken of before. This is done so that it may be rigid whilst I take one-inch rasp [47], and proceed to level all round the wood to about five-eighths of an inch and five-thirty-seconds of an inch deep. When I get to the ends of the back I loosen the wood, and use the file more freely at the end of the bench. But this is a matter left entirely to the workman. When this is nicely done, I wet a sponge and damp all I have gone over, surface and edge alike, and let it thoroughly dry, and when it is so, I employ medium cut file [63], half round, seven-eighths of an inch broad, and make the edge of the wood clean, and so even all round, that my first finger or thumb passes over the surface without a suspicion of irregularity suggesting itself. This, mind, must be most carefully done, as otherwise, if you, to make both ends meet, so to speak, take off here a morsel too much, and a little extra there, to repair your fault, thinking to improve your line, you will find it broken, and no longer in uninterrupted movement, as it should be. I would rather see almost anything bad about this noble instrument than a slovenly outline, for it is not only ugly in itself, but leads to other imperfections, and should be most strongly condemned in the modern school; it will most certainly be by me, should a school spring from this book, as is already spoken of as most likely.
The line being right, I next see to the flat edge being strictly of one thickness all round, which I get to my mind by using a cork rubber-tool [67], and about No. 1 sandpaper—maker's number. You can be sure of this correctness by using a sawyer's circular round gauge—and you had best do so.
Now, gentlemen, this brings me to
CHAPTER III.
PURFLING.