Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-02-15
IN PRAISE OF LACEMAKING
ENGLAND Is STRIVING TO REVIVE
THE INDUSTRY.
The Dainty Art is characterized rs
Decadent-A Trade of the
Hearth and Doorstep.
From the London Standard.

fTOfl LbHu"H
Lacemaking had its origin in ancient
days and the knotting of threads for pur-
poses of adOrnment is an idea natural
that it may well have been suggested in
the bronze age But the pershable ma
terial makes it difficult to say when orna-
mental netting, on the one hand, ard en-
broidery, on the other, first merged into
what would more strictly be called lace.
1t can hardly be less than a dozen centuries
ago and it may well be much more. IN
the later middle ages lace was highly fash
ionable, both on the continent ami in these
islands. some of the designs, especially
in Tudor times. being very beautiful and
elaborate. By the sixteenth century lace
making had taken its pace among the fHe
arts. 1t eliminated in the seventeenth and
sank to low ebb with the close of the
eighteenth. Since that time no work OF
high quality has been executed. Hand
made lace is of two kinds-the one where
the threads are Hoped, plated or twisted
together with a needle, from which It re-
ceiveS the name of needlepOint. the other
called bobbin, or sometimes pillow, lace
where the work is done with bobbtns. The
point lace of Venice was the first to be-
come famous, and In exchange for 1t much
French gold found its way to the republic
in the days of Catherine de Medici, when
extravaganza In dress was fashionable.
Then the industry spread to Flanders, and
was introduced INTO France by colbert,
minister of Louis XIV. FoStered by pro-
tective edicts, it soon acquired a fame of
Its own; but it suffered most severely, like
some other manufactures. from the revoca-
ton of the edict of Nantes. In Belgium
the persecution of the Spanish government
was hardly less mischievous, so that lace
making in Protestant England profited p
probably by Romanist intolerance on the
continent
Homemade lace was hardly known be-
fore the seventeenth bllt flour
ished exceedingly after. the restoration,
and never more than in the reign of Will
liam and Mary. One great center was in
DevonShire the home of the famous Honi-
ton Point d'Angleterre; another in Bed
fordshire, Bucks and some adjacent mid
land counties. In the eighteenth century
certain fashionable ladies We're so extrav-
agant as TO use lace not only for personal
adornment but also for the napery of the
bed and the bathroom. In this country
such lavishness was, happily, rare but the
demand was considerable, even the men
wearing it largely as rutfles and frills for
the shirt. With such encouragement, the
English laces became more elaborate and
expensive. Blandford point Is said by De-
foe to have cost f30 yard. The industry,
too, spread over wide area-WeStWard as
far as Cornwall, along the south coast to
Hampshire. and then through broad strip
OF the midland counties to CambridgeShire.
hold on the valleys of the Severn, Dee or
Trent, or in the northern and the most
eastern counties. In these districts, though
often a pursuit of the upper classes. 1t was
In no sense peasant industry, and an at
tempt by Queen Charlotte to introduce
lacemaking into London met with only a
temporary success. But in the counties
where 1t had taken root the lace pillow
was then TO be seen in almost every cot
tage. Girls learned the use of the bobbins
before the letters of the alphabet: schools
for lacemaking held the place now taken
by those for teaching the three RS young
W, men sat at home making lace instead
of going out to service, and mothers alter
mated throwing the bobbins with nursing
the baby The lace pillow, in fact, was the
first thing to be taken up in youth the last
II be laid aside in age.
AT time the industry was even prac
ticed by men, for it brought them higher
wages than agricultural labor. AS we learn
from little book on 'Lacemaking In the
Midlands," by Miss Channer and Mrs.
Roberts. almost two-thirds of the popula- /
ton of Hanslope, in BIckinghamshire, at
the beginning of this century were lace
makers. At that time the war with France
had greatly increased the demand for home
made work. The industry, prior to that,
had been liable to fuctuatiOn owing to
competition from foreign goods; for, what
ever the law might enact, the smuggler
in those days often managed to elude the
eXCiSeman. But, on the whole, lacemaking
progressed all through the eighteenth CEN
tury. and this multitude Of practitioners.
very beautiful work was turned out from
E4nSllSn cottages Inc best experts earned
high pay; the rank and file made enough,
ut any rate. to add materially to the weeks
income, and lacemaking had this advan-
tage-that, being done at home, it did not,
Ike work In factories, make attention to
domestic duties practically impossible Still.
ii had it's evils; stopping over the pillow
was not healthy for growing children; the
schools in which the young folks We're
taught We're ill-ventilated badly lighted and
rot always conducive 10 morality. So when
girls took to going out to service" in
stead of learning to make lace, some of
their friends were not altogether sorry. Yet
the evils were preventabe and the advan-
taees great.
long after the close of the great war. Ii
was partly. though not wholly, due to the
Introduction of machinery, which has made
all the less elaborate varieties so cheap
that to wear lace, at any rate of home
manufacture, is no longer a sign of social
position. Fashion also has had something
to do with it, for pillow lace. We are told
has continued to be imported from abroad.
In these circumstances those who kept up
the Industry aimed at the cheap and com
monplace, and high-class work ceased to he
produced The result was that through the
greater part of the present century lace
making has been a langulshing business
1t had friend in the late Queen Adelaide;
II has more than once found one in her
majesty. There have been occasional re-
vivals. as after the exhibition of 1871 ana
after the Franco-German war. 1t never
became extinct in Devonshire though me
present HOnitOn lace is rarely equal to the
Point d Angleterre once produced; but IN
the mtdlands not many years ago the in
dustry threatened soon to become lost
art. Skilled lacemakers were 10 be found
only among the old. and were rapidly dying
off. The bobbins, often quantity ornament
ed, were being destroyed, the elaborate
parchment patterns committed to the
flames. The women who still learned the
art could not rival their grandmothers IN
the beauty of their work. Dealers nai
ceased TO buy. and their collectors no longer
called at the cottage door. If any sale
was found It was for cheap and inferior
goods. The education act dealt the final
blow; the children. obliged to attend the
national schools, came home too tired to
be apt pupils for lacemaking. The agrl-
cultural depression and the flow of popu-
lation from the country to the towns also
had adverse influence. Then d number
of ladies. anxious for the well-be!ng OF
English villages. endeavored to save the
art from extinction.
In DeVonSh hire they strove to bring Honi-
ton work back to its old excellence; in the
mid .ands others interviewed just in time TO
prevent the link with the past being wholly
severed. Some of them worked sing gle hand
ed in their own immediate neighborhood
with what result single instance may
show. The clergyman's wife in village a
few miles from Newport Pagnell succeed
ca har ArSt anH.a ~,