considered to be the most ancient and considerable in France. It is
distributed over the four departments,[649] and employs from 125,000 to
130,000 women. It forms the sole industry of the Haute-Loire, in which
department alone are 70,000 lace-makers.
The lace industry of Le Puy, like all others, has experienced various
changes; it has had its trials[650] and its periods of great
prosperity.[651] In the chronicles of Le Puy of the sixteenth century[652]
we read that the merciers of Notre-Dame {243}des Anges "qui, suivant
l'usage faisaient dans notre ville le commerce des passementeries,
broderies, dentelles, etc., comptaient alors quarante boutiques, et qu'ils
figurent avec enseignes et torches au premier rang dans les solennités
religieuses."
Judging from local documents, this manufacture has for more than two
centuries back formed the chief occupation of the women of this province.
It suffered from the sumptuary edicts of 1629, 1635 and 1639, and in 1640
threatened to be annihilated altogether. In the month of January of that
year, the Seneschal of Le Puy published throughout the city a decree of the
Parliament of Toulouse, which forbade, under pain of heavy fine, all
persons of whatever sex, quality, or condition, to wear upon their
vestments any lace "tant de soie que de fil blanc, ensemble passement,
clinquant d'or ni d'argent fin ou faux;" thus by one ordinance annihilating
the industry of the province. The reason for this absurd edict was twofold:
first, in consequence of the large number of women employed in the lace
trade, there was great difficulty in obtaining domestic servants; secondly,
the general custom of wearing lace among all classes caused the shades of
distinction between the high and low to disappear. These ordinances, as may
be imagined, created great consternation throughout Le Puy. Father Régis, a
Jesuit, who was then in the province, did his best to console the sufferers
thus reduced to beggary by the caprice of Parliament. "Ayez confiance en
Dieu," he said; "la dentelle ne perira pas." He set out to Toulouse, and by
his remonstrances obtained a revocation of the edict. Nor did he rest
satisfied with his good work. At his suggestion the Jesuits opened to the
Auvergne laces a new market in Spain and the New World, which, until the
year 1790, was the occasion of great prosperity to the province. The Jesuit
Father, who died in December 1640, was later canonised for his good deeds;
and under his new appellation of Saint François Régis, is still held in the
greatest veneration by the women of Auvergne--as the patron saint of the
lace-makers.
Massillon, when bishop of Clermont (1717), greatly patronised the
lace-makers of his diocese, and, anxious that the province should itself
furnish the thread used in the manufacture, he purchased a quantity of
spinning-wheels, which he distributed among the poor families of
Beauregard, {244}the village in which the summer palace of the bishop,
previous to the Revolution, was situated.
The lace trade of this province frequently appears on the scene during the
eighteenth century. In 1707 the manufacturers demand a remission of the
import duties of 1664 as unfair,[653] and with success. Scarce ten years
afterwards,[654] notwithstanding the privilege accorded, we again find them
in trouble; whether their patterns did not advance with the fashions of the
day, or the manufacturers deteriorated the quality of the thread--too often
the effect of commercial prosperity--the shops were filled with lace,
"propres, les unes pour l'Italie, d'autres pour les mers du Sud," which the
merchants refused to buy. To remedy this bad state of affairs, the
commissioners assembled at Montpelier coolly decide that the diocese should
borrow 60,000 livres to purchase the dead stock, and so clear the market.
After some arguments the lace was bought by the Sieur Jerphanion, Syndic of
the diocese.
Prosperity, however, was not restored, for in 1755 we again hear of a grant
of 1,000 livres, payable in ten years by the States of Vélay, for the
relief of the distressed lace-makers, and again a fresh demand for
exemption of the export duty.[655] This is declared in a memorial of 1761
to be the chief cause of the distress, which memorial also states that, to
employ the people in a more lucrative way, a manufacture of blondes and
silk laces had been introduced. This distress is supposed to have been
somewhat exaggerated by the merciers of Le Puy, whose profits must have
been very considerable; the women, according to Arthur Young, earning only
from four to eight sous daily.
