Vigoureux, se délecte en toutes choses belles,
Prenez de bonne part ces nouvelles modelles
Que vous offre la main de ce maistre gentil."
He states that he has travelled and brought back from Italy some patterns,
without alluding to Vinciolo. At the end, in a chapter of good advice to
young ladies, after exhorting them to "salutairement passer la journée,
tant pour l'âme que pour le corps," he winds up that he is aware that other
exercises, such as stretching the hands and feet, "se frotter un peu les
points des bras," and combing the hair, are good for the health; that to
wash the hands occasionally in cold water is both "civil et honnête," etc.
[Illustration: PLATE XLIII.
BINCHE.--Width, 2-1/8 in.]
[Illustration: PLATE XLIV.
BELGIAN, BOBBIN-MADE.
MARCHE.--End of eighteenth century. In the Musée Cinquantenaire, Brussels.]
BELGIAN, BOBBIN-MADE.
PLATE XLV.
[Illustration: DRAWN AND EMBROIDERED MUSLIN, resembling fine lace.--Flemish
work. End of eighteenth century. Width, 2½ in., not including the modern
heading.
Photos by A. Dryden from private collections.]
_To face page 136._
{137}"Dentelles de Liège, fines et grosses de toutes sortes," are mentioned
with those of Lorraine and Du Comté (Franche-Comté) in the tariff fixed by
a French edict of September 18th, 1664.[387] Mrs. Calderwood, who visited
Liège in 1756, admires the point-edging to the surplices of the canons,
which, she remarks, "have a very genteel appearance." The manufacture had
declined at Liège, in 1802, when it is classed by the French Commissioners
among the "fabriques moins considérables," and the lace-makers of the Rue
Pierreuse, who made a "garniture étroite"--the "caïeteresses"[388]--had
died out in 1881. The same work is now carried on at Laroche.[389]
The lace products of St. Trond, in the province of Limburgh, appear by the
report of the French Commission of 1803 to have been of some importance.
Lace, they say, is made at St. Trond, where from 800 to 900 are so
employed, either at their own homes or in the workshops of the
lace-manufacturers. The laces resemble those of Brussels and Mechlin, and
although they have a lesser reputation in commerce, several descriptions
are made, and about 8,000 metres are produced of laces of first quality,
fetching from twelve to fourteen francs the metre. These laces are chiefly
made for exportation, and are sold mostly in Holland and at the Frankfort
fairs. The report concludes by stating that the vicissitudes of war, in
diminishing the demand for objects of luxury, has much injured the trade;
and also suggests that some provisions should be made to stop the abuses
arising from the bad faith of the lace-makers, who often sell the materials
given them to work with.[390][391]
{138}Many of the Belgian churches have lace among the _trésors d'église_. A
great number of the convents also possess beautiful lace, for girls who
have been educated in them often give their bridal lace, after their
marriage, to the chapel of the convent.
At Bruges, an ancient turreted house of the fifteenth century, the Gruuthus
mansion, now restored, contains one of the finest collections of lace in
the world--a collection of Flemish laces presented to the town by the
Baroness Liedts. Bruges itself, and the country round, is full of
lace-workers, some working in factories or _ateliers_ at the guipure de
Flandres, others working at the coarse cheap torchon, sitting in the sun by
the quiet canal-sides, or in the stone-cobbled lanes of the old city, where
their house-door opens into a room as dark and narrow as a fox-earth, and
leading a life so poor that English competition in the cheaper forms of
lace is impossible.
Within the last few years the immense development of the Belgian lace trade
has overthrown the characteristic lace of each city. Lace, white and black,
point and pillow, may at the present time be met with in every province of
the now flourishing kingdom of Belgium.[392]
{139}CHAPTER VIII.
FRANCE TO LOUIS XIV.
"Il est une déesse inconstante, incommode,
Bizarre dans ses goûts, folle en ses ornements,
Qui parait, fuit, revient, et renaît, en tout temps:
Protée était son père, et son nom est la mode."--Voltaire.
"To-day the French
All clinquant, all in gold."--Shakespeare.
To the Italian influences of the sixteenth century France owes the fashion
for points coupés and lace.[393] It was under the Valois and the Médicis
that the luxury of embroidery, laces of gold, silver, and thread, attained
its greatest height, and point coupé was as much worn at that epoch, as
were subsequently the points of Italy and Flanders.
Ruffs and cuffs, according to Quicherat, first appeared in France in 1540.
