they fit, and then tacked firmly down, with care that
the stitches are such as will be quite covered by the final couching,
chain stitch, or whatever is to be your outline.

In the case of silk or other delicate material, peculiar care must be
taken that the paste is not moist enough to penetrate the stuff; but an
experienced worker has no fear of that.

A firm outline is a condition of applique, and couched cord fulfils it
most perfectly. Much depends upon a tasteful and tactful choice of
colour for it. You fatten your pattern by outlining it with a colour
which goes with it (Illustration 62, B). You thin it by one which goes
into the ground. Very subtle use may be made of a double outline or of a
corded line upon couched floss. There is a double outline to the
ornament in Illustration 92: the inner one next to the yellow satin
applique is of gold, the outer one next the crimson velvet ground is of
white sewn with pale blue. This gives emphasis to the bold forms of the
leafage. The mid-rib there is of silver couching; the minor veinings are
stitched in silk, and are rather insignificant.

[Illustration: 61. APPLIQUE PANEL BY MISS KEIGHLEY.]

The less there is of extra stitching on applique the better as a rule.
It disturbs the breadth, which is so valuable a characteristic of onlay.
In no case is much mixing of methods to be desired; but if applique is
to be supplemented, it had best be with couching, which is not so much
stitching as stitched down, itself another form of applied work.

Applique of itself is not, of course, adapted to pictorial work, but
that in association with judicious stitching and couching it may be used
to admirable decorative purpose in figure design is shown by Miss Mabel
Keighley's panel, Illustration 61. What an artist may do depends upon
the artist. Miss Keighley's panel indicates the use that may be made of
texture in the stuff onlaid.

Applique is especially appropriate to bold church work, fulfilling
perfectly that condition of legibility so desirable in work necessarily
seen oftenest from afar. Broadly designed, it may be as fine in its way
as a piece of mediaeval stained glass, and it gives to silk and velvet
their true worth. The pattern may be readable as far off as you can
distinguish colour.

[Illustration: 62. A. COUNTERCHANGE. B. APPLIQUE.]

Applique work is thought by some to be an inferior kind of embroidery,
which it is not. It is not a lower but another kind of needlew