posing in obscurity some long forgotten,
unrecognised work by an old master of the art of violin making. Should
one be unearthed, if but a wreck of its former greatness or even a
portion, this is not refused but eagerly grasped and placed--not yet
in open daylight before the gaze of the world, but in the hands of a
specialist in re-vivifying these dry bones of a bygone age,
re-habilitating them--perhaps having by him or given him other
portions of a similar maker, or it may be--it has sometimes
occurred--the actual missing parts.

The specialist in the repairing and restoring art is now not of the
same class as in olden times. When the Amatis, Stradivaris, Guarneris
and the like were being turned out one after another, there was not
so much necessity for preserving all the pieces or splinters of
precious pine that had been separated by the fracture of the upper table
from any cause, there was a better remedy at hand, the nearest maker
would naturally be sought whose reputation was possibly more than local
and whose self confidence prompted him to make a fresh table rather
than devote time and labour for which adequate compensation could not
be hoped for. As a result, we frequently find old violins and their
kindred turning up with fronts and backs which, although fitting well
as regards size and outline, have been made by a distinctly different
workman, in some instances equal or even superior to the originator.
At the present day, however, this kind of restoration is much more
rarely attempted and is not resorted to unless the damage is very
extensive or vital portions have been irrecoverably lost.

The modern maker has no longer within reach, pine with requisite
acoustical properties, of which the old Italian masters seem to have
had so large a store, or if not, the knowledge where to obtain it. As
a consequence there has, in response to the pressure of necessity,
arisen a class of workmen some of whose dexterous conversion of a mere
bundle of splinters of an old master into the semblance of its former
grandeur of aspect would have astonished the original designers. These
modern restorers are not to be confounded with the minute imitators
or forgers, than whom they are much more clever, hard-working and
honest withal. The art of repairing and restoring has now become so
distinct from that of making, that many in the foremost ranks in the
increasing large army of restorers may never have made a violin
throughout. The