Peuchet, with his predecessor, Savary, and other writers on statistics,
describe the manufacture of Le Puy as the most flourishing in France. "Her
lace," writes Peuchet, "resembles greatly that of Flanders; much is
consumed in the {245}French dominions, and a considerable quantity exported
to Spain, Portugal, Germany, Italy and England. Much thread lace is also
expedited by way of Cadiz to Peru and Mexico. The ladies of these countries
trim their petticoats and other parts of their dress with such a profusion
of lace as to render the consumption 'prodigieuse.'" "Les Anglois en
donnent des commissions en contrebande pour l'Isthmus de Panama. Les
Hollandois en demandent aussi et faisaient expédier à Cadiz à leur
compte."[656] We read, however, after a time, that the taste for a finer
description of lace having penetrated to Mexico and Peru, the commerce of
Le Puy had fallen off, and that from that epoch the work-people had
supported themselves by making blondes and black lace. The thread used in
Auvergne comes from Haarlem, purchased either from the merchants of Rouen
or Lyons. In the palmy days of Le Puy her lace-workers consumed annually to
the amount of 400,000 livres. The laces made for exportation were of a
cheap quality, varying from edgings of 30 sous to 45 livres the piece of 12
ells; of these the annual consumption amounted to 1,200,000 livres.[657] It
may indeed be said that, with the exception of the period of the French
Revolution to 1801, the lace trade of Le Puy has ever been prosperous.
Formerly they only made at Le Puy laces which had each a distinctive
name--ave, pater, chapelets, mie, serpent, bonnet, scie, etc.
Le Puy now produces every description of lace, white and coloured, silk,
thread, and worsted, blondes of all kinds, black of the finest grounds,
application, double and single grounds; from gold and silver lace to
edgings of a halfpenny a yard, and laces of goats' and Angora rabbits'
hairs.
In 1847 more than 5,000 women were employed in making Valenciennes. They
have also succeeded in producing admirable needle-points, similar to the
ancient Venetian. A dress of this lace, destined to adorn an image of the
Virgin, was shown in the French Exhibition of 1855.
{246}In 1848 commerce and trade languished, and a cheaper lace was
produced, made of worsted, for shawls and trimmings. This lace was not long
in fashion, but it re-appeared a few years later under the name of "lama,"
or "poil de chèvre," when it obtained a great success. The hair of the lama
has never been used.
Le Puy now offers to the market an infinite variety of lace, and by means
of these novelties her laces successfully compete with those of Saxony,
which alone can rival her in cheapness; but as the patterns of these last
are copied from the laces of Le Puy and Mirecourt, they appear in the
foreign, market after the originals.
The finest collection of Auvergne lace in the International Exhibition
(1867) was from the fabric of Crâponne (Haute-Loire),[658] established in
1830 by M. Théodore Falcon, to whom Le Puy is indebted for her "musée de
dentelles," containing specimens of the lace of all countries and all ages,
a most useful and instructive collection for the centre of a lace district.
Le Puy has also a lace school, numbering a hundred pupils, and a school of
design for lace patterns, founded in 1859.[659]
AURILLAC AND MURAT (DÉP. CANTAL).
"L'on fait à Orillac les dentelles quit ont vogue dans le royaume," writes,
in 1670, the author of the _Délices de la France_.[660] The origin of the
fabric is assigned to the fourteenth century, when a company of emigrants
established themselves at Cuença and Valcameos, and nearly all the points
of Aurillac were exported into Spain through this company. In 1688 there
was sold on the Place at Marseilles annually to the amount of 350,000
livres of the products of Aurillac, with other fine laces of Auvergne.[661]
In 1726 the produce was already reduced to 200,000 livres. The finest
"points de France," writes Savary, were made at Aurillac and Murat, the
former alone at one time producing to the annual value of 700,000 francs
(£28,000), and giving occupation to from 3,000 to 4,000 lace-workers.
[Illustration: PLATE LXIII.
PLATE LXIV.
FRENCH.--Two specimens bought in France as Cambrai. They are typical of
Northern French laces that became naturalised in England after the French
Revolution. Widths, 2½ and 3½ in.
Photos by A. Dryden from private collection.]
PLATE LXV.
[Illustration: FRENCH. BOBBIN-MADE.--From the environs of Le Puy. Period
Louis XIII.-Louis XIV. Now made and called Guipure de Cluny.
In the Musée Cinquantenaire, Brussels.]
