Part 20

_Machine-made Lace._--We have already seen that a technical peculiarity in making needlepoint lace is that a single thread and needle are alone used to form the pattern, and that the buttonhole stitch and other loopings which can be worked by means of a needle and thread mark a distinction between lace made in this manner and lace made on the pillow. For the process of pillow lace making a series of threads are in constant employment, plaited and twisted the one with another. A buttonhole stitch is not producible by it. The Leavers lace machine does not make either a buttonhole stitch or a plait. An essential principle of this machine-made work is that the threads are twisted together as in stocking net. The Leavers lace machine is that generally in use at Nottingham and Calais. French ingenuity has developed improvements in this machine whereby laces of delicate thread are made; but as fast as France makes an improvement England follows with another, and both countries virtually maintain an equal position in this branch of industry. The number of threads brought into operation in a Leavers machine is regulated by the pattern to be produced, the threads being of two sorts, beam or warp threads and bobbin or weft threads. Upwards of 8880 are sometimes used, sixty pieces of lace being made simultaneously, each piece requiring 148 threads--100 beam threads and 48 bobbin threads. The ends of both sets of threads are fixed to a cylinder upon which as the manufacture proceeds the lace becomes wound. The supply of the beam or warp threads is held upon reels, and that of the bobbins or weft threads is held in bobbins. The beam or warp thread reels are arranged in frames or trays beneath the stage, above which and between it and the cylinder the twisting of the bobbin or weft with beam or warp threads takes place. The bobbins containing the bobbin or weft threads are flattened in shape so as to pass conveniently between the stretched beam or warp threads. Each bobbin can contain about 120 yds. of thread. By most ingenious mechanism varying degrees of tension can be imparted to warp and weft threads as required. As the bobbins or weft threads pass like pendulums between the warp threads the latter are made to oscillate, thus causing them to become twisted with the bobbin threads. As the twistings take place, combs passing through both warp and weft threads compress the twistings. Thus the texture of the clothing or _toilé_ in machine-made lace may generally be detected by its ribbed appearance, due to the compressed twisted threads. Figs. 47 and 48 are intended to show effects obtained by varying the tensions of weft and warp threads. For instance, if the weft, as threads b, b, b, b in fig. 47, be tight and the warp thread slack, the warp thread a will be twisted upon the weft threads. But if the warp thread a be tight and the weft threads b, b, b, b, be slack, as in fig. 48, then the weft threads will be twisted on the warp thread. At the same time the twisting in both these cases arises from the conjunction of movements given to the two sets of threads, namely, an oscillation or movement from side to side of the beam or warp threads, and the swinging or pendulum-like movement of the bobbin or weft threads between the warp threads. Fig. 49 is a diagram of a sectional elevation of a lace machine representing its more essential parts. E is the cylinder or beam upon which the lace is rolled as made, and upon which the ends of both warp and weft threads are fastened at starting. Beneath are w, w, w, a series of trays or beams, one above the other, containing the reels of the supplies of warp threads; c, c represent the slide bars for the passage of the bobbin b with its thread from k to k, the landing bars, one on each side of the rank of warp threads; s, t are the combs which take it in turns to press together the twistings as they are made. The combs come away clear from the threads as soon as they have pressed them together and fall into positions ready to perform their pressing operations again. The contrivances for giving each thread a particular tension and movement at a certain time are connected with an adaptation of the Jacquard system of pierced cards. The machine lace pattern drafter has to calculate how many holes shall be punched in a card, and to determine the position of such holes. Each hole regulates the mechanism for giving movement to a thread. Fig. 54 displays a piece of hand-made Valenciennes (Ypres) lace and fig. 55 a corresponding piece woven by the machine. The latter shows the advantage that can be gained by using very fine gauge machines, thus enabling a very close imitation of the real lace to be made by securing a very open and clear _réseau_ or net, such as would be made on a coarse machine, and at the same time to keep the pattern fine and solid and standing out well from the net, as is the case with the real lace, which cannot be done by using a coarse gauge machine. In this example the machine used is a 16 point (that is 32 carriages to the inch), and the ground is made half gauge, that is 8 point, and the weaving is made the full gauge of the machine, that is 16 point. Fig. 56 gives other examples of hand- and machine-made Valenciennes lace. The machine-made lace (b) imitating the real (a) is made on a 14-point machine (that is 28 carriages to the inch), the ground being 7 point and the pattern being full gauge or 14 point. Although the principle in these examples of machine work is exactly the same, in so far that they use half gauge net and full gauge clothing to produce the contrast as mentioned above, the fabrication of these two examples is quite different, that in fig. 55 being an example of tight bobbins or weft, and slack warp threads as shown in fig. 47. Whereas the example in fig. 56 is made with slack bobbins or weft threads and tight warp threads as in fig. 48. In fig. 57 is a piece of hand-made lace of stout thread, very similar to much Cluny lace made in the Auvergne and to the Buckinghamshire "Maltese" lace. Close to it are specimens of lace (figs. 58 and 59) made by the new patent circular lace machine of Messrs Birkin of Nottingham. This machine although very slow in production actually reproduces the real lace, at a cost slightly below that of the hand-made lace. In another branch of lace-making by machinery, mechanical ingenuity, combined with chemical treatment, has led to surprising results (figs. 53 and 50). Swiss, German and other manufacturers use machines in which a principle of the sewing-machine is involved. A fine silken tissue is thereby enriched with an elaborately raised cotton or thread embroidery. The whole fabric is then treated with chemical mordants which, whilst dissolving the silky web, do not attack the cotton or thread embroidery. A relief embroidery possessing the appearance of hand-made raised needlepoint lace is thus produced. Figs. 60 and 61 give some idea of the high quality to which this admirable counterfeit has been brought.

