Chapter VI: Part 6

Next let a word or two be reserved for Painted Furniture. Painting has been employed on furniture of all kinds at many periods. The ancients made theirs of bronze, or of ivory, carved or inlaid. In the Middle Ages wood-carving and many kinds of furniture were painted. The coronation chair at Westminster was so decorated. The chest fronts of Delli and other painters are often pictures of great intrinsic merit, and very generally these family chest fronts are valuable records of costumes and fashions of their day. In this country the practice of painting pianoforte cases, chair-backs, table-tops, panels of all sorts, has been much resorted to. Distinguished painters, Angelica Kauffmann and her contemporaries, and a whole race of coach-painters have left monuments of their skill in this line. It must suffice here to recall certain modern examples, _e.g._ a small dresser, now in the national collections, with doors painted by Mr. Poynter, with spirited figures representing the _Beers_ and the _Wines_; the fine piano case painted by Mr. Burne-Jones; another by Mr. Alma Tadema; lastly, a tall clock-case by Mr. Stanhope, which, as well as other promising examples, have been exhibited by the Arts and Crafts Society.

J. H. POLLEN.

OF CARVING

It is not uncommon to see an elaborate piece of furniture, in decorating which it is evident that the carver has had opportunity for the exercise of all his skill, and which, indeed, bears evidence of the most skilful woodcutting on almost every square inch of its surface, from the contemplation of which neither an artist nor an educated craftsman can derive any pleasure or satisfaction. This would seem to point to the designer of the ornament as the cause of failure, and the writer of this believes that in such cases it will generally be found that the designer, though he may know everything that he ought to know about the production of designs which shall look well on paper or on a flat surface, has had no experience, by actually working at the material, of its difficulties, special capabilities, or limitations.

If at the same time he has had but a limited experience of the difference in treatment necessary for carving which is to be seen at various altitudes, his failure may be taken as sufficiently accounted for.

An idea now prevalent that it is not advisable to make models for wood-carving is not by any means borne out by the experience of the writer of this paper.

Models are certainly not necessary for ordinary work, such as mouldings, or even for work in panels when the surfaces are intended to be almost wholly on one plane, but the carved decoration of a panel, which pretends to be in any degree a work of art, often depends for its effect quite as much on the masterly treatment of surface planes, and the relative projection from the surface of the more prominent parts, as upon the outline. Now, there are many men who, though able to carve wood exquisitely, have never given themselves the trouble, or perhaps have scarcely had the opportunity, to learn how to read an ordinary drawing. The practice obtains in many carving shops for one or two leading men to rough out (_viz._ shape out roughly) all the work so far as that is practicable, and the others take it up after them and finish it. The followers are not necessarily less skilful carvers or cutters than the leaders, but have, presumably, less knowledge of form. If, then, one wishes to avail oneself of the skill of these men for carrying out really important work, it is much the simpler way to make a model (however rough) which shall accurately express everything one wishes to see in the finished work; and, assuming the designer to be fairly dexterous in the use of clay or other plastic material, a sketch model will not occupy any more of his time than a drawing would.

To put it plainly, no designer can ever know what he ought to expect from a worker in any material if he has not worked in that material himself. If he has carved marble, for instance, he knows the extreme care required in under-cutting the projecting parts of the design, and the cost entailed by the processes necessary to be employed for that purpose. He therefore so arranges the various parts of his design that wherever it is possible these projecting portions shall be supported by other forms, so avoiding the labour and cost of relieving (or under-cutting) them; and if he be skilful his skill will appear in the fact that his motive in this will be apparent only to experts, while to others the whole will appear to grow naturally out of the design. Moreover, he knows that he must depend for the success of this thing on an effect of breadth and dignity. He is not afraid of a somewhat elaborate surface treatment, being aware that nearly any variety of surface which he can readily produce in clay may be rendered in marble with a reasonable amount of trouble.

In designing for the wood-carver he is on altogether different ground. He may safely lay aside some portion of his late dignity, and depend almost entirely on vigour of line; the ease with which under-cutting is done in this material enabling him to obtain contrast by the use of delicately relieved forms. Here, however, he must not allow the effect in his model to depend in any degree on surface treatment. Care in that respect will prevent disappointment in the finished work.

The most noticeable feature in modern carved surface decoration is the almost universal tendency to overcrowding. It appears seldom to have occurred to the craftsman or designer that decorating a panel, for instance, is not at all the same thing as covering it with decoration. Still less does he seem to have felt that occasionally some portions of the ground are much more valuable in the design than anything which he can put on them. Indeed, the thoughtful designer who understands its use and appreciates its value, frequently has more trouble with his ground than with anything else in the panel. Also, if he have the true decorative spirit, his mind is constantly on the general scheme surrounding his work, and he is always ready to subordinate himself and his work in order that it may enhance and not disturb this general scheme.

We will suppose, for example, that he has to decorate a column with raised ornament. He feels at once that the outlines of that column are of infinitely more importance than anything which he can put on it, however ingenious or beautiful his design may be. He therefore keeps his necessary projecting parts as small and low as possible, leaving as much of the column as he can showing between the lines of his pattern. By this means the idea of strength and support is not interfered with, and the _tout ensemble_ is not destroyed.

