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after her divorce from Bonaparte, she kept a sort of domestic estic court at Navarre or Malmaison, she and her ladies worked daily at tapestry or embroidery one reading aloud whilst the others were thus occu pied, and the hangings of the saloon at Malmaison were entirely her own work, They must have been elegant the material was white silk, the embroi dery roses, in which at intervals were entwined her own initials.se-tobrog odd not-quo cut

An interesting circumstance is related of a cont versation between one of those ministering spirits a sœur de la charité and Josephine, in a time of peculiar excitement and trouble. At the conclusion of it, the sœur, having discovered with whom she was conversing, added, "Since I am addressing the mother of the afflicted, I no longer fear my being indiscreet in any demand I may make for suffering humanity. We are in great want of lint, if your majesty would condescend "" I promise you shall have some; we will make it ourselves."hou

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From that moment the evenings were employed at Malmaison in making lint, and the empress yielded to none in activity at this work. ; 798 mol

Few of my readers will have accompanied me to this point without anticipating the name with which these slight notices of royal needlewomen must conclude a name which all know, and which, knowing, all reverence as that of a dignified princess, a noble and admirable matron-Adelaide, our Dowager Queen. It was hers to reform the morals of a court, which, to our shame, had become licentious; it was hers to render its charmed circle as pure and virtu ous as the domestic hearth of the most scrupulous

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British matron; it was hers to combine with the chilling etiquette of regal state the winning virtues of private life, and to weave a wreath of domestic virtues, social charities, and beguiling though simple occupations, round the stately majesty of England's throne.

The days are past when it would be either pleasurable or profitable for the Queen of the British empire to spend her days, like Matilda or Katharine, "in poring over the interminable mazes of tapestry;" but it is well known that Queen Adelaide, and, in consequence of her Majesty's example, those around her, habitually occupied their leisure moments in ornamental needlework; and there have been, of late years, few Bazaars throughout the kingdom, for really beneficent purposes, which have not been enriched by the contributions of the Queen Dowager-contributions ever gladly purchased at a high price, not for their intrinsic worth, but because they had been wrought by a hand which every Englishwoman had learnt to respect and love.

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CHAPTER XXV.

ON MODERN NEEDLEWORK.

“Our Country everywhere is fild

With Ladies, and with Gentlewomen, skild

In this rare Art."

TAYLOR.

"For here the needle plies its busy task,

The pattern grows, the well-depicted flower
Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn,
Unfolds its bosom; buds, and leaves, and sprigs,
And curling tendrils gracefully dispos'd,

Follow the nimble fingers of the fair;

A wreath that cannot fade."

CowPER.

"The great variety of needleworks which the ingenious women of other countries, as well as of our own, have invented, will furnish us with constant and amusing employment; and though our labours may not equal a Mineron's or an Aylesbury's, yet, if they unbend the mind, by fixing its attention on the progress of any elegant or imitative art, they answer the purpose of domestic amusement; and, when the higher duties of our station do not call forth our exertions, we may feel the satisfaction of knowing that we are, at least, innocently employed."

MRS. GRIFfiths.

THE triumph of modern art in needlework is probably within our own shores, achieved by our own countrywoman,- Miss Linwood. Miss Lin

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wood's Exhibition" used to be one of the lions of London, and fully deserves to be so now. Tɑ women it must always be an interesting sight; and the nobler gender" cannot but consider it as a curious one, and not unworthy even of their notice as an achievement of art. Many of these pictures are most beautiful; and it is not without great difficulty that you can assure yourself that they are bona fide needlework. Full demonstration, however, is given you by the facility of close approach to some of the pieces.

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Perhaps the most beautiful of the whole collection -a collection consisting of nearly a hundred pieces of all sizes is the picture of Miss Linwood herself, copied from a painting by Russell, taken in about her nineteenth year. She must have been a beautiful creature; and as to this copy being done with a needle and worsted,-nobody would suppose such a thing. It is a perfect painting. In the catalogue which accompanies these works she refers to her own portrait with the somewhat touching expression, (from Shakspeare,)

Have I lived thus long

This lady is now in her eighty-fifth year. Her life has been devoted to the pursuit of which she has given so many beautiful testimonies. She had wrought two or three pieces before she reached her twentieth year; and her last piece, "The Judgment of Cain," which occupied her ten years, was finished in her seventy-fifth year; since when, the failure of her eyesight has put an end to her labours.

The pieces are worked not on canvas, nor, we are

told, on linen, but ono some peculiar fabric made purposely for her. Her worsteds have all been dyed under her own superintendence, and it is said the only relief she has ever had in the manual labour was in having an assistant to thread her needles; 940 z

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Some of the pieces after Gainsborough are ads mirable; but perhaps Miss Linwood will consider her greatest triumph to be in her copy of Carlo Dolci's Salvator Mundi," for which she has been offered, and has refused, three thousand guineas.

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The style of modern embroidery, now so fashionable, from the Berlin patterns, dates from the commencement of the present century. About the year 1804 5, a print-seller in Berlin, named Philipson, published the first coloured design, on checked paper, for needlework. Ing 1810, Madame Wittich, who, being a very accomplished embroideress, perceived the great extension of which this branch of trade was capable, induced her husband, a book and print seller of Berlin, to engage in it with spirit. From that period the trade has gone on rapidly increasing, though within the last six years the progression has been infinitely more rapid than it had previously been, owing to the number of new publishers who have engaged in the trade. By leading houses up to the commencement of the year 1840, there have been no less than fourteen thousand copper-plate" designs published.

In the scale of consumption, and, consequently," by a fair inference in the quantity of needlework done, Germany stands first; then Russia, England, France, America, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, &c.,

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