tly, could carry in its transparent folds
the sentiment of such a bridal veil, wrought in love by the bride who
was to wear it.

I have seen one beautiful shawl, where the entire design was done in
shining silver-white flosses, upon a ground of black net, with the
effect of a disappearance of the background, the wreaths and groups of
flowers seeming to float around the figure of the wearer.

In one or two instances, also, I have seen shawls in varicolored flosses
producing a silvery mass of ornamentation which was most effective, but
they were experiments which evidently did not commend themselves to
North American taste.

The same method of darning was used upon what was then called, "bobbinet
footing," narrow lengths of bobbinet lace which were extensively used as
ruffles for caps and trimming and garniture of capes and various
articles of personal wear.

Cap bodies were also worked in this method; in fact, the decorative
treatment of caps must have been a trying question. The dignity of the
married woman depended somewhat upon the size of the cap she wore, and
it was as necessary to convention that the crow-black locks of the
matron of twenty-five should be hidden, as that the scant locks of sixty
should be decently shrouded.

Insertings of darned footing, alternating with bands of muslin, were
largely used in the construction of gowns, and, in short, this style of
needlework, while not as universal or absorbing as French embroidery,
continued longer in vogue and perhaps amused or solaced some who had
little skill or time for the more exacting methods of embroidery.

CHAPTER V -- BERLIN WOOLWORK

It surprises us in these latter days of demand for the best conditions
in the prosecution of decorative work, that it should have lived at all
through the days of existence in one-roomed log cabins of early settlers
and the conflicting demands of pioneer life. It survived them all, and
the little, fast-arriving Puritan children were taught their stitches as
religiously as their commandments; and so American embroidery grew to be
an art which has enriched the past and future of its executants.

After the two periods of French and Spanish needlework passed by, there
appeared what was known as Berlin woolwork. Those who in earlier times
were devoted to fine embroidery solaced their idleness with this new
work--certainly a poor substitute for the beautiful embroidery of the
preceding generation, but answering th