Violin Making Part 2

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 b.u.t.ton 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 pa.s.ses 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 n.o.ble 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.

There seems a difference of opinion as to where this word originally was used. I fancy in ancient heraldry; but there the word is "pur_flew_" a "bordure of ermines, peans, or furs," whilst the ancients spell it "pur_file_," a "tr.i.m.m.i.n.g for women's gowns."

Milton says "to purfle--to embroider." So it seems it has ever been used as an ornamental border, no matter what thing it had to grace, for grace it is: and though not essential to the violin in the matter of tone, yet it most certainly is from an artistic point of view; and its absence in an old instrument const.i.tutes the double drawback of being unfinished, and of less, very much less, value.

But it will be asked by some people, who know something of the construction of the instrument, "what has purfling got to do with the making of a violin at this stage?" To which I answer, much, very much indeed from my standpoint, and according to my theory, as I will explain. It will not be denied, I think, that makers have done and now do this ornamental part _after_ the body of the instrument is put together--in fact, the query at the beginning of this paragraph proves it; by whom I do not know, nor advocated by what book. But I ask you, is it not vexatious when all your efforts have been used to work up your surfaces and to round off and finish your edges, you must in a sense undo much of it, temporarily, by using a tool, or tools, to cut the narrow channel for the ornament, and using glue to finally fix it, when _some_ of the superfluous purfling has either to be cut away by a gouge or sc.r.a.per? And besides, and to me most important, glue, though wiped quickly away with a sponge and hot water, _will_ leave a residue which can never be wholly got out of the pores; and this should not be if you want a brilliant varnish. Of course I mean oil varnish, but am apt to forget this age of cheapness, which flies to easily put on, quick-drying, cheap spirit.

So, as I made it quite clear to you when introducing the subject of these lectures, that it was entirely on _my_ system that I was going to work, so we will now resume, I deeming no apology necessary for occupying your time in denouncing what, should you imitate, would be bad in art.

It is not my intention to go over the various styles of purfling--double, variegated, etc., etc.--but to show you how I prepare and place that which is universal now, the single, composed, as most people know, of two very thin strips of black wood on either side of one white one. But to do this, I must mark, cut and remove the groove in which it has to rest, which requires much explanation.

The outlined back, being quite ready for marking, I clamp down to the bench with two of those marked 11, one at either end, leaving one side of the outlet free. Then I take this specially-made purfling tool, No. 13, with its tracers fixed for marking the two parallel lines about five-thirty-seconds of an inch from the perfect outline of the back, and I grasp the handle in both hands perpendicularly, pressing the revolving wheel against the edge, of course, and keeping the steel markers going carefully and with only slight pressure all round the instrument, stopping without running _off_ at the corners, however. There is, you see, about two inches not marked where the b.u.t.ton comes; this must be traced by placing a piece of prepared hard wood, made to touch just the same curve as where the lines would have come had there been no wood there for a b.u.t.ton. This must be very carefully placed and traced, as, otherwise, all will not be in correct sweep.

Now, gentlemen, we enter on a difficult stage--nay, two; but then, as I was once asked by a gentleman, "Which part of a violin is the most difficult to make?" I replied, "Every part." But not quite that; still, what I am now going to do is not by any means the least. But you must not lose heart; he who never fights, never conquers; the man who never blundered or made a mistake, never made anything.

Fasten the plate again on the inner part, not the edge, of the bench, so that you can lean over to do what you see I am about to do, and remove cramps as occasion requires. This is a one and one-eighth inch pointed gouge, 54, long ground and very sharp and thin. I grasp it in my right hand, holding and guiding with the left, and gently work to barely the depth of the purfling along one of the two narrow lines, and then the other for a short distance, until I get a somewhat more substantial double line all over the body. But I must warn you respecting the very tender corners. When you are about say an inch from each on both of its turns, work the three-quarter inch gouge, 52, still more guardedly, and barely so deep, and to a very fine point, both curves, ready to receive the two joined pieces of purfling which is to present you with what is called the "Bees' sting." Do all this as well as lies in your power, for upon this channel being well cut will depend much of the success of the whole ornamentation.

Finis.h.i.+ng the tracing and cutting the groove, I find tool No. 0, and remove the strip from it, plate 4. And let me here again tell you to be careful, as it is so easy for a chip to flirt airily from either side, or for your tool to probe too deeply and nearly through the wood, putting you--or, more likely, some one else--to trouble and very nice mending ere all is sound. And the corners only look really well and handsome when you find them as on plate 4, because experience tells one the material to go therein can be made to look equally so.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE IV.]

