cs, linens, and muslins of
all kinds, the most precious of which were the linen-cambrics and India
mulls. The use of the former still survives in the finest of French
embroidered pocket handkerchiefs, but the latter is seldom seen except
in the veils and vests of Oriental women, or in the studio draperies of
all countries.

[Illustration: CAPE of white lawn embroidered. Nineteenth century
American.

_Courtesy Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York_]

[Illustration: COLLARS of white muslin embroidered. Nineteenth century
American.

_Courtesy Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York_]

The threads used were flosses of linen or cotton, preferably the
latter, which were almost entirely imported. With these restricted
materials, wonders of ornamentation were performed. The stitch, quite
different from that of crewelwork or picture embroidery of the preceding
period, was the simple over and over stitch we find in French embroidery
of the present day. The leaves of the design or pattern were frequently
brought into relief by a stuffing of under threads.

Everything was embroidered; gowns, from the belt to lower hem, finished
with scalloped and sprigged ruffles in the same delicate workmanship,
were everyday summer wear. Slips and sacques, which were not quite as
much of an undertaking as an entire gown, were bordered and ruffled with
the same embroidery. The amount and beauty of specimens which still
exist after the lapse of nearly a century is quite wonderful. Small
articles, like collars, capes and pelerines, were almost entirely
covered with the most exquisite tracery of leaf and flower, a perfect
frostwork of delicate stitchery, with patches of lacework introduced in
spaces of the design.

The designs were seldom, almost never, original, being nearly always
copied directly from what was called "boughten work," to distinguish it
from that which was produced at home.

Many beautiful and skillful stitches were used in this form of work.
Lace stitches, made with bodkins or "piercers," or darning needles of
sufficient size to make perforations, were skillfully rimmed and joined
together in patterns by finer stitches, and open borders, and
hemstitching, and dainty inventions of all kinds, for the embellishment
of the fabrics upon which they were wrought.

With these materials and these methods most of the women of the
different sections of the country busied themselves from a period
beginning probably about 1710 and extend