CHAPTER XXI
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DENMARK, SWEDEN AND RUSSIA.
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DENMARK.
"ERASTE.--Miss, how many parties have you been to this week?
"LADY.--I do not frequent such places; but if you want to know how much lace I have made this fortnight, I might well tell you."
--Holberg. _The Inconstant Lady._
"The far-famed lace of Tönder."
"A certain kind of embroidery, or cut-work in linen, was much used in Denmark before lace came in from Brabant," writes Professor Thomsen. "This kind of work is still in use among the peasants, and you will often have observed it on their bed-clothes."
The art of lace-making itself is supposed to have been first brought over by the fugitive monks at the Reformation, or to have been introduced by Queen Elizabeth,[729] sister of Charles V., and wife of Christian II., that good queen who, had her husband been more fortunate, would, says the chronicler, "have proved a second Dagmar to Denmark."
Lace-making has never been practised as a means of livelihood throughout Denmark. It is only in the province of North Schleswig (or South Jutland, as it is also called) that a regular manufacture was established. It is here that King Christian IV. appears to have made his purchases; and while travelling in Schleswig, entries constantly occur in his journal book, from 1619 to 1625, such as, "Paid to a female lace-worker 28 rixdollars--71 specie to a lace-seller for lace for the use of the children," and many similar {273}notices.[730] It was one of those pieces of Tönder lace that King Christian sends to his Chamberlain, with an autograph letter, ordering him to cut out of it four collars of the same size and manner as Prince Ulrik's Spanish. They must contrive also to get two pairs of manchettes out of the same.
In the museum of the palace at Rosenborg are still preserved some shirts of Christian IV., trimmed with Schleswig lace of great beauty (Fig. 115), and in his portrait, which hangs in Hampton Court Palace, the lace on his shirt is of similar texture.
[Illustration: Fig. 115.
SHIRT COLLAR OF CHRISTIAN IV.--(Castle of Rosenborg, Copenhagen.)]
It was in the early part of this monarch's reign[731] that the celebrated Golden Horn, so long the chief treasure of the Scandinavian Museum at Copenhagen, was found by a young {274}lace-maker on her way to her work. She carried her prize to the king, and with the money he liberally bestowed upon her she was enabled, says tradition, to marry the object of her choice.
The year 1647 was a great epoch in the lace-making of Jutland. A merchant named Steenbeck, taking a great interest in the fabric, engaged twelve persons from Dortmund, in Westphalia, to improve the trade, and settled them at Tönder, to teach the manufacture to both men and women, rich and poor. These twelve persons are described as aged men, with long beards, which, while making lace, they gathered into bags, to prevent the hair from becoming entangled among the bobbins. The manufacture soon made great progress under their guidance, and extended to the south-western part of Ribe, and to the island of Romö.[732] The lace was sold by means of "lace postmen," as they were termed, who carried their wares throughout all Scandinavia and parts of Germany.
Christian IV. protected the native manufacture, and in the Act of 1643,[733] "lace and suchlike pinwork" are described as luxurious articles, not allowed to be imported of a higher value than five shillings and sixpence the Danish ell.[734] A later ordinance, 1683, mentions "white and black lace which are manufactured in this country," and grants permission to the nobility to wear them.[735]
Christian IV. did not patronise foreign manufactures. "The King of Denmark," writes Moryson, "wears but little gold lace, and sends foreign apparel to the hangman to be disgraced, when brought in by gentlemen."
[Illustration: Fig. 116.
TÖNDER LACE, DRAWN MUSLIN.--Denmark, eighteenth century. Width 2¾ inches. Victoria and Albert Museum.