This may seem somewhat elementary to many who will read it. My excuse must be that one sees many columns in which every vestige of the outline is so covered by the carving which has been built round them, that the idea of their supporting anything other than their ornament appears preposterous.

There has been no opportunity to do more than glance at such a subject as this in a space so limited; but the purposes of this paper will have been served if it has supplied a useful hint to any craftsman, or if by its means any designer shall have been induced to make a more thorough study of the materials within his reach.

STEPHEN WEBB.

INTARSIA AND INLAID WOOD-WORK

Although decoration by inlaying woods of different colours must naturally have suggested itself in very early times, as soon indeed as there were workmen of skill sufficient for it, the history of this branch of art practically begins in the fifteenth century. It is eminently an Italian art, which according to Vasari had its origin in the days of Brunelleschi and Paolo Uccello; and it had its birth in a land which has a greater variety of mild close-grained woods with a greater variety of colour than Northern Europe. By the Italians it was regarded as a lower form of painting. Like all mosaic, of which art it is properly a branch, it has its limitations; and it is only so long as it confines itself to these that it is a legitimate form of decoration. Tarsia is at the best one of the minor decorative arts, but when well employed it is one that gives an immense deal of pleasure, and one to which it cannot be denied that the buildings of Italy owe much of their splendour. Their polished and inlaid furniture harmonises with the rare delicacy of their marble and mosaic, and goes far towards producing that air of rich refinement and elaborate culture which is to the severer styles and simpler materials of the North what the velvet-robed Senator of St. Mark was to the mail-clad feudal chief from beyond the Alps. As to its durability, the experience of four centuries since Vasari's time has proved that with ordinary care, or perhaps with nothing worse than mere neglect, Intarsia will last as long as painting. Its only real enemy is damp, as will be readily understood from the nature of the materials and the mode of putting them together. For though in a few instances, when the art was in its infancy, the inlaid pattern may have been cut of a substantial thickness and sunk into a solid ground ploughed out to receive it, this method was obviously very laborious, and admitted only of very simple design, for it is very difficult in this way to keep the lines of the drawing accurately. The recognised way of making Intarsia was, and is, to form both pattern and ground in thin veneers about 1/16 of an inch thick, which are glued down upon a solid panel. At first sight this method may appear too slight and unsubstantial for work intended to last for centuries, but it has, in fact, stood the test of time extremely well, when the work has been kept in the dry even temperature of churches and great houses, where there is neither damp to melt the glue and swell the veneer, nor excessive heat to make the wood shrink and start asunder. When these conditions were not observed, of course the work was soon ruined, and Vasari tells an amusing story of the humiliation which befell Benedetto da Majano, who began his career as an _Intarsiatore_, in the matter of two splendid chests which he had made for Matthias Corvinus, from which the veneers, loosened by the damp of a sea voyage, fell off in the royal presence.

The veneers being so thin, it is of course easy to cut through several layers of them at once, and this suggested, or at all events lent itself admirably to the design of the earlier examples, which are generally arabesques symmetrically disposed right and left of a central line. If two dark and two light veneers are put together, the whole of one panel, both ground and pattern, can be cut at one operation with a thin fret saw; the ornamental pattern drops into the space cut out of the ground, which it, of course, fits exactly except for the thickness of the saw-cut, and the two half-patterns thus filled in are "handed" right and left, and so complete the symmetrical design. The line given by the thickness of the saw is then filled in with glue and black colour so as to define the outline, and additional saw-cuts are made or lines are engraved, and in either case filled in with the same stopping, wherever additional lines are wanted for the design. It only remains to glue the whole down to a solid panel, and to polish and varnish the surface, and it is then ready to be framed into its place as the back of a church stall, or the lining of a courtly hall, library, or cabinet.

It was thus that the simpler Italian Intarsia was done, such as that in the dado surrounding Perugino's Sala del Cambio in his native city, where the design consists of light arabesques in box or some similar wood on a walnut ground, defined by black lines just as I have described.

But like all true artists the Intarsiatore did not stand still. Having successfully accomplished simple outline and accurate drawing, he was dissatisfied until he could carry his art farther by introducing the refinement of shading. This was done at different times and by different artists in a variety of ways; either by inlaying the shadow in different kinds of woods, by scorching it with fire, or by staining it with chemical solutions. In the book desks of the choir at the Certosa or Charterhouse of Pavia, the effect of shading is got in a direct but somewhat imperfect way by laying strips of different coloured woods side by side. Each flower or leaf was probably built up of tolerably thick pieces of wood glued together in position, so that they could be sliced off in veneers and yield several flowers or leaves from the same block, much in the way of Tunbridge Wells ware, though the Italian specimens are, I believe, always cut _with_ the grain and not across it. The designs thus produced are very effective at a short distance, but the method is, of course, suitable only to bold and simple conventional patterns.