[Illustration: FIG. 59.--Specimens of Machine-made Torchon Lace, in the same manner as such lace is made on the pillow by hand. (Nottingham, 20th century.)]

[Illustration: FIG. 60.--Machine-made Lace of Modern Design.]

[Illustration: FIG. 61.--Machine-made Lace in imitation of 17th-century Needlepoint Lace, "Gros point de Venise."]

Collections of hand-made lace chiefly exist in museums and technical institutions, as for instance the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, and museums at Lyons, Nuremberg, Berlin, Turin and elsewhere. In such places the opportunity is presented of tracing in chronological sequence the stages of pattern and texture development.

_Literature._--The literature of the art of lace-making is considerable. The series of 16th- and 17th-century lace pattern-books, of which the more important are perhaps those by F. Vinciolo (Paris, 1587), Cesare Vecellio (Venice, 1592), and Isabetta Catanea Parasole (Venice, 1600), not to mention several kindred works of earlier and later date published in Germany and the Netherlands, supplies a large field for exploration. Signor Ongania of Venice published a limited number of facsimiles of the majority of such works. M. Alvin of Brussels issued a brochure in 1863 upon these patterns, and in the same year the marquis Girolamo d'Adda contributed two bibliographical essays upon the same subject to the _Gazette des Beaux-Arts_ (vol. xv. p. 342 seq., and vol. xvii. p. 421 seq.). In 1864 Cavaliere A. Merli wrote a pamphlet (with illustrations) entitled _Origine ed uso delle trine a filo di rete_; Mons F. de Fertiault compiled a brief and rather fanciful _Histoire de la dentelle_ in 1843, in which he reproduced statements to be found in Diderot's _Encyclopédie_, subsequently quoted by Roland de la Platière. The first _Report of the Department of Practical Art_ (1853) contains a "Report on Cotton Print Works and Lace-Making" by Octavius Hudson, and in the first _Report of the Department of Science and Art_ are some "Observations on Lace." Reports upon the International Exhibitions of 1851 (London) and 1867 (Paris), by M. Aubry, Mrs Palliser and others contain information concerning lace-making. The most important work first issued upon the history of lace-making is that by Mrs Bury Palliser (_History of Lace_, 1869). In this work the history is treated rather from an antiquarian than a technical point of view; and wardrobe accounts, inventories, state papers, fashionable journals, diaries, plays, poems, have been laid under contribution with surprising diligence. A new edition published in 1902 presents the work as entirely revised, rewritten and enlarged under the editorship of M. Jourdain and Alice Dryden. In 1875 the Arundel Society brought out _Ancient Needlepoint and Pillow Lace_, a folio volume of permanently printed photographs taken from some of the finest specimens of ancient lace collected for the International Exhibition of 1874. These were accompanied by a brief history of lace, written from the technical aspect of the art, by Alan S. Cole. At the same time appeared a bulky imperial 4to volume by Seguin, entitled _La Dentelle_, illustrated with wood-cuts and fifty photo-typographical plates. Seguin divides his work into four sections. The first is devoted to a sketch of the origin of laces; the second deals with pillow laces, bibliography of lace and a review of sumptuary edicts; the third relates to needle-made lace; and the fourth contains an account of places where lace has been and is made, remarks upon commerce in lace, and upon the industry of lace makers. Without sufficient conclusive evidence Seguin accords to France the palm for having excelled in producing practically all the richer sorts of laces, notwithstanding that both before and since the publication of his otherwise valuable work, many types of them have been identified as being Italian in origin. Descriptive catalogues are issued of the lace collections at South Kensington Museum, at the Science and Art Museum, Dublin, and at the Industrial Museum, Nuremberg. In 1881 a series of four Cantor Lectures on the art of lace-making were delivered before the Society of Arts by Alan S. Cole.

