The scroll is exceptionally bold and original.

Although undoubtedly from the hand of the great master, this is of a pattern entirely different and distinct from any that have ever come under my observation." He then pointed out to my brother that the side lines of the scroll were unusually deeply cut, and that the front of it projected far more than is common with such instruments.
"The most remarkable feature," he concluded, "is that the instrument bears a double label.

Besides the label which you have already seen bearing '_Antonius Stradiuarius Cremonensis faciebat_,' with the date of his most splendid period, 1704, so clearly that the ink seems scarcely dry, there is another smaller one higher up on the back which I will show you." He took the violin apart and showed him a small label with characters written in faded ink.

"That is the writing of Antonio Stradivarius himself, and is easily recognisable, though it is much firmer than a specimen which I once saw, written in extreme old age, and giving his name and the date 1736.

He was then ninety-two, and died in the following year.