The panels of the high screen or back to the stalls at the same church afford an instance of a more elaborate method. These splendid panels, which go all round the choir, contain each a three-quarter-length figure of a saint. Lanzi deservedly praises them as the largest and most perfect figures of _tarsia_ which he had seen. They date from 1486, and were executed by an Istrian artist, Bartolommeo da Pola, perhaps from the designs of Borgognone. The method by which their highly pictorial effect is produced is a mixed one, the shading being partly inlaid with woods of different colours, and partly obtained by scorching the wood with fire or hot sand in the manner generally in use for marqueterie at the present day. The inexhaustible patience as well as the fertility of resource displayed by Messer Bartolommeo is astonishing. Where the saw-cut did not give him a strong enough line he has inlaid a firm line of black wood, the high lights of the draperies are inlaid in white, the folds shaded by burning, and the flowing lines of the curling hair are all inlaid, each several tress being shaded by three narrow strips of gradated colour following the curved lines of the lock to which they belong. When it is remembered that there are some forty or more of these panels, each differing from the rest, the splendour as well as the laborious nature of the decoration of this unrivalled choir will be better understood.

Of all the examples of pictorial Intarsia the most elaborate are perhaps those in the choir stalls of Sta. Maria Maggiore in Bergamo. They are attributed to Gianfrancesco Capo di Ferro, who worked from the designs of Lotto, and was either a rival or pupil of Fra Damiano di Bergamo, a famous master of the art. They consist of figure subjects and landscapes on a small scale, shaded with all the delicacy and roundness attainable in a tinted drawing, and certainly show how near Intarsia can approach to painting. Their drawing is excellent and their execution marvellous; but at the same time one feels that, however one may admire them as a _tour de force_, the limitations of good sense and proper use of the material have been reached and overstepped. When the delicacy of the work is so great that it requires to be covered up or kept under glass, it obviously quits the province of decorative art; furniture is meant to be used, and when it is too precious to be usable on account of the over-delicate ornament bestowed upon it, it must be admitted that the ornament is out of place, and, therefore, bad art.

The later Italian Intarsia was betrayed into extravagance by the dexterity of the craftsman. The temptation before which he fell was that of rivalling the painter, and as he advanced in facility of technique, and found wider resources at his command, he threw aside not only those restraints which necessity had hitherto imposed, but also those which good taste and judgment still called him to obey. In the plain unshaded arabesques of the Sala del Cambio, and even in the figure panels of the Certosa, the treatment is purely decorative; the idea of a plane surface is rightly observed, and there is no attempt to represent distance or to produce illusory effects of relief. Above all, the work is solid and simple enough to bear handling; the stalls may be sat in, the desks may be used for books, the doors may be opened and shut, without fear of injury to their decoration. Working within these limits, the art was safe; but they came in time to be disregarded, and in this, as in other branches of art, the style was ruined by the over-ingenuity of the artists. Conscious of their own dexterity, they attempted things never done before, with means quite unsuited to the purpose, and with the sole result that they did imperfectly and laboriously with their wooden veneers, their glue-pot, and their chemicals, what the painter did with crayon and brush perfectly and easily. Their greatest triumphs after they began to run riot in this way, however interesting as miracles of dexterity, have no value as works of art in the eyes of those who know the true principles of decorative design; while nothing can be much duller than the elaborate playfulness of the Intarsiatore who loved to cover his panelling with sham book-cases, birds in cages, guitars, and military instruments in elaborate perspective.

It would take too long to say much about the art in its application to furniture, such as tables, chairs, cabinets, and other movables, which are decorated with inlay that generally goes by the French name of marqueterie. Marqueterie and Intarsia are the same thing, though from habit the French title is generally used when speaking of work on a smaller scale. And as the methods and materials are the same, whether used on a grand or a small scale, so the same rules and restraints apply to both classes of design, and can no more be infringed with impunity on the door of a tall clock-case than on the doors of a palatial hall of audience. Nothing can be a prettier or more practical and durable mode of decorating furniture than marqueterie in simple brown, black, yellow, and white; and when used with judgment there is nothing to forbid the employment of dyed woods; while the smallness of the scale puts at our disposal ivory, mother-of-pearl, and tortoise-shell, materials which in larger works are naturally out of the question. Nothing, on the other hand, is more offensive to good taste than some of the overdone marqueterie of the French school of the last century, with its picture panels, and naturalesque figures, flowers, and foliage, straggling all over the surface, as if the article of furniture were merely a vehicle for the cleverness of the marqueterie cutter. Still worse is the modern work of the kind, whether English or foreign, of which so much that is hopelessly pretentious and vulgar is turned out nowadays, in which the aim of the designer seems to have been to cover the surface as thickly as he could with flowers and festoons of all conceivable colours, without any regard for the form of the thing he was decorating, the nature of the material he was using, or the graceful disposition and economy of the ornament he was contriving.