_To face page 246_
{247}An attempt to establish a "bureau" for Colbert's new manufacture of
points de France was at first opposed, as we read: "Les trois femmes
envoyées par les entrepreneurs pour établir cette manufacture furent
attaqués dans les rues d'Aurillac. Les ouvrières de cette ville leur disait
'qu'elles prouvaient s'en retourner, parce qu'elles savaient mieux
travailler qu'elles.'"[662]
The lace-makers would not give up what the intendant terms "the wretched
old point," which M. Henri Duref, the historian of the Département de
Cantal, describes, on the contrary, as consisting of rich flowered designs,
such as may be seen by studying the portraits of many Auvergnat noblemen of
the period. There are various letters on the subject in the Colbert
Correspondence; and in the last from Colbert, 1670, he writes that the
point d'Aurillac is improving, and there are 8,000 lace-women at work. It
appears that he established at Aurillac a manufactory of lace where they
made, upon "des dessins flamands modifiés," a special article, then named
"point Colbert," and subsequently "point d'Aurillac."
In the Convent of the Visitation at Le Puy is shown the lace-trimming of an
alb, point d'Angleterre. It is 28 inches wide, of white thread, with brides
picotées, of elegant scroll design. If, as tradition asserts, it was made
in the country, it must be the produce of this manufactory.
It appears that rich "passements," as they are still called in the country,
of gold and silver were made long before the period of Colbert. We find
abundant mention of them in the church inventories of the province, and in
the museum are pieces of rich lace said to have belonged to Francis I. and
his successors which, according to tradition, were the produce of Aurillac.
They are not of wire, but consist of strips of metal twisted round the
silk.
In the inventory of the sacristy of the Benedictine monastery at St.
Aligre, 1684, there is a great profusion of {248}lace. "Voile de brocard,
fond d'or entouré d'un point d'Espagne d'or et argent;" another, "garni de
dentelles d'or et argent, enrichi de perles fines"; "20 aubes à grandes
dentelles, amicts, lavabos, surplis," etc., all "à grandes ou petites
dentelles."[663]
In the inventory of Massillon's chapel at Beauregard, 1742, are albs
trimmed with "point d'Aurillac"; veils with "point d'Espagne or et
argent."[664]
Lacis was also made at Aurillac, and some specimens are still preserved
among the old families there. The most interesting dates from the early
seventeenth century, and belongs to the Chapel of Notre Dame at Thierzac,
where Anne of Austria made a pilgrimage in 1631, and which, by the
mutilated inscription on a piece of the work, would appear to refer to her.
Mazarin held the Aurillac laces in high estimation, and they are frequently
met with in the inventory of the effects he left on his death in 1660.
Again, in the account of a masked ball, as given in the _Mercure Galant_ of
1679, these points find honourable mention. The Prince de Conti is
described as wearing a "mante de point d'Aurillac or et argent." The Comte
de Vermandois, a veste edged with the same; while Mademoiselle de Blois has
"ses voiles de point d'Aurillac d'argent," and of the Duchesse de Mortemart
it is said, "On voyait dessous ses plumes un voile de point d'Aurillac or
et argent qui tomboit sur ses 'épaules.'" The Chevalier Colbert, who
appeared in an African costume, had "des manches pendantes" of the same
material.
The same _Mercure_ of April, 1681, speaking of the dress of the men, says,
"La plupart portent des garnitures d'une richesse qui empeschera que les
particuliers ne les imitent, puisqu'elles reviennent à 50 louis. Ces
garnitures sont de point d'Espagne ou d'Aurillac." From the above notices,
as well as from the fact that the greater part of these laces were sent
into Spain, it appears that point d'Aurillac was a rich gold and silver
lace, similar to the point d'Espagne.
The laces of Murat (Dép. Haute-Garonne) were "façon de {249}Malines et de
Lille." They were also made at La Chaise Dieu, Alenches, and Verceilles.
Those points were greatly esteemed, and purchased by the wholesale traders
of Le Puy and Clermont, who distributed them over the kingdom through their
colporteurs.
The fabrics of Aurillac and Murat ended with the Revolution. The women,
finding they could earn more as domestic servants in the neighbouring
towns, on the restoration of order, never again returned to their ancient
occupation.
{250}CHAPTER XIX.
LIMOUSIN.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, a kind of pillow net (torchon
entoilage, Mr. Ferguson calls it)[665] for women's sleeves was manufactured
at Tulle (Corrèze) and also at Aurillac. From this circumstance many
writers have derived tulle, the French name for bobbin net, from this town.
M. Lefébure is of this opinion, and adduces in favour of it the fact that
lace was made at Tulle in the eighteenth century, and that an account of
1775 mentions certain Mesdemoiselles Gantes as lace-makers in that town.