The ruff or fraise, as it was termed from its fancied resemblance to the
caul[394] or frill of the calf, first {140}adopted by Henry II. to conceal
a scar, continued in favour with his sons. The Queen-mother herself wore
mourning from the day of the King's death; no decoration therefore appears
upon her wire-mounted ruff,[395] but the fraises of her family and the
_escadron volante_ are profusely trimmed with the geometric work of the
period, and the making of laces and point coupé was the favourite
employment of her court. It is recorded that the girls and servants of her
household consumed much time in making squares of _réseuil_, and Catherine
de Médicis had a bed draped with these squares of _réseuil_ or _lacis_.
Catherine encouraged dress and extravagance, and sought by brilliant fêtes
to turn people's minds from politics. In this she was little seconded
either by her husband or gloomy son, King Charles; but Henry III. and his
"mignons frisés et fraisés" were tricked out in garments of the brightest
colours--toques and toquets, pearl necklaces and earrings. The ruff was the
especial object of royal interest. With his own hand he used the
poking-sticks and adjusted the plaits. "Gaudronneur des collets de sa
femme" was the soubriquet bestowed on him by the satirists of the day.[396]
By 1579 the ruffs of the French court had attained such an outrageous size,
"un tiers d'aulne,"[397] in depth that the wearers could scarcely turn
their heads.[398] "Both men and women wore them intolerably large, being a
quarter of a yard deep and twelve lengths in a ruff," writes Stone. In
London the fashion was termed the "French ruff"; in France, on the other
hand, it was the "English monster." Blaise de Viginière describes them as
"gadrooned like organ-pipes, contorted or crinkled like cabbages, and as
big as the sails of a windmill." So absurd was the effect, the
{141}journalist of Henry III.[399] declares "they looked like the head of
John the Baptist in a charger."
Nor could they eat so encumbered. It is told how Reine Margot one day, when
seated at dinner, was compelled to send for a spoon with a handle two feet
in length wherewith to eat her soup.[400] These monstrosities, "so
stiffened that they cracked like paper,"[401] found little favour beyond
the precincts of the Louvre. They were caricatured by the writers of the
day; and when, in 1579, Henry III. appeared thus attired at the fair of St.
Germain, he was met by a band of students decked out in large paper cuffs,
shouting, "À la fraise on connoit le veau"--for which impertinence the King
sent them to prison.[402] Suddenly, at the Court of Henry, the fraise gave
way to the rabat, or turn-down collar.[403] In vain were sumptuary edicts
issued against luxury.[404] The court set a bad example; and in 1577, at
the meeting of the States of Blois, Henry wore on his own dress four
thousand yards of pure gold lace. His successor, Henry IV., issued several
fresh ordinances[405] against "clinquants [406] et dorures." Touching the
last, Regnier, the satirist, writes:--
"A propos, on m'a dit
Que contre les clinquants le roy faict un edict."[407]
Better still, the King tried the effect of example: he wore a coat of grey
cloth with a doublet of taffety, without either {142}trimming or lace--a
piece of economy little appreciated by the public. His dress, says an
author, "sentait des misères de la Ligue." Sully, anxious to emulate the
simplicity of the King, laughed at those "qui portoient leurs moulins et
leurs bois de haute futaie sur leurs dos."[408] "It is necessary," said he,
"to rid ourselves of our neighbours' goods, which deluge the country." So
he prohibited, under pain of corporal punishment, any more dealings with
the Flemish merchants.
But edicts failed to put down point coupé; Reine Margot, Madame Gabrielle,
and Bassompierre were too strong for him.
The Wardrobe Accounts of Henry's first queen are filled with entries of
point coupé and "passements à l'aiguille";[409] and though Henry usually
wore the silk-wrought shirts of the day,[410] we find in the inventory of
his wife one entered as trimmed with cut-work.[411] Wraxall declares to
have seen exhibited at a booth on the Boulevart de Bondy, the shirt worn by
Henry when assassinated. "It is ornamented," he writes, "with a broad lace
round the collar and breast. The two wounds inflicted by the assassin's
knife are plainly visible."[412]
PLATE XLVI.
[Illustration: RUFF, EDGED WITH LACE.--In the Musée de Cluny, Paris.]
