Transcribed from the 1904 Gay and Bird edition ,
A VILLAGE
STRADIVARIUS
BY
KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN
LONDON
GAY AND BIRD
1904
THIS STORY APPEARS IN
‘THE VILLAGEWATCHTOWER.’
All rights reserved
I
“Goodfellow, Puck and goblins,
Know more than any book.
Down with your doleful problems,
And court the sunny brook.
The south-winds are quick-witted,
The schools are sad and slow,
The masters quite omitted
The lore we care to know.”Emerson’s April.
“Find the three hundred andseventeenth page, Davy, and begin at the top of the right-handcolumn.”
The boy turned the leaves of the old instruction bookobediently, and then began to read in a sing-song, monotonoustone:
“‘One of Pag-pag’”—
“Pag-a-ni-ni’s”
“‘One of Paggernyner’s’ (I wish allthe fellers in your stories didn’t have such tough oldnames!) ‘most dis-as-ter-ous triumphs he had when playingat Lord Holland’s.’ (Who was Lord Holland,uncle Tony?) ‘Some one asked him to im-provise on theviolin the story of a son who kills his father, runs a-way,becomes a high-way-man, falls in love with a girl who will notlisten to him; so he leads her to a wild country site, suddenlyjumping with her from a rock into an a-b-y-s-s’”
“Abyss.”
“‘—a—rock—into—an—abyss,where they disappear for ever. Paggernyner listenedquietly, and when the story was at an end he asked that all thelights should be distinguished.’”
“Look closer, Davy.”
“‘Should be extinguished. He thenbegan playing, and so terrible was the musical in-ter-pre-ta-tionof the idea which had been given him that several of the ladiesfainted, and the sal-salon-salon, when relighted, lookedlike a battle-field.’ Cracky! Wouldn’tyou like to have been there, uncle Tony? But I don’tbelieve anybody ever played that way, do you?”
“Yes,” said the listener, dreamily raising hissightless eyes to the elm-tree that grew by the kitchendoor. “I believe it, and I can hear it myself whenyou read the story to me. I feel that the secret ofeverything in the world that is beautiful, or true, or terrible,is hidden in the strings of my violin, Davy, but only a mastercan draw it from captivity.”
“You make stories on your violin, too, uncle Tony, evenif the ladies don’t faint away in heaps, and if the kitchendoesn’t look like a battle-field when you’vefinished. I’m glad it doesn’t, for my part, forI should have more housework to do than ever.”
“Poor Davy! you couldn’t hate housework any worseif you were a woman; but it is all done for to-day. Nowpaint me one of your pictures, laddie; make me see with youreyes.”
The boy put down the book and leaped out of the open door,barely touching the old millstone that served for a step. Taking a stand in the