116.—SAVING A FIDDLE.
One of Ole Bull's favorite violins was a Joseph Guarnerius, called the "King Joseph," for the greatest violins of the old makers are known and named as individuals. It is not to be wondered that he was willing to brave a good deal to preserve this violin, for, irrespective of its worth as a producer of beautiful tones, there was some eight hundred pounds invested in it.
On one of the great violinist's concert trips in this country, he was a passenger on an Ohio river steamboat. In the fashion of those days the boiler burst, tearing away the forepart of the boat and setting the cabins on fire. Ole Bull found himself choking, deafened, blinded, in the midst of shrieking women and howling children, and surrounded by smoke, flame, and shattered timbers. Did he turn his attention to saving the mothers and little ones? The action of the man was characteristic.
Oblivious to all else, he rushed to his cabin, seized his precious Guarnerius, and putting it between his teeth leaped over the guards into the muddy water and swam to shore. There he tenderly examined his precious fiddle to see that it was not harmed. Ole Bull was nothing to Ole Bull at that moment. His beloved instrument occupied his mind to the exclusion of all else. The only "King Joseph Guarnerius" might have been lost!