The first dictionary in which the word "tulle" occurs is the French
Encyclopædia of 1765, where we find, "Tulle, une espèce de dentelle commune
mais plus ordinairement ce qu'on appelait entoilage."[666] Entoilage, as we
have already shown, is the plain net ground upon which the pattern is
worked[667] or a plain net used to widen points or laces, or worn as a
plain border. In Louis XV.'s reign Madame de Mailly is described, after she
had retired from the world, as "sans rouge, sans poudre, et, qui plus est,
sans dentelles, attendu qu'elle ne portait plus que de l'entoilage à bord
plat."[668] We read in the _Tableau de Paris_ how "Le tul, la gaz et le
marli ont occupés cent mille mains." Tulle was made on the pillow in
Germany before lace was introduced. If tulle derived its name from any
town, it would more probably be from Toul, celebrated, as all others in
Lorraine, for its embroidery; and as net resembles the stitches made in
embroidery by separating the threads (hemstitch, etc.), it {251}may have
taken its French name, Tulle, German Tüll, from the points de Tulle of the
workwomen of the town of Toul, called in Latin Tullum, or Tullo.[669]
LORRAINE.
The lace[670] manufactures of Lorraine flourished in the seventeenth
century. Mirecourt (Dép. Vosges) and the villages of its environs,
extending to the department of Meurthe, was the great centre of this trade,
which formed the sole occupation of the countrywomen. For some centuries
the lace-workers employed only hempen thread, spun in the environs of
Épinal, and especially at Châtel-sur-Moselle.[671] From this they produced
a species of coarse guipure termed "passament," or, in the patois of the
province, "peussemot."[672]
As early as the seventeenth century they set aside this coarse article and
soon produced a finer and more delicate lace with various patterns: they
now made double ground and mignonette; and at Lunéville (Dép. Meurthe),
"dentelles à l'instar de Flandre." In 1715 an edict of Duke Leopold
regulates the manufacture at Mirecourt.[673] The lace was exported to Spain
and the Indies. It found its way also to Holland, the German States, and
England, where Randle Holme mentions "Points of Lorraine, without
raisings."[674]
The Lorraine laces were mostly known in commerce as {252}"Les dentelles de
Saint-Mihiel," from the town of that name, one of the chief places of the
fabric. These last-named laces were much esteemed on their first
appearance. Previous to the union of Lorraine to France in 1766, there were
scarcely 800 lace-makers in Mirecourt. The number amounted to nearly 25,000
in 1869.[675]
Early in the nineteenth century the export trade gave place to more
extensive dealings with France. "Point de Flandres" was then very much
made, the patterns imported by travelling merchants journeying on their way
to Switzerland. Anxious to produce novelty, the manufacturers of Mirecourt
wisely sent for draughtsmen and changed the old patterns. Their success was
complete. They soon became formidable rivals to Lille, Geneva, and the Val
de Travers (Switzerland). Lille now lowered her prices, and the Swiss lace
trade sank in the contest.
Scarcely any but white lace is made; the patterns are varied and in
excellent taste, the work similar to that of Lille and Arras.
Some few years since the making of application flowers was attempted with
success at Mirecourt, and though it has not yet attained the perfection of
the Brussels sprigs, yet it daily improves, and bids fair to supply France
with a production for which she now pays Belgium £120,000 annually. The
Lorraine application possesses one advantage over those of Flanders, the
flowers come from the hands of the lace-makers clean and white, and do not
require bleaching.[676] The price, too, is most moderate. The production
which of late years has been of the most commercial value is the Cluny
lace, so called from the first patterns being copied from specimens of old
lace in the Musée de Cluny. The immense success of this lace has been
highly profitable to Mirecourt and Le Puy.
{253}The wages of the 24,000 lace-workers averaging eightpence a day, their
annual products are estimated at £120,000. Much of the Lorraine lace is
consumed at Paris and in the interior of France; the rest is exported to
America, the East Indies, and the different countries of Europe.
CHAMPAGNE.