_To face page 274._]
{275}About the year 1712 the lace manufacture again was much improved by the arrival of a number of Brabant women, who accompanied the troops of King Frederick IV. on their return from the Netherlands,[736] and settled at Tönder. We have received from Jutland, through the kind exertions of Mr. Rudolf Bay, of Aalborg, a series of Tönder laces, taken from the pattern-books of the manufacturers. The earlier specimens are all of Flemish character. There is the old Flanders lace, with its Dutch flowers and double and trolly grounds in endless variety. The Brabant, with fine ground, the flowers and _jours_ well executed. Then follow the Mechlin grounds, the patterns worked with a coarse thread, in many, apparently, run in with the needle. There is also a good specimen of that description of drawn muslin lace, commonly known under the name of "Indian work," but which appears to have been very generally made in various manners. The leaves and flowers formed of the muslin are worked round with a cordonnet, by way of relief to the thick double ground (Fig. 116).[737] In the Scandinavian Museum at Copenhagen is a pair of lappets of drawn muslin, a fine specimen of this work.
The modern laces are copied from French, Lille, and Saxon patterns; there are also imitations of the so-called Maltese. The Schleswig laces are all remarkable for their fine quality and excellent workmanship. Guipure, after the manner of the Venice points, was also fabricated. A fine specimen of this lace may be seen decorating the black velvet dress of the youthful daughter of Duke John of Holstein. She lies in her coffin within the mortuary chapel of her family, in the castle of Sonderborg. Lace was much used in burials in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when it really appears people were arrayed in more costly clothing than in their lives. The author of _Jutland and the Danish Islands_ has often seen mummies in the Danish churches exposed to view tricked out in points of great richness.
The lace industry continued to increase in value till the beginning of the present century. The year 1801 may be considered its culminating point. At that period the number of peasants employed in Tönder and its neighbourhood alone was 20,000. Even little boys were taught to make lace till strong enough to work in the fields, and there was scarcely a house without a lace-maker, who would sit before her {276}cottage door, working from sunrise till midnight, singing the ballads handed down from their Brabant teachers.[738]
"My late father,"[739] writes Mr. F. Wulff, of Brede, "who began the lace trade the end of the last century, first went on foot with his wares to Mecklenburg, Prussia and Hanover: we consigned lace to all parts of the world. Soon he could afford to buy a horse; and in his old age he calculated he had travelled on horseback more than 75,000 English miles, or thrice round the earth. In his youth the most durable and prettiest ground was the old Flemish, much used by the peasants in Germany. It was solid, and passed as an heirloom through several generations. Later, the fine needle ground came in, and lastly, the fond clair, or point de Lille, far less solid, but easier to work; hence the lace-makers became less skilful than of old."
They had not many models, and the best workwomen were those who devoted their whole life to one special pattern. Few were found so persevering. One widow, however, is recorded who lived to the age of eighty and brought up seven children on the produce of a narrow edging, which she sold at sixpence a yard.
Each pattern had its proper name--cock-eye, spider, lyre, chimney-pot, and feather.
The rich farmers' wives sat at their pillows daily, causing their household duties to be performed by hired servants from North Jutland. Ladies also, a century and a half ago, made it their occupation, as the motto of our chapter, from the drama of Holberg, will show. And this continued till the fashion of "hvidsom"--white seaming--the cut-work already alluded to, was for a time revived. This work was, however, looked upon as _infra dig._ for the wives of functionaries and suchlike, in whom it was unbecoming to waste on such employment time that should be devoted to household matters. Our informant tells of a lady in the north who thus embroidered the christening robe of her child by stealth in the kitchen, fearing to be caught by her visitors--cookery had in those days precedence over embroidery. Among the hoards of this child, born 1755, was found a most exquisite collection of old Tönder lace, embracing all the varieties made by her mother and herself, from the thick Flemish to the finest needle-point.
PLATE LXXII.
[Illustration: RUSSIAN.--The upper piece of lace is needle-point "à brides picotées." Modern reproduction of a sixteenth century design. Width, 3-3/8 in.
GERMAN. SAXON.--The lower piece bobbin-made by the peasants of the Erzgebirge. Nineteenth century. Width, 3¼ in.
