Another thing that stands in the way of a clear exposition of the bow's development is that even the most reliable drawings and sculptures do not show by any means a gradual improvement in the shape of the bow, for it is no uncommon thing to find fourteenth and fifteenth century representations of bows of quite eighth and ninth century type. It is not likely that any of such primitive bows would have remained in use unbroken for so many centuries, therefore I do not think these later representations of early bows can have been copied from actual specimens then in use, but, where not evolved from the artist's inner consciousness, may have been taken from the drawings, MSS., etc., handed down from the earlier periods. On this point Mr. Heron-Allen makes the following very sensible observations:--"The conclusion we are brought to is consequently this: _either_ all representations of bows which have come down to us are unreliable, _or_, the bow, instead of developing as the fiddle undoubtedly did, remained in a state of primitive simplicity, and bore till a comparatively recent date the same relation to its companion the fiddle, as do the early specimens of Delft ware and the exquisite Sevres specimens, which recline side by side in the cabinets of the delightfully incongruous nineteenth century drawing room. If you ask me to which of these conclusions I incline, I think the two deductions are to one another as three times two are to twice three, and that a combination of the two would probably account for the present misty aspect of the past history of the bow." One should not lay too much stress on pictorial records; even our contemporary artists are not free from error, and it would be interesting to know what future writers on this subject will say of the nineteenth century violins and bows as represented by popular painters at the Royal Academy and other picture shows. They will find the evidence just as conflicting. Unconvincing and contradictory as the existing records are, they are all we have, and, such as they are, I give a few selected examples. A form of bow constantly occurring in drawings, etc., from the eighth to the sixteenth centuries, is Fig. 15. It is only slightly suggestive of the Oriental bows. [Illustration: FIG. 15.] In the ninth century we find a bow (Fig. 16) strongly resembling those of the Saw-oo and Saw-Tai. And from the same century we find a miniature representation of a Crwth player with a bow slightly more distinctive in character (Fig. 17). [Illustration: FIG. 16.] [Illustration: FIG. 17.] Similar bows to the above appear to have been pretty general in the tenth century. In the eleventh century a little more variety is apparent, as will be seen in Fig. 18. [Illustration: FIG. 18.]