T. G. JACKSON.

WOODS AND OTHER MATERIALS

The woods in ordinary use by cabinetmakers may be divided broadly into two classes, viz. those which by their strength, toughness, and other qualities are suitable for construction, and those which by reason of the beauty of their texture or grain, their rarity, or their costliness, have come to be used chiefly for decorative purposes--veneering or inlaying. There are certainly several woods which combine the qualities necessary for either purpose, as will be noticed later on. At present the above classification is sufficiently accurate for the purposes of this paper. The woods chiefly used in the construction of cabinet work and furniture are oak, walnut, mahogany, rosewood, satin-wood, cedar, plane, sycamore.

The oak has been made the standard by which to measure all other woods for the qualities of strength, toughness, and durability. There are said to be nearly fifty species of oak known, but the common English oak possesses these qualities in a far greater degree than any other wood. It is, however, very cross-grained and difficult to manage where delicate details are required, and its qualities recommend it to the carpenter rather than to the furniture-maker, who prefers the softer and straight-grained oak from Turkey or wainscot from Holland, which, in addition to being more easily worked and taking a higher finish, is not so liable to warp or split.

There is also a species called white oak, which is imported into this country from America, and is largely used for interior fittings and cabinet-making. It is not equal to the British oak in strength or durability, and it is inferior to the wainscot in the beauty of its markings. The better the quality of this oak, the more it shrinks in drying.

Walnut is a favourite wood with the furniture-maker, as well as the carver, on account of its even texture and straight grain. The English variety is of a light grayish-brown colour, which colour improves much by age under polish. That from Italy has more gray in it, and though it looks extremely well when carved is less liked by carvers on account of its brittleness. It is but little liable to the attacks of worms. In the English kind, the older (and therefore, generally speaking, the better) wood may be recognised by its darker colour.

Of mahogany there are two kinds, viz. those which are grown in the islands of Cuba and Jamaica, and in Honduras. The Cuba or Spanish mahogany is much the harder and more durable, and is, in the opinion of the writer, the very best wood for all the purposes of the cabinet or furniture maker known to us. It is beautifully figured, takes a fine polish, is not difficult to work, when its extreme hardness is taken into account, and is less subject to twisting and warping than any other kind of wood. It has become so costly of late years, however, that it is mostly cut into veneers, and used for the decoration of furniture surfaces.

Honduras mahogany, or, as cabinetmakers call it, "Bay Wood," is that which is now in most frequent demand for the construction of the best kinds of furniture and cabinet work. It is fairly strong (though it cannot compare in that respect with Cuba or rosewood), works easily, does not shrink, resists changes of temperature without alteration, and holds glue well, all of which qualities specially recommend it for the purposes of construction where veneers are to be used. Many cabinetmakers prefer to use this wood for drawers, even in an oak job.

Rosewood is one of those woods used indifferently for construction or for the decoration of other woods. Though beautiful specimens of grain and figure are often seen, its colour does not compare with good specimens of Cuba veneer. Its purple tone (whatever stains are used) is not so agreeable as the rich, deep, mellow browns of the mahogany; nor does it harmonise so readily with its surroundings in an ordinary room. It has great strength and durability, and is not difficult to work. Probably the best way to use it constructively is in the making of small cabinets, chairs, etc.--that is, if one wishes for an appearance of lightness with real strength. The writer does not here offer any opinion as to whether a piece of furniture, or indeed anything else, should or should not look strong when it really is so.

Satin-wood, most of which comes from the West India islands, is well known for its fine lustre and grain, as also for its warm colour, which is usually deepened by yellow stain. It is much used for painted furniture, and the plain variety is liked by the carver.

Cedar is too well known to need any description here. It is commonly believed that no worm will touch it, and it is therefore greatly in demand for the interior fitting of cabinets, drawers, etc. It is a straight-grained wood and fairly easy to work, though liable to split. It is impossible in a short paper like the present to do more than glance at a few of the numerous other woods in common use. Ebony has always been greatly liked for small or elaborate caskets or cabinets, its extreme closeness of grain and hardness enabling the carver to bring up the smallest details with all the sharpness of metal work.

Sycamore, beech, and holly are frequently stained to imitate walnut, rosewood, or other materials; of these the first two are used constructively, but the latter, which takes the stain best, is nearly all cut into veneer, and, in addition to its use for covering large surfaces, forms an important element in the modern marquetry decorations.

Bass wood, on account of its softness and the facility with which it can be stained to any requisite shade, is extensively used to imitate other woods in modern furniture of the cheaper sort. It should, however, never be used for furniture at all, as it has (as a cabinetmaker would say) no "nature" in it, and in the result there is no wear in it.

Other woods, coming under the second category, as amboyna, coromandel, snake-wood, orange-wood, thuyer, are all woods of a beautiful figure, which may be varied indefinitely by cutting the veneers at different angles to the grain of the wood, and the tone may also be varied by the introduction of colour into the polish which is used on them. Coromandel wood is one of the most beautiful of these, but it is not so available as it would otherwise be on account of its resistance to glue. Orange-wood, when not stained, is very wasteful in use, as the natural colour is confined to the heart of the tree.

Silver, white metal, brass, etc., are cut into a veneer of tortoise-shell or mother-of-pearl, producing a decorative effect which, in the opinion of the writer, is more accurately described as "gorgeous" than "beautiful."

