BOBBIN-LACE.--(Ceylon.)]
The specimens of Indian pillow-laces, wrought with white and black threads,
in the India Museum, are apparently made in single pieces, and not as in
Honiton laces, by separate flowers, which are subsequently placed together
for the ground to be worked in between them.[264] "A missionary taught a
few Chinese women to make silk lace from the wild silk of this part of
China," reports Consul Bullock from Chefoo (at the request of the
Nottingham Chamber of Commerce), but the small quantity of lace so produced
is sold to Europeans only. The Chinese do not care to buy it. Acting Consul
Trotman also reported from Hangkow, that a large quantity of hand-made lace
is made in the Roman Catholic orphanages there, but this was entirely for
European consumption. White lace in China is not woven by the natives, for
white and blue being the national mourning colours, and severe simplicity
of dress being _de rigueur_ on these occasions, lace of these colours has
no sale.[265]
{90}CHAPTER VI.
SPAIN.
"Of Point d'Espagne a rich cornet,
Two night rails and a scarf beset,
With a large lace and collaret."
--Evelyn, _Voyage to Marryland_.
"Hat laced with gold Point d'Espagne."[266]
--Wardrobe of a Pretty Fellow, _Roderick Random_.
"The Count: 'Voglio una punta di Spagna, larga, massiccia, ben lavorata.
Del disegno, della ricchezza, ma niente di luccicante."--Goldoni,
_L'Avaro fastoso_.
Spanish point, in its day, has been as celebrated as that of Flanders and
Italy. Tradition declares Spain to have learned the art from Italy, whence
she communicated it to Flanders, who, in return, taught Spain how to make
pillow-lace. Though the dress of the Court, guided not by the impulse of
fashion, but by sumptuary laws, gave little encouragement to the fabric, on
the other hand, the numberless images of our Lady and other patron saints,
dressed and redressed daily in the richest vestments, together with the
albs of the priests and the decorations of the altars, caused an immense
consumption of lace for ecclesiastical purposes. "Of so great value," says
Beckford, "were the laces of these favoured Madonnas, that in 1787 the
Marchioness of Cogalhudo, wife of the eldest son of the semi-royal race of
Medino Coeli, was appointed Mistress of the Robes to our Lady of La
Solidad, at Madrid, a much-coveted office."
{91}[Illustration: Fig. 43.
THE WORK-ROOM.--(From an engraving of the Sixteenth Century after
Stradan.)]
Point d'Espagne, in the usual sense of the word, signifies that gold or
silver lace, sometimes embroidered in colours, so largely consumed in
France during the earlier years of Louis XIV.'s reign. Ornaments made of
plaited and twisted gold and silver threads were produced in Spain during
the seventeenth century, and mention of them is to be found in the
ordinances of that time. Towards the end of the century, Narciso Felin,
author of a work published in Barcelona, quoted by M. Aubry, writes that,
"edgings of all sorts of gold, silver, silk thread and aloe fibres are made
at Barcelona with greater perfection than in Flanders." In the sixteenth
century, Flanders was part of the Spanish dominions, and from Flanders
Spain imported artistic goods, linen and lace included. Mr. A. S. Cole
concludes from this that the Barcelona lace-making was more or less an
imitation of that which had previously existed in Spanish Flanders.
{92}Apart from this, the gold and silver lace of Cyprus, Venice, Lucca and
Genoa preceded that from Flanders, and it appears that Spain was later in
the field of artistic lace-making than either Italy, Flanders or France.
Even the celebrity of the gold point d'Espagne is probably due more to the
use of gold lace by Spanish grandees,[267] than to the production in Spain
of gold lace. The name point d'Espagne was, I think, a commercial one,
given to gold lace by French makers.[268]
Dominique de Sera, in his _Livre de Lingerie_, published in 1584,
especially mentions that many of the patterns of point couppé and passement
given were collected by him during his travels in Spain; and in this he is
probably correct, for as early as 1562, in the Great Wardrobe Account of
Queen Elizabeth, we have noted down sixteen yards of black Spanish _laquei_
(lace) for ruffs, price 5s.