_A Technical History of the Manufacture of Venetian Laces_, by G. M. Urbani de Gheltof, with plates, was translated by Lady Layard, and published at Venice by Signor Ongania. The _History of Machine-wrought Hosiery and Lace Manufacture_ (London, 1867), by Felkin, has already been referred to. There is also a technological essay upon lace made by machinery, with diagrams of lace stitches and patterns (_Technologische Studien im sächsischen Erzgebirge_, Leipzig, 1878), by Hugo Fischer. In 1886 the Libraire Renouard, Paris, published a _History of Point d'Alençon_, written by Madame G. Despierres, which gives a close and interesting account of the industry, together with a list, compiled from local records, of makers and dealers from 1602 onwards.--_Embroidery and Lace: their manufacture and history from the remotest antiquity to the present day_, by Ernest Lefebure, lace-maker and administrator of the École des Arts Décoratifs, translated and enlarged with notes by Alan S. Cole, was published in London in 1888. It is a well-illustrated handbook for amateurs, collectors and general readers.--Irish laces made from modern designs are illustrated in a _Renascence of the Irish Art of Lace-making_, published in 1888 (London).--_Anciennes Dentelles belges formant la collection de feue madame Augusta Baronne Liedts et données au Musée de Grunthuis à Bruges_, published at Antwerp in 1889, consists of a folio volume containing upwards of 181 phototypes--many full size--of fine specimens of lace. The ascriptions of country and date of origin are occasionally inaccurate, on account of a too obvious desire to credit Bruges with being the birthplace of all sorts of lace-work, much of which shown in this work is distinctly Italian in style.--The _Encyclopaedia of Needlework_, by Thérèse de Dillmont-Dornach (Alsace, 1891), is a detailed guide to several kinds of embroidery, knitting, crochet, tatting, netting and most of the essential stitches for needlepoint lace. It is well illustrated with wood-cuts and process blocks.--An exhaustive history of Russian lace-making is given in _La Dentelle russe_, by Madame Sophie Davidoff, published at Leipzig, 1895. Russian lace is principally pillow-work with rather heavy thread, and upwards of eighty specimens are reproduced by photo-lithography in this book.