The Ardennes lace was generally much esteemed, especially the "points de
Sedan," which derived their name from the city where they were
manufactured.[677] Not only were points made there, but, to infer from the
Great Wardrobe Account of Charles I., the cut-work of Sedan had then
reached our country, and was of great price. We find in one account[678] a
charge for "six handsome Sedan and Italian collars of cut-work, and for 62
yards of needlework purl for six pairs of linen ruffs" the enormous sum of
£116 6s. And again, in the last year of his reign, he has "six handsome
Pultenarian Sedan collars of cut-work, with the same accompaniment of 72
yards of needlework purl" amounting to £106 16s.[679] What these
Pultenarian collars may have been we cannot, at this distance of time,
surmise; but the entries afford proof that the excellency of the Sedan
cut-work was known in England. Rheims, Château-Thierry and Sedan are
mentioned among the other towns in the ordinance establishing the points de
France in 1665. In less than four months Rheims numbered a hundred and
forty workers, consisting of Venetians and Flemings, with seven from Paris
and the natives of the place. In 1669 the number had fallen to sixty, in
consequence of the price demanded for their board and lodging. Their lace
was remarkable for its whiteness. Lace was made in the seventeenth century
at Sedan, Donchéry, Charleville, Mézières, Troyes and Sens.
The thread manufacturers of Sedan furnished the material {254}necessary for
all the lace-workers of Champagne. Much point de Sedan was made at
Charleville, and the laces of this last-named town[680] were valued at from
four up to fifty livres the ell, and even sometimes at a higher rate. The
greater part of the produce was sold in Paris, the rest found a ready
market in England, Holland, Germany, and Poland.[681] Pignariol de la
Force, writing later, says the manufacture of points and laces at Sedan,
formerly so flourishing, is now of little value.[682]
Most of its lace-makers, being Protestants, emigrated after the Edict of
Revocation. Château-Renaud and Mézières were chiefly employed in the
manufacture of footings (_engrêlures_).[683] The laces of Donchéry were
similar to those of Charleville, but made of the Holland thread. They were
less esteemed than those of Sedan. A large quantity were exported to Italy
and Portugal; some few found their way to England and Poland. Up to the
Revolution Champagne employed from 5000 to 6000 lace-workers, and their
annual products were estimated at 200,000 fr. During the twelve years of
revolutionary anarchy, all the lace manufactures of this province
disappeared.
There are differences of opinion as to the exact character of Sedan lace.
M. Séguin considers it to have been a lace inferior in design and
workmanship to point de Venise à réseau. A single thread intervenes between
the pattern and the réseau, instead of the overcast cordonnet of Alençon,
and in other respects it resembles late Venetian needlepoint. Certain
authorities in Brussels, again, claim the point de Sedan as a needle-made
production of Brabant or Liège. M. Lefébure, on the other hand, considers
it as an important variety of Alençon. "The floral devices in points de
Sedan, which are somewhat large and heavy in execution, spring from bold
scroll forms, and in between them are big meshes of the 'grande maille
picotée' of the point de France. Instead of an even and slightly raised
stitching along their contours, these big flowers are accentuated here and
there in well chosen parts by raised stitching, worked somewhat {255}with
the effect of vigorous touches of rather forced high lights in a picture.
These recurrent little mounds of relief, as they may be called, are
frequently introduced with admirable artistic result. The finest bishops'
rochets which appear in the later portraits by Hyacinthe Rigaud and de
Larguillière are of point de Sedan."
It is possible that both types of lace mentioned--the heavy kind, and the
lace with the réseau--are the productions of Sedan.
BURGUNDY.
Colbert was proprietor of the terre de Seignelay, three leagues from
Auxerre, which caused him to interest himself in establishing
manufactories, and especially that of point de France. In his
Correspondence are twelve letters relating to this manufacture for 1667-74,
but it did not succeed. At last, worn out, he says "the mayor and aldermen
will not avail themselves of the means of prosperity I offer, so I will
leave them to their bad conduct."
Specimens of a beautifully fine well-finished lace, resembling old Mechlin,
are often to be met with in Belgium (Fig. 112), bearing the traditional
name of "point de Bourgogne," but no record remains of its manufacture. In
the census taken in 1571, giving the names of all strangers in the City of
London, three are cited as natives of Burgundy, knitters and makers of
lace.[684] In the eighteenth century, a manufactory of Valenciennes was
carried on in the hospital at Dijon, under the direction of the magistrates
of the city. It fell towards the middle of the last century, and at the
Revolution entirely disappeared.[685] "Les dentelles sont grosses," writes
Savary, "mais il s'en débite beaucoup en Franche-Comté."
{256}LYONNOIS.
Lyons, from the thirteenth century, made gold and silver laces enriched
with ornaments similar to those of Paris.