The early pattern-books contain designs to be worked in gold and
silver,[269] a manufacture said to have been carried on chiefly by the
Jews,[270] as indeed it is in many parts of Europe at the present time; an
idea which strengthens on finding that two years after the expulsion of
that persecuted tribe from the country, in 1492, the most Catholic kings
found it necessary to pass a law prohibiting the importation of gold lace
from Lucca and Florence, except such as was necessary for ecclesiastical
purposes. Mrs. Palliser was of opinion that thread lace was manufactured in
Spain at this epoch, for, "in the cathedral of Granada is preserved a lace
alb presented to the church by Ferdinand and Isabella, one of the few
relics of ecclesiastical grandeur still extant in the country." The late
Cardinal Wiseman stated to Mrs. Palliser that he had himself officiated in
this vestment, which was valued at 10,000 {93}crowns. But the following
passage from Señor Riano greatly affects the value of what would otherwise
be a fact of importance adduced by Mrs. Palliser. "Notwithstanding the
opinion of so competent an authority as Mrs. Palliser, I doubt the
statement, finding no evidence to support it, that thread lace of a very
fine or artistic kind was ever made in Spain, or exported as an article of
commerce during early times. The lace alb which Mrs. Palliser mentions to
prove this as existing at Granada, a gift of Ferdinand and Isabella in the
fifteenth century, is Flemish lace of the seventeenth."[271]
The sumptuous "Spanish point," the white thread heavy arabesque lace, was
an Italian production originally. It was imported for the Spanish churches
and then imitated in the convents by the nuns, but was little known to the
commercial world of Europe until the dissolution of the Spanish
monasteries[272] in 1830, when the most splendid specimens of nun's work
came suddenly into the market; not only the heavy lace generally designated
as "Spanish point," but pieces of the very finest description (like point
de Venise), so exquisite as to have been the work only of those whose "time
was not money," and whose devotion to the Church and to their favourite
saints rendered this work a labour of love, when in plying their needles
they called to mind its destination. Among the illustrations are some
photographs received from Rome of some curious relics of old Spanish
conventual work, parchment patterns with the lace in progress. They were
found in the Convent of Jesù Bambino, and belonged to some Spanish nuns
who, in bygone ages, taught the art to the novices. None of the present
inmates can give further information respecting them. The work, like all
point, was executed in separate pieces given out to the different nuns and
then joined together by a more skilful hand. In Fig. 44 we see the pattern
traced out by two threads fixed in their places by small stitches made at
intervals by a needle and aloe[273] thread working from underneath. The
réseau ground is alone worked in. We see the thread left as by Sister
Felice Vittoria when she last plied her task.
{94}Fig. 45 has the pearled ground, the pattern traced as in the other.
Loops of a coarser thread are placed at the corners, either to fasten the
parchment to a light frame, like a schoolboy's slate, or to attach it to a
cushion. In Fig. 46 the pattern is just worked.
[Illustration: Fig. 44.
UNFINISHED WORK OF A SPANISH NUN.]
PLATE XXIX.
[Illustration: SPANISH. MODERN THREAD BOBBIN LACE MADE AT
ALMAGRO.--Slightly reduced.]
PLATE XXX.
[Illustration: SPANISH, BLONDE. WHITE SILK DARNING ON MACHINE
NET.--Nineteenth century. Much reduced.
Photos by A. Dryden from private collections.]
_To face page 94._
{95}A possible reference to lace is found in Father Fr. Marcos Antonio de
Campos,[274] in his book, _Microscosmia y gobierno Universal del Hombre
Crestiano_, when he writes, "I will not be silent, and fail to mention the
time lost these last years in the manufacture of _cadenetas_, a work of
thread combined with gold and silver; this extravagance and excess reached
such a point that hundreds and thousands of ducats were spent in this work,
in which, besides destroying the eyesight, wasting away the lives, and
rendering consumptive the women who worked it, and preventing them from
spending their time with more advantage to their souls, a few ounces of
thread and years of time were wasted with so unsatisfactory a result. I ask
myself, after the fancy has passed away, will the lady or gentleman find
that the chemises that cost them fifty ducats, or the _basquina_
(petticoats) that cost them three hundred, are worth half their price?"
[Illustration: Fig. 45.
UNFINISHED WORK OF A SPANISH NUN.]
"The most important of Spanish ordinances[275] relating to Spanish art and
industry are those which appeared in the {96}fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries in Toleda and Seville, both remarkable centres for all kinds of
artistic productions. In neither of these, nor in the sixteenth and
seventeenth century ordinances relating to Granada--another art-centre--is
there any mention of lace.
[Illustration: Fig. 46.