There are many processes and materials used to alter or modify the colour of woods and to "convert" one wood into another. Oak is made dark by being subjected to the fumes of liquid ammonia, which penetrate it to almost any depth. Ordinary oak is made into brown oak by being treated with a solution of chromate of potash (which is also used to convert various light woods into mahogany, etc.). Pearlash is used for the same purpose, though not commonly. For converting pear-tree, sycamore, etc., into ebony, two or more applications of logwood chips, with an after application of vinegar and steel filings, are used.

A good deal of bedroom and other furniture is enamelled, and here the ground is prepared with size and whiting, and this is worked over with flake white, transparent polish, and bismuth. But by far the most beautiful surface treatment in this kind are the lacquers, composed of spirit and various gums, or of shellac and spirit into which colour is introduced.

STEPHEN WEBB.

OF MODERN EMBROIDERY

If we wish to arrive at a true estimate of the value of modern embroidery, we must examine the work being sold in the fancy-work shops, illustrated in ladies' newspapers or embroidered in the drawing-rooms of to-day, and consider in what respect it differs from the old work such as that exhibited in the South Kensington Museum.

The old embroidery and the modern differ widely--in design, in colour, and in material; nor would any one deny that a very large proportion of modern work is greatly inferior to that of past times.

What, then, are the special characteristics of the design of the present day?

Modern design is frequently very naturalistic, and seems rather to seek after a life-like rendering of the object to be embroidered than the decoration of the material to be ornamented.

Then again it may be noted that modern designs are often ill adapted to the requirements of embroidery. This is probably because many of the people who design for embroidery do not understand it. Very often a design that has been made for this purpose would have been better suited to a wall paper, a panel of tiles, or a woven pattern. The designer should either be also an embroiderer or have studied the subject so thoroughly as to be able to direct the worker, for the design should be drawn in relation to the colours and stitches in which it is to be carried out.

The more, indeed, people will study the fine designs of the past, and compare with them the designs of the art-needlework of the present, the more they will realise that, where the former is rich, dignified, and restrained, obedient to law in every curve and line, the latter is florid, careless, weak, and ignores law. And how finished that old embroidery was, and how full! No grudging of the time or the labour spent either on design or needlework; no scamping; no mere outlining. Border within border we often see, and all the space within covered up to the edges and into the corners. Contrast with this very much of our modern work. Let us take as an example one piece that was on view this summer at a well-known place in London where embroidery is sold. It is merely a type of many others in many other places. This was a threefold screen made of dark red-brown velveteen. All over it ran diagonal crossing lines coarsely worked in light silk, to imitate a wire trellis, with occasional upright supports worked in brown wool, imitating knotty sticks. Up one side of this trellis climbed a scrambling mass of white clematis; one spray wandering along the top fell a little way down the other side. Thus a good part of the screen was bare of embroidery, except for the trellis. Naturalism could not go much farther, design is almost absent, and the result is feeble and devoid of beauty.

If we turn now to material, we shall find that embroidery, like some other arts, depends much for its excellence on the minor crafts which provide it with material; and these crafts supplied it with better material in former times than they do now. A stuff to be used as a ground for embroidery should have endless capacities for wear. This was a quality eminently possessed by hand-spun and hand-woven linen, which, with its rounded and separate thread, and the creamy tint of its partial bleaching, made an ideal ground for embroidery. Or if silk were preferred, the silks of past centuries were at once thick, firm, soft and pure, quite free from the dress or artificial thickening, by whose aid a silk nowadays tries to look rich when it is not. The oatmeal cloth, diagonal cloth, cotton-backed satin, velveteen and plush, so much used now, are very inferior materials as grounds for needlework to the hand-loom linens and silks on which so large a part of the old embroidery remaining to us was worked. And so very much of the beauty of the embroidery depends on the appropriateness of the material.[1] Cloth, serge, and plush are not appropriate; embroidery never looks half so well on them as on silk and linen.

It is equally important that the thread, whether of silk, wool, flax, or metal, should be pure and as well made as it can be, and, if dyed, dyed with colours that will stand light and washing. Most of the silk, wool, and flax thread sold for embroidery is not as good as it should be. The filoselles and crewels very soon get worn away from the surface of the material they are worked on. The crewels are made of too soft a wool, and are not twisted tight enough, and the filoselles, not being made of pure silk, should never be used at all, pretty and soft though their effect undoubtedly is while fresh. Though every imaginable shade of colour can be produced by modern dyers, the craft seems to have been better understood by the dyers of times not very long past, who, though they may not have been able to produce so many shades, could dye colours which would wash and did not quickly fade, or when they faded merely lost some colour, instead of changing colour, as so many modern dyes do. The old embroidery is worked with purer and fewer colours; now all kinds of dull intermediate tints are used of gold, brown, olive, and the like, which generally fade rapidly and will not wash. Many people, admiring old embroidery and desiring to make their new work look like it at least in colour, will use tints as faint and delicate as the faded old colours, forgetting that in a few years their work will be almost colourless. It is wiser to use strong good colours, for a little fading does not spoil but really improves them.

