titch--Irish Stitch--Plait Stitch--Two-sided
Italian Stitch--Holbein Stitch--Rococo Stitch.

Canvas work, known in the XIIIth century as _opus pulvinarium_ or
cushion work, is of great antiquity, and seems to have had an
independent origin in several countries. It is sometimes given the
misleading name of tapestry, perhaps owing to hangings of all kinds
being called tapestries, whether loom-woven, worked with the needle, or
painted. Large wall hangings with designs similar to those of woven
tapestries have been most successfully carried out on canvas in cross or
tent stitch; as a rule, however, smaller objects are worked, such as
furniture coverings, screens or cushions, whence it is obvious canvas
work received its ancient and descriptive Latin name. Many Eastern
carpets are worked upon a strong canvas in a kind of tent stitch, and
so come under the heading of canvas work. It is a particularly durable
method of embroidering, and this makes it suitable for use upon anything
subjected to hard wear.

The work has usually a very decided and attractive character of its own.
A familiar example of this can be seen in the XVIIIth century samplers.
Its peculiar character is perhaps due to the fact that it cannot break
away from a certain conventionality due to constant use of the same
stitch, and its dependence upon the web of the fabric. This regularity
prevents the work from showing certain faults of design that other
methods may exaggerate. It is hardly possible to copy a natural spray of
flowers in cross stitch and keep it very naturalistic. The stitch being
square and alike all over gives a formality of treatment to every part
of the design, also, some detail is perforce omitted owing to the
impossibility of putting it in; all of this tends to a right method of
treatment, which renders the sampler an admirable lesson not only in
workmanship but also in design.

The XVIth and XVIIth century pictorial subjects worked upon fine canvas
in cross or tent stitch afford instances of most interesting work in
canvas stitches. Some of these, though, as a rule, very much smaller in
size, equal, in their way, the finest tapestries. Most of them, if
judged from a painter's standpoint, would be pronounced failures, but
this effect is not what is sought after; the method of treatment belongs
rather to the great traditions of the tapestry weaver, and is not
governed by the canons of the painter. Plate VI. shows a detail of
foliage f