UNFINISHED WORK OF A SPANISH NUN.]
"In the laws which were passed by Ferdinand and Isabella at the end of the
fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth centuries, no mention is made of
lace, though numerous {97}details of costumes are named. It will be seen
from these remarks on Spanish lace that we give to Italy the credit of
producing the artistic and valuable point lace, which unexpectedly came out
of Spain after the dissolution of the monasteries."
The ordinance of Philip III, against the wearing of lace, dated 1623, which
enjoined "simples rabats, sans aucune invention de point couppé ou
passement" for the men, with fraises and manchettes in like trim for the
ladies, both too without starch,[276] and which extended to gold and silver
lace, was suspended during the matrimonial visit of Prince Charles;[277]
indeed, the Queen of Spain herself sent him, on his arrival at Madrid, ten
trunks of richly-laced linen. The Prince had travelled incognito, and was
supposed to be ill-provided. Whether the surmises of her Majesty were
correct, we cannot presume to affirm; we only know that, on the occasion of
the Spanish voyage, a charge of two dozen and a half laced shirts, at
twelve shillings each, for the Prince's eight footmen, appears in the
wardrobe accounts.[278]
The best account of Spanish manners of the seventeenth century will be
found in the already-mentioned _Letters of a Lady's Travels in Spain_.
"Under the vertingale of black taffety," she writes, "they wear a dozen or
more petticoats, one finer than the other, of rich stuffs trimmed with lace
of gold and silver, to the girdle. They wear at all times a white garment
called _sabenqua_; it is made of the finest English lace, and four ells in
compass. I have seen some worth five or six hundred crowns;... so great is
their vanity, they would rather have one of these lace _sabenquas_ than a
dozen coarse ones;[279] and either lie in bed till it is washed, or dress
themselves without any, which they frequently enough do." A number of
portraits exist in the Spanish galleries, {98}especially by Velasquez and
Carrêno, in which these extravagant costumes are fully portrayed, but in
very few Spanish portraits of the seventeenth century does thread lace of
the kind known to us as point d'Espagne, or de Venise ever appear.
Describing her visit to the Princess of Monteleon, the author continues:
"Her bed is of gold and green damask, lined with silver brocade, and
trimmed with point de Spain.[280] Her sheets were laced round with an
English lace, half an ell deep. The young Princess bade her maids bring in
her wedding clothes. They brought in thirty silver baskets, so heavy, four
women could carry only one basket; the linen and lace were not inferior to
the rest." The writer continues to enumerate the garters, mantle, and even
the curtains of the Princess's carriage, as trimmed with fine English
thread, black and bone lace.[281]
Judging from this account, Spain at that period received her "dentelles
d'Angleterre" from the Low Countries. Spain was early celebrated for its
silk,[282] which with its coloured embroidered laces, and its gold and
silver points, have always enjoyed a certain reputation. Of the latter,
during the seventeenth century, we have constant mention in the wardrobe
accounts and books of fashion of the French court. The description of the
celebrated gold bed at Versailles, the interior lacings of the carriages,
the velvet and brocade coats and dresses, "chamarrés de point d'Espagne,"
the laces of gold and coloured silk, would alone fill a volume to
themselves.[283] {99}Narciso Felin, writing in the seventeenth
century,[284] says that at that time "edgings of all sorts of gold,[285]
silver, silk, thread, and aloe, are made there with greater perfection than
in Flanders." Campany, another old author, carries the number of
lace-makers to 12,000. The Spaniards are said, nevertheless, in 1634, to
have derived a great part of their laces from the Île de France, while the
French, on their part, preferred those of Flanders.[286] That the lace
import was considered excessive is evident by the tariff of 1667; the
import duty of twenty-five reals per pound on lace was augmented to two
hundred and fifty reals. Much point was introduced into Spain at this time
by way of Antwerp to Cadiz, under the name of "puntos de mosquito e de
transillas."
Madame des Ursins, 1707, in a letter to Madame de Maintenon, ordering the
layette of the Queen of Spain from Paris, writes: "If I were not afraid of
offending those concerned in the purchase, in my avarice for the King of
Spain's money, I would beg them to send a low-priced lace for the linen."
{100}This gold point d'Espagne was much fabricated for home consumption.
The oldest banner of the Inquisition--that of Valladolid--is described as
bordered with real point d'Espagne, of a curious Gothic (geometric) design.