To cut the prepared purfling into lengths (only approximate, exact had better not yet be tried by you), and heat the iron (inside the bending iron) to a good red, but not white heat, is the next thing I do, and, while the tool is getting ready for me, I cut the purfling of the middle bout at one end only, so that I have half of the finely graduated point we see in a corner of a well-wrought violin, the half springing from one of the other bouts forming the complete whole. You must not suppose that the _exact_ length of the ornament is to be measured by you, no, not with unabated practice; you will have to begin with a length always longer than you need, and pare from the points until your lengths fit beautifully before they are fixed with glue--that is, after bending to shape, which I now proceed to do.

Of course, my experience is great, so I manage to get through this very tedious part of the work without breaking the sensitive thread of wood; but I am bound to tell you that you must be prepared for mishaps, as you will be sometimes off your guard and apply force (if ever so mild) to bend what tact, a sort of feeling I may say, and an iron kept hot, can alone achieve. But, if you break, prepare fresh lengths, and again and again; and I warrant your repeated disasters will have something to do with amended touch, and consequently its results.

CHAPTER IV.

BENDING THE PURFLING.

What I have proved is the best way to bend the purfling is this--place the heated iron (plate 5) in the bending socket, and, when all is so that a smart rap of your hand on the metal shows you the warmth is about as you want it, hold the purfling by the left hand, the mitred end to the iron, so that when you bend, by holding, say rasp 47 in the right hand firmly against the point, and _letting the heat only make the curve you want_, or nearly without pressure, you will, I think, not do bad work.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE V.]

So I am now ready to fix this ornament in the groove prepared, and have ready thin glue and a table knife to run it there, section by section, as, in cold weather especially, the liquid sets so rapidly.

I select the middle bout of either side (it is not material which) and lay in the glue rapidly, and yet more rapidly the slip for insertion, merely at this stage laying it flat, and going to the lower and upper bouts, joining the corners as mitred as well as I possibly can. Then I press the purfling as deep as it will sink all over, finally wiping all superfluous glue away with sponge and hot water. But I have not done yet, for there may be a weak place or two in my work that glue will strengthen, so I run yet a little thinner all over the insertion, and let it rest until next morning, when it will mostly have sunk somewhere.

When you are at this stage, great headway has been made; but you must now make ready for greater exertions, and prepare to comply with the requirements of the higher branches of this most exacting art, which you will when you model the back as I now begin to do this, which has dried overnight.

But I must pause to make you acquainted with the difference between "outline" and "model" of a violin--not by any means synonymous, as some have supposed and do yet suppose. I ought, perhaps, to have done this before, but will no longer delay.

It always makes me feel very angry when I hear some person, palpably ignorant in the matter, exclaim, "what a fine model" when he or she means "outline." And again, "this is a grand 'copy' of so-and-so,"

when _example_ of such is meant; how can an example of, say "Mayson"

be a "copy" of him? A fine outline will naturally lead you to expect a fine model--that is to say, arching of length and breadth, graceful and perfectly relative as regards proportion, curves, and an unmistakeable _oneness of expression_, if I may so speak, of every part as a whole, nothing whatever of incongruity or want of symmetry intruding to disturb once and always the gaze of the connoisseur.

But it by no means follows that a grandly carved and completed model has for its counterpart an equally bold yet subtly refined outline; on the contrary, I have seen just the reverse, as I have also seen most wretched modelling wedded to an outline fit to grace the finest instrument extant. But it is not often so, for, as a rule, where a mind is highly gifted, so that elegance breathes in what its body creates, a broken line or curve comes as a great surprise, and one is apt to doubt the same hand fas.h.i.+oned it all.

Be this as it may, call things by their proper names, and in elegant terms where no quaint ones are sacrificed; and if you know better, never let a false epithet pa.s.s unchallenged, for I do not see why a refined, but _correct_, mode of expression should not be as vigorously upheld in this fine art as in speaking of any of its sisters. For surely vulgarity has no right of place in its vocabulary, yet much language that is certainly not elegant, and not of any particular force of expression, finds repose therein; and a really beautiful and great work is neither made more lovely nor more exalted through contact with that which has neither the status of the one nor the other at heart, except that beauty or high estate be ready ministers of a rapacity calculated sooner or later to bring about its own terrible undoing.

So I resume, all being hard and dry, and begin to model the back.

CHAPTER V.

MODELLING THE BACK.

