Morning journal and courier., 1891-02-14
THE FLEETING SHOW.

THE FLEETING SHOW.
Some of Its Facts and Fnncfes.
Written for the JOURNAL AND CoUR1ER.l
"GooD MORROW, IT'S SAINT VALENTINES
DAY!"
''Hail to thy returning festival, old
Bishop Valentine! Great is thy name in
the rubric, thou venerable Arch-famen of
Hymen Immortal Go-between; who and
what manner of person art thoua Art thou
but a name, typifying the restless princi-
pie which impels poor humans to seek per-
fection in unions Or vert thou indeed
mortal prelate, with thy tippet and thy ro-
chet, thy apron on, and decent lawn
sleevess Mysterious parsonage! Like unto
thee assuredly there is no other mitred
father in the calendar. Singing Cupids
are thy choristers and thy precentors, and
instead of the crosier the mystical arrow is
borne before thee"
Thus, long ago, wrote Charles Lamb, in
the quaint and playful vein according
| with his subject One cannot help Won
| dering why that staunch ecclesiastic, ST.
Valentine, who parted with his head by
order of the Emperor Claudius, away back
in the third century, has been held re-
sponsible ever since for those vagaries of
lovers, artists, and poets, called valen-
tines.
Charming love missives some of them,
delicate, dainty, alluring, others are fool
ish as they are costly, and others still con-
vey a doubtful jest or wound and sting
with positive insult. For these last the
good saint would be unwilling to stand
sponsor. Imagine his disgust, and then
let them be given another name, or better,
alb olished altogether.
Not SO much to-day, as perhaps in Elias
| time "the weary and all forspent postman
sinks beneath load of delicate embarrass-
ments, not his own,' though enough of
them are still sent to distend the mail
bags, and load our grey uniformed friends
and ministrants the cupids of the post
Office, with an added weight of care.
| Monied lovers now provide the adored
| one with flowers, those living pictures and
poems, precious gift (at florists price,
| welcome always and speaking language,
or breathing it, rather, that is full of de
lightful suggestions; while lovers are true,
though less favored by fortune, select the
dantiest of pretty devices in cards, and in
trust these to the call swallowing, indis-
| criminate orifce" of the street letter box,
| from whence, jostled and crowded by pro-
| sale, 'every- y-day-motive" epistles, they go
| upon their pleasant mission.
| It is the children, however, who enjoy
st. Valentines day the most, with their
elaborate preparations, their hoardings of
pocket money and beggings of additions
| thereto, their shopping, transacted with a
| secrecy and excitement akin to that of
Christmas time, and their remarkable fab
rications of gilt and colored paper and
"scrap'' pictures. And then there is the
wild delight of distributing valentines, the
stealthy progress up door steps, the hasty
jerk of the bell handle, the headlong flight,
the lurkings in shadowy corners, and the
&C ,<,1,k
is closed and the undetected urchins sally
forth for another raid
All this is most delightful to most boys
and some girls Though the latter usually
prefer to watch and wait at home, spring
ing out like a jack-in-the-box at the sound
of football on the door steps,, so why
should their elders object to this revelry
by night, disturbing though it may be,
and fotget the pranks of their own frolic-
some youths Let the children observe the
festival of Valentine, martyr and saint,
with the usual inappropriate ceremonies,
and keep alive his name and story. Their
time to wonder why such rites were ever
instituted, and why any one could ever
take pleasure in maintaining them, is upon
the way and coming all too soon.
TEXTILES AND NEEDLEwoRK.
At an exhibition of textile fabrics held
recently at the Union League club rooms
in New York were displayed bewildering
variety of rare and magnificent products
of the loom, ranging in date of manufac-
ture from the fifteenth century to the
present time, and showing examples of the
arts of weaving and embroidery as known
to workers of every nationality.
These fabrics were of wool, fax, hemp
and silk, and comprised rugs, altar cloths,
| oh III SoorfS
| ings of all descriptions, some of the ma
terials being combined in the weaving with
metallic threads, and others ornamented
with exquisitely wrought needlework.
One rug, wonderfully fine in texture and
brilliant in coloring, was found among the
treasures of the Sultan Aziz, another,
prayer rug of the same period, the six
teenth century, very rich and lustrous,
was shown in a frame, under glass, and
still another was of silk combined with
threads of metal and bordered with many
hued arabesques upon a ground work of
silver.
The embroidered fabrics We're of great
beauty and value. Spanish canopy of
cream-colored satin, once carried over the
head of cardinal in religious professions,
was heavy with decorations of gold, and
vestment of interviewer white silk and gold
was enriched with designs wrought in
gold, with a cardinals coat of arms in
colors in the center.
A white silk spread with an intricate
Persian floral design was remarkable for
the brightness of the gold thread and col
ored silks with which it was so deliberately
embroidered more than hundred years
ago. Other noteworthy pieces among the
many were a large spread of linen covered
with silk embroidered figures of Italian
workmanship and dated 1850, and a
Japanese dress of crimson CREPE embel-
lished with birds and flowers wrought in
silks, silver, and gold, of the eighteenth
century.
Some magnificent velvets were exhibited; ;
one, superb Spanish hanging of the sew
enteenth century, having a rich yellow
ground with emblematic and armorial de-
signs, and border of white upon which
were ornaments in color, and splendid
!: piece of italian brocade with raised figures
of green velvet in conventional leaf and
flower designs, the color heightened with
tracings of bullion, upon back ground of
gold.
, The study of such fabrics is of great
, value as showing the characteristics of the
work of different peoples during different
periods, and the degree of skill and artis-
tic taste to which they attained while af
| fording many excellent suggestions to the
designers and workers of to-day A form
of art expression which seems most per-
ishable. it has outlasted oftentimes those
other forms in which were used materjrls
r presumably hundred times more endur-
: ing, so that woven products of olden time 8
, have been preserved for our examination
in much of their original beauty, while
paintings have faded, sculptures crumbled
l away and buildings fallen to ruin.
: The art of weaving has been practiced
in all ages and in all countries; we go
back to that oldest of books, the book of
Job, for the first mention of it, and find
Y the man of Ug lamenting, my days are
a swifter than weaver's shuttle"
Before the time of Moses the Egyptians
, wove fax into cloth, dyeing it in brilliant
colors and weaving into it golden threads.
Sometimes they drew out the linen threads
and twined those that were left with
s threads of a different color or of gold max.
d ing the primitive ''drawn-work" and origi.
T. nal form of all varieties of lace
Fine linen and cloth of goats hair the
: women of Israel gave for the hangings OF
+ the tabernacle in the wilderness, and "they
J.; that were wise hearted did spin with theil
d hands and brought that which they had
spun, both of blue, and of purple, and OF
Ii scarlet, and of fine linen" The holy
it garments of the priests were also of ssfint
Il twined linen, with cunning work." en-
.. riched with drawn-work and embroidery