At the Auto-da-fè, the grandees of Spain and officers of the Holy Office
marched attired in cloaks, with black and white crosses, edged with this
gold lace. Silver point d'Espagne was also worn on the uniform of the
Maestranza, a body of nobility formed into an order of chivalry at Seville,
Ronda, Valencia and Granada. Even the saints were rigged out, especially
St. Anthony, at Valencia, whose laced costume, periwig and ruffles are
described as "glorious."
[Illustration: Fig. 47.
OLD SPANISH PILLOW-LACE.]
Point d'Espagne was likewise made in France, introduced by one Simon
Châtelain, a Huguenot, about 1596, in return for which good services he
received more protection than his advanced opinions warranted. Colbert,
becoming minister in 1662, guaranteed to Simon his safety--a boon already
refused to many by the intolerant spirit of the times. He died in 1675,
having amassed a large fortune.[287] That the fabric prospered, the
following entry in the wardrobe accounts of the Duke de Penthièvre, 1732,
gives proof:[288] "Un bord de Point d'Espagne d'or de Paris, à fonds de
réseau." "France," writes Anderson, "exports much lace into Spain."
PLATE XXXI.
[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF THE DUCHESSE DE MONTPENSIER, INFANTA OF SPAIN,
SHOWING MANTILLA.
Middle of nineteenth century. M. de Versailles.]
_To face page 100._
{101}"The sumptuary law of 1723 has taken away," writes the author of two
thick books on Spanish commerce, "all pretence for importing all sorts of
point and lace of white and black silk which are not the manufactures of
our kingdom. The Spaniards acted on Lord Verulam's policy--that foreign
superfluities should be prohibited[289]--for by so doing you either banish
them or gain the manufacture." But towards the middle of the eighteenth
century there are notices of constant seizures of vessels bound from St.
Malo to Cadiz, freighted with gold and silver lace. The _Eagle_, French
vessel, taken by Captain Carr, in 1745, bore cases to the value of
£150,000.[290] In 1789 we also read that the exports of lace from the port
of Marseilles alone to Cadiz exceeded £500,000,[291] and the author of the
_Apendice a la Educacion Popular_[292] states that "all the five qualities
(of lace) come from foreign lands, and the greater varieties of coarser
ones."
Gold and silver lace were made at Barcelona, Talavera de la Reyna, Valencia
and Seville. In 1808 that of Seville was flourishing. The gold is badly
prepared, having a red cast. The manufacture of blonde is almost entirely
confined to Catalonia, where it is made in many of the villages along the
sea-coast, and especially in the city of Barcelona. In 1809 it gave
employment to 12,000 persons, a number which in 1869 was augmented to
34,000.
There are no large manufactories, and the trade is in the hands of women
and children, who make it on their own account, and as they please.[293]
Swinburne, who visited Spain in 1775, writes: "The women of the hamlets
were busy with their bobbins making black lace, some of which, of the
coarser kind, is spun out of the leaf of the aloe. It is curious, but of
little use, for it grows mucilaginous with washing." He adds: "At Barcelona
there is a great trade in thread lace."[294] Larruga, in his
{102}_Memorias_,[295] mentions a manufacture of gold and silver lace which
had been set up lately in Madrid, and in another place he[296] mentions
lace made at La Mancha,[297] where "the industry of lace has existed at
Almagro from time immemorial." Don Manuel Fernandez and Donna Rita Lambert,
his wife, natives of Madrid, established in this town in 1766 a manufacture
of silk and thread lace. This industry also existed at Granatula,
Manzanares and other villages in La Mancha. At Zamora "lace and blonde were
made in private houses." In _Sempere Historia del Lujo_[298] we find that
in the ordinance issued in 1723 the "introduction of every sort of edgings
or foreign laces was prohibited; the only kinds allowed were those made in
the country." Cabanillas writes[299] that at Novelda a third part of the
inhabitants made lace, and that "more than 2,000 among women and children
worked at this industry, and the natives themselves hawked their wares
about the country."[300]
The laces of New Castile were exported to America, to which colonies, in
1723, the sumptuary laws were extended, as more necessary than in Spain,
"many families having been ruined," says Ustariz, "by the great quantities
of fine lace and gold stuffs they purchased of foreign manufacture, by
which means Spanish America is drained of many millions of dollars."[301] A
Spanish lace-maker does not earn on an average two reals (5d.) a day.[302]