Pressing the plate firmly between the fixed rests on the bench, I take three-quarter inch gouge, tool 22, and proceed to cut a channel entirely round the wood to the depth of about one-twelfth of an inch and about three-quarters of an inch broad from one-sixteenth or rather less, of an inch from extreme edge, and through the purfling, of course. The student will at once see that this is done as a base from which is to spring the arching. There must be no attempt at a _finished_ bend in going over this groove; but there must be the greatest care observed in the cutting of it, as you are using the tool following the outline, consequently, in the manner most liable to encounter disaster in the shape of chips flying from that narrow edging which it is your set business to leave as intact as possible.

After going over the wood in what I call "the guitar line," that is to say, pa.s.sing by for the present all the corners, I return to them, in my hand gouge 24, three-eighths of an inch, and work them out on the same basis exactly as the main groove. All this being to my mind as shown in fig. 6, I take gouge 43, used before, and in the roughest way possible, and avoiding any depth of cutting, I model the back in its first stage, as shown in fig. 7, obtaining even here a decently developed and somewhat truthful arching all over.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE VI.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE VII.]

From which I advance to obtain the first smooth stage all over, as in fig. 8, thus--with a square of No. 2-1/2 sandpaper folded in half, so that in size it is about 2-1/2 inches all ways, and this again folded crosswise, giving me a firm point as would be a rasp so formed, I work out the corners, and all about them for, say, an inch, until I get a beginning and an example of groundwork from which to smooth down the whole. Then I take the cork rubber, tool 67, and a piece of sandpaper as last, rather larger than the one just used, so that I can bend it firmly over both sides and as I want, when I change it about to secure a fresh, sharp edge.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE VIII.]

I begin by firmly placing the wood, etc., as before, and working the sandpaper (over the cork), firmly pressed in the first stage, against the rough, raised edge, all around the outline, but being most careful not to wear what is left of it away, which must be left intact as far as possible to the end, when it is made to a.s.sume that beautiful sort of curled, yet sharp edge so much admired. Then, more towards the upper ridges, over and over, backwards and forwards, having always the careful arching and model of elegance before me, until I arrive at that growing stage of the work as shown in fig. 8, which I proceed to damp well all over with a wet sponge, the surface, as you may see, as I hold it well to the light, being again abominably rough, and not at all _now_ like fig. 8, as the moisture has raised the fibres in all directions.

But before I go farther into this interesting, consequently absorbing process, I must answer some question such as "but why use sandpaper? it is decried by most experts, and utterly ignored by some writers as having no status among the tools used by professional makers of note, and was not believed to have had a place among those of the Ancients."

Then so much the worse for the work of the makers of to-day and for those of yesterday. But who says the ancients did not use it, or crocodile skin, or a cloth made in Venice, and somewhat after our emery cloth? or variously shaped files of different cuttings? At a time when sculpture and very chaste and highly finished woodwork would employ it largely, does any one mean to a.s.sert that the violin, not by any means held in the estimation it is to-day, must receive the dignity of small plane and sc.r.a.per only, and such a useful article treated with contempt _because_ it was what it was?

If they do, or any of you do, I should much like to devote an hour privately to any such, when it should be my business to combat such a sentiment, more especially as some writers seem to hint that when sandpaper is used, its scratchy effects can be traced, as I could bring many of my finest efforts to prove the contrary.

My reason for not using small planes for modelling is, that in the first cutting you cannot possibly go over the delicate groove without endangering the surface level--that is to say, if you tear any part in going against the grain (or sometimes with it) and go _deeper_ than you should, would you not at once ruin your even flow of curves as by early arrangement you had set out? your only escape from fias...o...b..ing sinking to a lower surface and sacrificing your original conception of true proportion.

Therefore, I stand to the system adopted at the outset of my career, and resume. The wetted surface being thoroughly dry (not apparently so, but really free from any feeling whatever of dampness) I take the next degree towards fineness of sandpaper (or if you like the term "gla.s.s-paper" better, by all means adopt it), and I do precisely as formerly, again and again, until six courses have been carefully gone over. Then I go over the same ground six times more, using sc.r.a.pers 4, 20, 26, 62 alternately, and continually holding up the surfaces to the light as they develop their curves and archings truer and more true, as I sc.r.a.pe here and there with great patience to bring all this about. At this point I suppose you will think the modelling and surface finis.h.i.+ng is finally accomplished, and that the interesting pa.s.sages on thicknesses are about to be written. But it is not so, for the final surface of silk-like smoothness is four or five coats farther from me yet. So I attack with No. 1 sandpaper the surface once more, mostly cross-wise this and all following stages, putting fair pressure and with both hands on the rubber, so that I get sure curves and even surface all over; and then I take No. 0 paper, working well many times round and round by the outline and all over and lengthwise among the curves until I finish this exacting piece of business and fine art, as shown in fig. 9.