Some Famous Needlewomen.
By Mary B. Sleight
One morning when the young people went to call on Aunt Marian, their attention was attracted by a new picture hanging over her desk. "How pretty it is!" cried Cora. "Is it a painting, Aunt Marian?" "Yes, a needle painting; that is, the artist used a needle instead of a brush," said Aunt Marian, "but the colors are so finely blended as to have the effect of oil painting." "Dear! dear! how many stitches it must have taken," said Grace, who had no fondness for needlework. "Yes," said Aunt Marian; "and a great deal of patience and skill. In olden days ladies of leisure spent the most of their time in embroidering, and many of their embroideries were very valuable as historical records. There is one called the Bayeux Tapestry, that is supposed to be the work of Matilda, wife of William the Conqueror, and the ladies of her court. It was worked very much as our grandmothers worked samplers, but instead of being made up of letters and mottoes, it depicts important events connected with the conquest of England. It is twenty inches wide and two hundred and fourteen feet long, and has seventy-two divisions, each with a Latin inscription giving the subject. These pictures show the Norman customs and mode of life at the time of the conquest, and also portray events of which there are no other records in existence. I think Matilda and her ladies, doing their elegant embroidery day after day, wrought better than they knew, for they were writing history with their needles." "I'd like to study that kind of history," said Grace; "it would be like reading a story book." "Well, my dear," said Aunt Marian, "when you go to Europe you can see these pictorial records in the public library in the town hall of Bayeux. And these are not the only famous pictures that were not painted with a brush. There, for instance, are the G obeli n Tapestries." "Oh! I know what a goblin is," cried Jack; "it's a horrid, awful creature, with horns. I saw one once in a book." "Sofly, softly, Jack," said Aunt Marian, with a smile. "This Gob-lin has an e in the middle, and is a man's name. More than 400 years ago, two brothers, Jehan and Giles G obelin, founded in Paris the manufactory where these wonderful tapestries were made. Some of their pieces were copies of portraits, and so fine was the work and so slow the process, that an artist could seldom make more than twenty-nine square inches in a year, and, consequently, a single piece sometimes represented the work of a life time." "That must have been almost as tiresome as painting with a needle," sighed Grace. "Ah, Gracie, dear," said Aunt Marian, "I am afraid the needle will never do for you what it did for a young girl I heard of once." "What did it do for her, Aunt Marian?" asked Cora, eagerly. "It won her fame and fortune," said Aunt Marian. "I saw one of her pictures a few years ago in an Englishman's house, in New Jersey. It was a needle-wrought copy of Sir Joshua Reynolds' 'Sleeping Girl,' and while we were studying it the owner gave us a little sketch of the artist. Her gift for making pictures with her needle displayed itself at a very early age, and being too poor to buy the necessary materials, she would gather up the bits of wool that caught on the brambles and hedges, and after dyeing them with roots and berries, spin them for her needle. Scraps of cloth picked up about the shop doors served for canvas, and now and then a bright-colored mite of a picture from the same source furnished a pattern. It was embroidering under difficulties, but the little girl soon acquired such skill that wealthy people began to notice her work. Better materials were supplied, though she insisted on still coloring her own wools, and through the influence of some of her new friends, she gained access to the picture galleries, with permission to copy at her pleasure. Working on with patient enthusiasm, improving her one talent to the utmost, she soon found herself famous, and the little cottage could no longer hold either the pictures or the visitors; for at the age of twenty she had worked a hundred pieces. With these she opened a gallery, which was patronized by all the nobility, and the proceeds of the exhibitions made an income that raised the family from poverty to affluence. So wonderful was her skill with the needle that Queen Victoria herself took lessons of her, and at her death, sixty years later, the artist willed to her royal pupil whichever picture in the collection she might select. After the Queen had made her choice, the French emperor purchased at a large price the piece that pleased him best; the rest were disposed of at a public sale, and through this opportunity the father of our English friend became owner of 'The Sleeping Girl.'" "I like that story, Aunt Marian," said Grace; "but I don't see how in the world she ever did it. I'm sure I shall be thankful if I ever learn to do plain sewing neatly." Aunt Marian took the rosy face between her palms. "After all," she said, "the plain sewing is much more essential to comfort than embroidery; and though that sort of needlework does not often make one famous, I am just reminded of a woman whose plain sewing in the way of garments for the poor was put on exhibition at her death, and has kept her memory fresh for eighteen hundred years. I wonder if you know her name. Grace looked up with a sudden light in her eyes. "And all the widows stood by him weeping and showing the coats and garments which Dorcas made while she was with them," she repeated softly.—Mary B. Sleight, in Christian at Work.