brought forth another name as pupil or workman with Stradivari, and whose identification with some fine specimens of the liutaro's art may yet prove an interesting study. A relative of the master, we should expect to find his work strongly tinged with the Stradivarian characteristics. His tickets are said to have been all removed in very early times after their insertion and that one only is known to have been preserved intact. Of the great rival—in public estimation—of Stradivari, Joseph Guarnerius, I.H.S., it can only be said there is not a single feature in his handiwork, style or tone, agreeing with the supposition that he at any time was his pupil or assistant, moreover, having by me distinct evidence of his pupilage of another maker of a different school, will of course prevent the inclusion of his name.

The number of pupils and assistants who worked with or under the supervision of Stradivari in his prime, might, if we knew all, be more considerable than we should be prepared to expect. The proportion in the usual course of nature, of those able to single out a path for themselves, prove their individuality superior to their fellows or eventually become of great eminence, must of necessity have been comparatively small. There may have been many working "on and off" under the eye of the master at different periods who were without ambition or the talent to rise above the position of humble helpers among their more talented brethren, born to be assistants only, and, in consequence, never heard of outside the studio. These, and the before mentioned, must all have had something to do with the instruments their master was sending forth into the world; the more clever ones being intrusted with some responsibility on particular work. It is not impossible to fix upon the parts the assistants probably would be allowed to work upon. In the first place, all the designing, drawing out and tracing down of the pattern on to the mould, or on to the unprepared blocks that were to be carved into necks, scrolls, or marked out for ribs, would be Stradivari's.

The different stages succeeding each other would be most likely as follows—firstly, the master having been commissioned by a wealthy patron to make of his best pattern and highest finish a quartet of instruments, he would take from his store of choice pine and sycamore, which he had taken so much trouble and skill in collecting together, such pieces that appeared to him suitable for the instruments to be constructed. The upper and lower tables had previously been hewn or sawn to size, then the jointed back and front, if both were so, planed carefully and made ready for the master's work, which would first come on to the wood as a careful tracing from his original design. Sometimes the tracing down may have been done by some advanced pupil or competent assistant. We may fairly assume the presence here of one or two, if not more, assistants, besides a pupil or improver. One would be selected for the bow-sawing of the pattern, another afterwards receiving it for roughly gouging out according to measurements at hand or marked by the master. Another had meanwhile the bending of the thin slips for the ribs to the necessary curves, or working down the corner and end blocks that had been affixed to the mould. Another, if not the same, might have been carrying out the first stages of the working of the scroll, or perhaps a very competent and trusty assistant would be allowed, under the eye of the master, to work on more advanced forms, making ready for the final or necessary touches of the master hand. The sound holes may have been traced down and even the upper and lower circular holes bored. Further, it is not impossible, that after the modelling back and front had been sufficiently advanced, the glueing and screwing down was intrusted to an assistant, and even some of the finishing up with glass paper or other material in use at the time and place, of parts of minor importance. These are, perhaps, the majority of the details in which the individuality of the handwork of the master was not obligatory in evidence.

In summing up what could have been done by other hands than those of the busy master, it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, unless we admit its presence, to account for the extremely large output of the great Cremonese, even when taking fully into the balance his very industrious habits and extraordinary long working career. Assuming the above view to be reasonable, the number of new instruments which left the Stradivari house must have been very large. It is well known that the master undertook the repairs of musical instruments, which department would require some personal attention or supervision, even if actually executed by his assistants or his two sons, Francescus and Omobono, who, when their father died, were not very young, the first being sixty-five years of age, and the other fifty-five. They had most likely worked with their parent for about forty years and must have done much of making and repairing, that is, crediting them with some of their father's industrial tendencies. Stradivari had two other sons by his first wife, Francesca Ferraboschi, one, Giulio, died 1707, aged forty; the other, Allesandro, in 1732, aged fifty-five. Nothing seems to be known as to whether they were brought up by their father in his own craft or not; if they were, there was time for them also to have done much work with him. There was a son by his second wife, Antonia Zambelli, who died 1727, aged twenty-four, who under the same circumstances may have helped. We have thus five sons of Stradivari, who, if they were all taught the art, may have been working together, besides other assistants at the same time. Carlo Bergonzi has already been mentioned, but although he came late into the field, yet there seems a slight indication that he may have had to supply the place of others who had departed for the carrying out of their own schemes.

Having so far roughly estimated the kind and amount of work, not necessarily his own, on the violins that were sent forth by Antonio Stradivari, we may glance at the particulars of detail that demanded his handiwork and that solely. That there were keen connoisseurs living at the time of Stradivari, as also in the previous century and earlier, there is no room for doubting. Workers in art reduce their inspirations to tangible forms helped by colour that people may see them and, comparing them with what may have gone before and have been executed at the same time, pass judgment on them. In like manner Stradivari, like other masters before him, knew that his handiwork would be scrutinised as well as the tone of his instruments. It was therefore obligatory that purchasers should know his work, that in fact his sign manual should be always present. Contemporaneous with him were makers, artists, who had been initiated in the mysteries of the manufacture and application of the wonderful varnishes which have since by their qualities made them famous throughout the civilised world. There was nothing, however, in the material or its application that could, under the closest examination, be discerned as different to what might be seen on the best instruments of the Amatis—these must have been numerous at the time—the Ruggieris or the Venetian masters, but these did not in the application invariably work up to a certain standard of excellence, whereas Stradivari always did. There was a consummate beauty of result in this branch of the liutaro's art known at the time to many, beyond which it seemed not possible to go. It was, therefore, more in the construction and workmanship then, that the sign manual was perceptible. With this view Stradivari seems to have been careful to let the evidence of no hand but his own be seen in parts that were sure to be closely scrutinised as evidence.

Standing first perhaps in importance would be the cutting of the sound