So we see that many things combine to render embroidery as fine as that of the past difficult of production, and there is nothing more against it than machinery, which floods the market with its cheap imitations, so that an embroidered dress is no longer the choice and rare production it once was; the machine-made imitation is so common and so cheap that a refined taste, sick of the vulgarity of the imitation, cares little even for the reality, and seeks refuge in an unornamented plainness. The hand-worked embroidery glorified and gave value to the material it was worked on. The machine-work cannot lift it above the commonplace. When will people understand that the more ornament is slow and difficult of production, the more we appreciate it when we have got it; that it is because we know that the thought of a human brain and the skill of a human hand went into every stroke of a chisel, every touch of a brush, or every stitch placed by the needle, that we admire, enjoy, and wonder at the statue, the picture, or the needlework that is the result of that patience and that skill; and that we do not care about the ornament at all, and that it becomes lifeless always, and often vulgar, when it has been made at little or no cost by a machine which is ready at any moment to produce any quantity more of the same thing? All ornament and pattern was once produced by hand only, therefore it was always rare and costly and was valued accordingly. Fashions did not change quickly. It was worth while to embroider a garment beautifully, for it would be worn for years, for a lifetime perhaps; and the elaborately worked counterpane would cover the bed in the guest-chamber for more than one generation.

These remarks must be understood to apply to the ordinary fancy-work and so-called "art-needlework" of the present day. Twenty years ago there would have been no ray of light in the depths to which the art of embroidery had fallen. Now for some years steady and successful efforts have been made by a few people to produce once more works worthy of the past glories of the art. They have proved to us that designers can design and that women can execute fine embroidery, but their productions are but as a drop in the ocean of inferior and valueless work.

MARY E. TURNER.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] But cf. "Of Materials," p. 365.

OF MATERIALS

Almost every fabric that is good of its kind is suitable for a ground for needlework, and any thread of silk, linen, cotton, or wool, is suitable for laying on a web, with the purpose of decorating it. Yet these materials should not be wedded indiscriminately, every surface requiring its peculiar treatment; a loose woollen fabric, for example, being best covered with wool-work rather than with silk. Not that it is necessary to work in linen thread on linen ground, in silk on silk ground, and so forth; silk upon linen, silk on canvas, wool on linen, are legitimate, because suitable combinations; it being scarcely necessary to note that linen or wool threads should not be used on silk surface, as to place the poorer on the richer material would be an error in taste. Gold thread and precious stones will of course be reserved for the richer grounds, and the more elaborate kinds of work.

A plain or a figured (damask) silk can be employed as a ground for needlework, the broken surface of a good damask sometimes enriching and helping out the design. If work is to be laid directly on silk ground, it should be rather open and light in character; if closer stitches are wanted, the principal forms are usually done on a canvas or linen backing, which is then cut out and "applied" to the final silk ground, the design being carried on and completed by lighter work of lines and curves, and by the enrichment of gold thread, and sometimes even precious stones. These two methods are a serious and dignified form of embroidery, and were often used by the great mediaeval embroiderers on a rich figured or damask silk, and sometimes on plain silk, and sometimes on a silky velvet. It is not easy to procure absolutely pure "undressed" silk now, and pliable silk velvet of a suitable nature is still more difficult to obtain. Satin is, to my thinking, almost too shiny a surface for a ground, but it may, occasionally, be useful for small work. A sort of imitation called "Roman satin" is sometimes employed on account of its cheapness and effectiveness, I suppose, as it cannot be for its beauty; the texture, when much handled, being woolly and unpleasant. No one taking trouble to procure choice materials will think of making use of it.

Floss silk lends itself particularly to the kind of needlework we are speaking of; there is no twist on it, the silk is pure and untouched, if properly dyed has a soft gloss, and a yielding surface that renders it quite the foremost of embroidery silks, though its delicate texture requires skilful handling. But avoid silks that profess to be floss with the difficulty in handling removed. If the old workers could use a pure untwisted floss, surely we can take the trouble to conquer this difficulty and do the same. Twisted silk, if used on a silk ground, should, I think, be rather fine; if thick and much twisted, it stands out in relief against the ground and gives a hard and ropy appearance. I am, in fact, assuming that work on so costly a material as pure thick silk is to be rather fine than coarse. Gold and silver thread is much used with silk, but it is almost impossible to keep the silver from tarnishing. Ordinary "gold passing," which consists of a gilt silver thread wound round silk, is also apt to tarnish, and should always be lacquered before using--a rather troublesome process to do at home, as the gold has to be unwound and brushed over with the lacquer, and should be dried in a warm room free from damp, or on a hot sunny day. Japanese paper-gold is useful, for the reason that it does not tarnish, though in some ways it is more troublesome to manage than the gold that can be threaded in a needle and passed through the material. It consists, like much of the ancient gold thread, of a gilded strip of paper wound round silk, the old gold being gilded vellum, when not the flat gold beaten out thin (as, by the bye, in many of the Eastern towels made to-day where the flat tinsel is very cleverly used).