A short account of the best-known varieties of _Point and Pillow Lace_, by A. M. S. (London, 1899), is illustrated with typical specimens of Italian, Flemish, French and English laces, as well as with magnified details of lace, enabling any one to identify the plaits, the twists and loops of threads in the actual making of the fabric.--_L'Industrie des tulles et dentelles mécaniques dans le Pas de Calais_, 1815-1900, by Henri Hénon (Paris, 1900), is an important volume of over 600 pages of letterpress, interspersed with abundant process blocks of the several kinds of machine nets and laces made at Calais since 1815. It opens with a short account of the Arras hand-made laces, the production of which is now almost extinct. The book was sold for the benefit of a public subscription towards the erection of a statue in Calais to Jacquard, the inventor of the apparatus by means of which all figured textile fabrics are manufactured. It is of some interest to note that machine net and lace-making at Calais owe their origin to Englishmen, amongst whom "le sieur R. Webster arrivé à St Pierre-les-Calais en Décembre, 1816, venant d'Angleterre, est l'un des premiers qui ont établi dans la communauté une fabrique de tulles," &c. _Lace-making in the Midlands: Past and Present_, by C. C. Channer and M. E. Roberts (London, 1900) upon the lace-making industry in Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire contains many illustrations of laces made in these counties from the 17th century to the present time. _Musée rétrospectif. Dentelles à l'exposition universelle internationale de 1900 à Paris. Rapport de Mons. E. Lefebvre_ contains several good illustrations, especially of important specimens of Point de France of the 17th and 18th centuries. _Le Point de France et les autres dentelliers au XVII^e et au XVIII^e siècles_, by Madame Laurence de Laprade (Paris, 1905), brings together much hitherto scattered information throwing light upon operations in many localities in France where the industry has been carried on for considerable periods. The book is well and usefully illustrated.

See also _Irische Spitzen_ (30 half-tone plates), with a short historical introduction by Alan S. Cole (Stuttgart, 1902); _Pillow Lace_, a practical handbook by Elizabeth Mincoff and Margaret S. Marriage (London, 1907); _The Art of Bobbin Lace_, a practical text-book of workmanship, &c., by Louisa Tebbs (London, 1907); _Antiche trine italiane_, by Elisa Ricci (Bergamo, 1908), well illustrated; _Seven Centuries of Lace_, by Mrs John Hungerford Pollen (London and New York, 1908), very fully illustrated. (A. S. C.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The prevalence of fashion in the above-mentioned sorts of embroidery during the 16th century is marked by the number of pattern-books then published. In Venice a work of this class was issued by Alessandro Pagannino in 1527; another of a similar nature, printed by Pierre Quinty, appeared in the same year at Cologne; and La _Fleur de la science de pourtraicture et patrons de broderie, façon arabicque et ytalique_, was published at Paris in 1530. From these early dates until the beginning of the 17th century pattern-books for embroidery in Italy, France, Germany and England were published in great abundance. The designs contained in many of those dating from the early 16th century were to be worked for costumes and hangings, and consisted of scrolls, arabesques, birds, animals, flowers, foliage, herbs and grasses. So far, however, as their reproduction as laces might be concerned, the execution of complicated work was involved which none but practised lace-workers, such as those who arose a century later, could be expected to undertake.

[2] A very complete account of how these conditions began and developed at Alençon, for instance, is given in Madame Despierre's _Histoire du Point d'Alençon_ (1886) to which is appended an interesting and annotated list of merchants, designers and makers of Point d'Alençon.

[3] _E.g._ The family of Camusat at Alençon from 1602 until 1795.

[4] The picture, however, as Seguin has pointed out, was probably painted some thirty years later, and by Jean Matsys.

[5] See the poetical skit _Révolte des passements et broderies_, written by Mademoiselle de la Tousse, cousin of Madame de Sévigné, in the middle of the 17th century, which marks the favour which foreign laces at that time commanded amongst the leaders of French fashion. It is fairly evident too that the French laces themselves, known as "bisette," "gueuse," "campane" and "mignonette," were small and comparatively insignificant works, without pretence to design.

[6] Useful information has been communicated to the writer of the present article on lace by Mrs B. Wishaw of Seville.

[7] See Felkin's _Machine-wrought Hosiery and Lace Manufactures_.