_To face page 142._
{143}In the inventory[413] made at the death of Madame Gabrielle, the fair
Duchesse de Beaufort, we find entered sleeves and towels of point couppé,
with fine handkerchiefs, gifts of the King to be worn at court, of such an
extraordinary value that Henry requires them to be straightway restored to
him. In the same list appears the duchess's bed of ivory,[414] with
hangings for the room of rézeuil.[415]
The Chancellor Herault,[416] who died at the same period, was equally
extravagant in his habits; while the shirts of the combatants in the duel
between M. de Crequy and Don Philippe de Savoie are specially vaunted as
"toutes garnies du plus fin et du plus riche point coupé qu'on eust pu
trouver dans ce temps là, auquel le point de Gennes et de Flandres
n'estoient pas en usage."[417]
The enormous collarette, rising behind her head like a {144}fan, of Mary de
Médicis, with its edgings of fine lace, are well known to the admirers of
Rubens:--
"Cinq colets de dentelle haute de demy-piè
L'un sur l'autre montez, qui ne vont qu'a moitié
De celuys de dessus, car elle n'est pas leste,
Si le premier ne passe une paulme la teste."[418]
On the accession of Louis XIII, luxury knew no bounds. The Queen Regent was
magnificent by nature, while Richelieu, anxious to hasten the ruin of the
nobles, artfully encouraged their prodigality. But Mary was compelled to
repress this taste for dress. The courtiers importuned her to increase
their pensions, no longer sufficient for the exigencies of the day. The
Queen, at her wits' end, published in 1613 a "Réglement pour les
superfluités des habits," prohibiting all lace and embroidery.[419]
France had early sent out books of patterns for cut-work and lace. That of
Francisque Pelegrin was published at Paris in the reign of Francis I. Six
were printed at Lyons alone. The four earlier have no date,[420] the two
others bear those of 1549[421] and 1585.[422] It was to these first that
Vinciolo so contemptuously alludes in his dedication, "Aux Benevolles
Lecteurs," saying, "Si les premiers ouvrages que vous avez vus out engendré
quelque fruit et utilité je m'assure que les miens en produiront
davantage." Various editions of Vinciolo were printed at Paris from 1587 to
1623; the earlier dedicated to Queen Louise de Lorraine; a second to
Catherine de Bourbon, sister of Henry IV.; the last to Anne of Austria. The
_Pratique de Leguille de Milour M. Mignerak_ was published by the same
printer, 1605; and we have another work, termed _Bèle Prerie_, also printed
at Paris, bearing date 1601.[423]
The points of Italy and Flanders now first appear at court, and the Church
soon adopted the prevailing taste for the decoration of her altars and her
prelates.[424]
PLATE XLVII.
[Illustration: BRUSSELS. FLOUNCE, BOBBIN-MADE.--Late seventeenth century.
Given by Madame de Maintenon to Fénélon, Archbishop of Cambrai. Now in the
Victoria and Albert Museum.
Height, 2 ft. 2 in.]
_To face page 146._
{145}The ruff is finally discarded and replaced by the "col rabattu," with
its deep-scalloped border of point. The "manchettes à revers" are trimmed
in the same manner, and the fashion even extends to the tops of the boots.
Of these lace-trimmed boots the favourite, Cinq-Mars, left three hundred
pairs at his death, 1642. From his portrait, after Lenain, which hangs in
the Gallery of Versailles, we give one of these boots (Fig. 66), and his
rich collerette of Point de Gênes (Fig. 67).
[Illustration: Fig. 66.
CINQ-MARS.--(M. de Versailles.)]
The garters, now worn like a scarf round the knee, have the ends adorned
with point. A large rosette of lace completes the costume of the epoch
(Fig. 68).
{146}Gold lace shared the favour of the thread fabric on gloves,[425]
garters and shoes.[426]
"De large taftas la jartière parée
Aux bouts de demy-pied de dentelle dorée."[427]
The cuffs, collars of the ladies either falling back or rising behind their
shoulders in double tier, caps, aprons descending to their feet (Fig. 69),
are also richly decorated with lace.
[Illustration: Fig. 67.
CINQ-MARS.--(After his portrait by Le Nain. M. de Versailles.)]
The contemporary engravings of Abraham Bosse and Callot faithfully portray
the fashions of this reign. In the Prodigal Son, of Abraham Bosse, the
mother, waiting his {147}return, holds out to her repentant boy a collar
trimmed with the richest point. The Foolish Virgins weep in lace-trimmed
handkerchiefs, and the table-cloth of the rich man, as well as his
dinner-napkins, are similarly adorned. Again, the Accouchée recovers in a
cap of Italian point under a coverlet of the same. At the Retour de
Baptême, point adorns the christening-dress of the child and the surplice
of the priest.
When, in 1615, Louis XIII. married Anne of Austria, the collerettes of the
Queen-Mother were discarded--the reign of Italy was at an end--all was now
à l'éspagnole and the court of Castile.
[Illustration: Fig. 68.