The national mantilla is, of course, the principal piece manufactured. Of
the three kinds which, _de rigueur_, form the toilette of the Spanish lady,
the first is composed of white blonde, a most unbecoming contrast to their
sallow, olive complexion; this is only used on state occasions--birthdays,
bull-fights, and Easter Mondays. The second is black {103}blonde, trimmed
with a deep lace. The third, "mantilla de tiro," for ordinary wear, is made
of black silk, trimmed with velvet. A Spanish woman's mantilla is held
sacred by law, and cannot be seized for debt.[303] The silk employed for
the lace is of a superior quality. Near Barcelona is a silk-spinning
manufactory, whose products are specially used for the blondes of the
country. Spanish silk laces do not equal in workmanship those of Bayeux and
Chantilly, either in the firmness of the ground or regularity of the
pattern. The annual produce of this industry scarcely amounts to
£80,000.[304]
Specimens of Barcelona white lace have been forwarded to us from Spain,
bearing the dates of 1810, 1820, 1830 and 1840. Some have much resemblance
to the fabric of Lille--clear hexagonal ground, with the pattern worked in
one coarse thread; others are of a double ground, the designs flowers,
bearing evidence of a Flemish origin.[305]
Spain sent to the International Exhibitions, together with her black and
white mantillas, fanciful laces gaily embroidered in coloured silks and
gold thread--an ancient fabric lately revived, but constantly mentioned in
the inventories of the French Court of the seventeenth century, and also by
the lady whose letters we have already quoted. When describing a visit to
Donna Teresa de Toledo, who received her in bed, she writes: "She had
several little pillows tied with ribbons and trimmed with broad fine lace.
She had 'lasses' all of flowers of point de Spain in silk and gold, which
looked very pretty."[306]
The finest specimen of Spanish work exhibited in 1862 {104}was a mantilla
of white blonde, the ground a light guipure, the pattern, wreaths of
flowers supported by Cupids. In the official report on Lace and Embroidery
at the International Exhibition of that year, we read that "the manufacture
of black and white Spanish lace shows considerable progress since 1851,
both in respect of design and fabrication. The black mantillas vary in
value from £4 to £50, and upwards of 20,000 persons are said to be employed
in their manufacture."
Before concluding our account of Spanish lace, we must allude to the
"dentelles de Moresse," supposed by M. Francisque Michel[307] to be of
Iberian origin, fabricated by the descendants of the Moors who remained in
Spain and embraced Christianity. These points are named in the
above-mentioned "Révolte des Passemens," where the author thus announces
their arrival at the fair of St. Germain:--
"Il en vint que, le plus souvent.
On disoit venir du Levant;
Il en vint des bords de l'Ibère.
Il en vint d'arriver n'agueres
Des pays septentrionaux."
What these points were it would be difficult to state. In the inventory of
Henry VIII. is marked down, "a purle of morisco work."
One of the pattern-books gives on its title-page--
"Dantique et Roboesque
En comprenant aussi Moresque."
A second speaks of "Moreschi et arabesche."[308] A third is entitled, "Un
livre de moresque."[309] A fourth, "Un livre de feuillages entrelatz et
ouvrages moresques."[310] All we can say on the subject is, that the making
cloths of chequered lace formed for a time the favourite employment of
Moorish maidens, and they are still to be purchased, yellow with age, in
the African cities of Tangier and Tetuan. They may be distinguished from
those worked by Christian fingers from the absence of all animals in the
pattern, the representation of living creatures, either in painting,
sculpture, or embroidery, being strictly forbidden by Mahommedan law.
PLATE XXXII.
[Illustration: JEWISH.--Made in Syria. The pattern is only modern Torchon,
but the knotting stitch is their peculiar tradition. Same size.]
PLATE XXXIII.
[Illustration: SPANISH.--The upper one is a copy of Italian lace clumsily
made. The lower is probably a "dentelle de Moresse." Widths about 3½ in.
Photo by A. Dryden from Salviati & Co.'s Collection.]
_To face page 104._
{105}PORTUGAL.
Point lace was held in high estimation in Portugal. There was no regular
manufacture; it formed the amusement of the nuns and a few women who worked
at their own houses. The sumptuary law of 1749 put an end to all luxury
among the laity. Even those who exposed such wares as laces in the streets
were ordered to quit the town.[311]