[8] After 1650 the lace-workers at Alençon and its neighbourhood produced work of a daintier kind than that which was being made by the Venetians. As a rule the hexagonal _bride_ grounds of Alençon laces are smaller than similar details in Venetian laces. The average size of a diagonal taken from angle to angle in an Alençon (or so-called Argentan) hexagon was about one-sixth of an inch, and each side of the hexagon was about one-tenth of an inch. An idea of the minuteness of the work can be formed from the fact that a side of a hexagon would be overcast with some nine or ten buttonhole stitches.

LACE-BARK TREE, a native of Jamaica, known botanically as _Lagetta lintearia_, from its native name lagetto. The inner bark consists of numerous concentric layers of interlacing fibres resembling in appearance lace. Collars and other articles of apparel have been made of the fibre, which is also used in the manufacture of whips, &c. The tree belongs to the natural order Thymelaeaceae, and is grown in hothouses in Britain.

LACEDAEMON, in historical times an alternative name of LACONIA (q.v.). Homer uses only the former, and in some passages seems to denote by it the Achaean citadel, the Therapnae of later times, in contrast to the lower town Sparta (G. Gilbert, _Studien zur altspartanischen Geschichte_, Göttingen, 1872, p. 34 foll.). It is described by the epithets [Greek: koilê] (hollow) and [Greek: kêtôessa] (spacious or hollow), and is probably connected etymologically with [Greek: lakkos], _lacus_, any hollow place. Lacedaemon is now the name of a separate department, which had in 1907 a population of 87,106.

LACÉPÈDE, BERNARD GERMAIN ÉTIENNE DE LA VILLE, COMTE DE (1756-1825), French naturalist, was born at Agen in Guienne on the 26th of December 1756. His education was carefully conducted by his father, and the early perusal of Buffon's _Natural History_ awakened his interest in that branch of study, which absorbed his chief attention. His leisure he devoted to music, in which, besides becoming a good performer on the piano and organ, he acquired considerable mastery of composition, two of his operas (which were never published) meeting with the high approval of Gluck; in 1781-1785 he also brought out in two volumes his _Poétique de la musique_. Meantime he wrote two treaties, _Essai sur l'électricité_ (1781) and _Physique générale et particulière_ (1782-1784), which gained him the friendship of Buffon, who in 1785 appointed him subdemonstrator in the Jardin du Roi, and proposed to him to become the continuator of his _Histoire naturelle_. This continuation was published under the titles _Histoire des quadrupèdes ovipares et des serpents_ (2 vols., 1788-1789) and _Histoire naturelle des reptiles_ (1789). After the Revolution Lacépède became a member of the legislative assembly, but during the Reign of Terror he left Paris, his life having become endangered by his disapproval of the massacres. When the Jardin du Roi was reorganized as the Jardin des Plantes, Lacépède was appointed to the chair allocated to the study of reptiles and fishes. In 1798 he published the first volume of _Histoire naturelle des poissons_, the fifth volume appearing in 1803; and in 1804 appeared his _Histoire des cétacés_. From this period till his death the part he took in politics prevented him making any further contribution of importance to science. In 1799 he became a senator, in 1801 president of the senate, in 1803 grand chancellor of the legion of honour, in 1804 minister of state, and at the Restoration in 1819 he was created a peer of France. He died at Épinay on the 6th of October 1825. During the latter part of his life he wrote _Histoire générale physique et civile de l'Europe_, published posthumously in 18 vols., 1826.

A collected edition of his works on natural history was published in 1826.

LACEWING-FLY, the name given to neuropterous insects of the families _Hemerobiidae_ and _Chrysopidae_, related to the ant-lions, scorpion-flies, &c., with long filiform antennae, longish bodies and two pairs of large similar richly veined wings. The larvae are short grubs beset with hair-tufts and tubercles. They feed upon _Aphidae_ or "green fly" and cover themselves with the emptied skins of their prey. Lacewing-flies of the genus _Chrysopa_ are commonly called golden-eye flies.