Victoria and Albert Museum.]
PLATE LXXIII.
[Illustration: RUSSIAN.--Old bobbin-made with coloured silk outlines. The property of Madame Pogosky.
Photo by A. Dryden.]
_To face page 276._
{277}The fashion of cut-work still prevails in Denmark, where collars and cuffs, decorated with stars, crosses, and other mediæval designs, are exposed in the shop-windows of Copenhagen for sale--the work of poor gentlewomen, who, by their needle, thus add a few dollars yearly to their income.
From 1830 dates the decline of the Tönder lace. Cotton thread was introduced, and the quality of the fabric was deteriorated.[740] The lace schools were given up; and the flourishing state of agriculture rendered it no longer a profitable employment either for the boys or the women.[741] The trade passed, from the manufacturers into the hands of the hawkers and petty dealers, who were too poor to purchase the finer points. The "lace postmen" once more travelled from house to house with their little leathern boxes, offering these inferior wares for sale.[742] The art died out. In 1840 there were not more than six lace manufacturers in Schleswig.
The old people, however, still believe in a good time coming. "I have in my day," said an aged woman, "sold point at four thalers an ell, sir; and though I may never do so again, my daughter will. The lace trade slumbers, but it does not die."
SWEDEN.
At a very early period the Scandinavian goldsmith had learned to draw out wires of gold and twine them round threads either of silk or flax--in fact to _guiper_ them.
{278}Wadstena, where lies Queen Philippa of Lancaster, daughter of Henry IV., is celebrated for its lace. The art, according to tradition, was introduced among the nuns of the convent by St. Bridget on her return from Italy. Some even go so far as to say she wrote home to Wadstena, ordering lace from Rome; but, as St. Bridget died in 1335, we may be allowed to question the fact: certain it is, though, the funeral coif of the saint, as depicted in an ancient portrait, said to have been taken at Rome after death, is ornamented with a species of perforated needlework.[743] By the rules of the convent, the nuns of Wadstena were forbidden to touch either gold or silver, save in their netting and embroidery. There exists an old journal of the Kloster, called _Diarium Vadstenænse_, in which are, however, no allusions to the art; but the letters of a Wadstena nun to her lover _extra muros_, published from an old collection[744] of documents, somewhat help us in our researches.
"I wish," she writes to her admirer, "I could send you a netted cap that I myself have made, but when Sister Karin Andersdotter saw that I mingled gold and silver thread in it, she said, 'You must surely have some beloved.' 'Do you think so?' I answered. 'Here in the Kloster, you may easily see if any of the brethren has such a cap, and I dare not send it by anyone to a sweetheart outside the walls.' 'You intend it for Axel Nilson,' answered Sister Karin. 'It is not for you to talk,' I replied. 'I have seen you net a long hood, and talk and prattle yourself with Brother Bertol.'"
From netted caps of thread, worked in with gold and silver, the transition to lace is easy, and history tells that in the middle ages the Wadstena nuns "Knit their laces of {279}gold and silk." We may therefore suppose the art to have flourished in the convents at an early date.
At the suppression of the monasteries, under Charles IX., a few of the nuns, too infirm to sail with their sisters for Poland, remained in Sweden. People took compassion on the outcasts, and gave them two rooms to dwell in, where they continued their occupation of making lace, and were able, for a season, to keep the secret of their art. After a time, however, lace-making became general throughout the town and neighbourhood, and was known to the laity previous to the dissolution of Wadstena--a favoured convent which survived the rest of the other monasteries of Sweden.
"Send up," writes Gustaf Vasa, in a familiar letter[745] to his Queen Margaret, "the lace passement made for me by Anne, the smith's daughter, at Upsala; I want it: don't neglect this."[746]
In an inventory of Ericksholm Castle, drawn up in 1548, are endless entries of "sheets seamed with cut-work, half worn-out sheets with open border of cut-work, towels with cut-work and with the king's and queen's arms in each corner, blue curtains with cut-work seams," etc.