For needlework for more ordinary uses, linen is by far the most pleasing and enduring web. Unlike silk on the one side, and wool on the other, it has scarcely any limitations in treatment, or in material suitable to be used on it. For hangings it can be chosen of a loose large texture, and covered with bold work executed in silk, linen thread, or wool, or it can be chosen of the finest thread, and covered with minute delicate stitches; it can be worked equally well in the hand, or in a frame, and usually the more it is handled the better it looks. A thick twisted silk is excellent for big and coarse work on linen, the stitches used being on the same scale, big and bold, and finer silk used sparingly if needed. White linen thread is often the material employed for linen altar cloths, coverlets, etc., and some extremely choice examples of such work are to be seen in our museums, some worked roughly with a large linen thread and big stitches, some with patient minuteness. It is hardly necessary to say how important the design of such work is.

Different qualities of this material will be suggested to the embroideress by her needs; but, before passing to other things, I should not omit mention of the charming linen woven at Langdale. For some purposes it is very useful, as good linen for embroidering on is not easy to obtain. We have, however, yet to find a web which will resemble the rougher and coarser linens used for old embroideries, rather loosely woven, with a thick glossy thread, and of a heavy yet yielding substance, quite unlike the hard paper-like surfaces of machine-made linens. The Langdale linen is, of course, hand-spun and hand-made, and the flat silky thread gives a very pleasant surface; but, owing to its price and fine texture, it is not always suitable for the purposes of large hangings. Many fine examples of Persian work, such as quilts and so forth, are executed on a white cotton ground, neither very fine nor very coarse, entirely in floss silk, a variety of stitches being used, and the brightest possible colours chosen. The cool silky surface of linen, however, commends itself more to us than cotton, each country rightly choosing the materials nearest to hand, in this as in other decorative arts. Both linen and cotton are good grounds for wool-work, of which the most satisfactory kind is that done on a large scale, with a variety of close and curious stitches within bold curves and outlines.

Canvas and net are open textures of linen or cotton, and can be used either as a ground-work covered entirely with some stitch like the old-fashioned cross-stitch or tent-stitch, or some kindred mechanical stitch, or it can stand as the ground, to be decorated with bright silks. The texture of canvas being coarse, the design for it should be chosen on a large scale, and thick silk used; floss preferably as the glossiest, but a thick twisted silk is almost equally effective, and rather easier to handle. This canvas is used frequently in seventeenth-century Italian room-hangings, either in the natural brownish colour, or dyed blue or green, the dye on it giving a dusky neutral colour which well shows up the richness of the silk.

Of woollen materials, cloth is the king; though as a ground for needle-decoration it has its limitations. It forms a good basis for applique, the groups of ornament being worked separately, and laid on the cloth with threads and cords of silk, gold, or wool, according to the treatment decided on. Rough serge gives a good surface for large open wool-work. Such work is quickly done, and could be made a very pleasing decoration for walls. See the delightful inventories of the worldly goods of Sir John Fastolf in the notes to the Paston Letters, where the description of green and blue worsted hangings, and "bankers" worked over with roses and boughs, and hunting scenes, make one long to emulate the rich fancies of forgotten arts, and try to plan out similar work, much of which was quite unambitious and simple, both in design and execution. "Slack," a slightly twisted wool, worsted and crewel are usually the forms of work used; of these slack wool is the pleasantest for large work, worsted being too harsh; crewel is very fine and much twisted,[1] often met with in old work of a fine kind. The advantage of wool over silk in cost is obvious, and renders it suitable for the commoner uses of life, where lavishness would be out of place.

MAY MORRIS.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Crewel, crull, curly:--

"His locks were crull as they were laid in press,"

says Chaucer of the Squire in _The Canterbury Tales_.

COLOUR

It is not unusual to hear said of textiles and embroideries, "I like soft quiet colouring; such and such is too bright." This assertion is both right and wrong; it shows an instinctive pleasure in harmony combined with ignorance of technique. To begin with, colour cannot be too bright in itself; if it appears so, it is the skill of the craftsman that is at fault. It will be noted in a fine piece of work that far from blazing with colour in a way to disturb the eye, its general effect is that of a subdued glow; and yet, on considering the different shades of the colours used, they are found to be in themselves of the brightest the dyer can produce. Thus I have seen in an old Persian rug light and dark blue flowers and orange leaves outlined with turquoise blue on a strong red ground, a combination that sounds daring, and yet nothing could be more peaceful in tone than the beautiful and complicated groups of colours here displayed. Harmony, then, produces this repose, which is demanded instinctively, purity and crispness being further obtained by the quality of the colours used.