LACE ROSE AND GARTER.--(After Abraham Bosse.)]
The prodigality of the nobles[428] having called down royal ordinances on
their heads,[429] these new edicts bring forth {148}fresh satires, in which
the author deplores the prohibition of cut-work and lace:--
"Ces points couppez, passemens et dentelles,
Las! que venaient de l'Isle et de Bruxelles,
Sont maintenant descriez, avilis,
Et sans faveur gisent ensevelis;"[430]
but
"Pour vivre heureux et à la mode
Il faut que chacun accommode
Ses habits aux editz du roi."
[Illustration: Fig. 69.
YOUNG LADY'S APRON, TIME OF HENRY III.--(After Gaignières. Bib. Nat.
Grav.)]
Edict now follows on edict.[431] One known as the Code Michaud, entering
into the most minute regulations for the toilet, especially excited the
risibility of the people. It was never carried out. The caricatures of this
period are admirable: one represents a young courtier fresh rigged in his
{149}plain-bordered linen, according to the ordinance. His _valet de
chambre_ is about to lock up his laced suit:--
"C'est avec regret que mon maître
Quitte ses beaux habillemens
Semés de riches passemens."[432]
Another engraving of Abraham Bosse shows a lady of fashion with her lace
discarded and dressed in plain linen cuffs and collar:--
"Quoique l'âge assez de beauté
Pour asseurer sans vanité
Qu'il n'est point de femme plus belle
Il semble pourtant, à mes yeux,
Qu'avec de l'or et la dantelle
Je m'ajuste encore bien mieux."
Alluding to the plain-bordered collars now ordered by the prohibition of
1639, the "Satyrique de la Court" sings:--
"Naguères l'on n'osoit hanter les damoiselles
Que l'on n'eust le colet bien garni de dentelles;
Maintenant on se rit et se moque de ceux là
Qui desirent encore paroistre avec cela.
Les fraises et colets à bord sont en usage,
Sans faire mention de tous en dentellage."
France at this time paying large sums to Italy and Flanders for lace, the
wearing of it is altogether prohibited, under pain of confiscation and a
fine of 6,000 livres.[433] The Queen-Mother, regardless of edicts, has over
_passements d'or_ and all sorts of forbidden articles, "pour servir à la
layette que sa majesté à envoyé en Angleterre."[434] Within scarce one year
of each other passed away Marie de Médicis, Richelieu, and Louis XIII. The
King's effigy was exposed on its "lit de parade vêtue d'une chemise de
toile de Hollande avec de tres belles dantelles de point de Gennes au
collet et aux manches."[435]--So say the chroniclers.
{150}CHAPTER IX.
LOUIS XIV.
The courtiers of the Regency under Anne of Austria vied with the Frondeurs
in extravagance. The latter, however, had the best of it. "La Fronde,"
writes Joly, "devint tellement à la mode qu'il n'y avoit rien de bien fait
qu'on ne dist être de la Fronde. Les étoffes, les dentelles, etc., jusqu'au
pain,--rien n'estoit ni bon, ni bien si n'estoit à la Fronde."[436]
Nor was the Queen Regent herself less profuse in her indulgence in lace.
She is represented in her portraits with a berthe of rich point, her
beautiful hand encircled by a double-scalloped cuff (Fig. 70). The
boot-tops had now reached an extravagant size. One writer compares them to
the farthingales of the ladies, another to an inverted torch. The lords of
the Regent's court filled up the apertures with two or three rows of Genoa
point (Fig. 71).
In 1653,[437] we find Mazarin, while engaged in the siege of a city,
holding a grave correspondence with his secretary Colbert concerning the
purchase of some points from Flanders, Venice, and Genoa. He considers it
advisable to advance thirty or forty thousand livres "à ces achapts,"
adding, that by making the purchases in time he will derive great advantage
in the price; but as he hopes the siege will soon be at an end, they may
wait his arrival at Paris for his final decision.[438]
PLATE XLVIII.
[Illustration: BRUSSELS. BOBBIN-MADE.--Period Louis XIV., 1643-1715.
In the Musée Cinquantenaire, Brussels.]
PLATE XLIX.
[Illustration: BRUSSELS. POINT D'ANGLETERRE À RÉSEAU.--Eighteenth century.
Widths, 2 in. and 3½ in.
Photo by A. Dryden.]
_To face page 150._
{151}[Illustration: Fig. 70.
ANNE OF AUSTRIA.--(M. de Versailles.)]
