the good old days after a dinner or ball for the
guests, who necessarily came from long distances, to stay all night,
and many bedrooms, frequently from ten to twenty-five, besides those
needed for the family, were provided in the big houses. All were
beautifully furnished with imported, massive, carved furniture from
France and England. In one year, 1768, in Charlestown, South Carolina,
occurred twelve weddings among the wealthy residents of that city, and
all the furniture for these rich couples came from England. The twelve
massive beds with canopies supported by heavily carved posts,
decorated with rice stalks and full heads of grain, were so high that
steps were needed in order to climb into them. Elaborate and expensive
curtains and spreads were furnished to correspond. In one early
inventory of an extensively furnished house there are mentioned "four
feather beds, bolsters, two stools, looking-glass tipt with silver,
two Turkey carpets, one yellow mohair bed counterpane, and _two green
silk quilts_." From this it is evident that the quilt had already
found its place, and no doubt in great numbers, on account of the many
beds to furnish in the spacious house of the rich planters.

Shortly after the Revolution came the great migration from Virginia
over the ridges of the Blue and the Appalachian chains into what was
then the wilderness of Tennessee and Kentucky. The descendants of
these hardy pioneers who first forced their way westward still live
among the Kentucky and Virginia hills under the conditions which
prevailed a hundred years ago. In this heavily timbered rough country
they manage to eke out a precarious existence by cultivating small
hillside patches of cotton, corn, and a few vegetables. Immured in the
seclusion of the mountains they have remained untouched by the world's
progress during the past century. Year after year they are satisfied
to live this secluded existence, and but rarely make an acquaintance
with a stranger. Educational advantages, except of the most elementary
sort, are almost unknown, and the majority of these mountaineers
neither read nor write. As a result of this condition of isolated and
primitive living, existing in the mountains of Virginia, Kentucky,
Tennessee, and the Carolinas, the household crafts that flourished in
this country before the advent of machinery are still carried on
exactly as in the old days.

[Illustration: OHIO ROSE

This "Rose" quilt was made in