Thus in blues, use the shades that are only obtained satisfactorily by indigo dye, with such modifications as slightly "greening" with yellow when a green-blue is wanted, and so forth. The pure blue of indigo,[1] neither slaty nor too hot and red on the one hand, nor tending to a coarse "peacock" green-blue on the other, is perfect in all its tones, and of all colours the safest to use in masses. Its modifications to purple on one side and green-blue on the other are also useful, though to be employed with moderation. There are endless varieties of useful reds, from pink, salmon, orange, and scarlet, to blood-red and deep purple-red, obtained by different dyes and by different processes of dyeing. Kermes, an insect dye, gives a very beautiful and permanent colour, rather scarlet. Cochineal, also an insect dye, gives a red, rather inferior, but useful for mixed shades, and much used on silk, of which madder and kermes are apt to destroy the gloss, the former a good deal, the latter slightly. Madder, a vegetable dye, "yields on wool a deep-toned blood-red, somewhat bricky and tending to scarlet. On cotton and linen all imaginable shades of red, according to the process."[2] Of the shades into which red enters, avoid over-abundant use of warm orange or scarlet, which are the more valuable (especially the latter) the more sparingly used; there is a dusky orange and a faint clear bricky scarlet, sometimes met with in old work, that do not need this reservation, being quiet colours of impure yet beautiful tone. Clear, full yellow, fine in itself, also loses its value if too plentifully used, or lacking due relief by other colours. The pure colour is neither reddish and hot in tone, nor greenish and sickly. It is very abundant, for example, in Persian silk embroidery, also in Chinese, and again in Spanish and Italian work of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The best and most permanent yellow dye, especially valuable on silk, is weld or "wild mignonette."

Next to blue, green seems the most natural colour to live with, and the most restful to the eye and brain; yet it is curious to those not familiar with the ins and outs of dyeing that it should be so difficult to obtain through ordinary commercial channels a full, rich, permanent green, neither muddy yellow nor coarse bluish. A dyer who employed old-fashioned dye-stuffs and methods would, however, tell us that the greens of commerce are obtained by _messes_, and not by dyes, the only method for obtaining good shades being that of dyeing a blue of the depth required in the indigo-vat, and afterwards "greening" it with yellow, with whatever modifications are needed. Three sets of greens will be found useful for needlework, full yellow-greens of two or three shades, grayish-greens, and blue-greens. Of these, the shades tending to grayish-green are the most manageable in large masses. There is also an olive-green that is good, if not too dark and brown, when it becomes a nondescript, and as such to be condemned.

Walnut (the roots or the husks or the nut) and catechu (the juice of a plant) are the most reliable brown dye-stuffs, giving good rich colour. The best black, by the bye, formerly used, consisted of the darkest indigo shade the material would take, dipped afterwards in the walnut root dye.

This hasty enumeration of dye-stuffs gives an idea of those principally used until this century, but now very rarely, since the reign of Aniline. Yet they give the only really pure and permanent colours known, not losing their value by artificial light, and very little and gradually fading through centuries of exposure to sunlight. It would be pleasant if in purchasing silk or cloth one had not to pause and consider "will it fade?" meaning not "will it fade in a hundred, or ten, or three years?" but "will it fade and be an unsightly rag this time next month?" I cannot see that Aniline has done more for us than this.

Colour can be treated in several different ways: by distinctly light shades, whether few or many, on a dark ground, which treatment lends itself to great variety and effect; or by dark on a light ground, not so rich or satisfying in effect; or again, by colour placed on colour of equal tone, as it were a mosaic or piecing together of colours united, or "jointed," by outlining round the various members of the design. Black on white, or white on white, a mere drawing of a design on the material, scarcely comes under the head of Colour, though, as aforesaid, some very beautiful work has been done in this way.

As regards method of colouring, it is not very possible to give much indication of what to use and what to avoid, it being greatly a matter of practice, and somewhat of instinct, how to unite colour into beautiful and complex groups. A few hints for and against certain combinations may perhaps be given: for instance, avoid placing a blue immediately against a green of nearly the same tone; an outline of a different colour disposes of this difficulty, but even so, blue and green for equally leading colours should be avoided. Again, red and yellow, if both of a vivid tone, will need a softening outline; also, I think, red and green if at all strong; avoid cold green in contact with misty blue-green, which in itself is rather a pretty colour: the warning seems futile, but I have seen these colours used persistently together, and do not like the resulting undecided gray tone. A cold strong green renders service sometimes, notably for placing against a clear brilliant yellow, which is apt to deaden certain softer greens. Brown, when used, should be chosen carefully, warm in tint, but not _hot_; avoid the mixture of brown and yellow, often seen in "Art Depots," but not in nature, an unfortunate groping after the picturesque, as brown wants cooling down, and to marry it to a flaming yellow is not the way to do it. Black should be used very sparingly indeed, though by no means banished from the palette. Blue and pink, blue and red, with a little tender green for relief, are perfectly safe combinations for the leading colours in a piece of work; again, yellow and green, or yellow, pink, and green, make a delightfully fresh and joyous show. There is a large coverlet to be seen at the South Kensington Museum (in the Persian gallery) which is worked in these colours, all very much the same bright tone, the centre being green and yellow and pink, and the several borders the same, with the order and proportion altered to make a variety. In recalling bright colouring like this, one is reminded of Chaucer and his unfailing delight in gay colours, which he constantly brings before us in describing garden, woodland, or beflowered gown. As--

"Everich tree well from his fellow grewe
With branches broad laden with leaves newe
That sprongen out against the sonne sheene
Some golden red and some a glad bright grene."