Charles Lamb, on being asked how he distinguished his "ragged veterans" in their tattered and unlettered bindings, answered, "How does a shepherd know his sheep?" It has been observed that, "Touch becomes infinitely more exquisite in men whose employment requires them to examine the polish of bodies than it is in others. In music only the simplest and plainest compositions are relished at first; use and practice extend our pleasure--teach us to relish finer melody, and by degrees enable us to enter into the intricate and compounded pleasure of harmony." Thus it is with connoisseurship in Violins. Custom and observation, springing from a natural disposition, make prominent features and minute points of difference before unseen, resulting in a knowledge of style of which it has been well said "Every man has his own, like his own nose." As an ardent votary of the Violin, regarded from a point of view at once artistic and curious, Count Cozio di Salabue takes precedence of all others. He was born about the time when the art of Italian Violin-making began to show signs of decadence, and having cultivated a taste for Cremonese instruments, he resolved to gratify his passion by bringing together a collection of Violins which should be representative of the work and character of each maker, and serve as models to those seeking to tread the path of the makers who made Cremona eminent as a seat of Violin manufacture. Virtuosity emanating from a spirit of beneficence is somewhat rare. When, however, utility occupies a prominent place in the thoughts of the virtuoso, he becomes a benefactor. The virtuosity of Count Cozio was of this character. His love for Cremonese instruments was neither whimsical nor transient. From the time when he secured the contents of the shop of Stradivari to the end of his life--a period of about fifty years--he appears to have exerted himself to obtain as much information as possible relative to the art, and to collect masterpieces that they might in some measure be the means of recovering a lost art. When in the year 1775 he secured ten instruments out of ninety-one which Stradivari left in his shop at the time of his death, he must surely have considered himself singularly fortunate, and the happiest of collectors.[3] That such good fortune prompted him to make fresh overtures of purchase cannot be wondered at. We learn from the correspondence of Paolo Stradivari that the Count had caused two letters to be sent by the firm of Anselmi di Briata to Paolo inquiring if he was willing to part with the tools and patterns used by his father Antonio, and that Paolo replied on May 4, 1776: "I have already told you that I have no objection to sell all those patterns, measures, and tools which I happen to have in my possession, provided that they do not remain in Cremona, and you will recollect that I have shown you all the tools I have, and also the box containing the patterns.... I place all at your disposal, and as it is simply a