to name the principal recognised old English stitches;-to attempt a description of them, would be alike tedious and useless. They are, Ferne stitch, feather stitch, basket stitch, mat stitch, bead stitch, braid stitch, plait stitch, diamond stitch, square stitch, star stitch, wove Irish stitch, reverse cross stitch, mosaic flat stitch, brick stitch, Venetian stitch, Peruvian stitch, Hungary stitch, plaid stitch; but this must suffice. Innumerable are the stitches which are to be met with on the samplers worked for sale, both in England and Germany, and numberless the names applied to them, and it is as easy to invent new stitches, as it is to invent new names for them. CHAPTER XIV. Embroidery. "Whether her needle play'd the pencil's part, OVID. "In a curious brede of needle-work, one colour falls away in such degrees, and another rises so insensibly, that we see the variety without being able to distinguish the total vanishing of the one from the first appearance of the other." ADDISON. E are indebted to the luxury and magnificence of the nations of the East, for the invention of embroidery, an art that has not inaptly been termed the mother of painting, its discovery claiming the priority by many centuries. In more modern times, it has been called the humble sister of the latter art; and the aim of the needlewoman has been to imitate, as closely as possible, the productions of the pencil, a labour in which she has been assisted by some of the most celebrated masters, many of whose chef-d'œuvres have been executed for the express purpose of being copied in needlework or tapestry. The Greeks gave the honour of the invention of embroidery to Minerva :* by Pliny it has been assigned to the Phrygians; hence, he says, the Romans called embroiderers "Phrygiones," and embroidered garments, "vestes Phrygionia."† The women of Sidon, before the Trojan war, were especially celebrated for their skill in this art and Homer mentions Helen as being engaged in embroidering the combats of the Greeks and Trojans :"An ample web magnificent she wove, Inwrought with num'rous conflicts for her sake, Andromache also "She in her chamber at the palace top, A splendid texture wrought, on either side All dazzling bright with flowers of various hues." * It is possible that the story of Procne, daughter of Pandion, king of Athens, who informed her sister Philomela of her misfortunes by embroidering them on a veil, is fabulous; but be this as it may, the fable is of remote origin, and tends to prove the antiquity of the art. Vide Apollodorus, lib. iii. c. 14. + Lib. viii. c. 74. "Pictas vestes jam apud Homerum fuisse, unde triumphales natæ. Acu facere id Phryges invenerunt, ideoque Phrygioniæ appellatæ sunt. Aurum intexere in eadem Asia invenit Attalus rex: unde nomen Attalicis. Colores diversos picturæ intexere Babylon maxime celebravit, et nomen imposuit.” We have been tempted to give the original words of this author, as the terms pictas vestes," and " intexere," have been variously translated. In the Menæchmi of Plautus (act ii. sc. 3.) a young woman, desirous of sending her mantle to be embroidered, says: "Pallam illam ad Phrygionem ut deferas, ut reconcinnetur, atque ut opera addantur, quæ volo." That the cloth of Attalus was embroidered, is proved by a passage of Silius Italicus (lib. xiv. 661):— "Quæque Attalicis variata per artem Aulæis scribuntur acu." And from the following lines in Martial (lib. viii. ep. 28), it is evident that the "Non ego prætulerim Babylonica picta superbe The art of embroidery was greatly practised among the ancient Egyptians; even the sails of some of their ships were wrought with fanciful devices, representing the phoenix, flowers, and various emblems.* In the time of Moses, Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, was celebrated as "a cunning workman," and as an embroiderer in blue, in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen.† The curtains and ornaments of the Tabernacle, and the vestments of the priests, were decorated with embroidery. The prophet Ezekiel, reproaching the women of Israel with having abused the benefits of Providence, after mentioning their bracelets and chains, jewels for their foreheads, and earrings, and their crowns, still farther names their robes, dyed and embroidered of divers colours. Attalus, king of Pergamus, is said by Pliny, to have invented the art of embroidering with gold thread. According to Diodorus Siculus, Zaleucus, a disciple of Pythagoras, and a lawgiver of the Locrians, forbade the use of embroidery, except to courtesans: and Dionysius Halicarnassus|| informs us, that Tarquinius Priscus, who first distinguished the monarch and senators by particular robes and ornaments, was the first Roman king who wore an embroidered garment. The term embroidery, as employed in the writings of the ancient historians, has reference to all kinds of ornamental work done with the needle; thus comprehending within its meaning every * Cloth, of embroidered linen, appears to have been made in Egypt expressly for sails, and was bought by the Tyrians for that purpose (Ezekiel xxvii. 7), but its use was confined to the pleasure boats of the nobles, or of the king himself; ordinary sails being white. We are informed by Pliny (lib. xxx. c. 1), that the ship in which Antony and Cleopatra went to the battle of Actium was distinguished from the rest of the fleet by its purple sails, which were the peculiar privilege of the admiral's vessel. + Exod. xxv. 35. § Lib. iii. c. 62. Ezekiel xvi. 13. Lib. xii. p. 299. description of decorative needlework, including tapestry, and some descriptions of weaving. At the present day, the term is much more limited, relating to one kind of needlework only, which, however, embraces an almost innumerable variety, both as to the materials employed, and the mode of using them. In the extended meaning of the term, therefore, nations and savage tribes unknown to the ancients, may equally claim the honour of a similar invention, as most of them have a species of embroidery peculiarly their own.* The Chinese have long been celebrated for the beauty of their embroideries; indeed, it has been doubted whether the art was not originally brought into Europe from them, through the Persians. They use floss and twisted silks, also the bark of a tree spun into a fine thread.† The drawing of their embroideries is sometimes as uncouth as that of their paintings, but in that of some of their flowers (doubtless copied from nature) they are frequently even botanically correct; and their works are not more to be admired for their remarkable freshness than for the extreme labour bestowed upon them. Success, as gained by patient application, is nowhere so frequently exemplified as in China. The mere accomplishment of writing a good style, is the result only of many tedious years of study and self-denial. The beauty of the written character, the finished graces of their composition, the *The word embroidery is derived from the French broderie which some deduce by transposition from bordeur, because they formerly only embroidered the borders of their stuffs, whence the Latins sometimes called embroiderers limbularii. According to Du Cange, they anciently wrote aurobrustus, for embroidered with gold, or brustus brodatus, whence the French word broderie. The fine muslins made at Manilla, with threads spun from the pine-apple plant, and afterwards so richly and delicately embroidered with the same material, are well known. |