ittle idea of the fertility of the artists in that
untired period.

It was the delight of the great Raphael himself to expend his talent
on the border of his cartoons. From this artist others took their cue
with varying skill, but with fine effect, and with unlimited interest
to us. Those who run have time to remark only the great central
picture in a hanging; but, to those who live with it, this added line
of exquisite panorama is an unceasing delight for the contemplative
hours of solitude. From this rich departure from Gothic simplicity the
artists grew into the same fulness of design that ended in decadence.
The border became almost obnoxious in its inflated importance and from
voluptuous elegance changed to coarse overweight; and by these signs
we know the early inspired work from its rank and monstrous
aftergrowth in the Eighteenth Century.

A quick glance at the plates showing the work of tapestry's next
highwater mark, the hundred years of the Gobelins' best work,
illustrates the difference between that time and others, and shows
also the gradual drop into the border which is merely a woven
representation of a gilded wood frame to enclose the woven picture as
a painted one would be framed. The plate of _Esther and Ahasuerus_
illustrates this sort of border in the unmistakable lines of Louis XV
ornament.

POINT OF INTEREST

Allusion has been made to the placing of the point of interest in a
tapestry, but this is a matter to be studied by much exercise of the
eye. Perhaps the amateur knows already much about it, an unconscious
knowledge, and needs only to be directed to his own store of
observations. As much as anything this change of design depended on
the uses the varying civilisation made of the hangings. So much
interest lies in this that I find myself ever prone to recapitulate
the very human facts of the past; the lining of rude stone walls and
the forming of interior doors, which was the office of the early
tapestries, and the loose full draping of the same; then the gradual
increase of luxury in the finish of dwellings themselves, until
tapestries were a decoration only; and then the minimising of grandeur
under Louis XV when everything fell into miniature and tapestries were
demanded only in small pieces that could be applied to screens or
chairs--a prostitution of art to the royal demand for prettiness.

Keeping these general ideas of the uses of tapestries in mind, it is
easy to reason out the