The style of Wadstena lace changed with the times and fashion of the national costume. Those made at present are of the single or double ground, both black and white, fine, but wanting in firmness. They also make much dentelle torchon, of the lozenge pattern, for trimming the bed-linen they so elaborately embroider in drawn-work.
In 1830 the products in value amounted to 30,000 rixdollars. They were carried to every part of Sweden, and a small quantity even to foreign parts. One dealer alone, a Madame Hartruide, now sends her colporteurs hawking Wadstena lace round the country. The fabric, after much depression, has slightly increased of late years, having received much encouragement from her Majesty Queen {280}Louisa. Specimens of Wadstena lace--the only lace manufactory now existing in Sweden--were sent to the Great International Exhibition of 1862.
Hölesom, or cut-work, is a favourite employment of Swedish women, and is generally taught in the schools.[747] At the various bathing-places you may see the young ladies working as industriously as if for their daily sustenance; they never purchase such articles of decoration, but entirely adorn their houses by the labours of their own hands. It was by a collar of this hölesom, worked in silk and gold, that young Gustaf Erikson was nearly betrayed when working as a labourer in the barn of Rankhytta, the property of his old college friend, Anders Petersen. A servant girl observed to her master, "The new farm-boy can be no peasant; for," says she, "his linen is far too fine, and I saw a collar wrought in silk and gold beneath his kirtle."
Gold lace was much in vogue in the middle of the sixteenth century, and entries of it abound in the inventory of Gustavus Vasa and his youngest son, Magnus.
In an inventory of Ericksholm, 1536, is a pair of laced sheets. It is the custom in Sweden to sew a broad border of seaming lace between the breadths of the sheets, sometimes wove in the linen. Directions, with patterns scarcely changed since the sixteenth century, may be found in the _Weaving Book_ published at Stockholm in 1828.[748]
Towards the end of 1500 the term "passement" appears in general use, in an inventory of "Pontus de Gardia."
In the neighbourhood of Wadstena old soldiers, as well as women, may be seen of a summer's evening sitting at the cottage doors making lace. Though no other lace manufactory can be said to exist in Sweden beyond that of Wadstena, still a coarse bobbin lace is made by the peasantry for home consumption. The author has received from the Countess Elizabeth Piper, late Grande Maîtresse to her Majesty the Queen of Sweden, specimens of coarse pillow laces, worked by the Scanian peasant women, which, she writes, "form a favourite occupation for the women of our province."
PLATE LXXIV.
[Illustration: RUSSIAN.--Part of a long border setting forth a Procession. Lacis and embroidery in silk. The lace is bobbin-made in thread. Réseau similar to Valenciennes. The Russian thread is good quality linen. Size of portion shown 18½ x 14 in. The property of Madame Pogosky.
Photo by A. Dryden.]
_To face page 280._
{281}Latterly this manufacture has been protected and the workwomen carefully directed.
Far more curious are the laces made by the peasants of Dalecarlia, still retaining the patterns used in the rest of Europe two hundred years since. The broader[749] kinds, of which we give a woodcut (Fig. 117), are from Gaguef, that part of Dalecarlia where laces are mostly made and used. Married women wear them on their summer caps, much starched, as a shelter against the sun. Others, of an unbleached thread, are from Orsa. This lace is never washed, as it is considered an elegance to preserve this coffee-coloured tint. The firmness and solidity of these last laces are wonderful.
[Illustration: Fig. 117.
DALECARLIAN LACE.]
The specimens from Rättwik are narrow "seaming" laces of the lozenge pattern.