Colbert again writes, November 25th, pressing his Eminence on account of
the "quantité de mariages qui se feront l'hyver." A passage in Tallemant
des Réaux would lead one to suppose these laces were destined as patterns
for the improvement of French manufactures. "Per mostra di farne in
Francia," as the Cardinal expressed himself. Certainly in the inventory of
Mazarin[439] there are no mention of Italian points, no lace coverlets to
his "Lict d'ange moire tabizée, couleur de rose chamarrée de {152}dentelles
d'or et d'argent." We may almost imagine that the minister and his
secretary combined were already meditating the establishment of Points de
France.
In this reign, fresh sumptuary ordinances are issued. That of November
27th, 1660, is the most important of all,[440] and is highly commended by
Sganarelle in the "Ecole des Maris" of Molière which appeared the following
year:--
"Oh! trois et quatre fois soit béni cet édit,
Par qui des vêtemens le luxe est interdit;
Les peines des maris ne seront pas si grandes,
Et les femmes auront un frein à leurs demandes.
Oh! que je sais au roi bon gré de ses décrets;
Et que, pour le repos de ces mêmes maris,
Je voudrais bien qu'on fit de la coquetterie
Comme de la guipure et de la broderie."
[Illustration: Fig. 71.
A COURTIER OF THE REGENCY.--(After Abraham Bosse.)]
This ordinance, after prohibiting all foreign "passemens, points de Gênes,
points coupés," etc., or any French laces or passements exceeding an inch
in width, allows the use of the "collerettes and manchettes" persons
already possess for the space of one year, after which period they are only
to be trimmed with a lace made in the kingdom, not exceeding an {153}inch
in width. The ordinance then goes on to attack the "canons," which it
states have been introduced into the kingdom, with "un excès de dépense
insupportable, par la quantité de passemens, points de Venise et Gênes,"
with which they are loaded.[441] Their use of them is now entirely
prohibited, unless made of plain linen or of the same stuff as the coat,
without lace or any ornament. The lace-trimmed "canons" of Louis XIV., as
represented in the picture of his interview with Philip IV., in the Island
of Pheasants, previous to his marriage, 1660 (Fig. 72), give a good idea of
these extravagant appendages. These
"Canons à trois étages
A leurs jambes faisoient d'ombrages."[442]
And, what was worse, they would cost 7,000 livres a pair. "At the Court of
France," writes Savinière, "people think nothing of buying rabats,
manchettes, or canons to the value of 13,000 crowns."[443] These canons,
with their accompanying rheingraves, which after the prohibition of Venice
point were adorned with the new productions of France, suddenly
disappeared. In 1682, the _Mercure_ announces, "Les canons et les
rheingraves deviennent tout à fait hors de mode."
At the marriage of the young King with the Infanta, 1660, black lace,[444]
probably in compliment to the Spanish[445] {154}court, came into favour,
the nobles of the King's suite wearing doublets of gold and silver brocade,
"ornés," says the _Chronique_,[446] "de dentelles noires d'un point
recherché."[447] The same writer, describing the noviciate of La Vallière
at the Carmelites, writes, "Les dames portoient des robes de brocard d'or,
d'argent, ou d'azur, par dessus lesquelles elles avoient jetées d'autres
robes et dentelles noires transparentes."[448] Under Louis XIV., the gold
and silver points of Spain and Aurillac rivalled the thread fabrics of
Flanders and Italy; but towards the close of the century,[449] we are
informed, they have fallen from fashion into the "domaine du vulgaire."
The ordinance of 1660 had but little effect, for various others are issued
in the following years with the oft-repeated prohibitions of the points of
Genoa and Venice.[450] But edicts were of little avail. No royal command
could compel people to substitute the coarse inferior laces of France[451]
for the fine artistic productions of her sister countries. Colbert
therefore wisely adopted another expedient. He determined to develop the
lace-manufacture of France, and to produce fabrics which should rival the
coveted points of Italy and Flanders, so that if fortunes were lavished
upon these luxuries, at all events the money should not be sent out of the
kingdom to procure them.
He therefore applied to Monseigneur de Bonzy, Bishop of Béziers, then
Ambassador at Venice, who replied that in Venice "all the convents and poor
families make a living out of this lace-making." In another letter he
writes to the minister, "Je vois que vous seriez bien aise d'establir dans
le royaume la manufacture des points de Venise, ce qui se pourrait faire en
envoyant d'icy quelques filles des meilleures ouvrières qui pussent
instruire celles de France avec le temps."[452]
[Illustration: Fig. 72.
CANONS OF LOUIS XIV.--(M. de Versailles, 1660.)
_To face page 154._]