foliage, like an Acanthus,
Which o'er a wall its graceful branches trails.
Look on those lovely flowers of purest white,
Which, near the pods that open, hang in harmony.
That little cord which binds each one about,
How it projects! proving that she who wrought it
Is very mistress of this art.
How well distributed are all these points!
See the equality of all those little buds
Which rise like many fair proportioned hills,
One like the other. …
This hand-made lace, this open-work,
Is all produced by her, this herring-bone,
Which in the midst holds down a little cord,
Was also made by her; all wrought by her."
Henry VIII. granted to two Florentines the privilege of importing for three years' time all "manner of fringys and passements wrought with gold and silver or otherwise,"[208] an account of which will be found in the notice of that monarch's reign.
Beyond this, and the statute already mentioned, passed at the "Sute of the Browderers" on account of the "deceyptful waight of the gold of Luk, Florence, Jeane, and Venice,"[209] there is no allusion to the lace of Florence in our English records.
In France, as early as 1545, the sister of Francis I. purchases "soixante aulnes fine dantelle de Florence"[210] for her own use, and some years afterwards, 1582, the Queen of Navarre pays 17 écus 30 sols for 10 aulnes et demye of the same passement "faict à l'esguille à haulte dantelle pour mettre à des fraizes."[211] On the marriage of Elizabeth de France with Philip II. in 1559, purchases were made of "passements et de bisette, en fil blanc de Florence."
Seeing the early date of these French accounts, it may be inferred that Catherine de Médicis first introduced, on her arrival as a bride, the Italian points of her own native city.[212]
In Florence, in the fifteenth century, Savonarola, in his sermons (1484–1491), reproached the nuns with "devoting their time to the vain fabrication of gold laces with which to adorn the houses and persons of the rich."
Ray mentions that people of quality sent their daughters at eight years old to the Florentine nunneries to be instructed in all manner of women's work.
Lace was also fabricated at Sienna, but it appears to have been the lavoro di maglia or lacis, called by the Tuscans modano ricamato—embroidered network.
Early in the last century two Genoese nuns, of the Convent Sta. Maria degli Angeli in Sienna, executed pillow laces and gold and silver embroidery of such surpassing beauty, that they are still carefully preserved and publicly exhibited on fête-days. One Francesca Bulgarini also instructed the schools in the making of lace of every kind, especially the Venetian reticella.[213]
THE ABRUZZI.
In the Abruzzi, and also the Province of the Marche, coarse laces are made. These are worked without any drawing, the rude design being made by skipping the pin-holes on a geometrically perforated card. The pattern is surrounded by a heavy thread, and composed of a close stitch worked between the meshes of a coarse net ground. This lace somewhat resembles Dalecarlian lace. In the eighteenth century fine pillow lace was also made in these provinces. The celebrated industry of Offida in the Marche has sunk into artistic degradation.
ROMAGNA.
Lace was made in many parts of Romagna. Besides the knotted lace already alluded to,[214] which is still made and worn by the peasants, the peasant women wore on their collerettes much lace of that large-flowered pattern and fancy ground, found alike in Flanders and on the headdresses of the Neapolitan and Calabrian peasants.
Specimens of the lace of the province of Urbino resemble in pattern and texture the fine close lace on the collar of Christian IV., figured in our notice of Denmark. The workmanship is of great beauty.
Reticella is made at Bologna, and was revived in January, 1900, by the Aemilia-Ars Co-operative Society. The designs are for the most part taken from old pattern-books, such as Parasole.
Fig. 34 represents a fragment of a piece of lace of great interest, communicated by the Countess Gigliucci. It is worked with the needle upon muslin, and only a few inches of the lace are finished. This incompleteness makes it the more valuable, as it enables us to trace the manner of its execution, all the threads being left hanging to its several parts. The Countess states that she found the work at a villa belonging to Count Gigliucci, near Fermo on the Adriatic, and it is supposed to have been executed by the Count's great-grandmother above 160 years ago—an exquisite specimen of "the needle's excellency."
Fig. 34.
Unfinished Drawn-Work.
Though the riches of our Lady of Loreto fill a volume in themselves,[215] and her image was fresh clad every day of the year, the account of her jewels and plate so overpower any mention of her laces, which were doubtless in accordance with the rest of the wardrobe, that there is nothing to tell on the subject.
The laces of the Vatican and the holy Conclave, mostly presents from crowned heads, are magnificent beyond all description. They are, however, constantly in the market, sold at the death of a Cardinal by his heirs, and often repurchased by some newly-elected prelate, each of whom on attaining a high ecclesiastical dignity is compelled to furnish himself with several sets.
A lady[216] describing the ceremony of washing the feet by the Pope, writes, in 1771, "One of his cardinals brought him an apron[217] of old point with a broad border of Mechlin lace, and tied it with a white ribbon round his holiness's waist." In this guise protected, he performed the ceremony.
Clement IX. was in the habit of making presents of Italian lace, at that period still prized in France, to Monsieur de Sorbière, with whom he had lived on terms of intimacy previous to his elevation. "He sends ruffles," cries the irritated Gaul, who looked for something more tangible, "to a man who never has a shirt."[218]
NAPLES.
When Davies, Barber Surgeon of London,[219] visited Naples in 1597, he writes, "Among the traffic of this city is lace of all sorts and garters."
Fynes Moryson, his contemporary, declares "the Italians care not for foreign apparel, they have ruffles of Flanders linen wrought with Italian cut-work so much in use with us. They wear no lace in gold and silver, but black"; while Lassels says, all they care for is to keep a coach; their point de Venise and gold lace are all turned into horses and liveries.[220]
Plate XVIII.
Cushion made at the School.—These coloured silk laces are reproductions of the sixteenth century. Size, 20 × 12 in.
Plate XIX.
Italy.—Group of workers of the Brazza School, Torreano di Martignacco, Friuli, showing the different kinds of lacework done and pillows in use.
Photos by Contessa di Brazza.
To face page 70.
Of this lace we find but scanty mention. In the tailor's bill of Sir Timothy Hutton, 1615, when a scholar at Cambridge, a charge is made for "four oz. and a half quarter and dram of Naples lace." And in the accounts of laces furnished for the marriage of the Princess