There is also a sort of plaiting used as a fringe, in the style of the Genoese macramè, from the ends of a small {282}sheet which the peasants spread over their pillows. No improvement takes place in the designs. The Dalecarlian women do not make a trade of lace-making, they merely work to supply their own wants.[750]
Fig. 118 represents a lace collar worn by Gustavus Adolphus, a relic carefully preserved in the Northern Museum at Stockholm. On it is inscribed in Swedish: "This collar was worn by Gustaf Adolf, King of Sweden, and presented, together with his portrait, as a remembrance, in 1632, to Miss Jacobina Lauber, of Augsburg, because she was the most beautiful damsel present." In addition to this collar, there is preserved at the Royal Kladskammar at Stockholm a blood-stained shirt worn by Gustavus at the Battle of Dirschau, the collars and cuffs trimmed with lace of rich geometric pattern, the sleeves decorated with "seaming" lace.
In an adjoining case of the same collection are some splendid altar-cloths of ancient raised Spanish point, said to have been worked by the Swedish nuns previous to the suppression of the monasteries. A small escutcheon constantly repeated on the pattern of the most ancient specimens has the semblance of a water-lily leaf, the emblem of the Stures, leading one to believe they may have been of Swedish fabric, for many ladies of that illustrious house sought shelter from troublous times within the walls of the lace-making convent of Wadstena.
In the same cabinet is displayed, with others of more ordinary texture, a collar of raised Spanish guipure, worked by the Princesses Catherine and Marie, daughters of Duke Johan Adolf (brother of Charles X.). Though a creditable performance, yet it is far inferior to the lace of convent make. The making of this Spanish point formed a favourite amusement of the Swedish ladies of the seventeenth century: bed-hangings, coverlets, and toilets of their handiwork may still be found in the remote castles of the provinces. We have received the photograph of a flower from an old bed of Swedish lace--an heirloom in a Smaland castle of Count Trolle Bonde.
[Illustration: Fig. 118.
COLLAR OF GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS.
_To face page 282._]
{283}RUSSIA.
After his visit to Paris early in the eighteenth century, Peter the Great founded a manufacture of silk lace at Novgorod, which in the time of the Empress Elizabeth fell into decay. In the reign of Catherine II. there were twelve gold lace-makers at St. Petersburg, who were scarcely able to supply the demand. In Russia lace-making and embroidery go hand in hand, as in our early examples of embroidery, drawn-work, and cut-work combined. Lace-making was not a distinct industry; the peasants, especially in Eastern Russia, made it in their houses to decorate, in conjunction with embroidery, towels, table-linen, shirts, and even the household linen, for which purpose it was purchased direct from the peasants by the inhabitants of the towns. Many will have seen the Russian towels in the International Exhibition of 1874, and have admired their quaint design and bright colours, with the curious line of red and blue thread running through the pattern of the lace. Darned netting and drawn-work appear, as elsewhere, to have been their earliest productions. The lace is loosely wrought on the pillow, the work simple, and requiring few bobbins to execute the vermiculated pattern which is its characteristic (Fig. 119, and Plates LXXII.-IV.).
The specimens vary very much in quality, but the patterns closely resemble one another, and are all of an oriental and barbaric character (Fig. 119).
In Nardendal, near Abo, in Finland, the natives offer to strangers small petticoats and toys of lace--a relic of the time when a nunnery of Cistercians flourished in the place.
Much of a simple design and coarse quality is made in Belev, Vologda, Riazan, Mzeresk. At Vologda a lace resembling torchon is made, with colours introduced, red, blue, and écru and white.[751] In some laces silks of various colours are employed. Pillow-lace has only been known in Russia for over a hundred years, and although the {284}lace produced is effective, it is coarse in texture and crude in pattern. Late in the nineteenth century the Czarina gave her patronage to a school founded at Moscow, where Venetian needle-point laces have been copied, using the finest English thread, and needle-laces made after old Russian designs of the sixteenth century,[752] called _Point de Moscou_.
[Illustration: Fig. 119.
RUSSIA.--Bobbin-made nineteenth century.
_To face page 284._]
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