Samplers and Tapestry Embroideries Part 5

As ill.u.s.trations of tales the sampler of Sarah Young (Fig. 15) is an unusual example. It deals with Sir Richard Steele's story of the loves of Inkle and Yarico. Inkle, represented as a strapping big sailor, was cast away in the Spanish Main, where he met and loved Yarico, an Indian girl, but showed his baseness by selling her for a slave when he reached Barbadoes in a vessel which rescued him. The story evidently had a considerable, if fleeting, popularity, for it was dramatised.

The Design, Ornament and Colouring of Samplers

Whilst important clues to the age of a sampler may be gathered from its form and legend, its design and colouring are factors from which almost as much may be learnt.

Design can be more easily learned from considering in detail the ill.u.s.trations, which have been mainly chosen for their typifying one or other form of it, but certain general features are so usually present that they may be summarised here.

No one with any knowledge of design can look through the specimens of samplers selected for this volume without noting, first, that it is, in the earlier specimens, appropriate to the subject, decorative in treatment, and lends itself to a variety of treatment with the needle.

Secondly, that the decoration is not English in origin, but is usually derived from foreign sources. Indeed, if we are to believe an old writer of the Jacobean time, the designs were

"Collected with much praise and industrie, From scorching Spaine and freezing Muscovie, From fertile France and pleasant Italie, From Poland, Sweden, Denmarke, Germanie, And some of these rare patternes have been set Beyond the boundes of faithlesse Mahomet, From s.p.a.cious China and those Kingdomes East And from great Mexico, the Indies West.

Thus are these workes farre fetch't and dearly bought, And consequently good for ladyes thought."

Thirdly, that after maintaining a remarkable uniformity until the end of the seventeenth century, design falls away, and with rare exceptions continuously declines until it reaches a mediocrity to which the term can hardly be applied.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 15.--SAMPLER BY SARAH YOUNG. ABOUT 1750. _Mrs Head._]

The same features are noticeable in the colouring. The samplers of the Caroline period are in the main marked by a softness and delicacy, with a preference for tender and harmonious shades of pinks, greens, and blues, but these quickly pa.s.s out of the schemes of colouring until their revival a few years ago through the influence of j.a.pan and the perspicuity, of Sir Lazenby Liberty. This delicacy is not, as some suppose, due to time having softened the colours, for examination shows that fading has seldom taken place, in fact one of the most remarkable traits of the earlier samplers is the wonderful condition of their colouring (see Mrs Longman's sampler of 1656, Plate IV., as an example). Towards the end of the seventeenth century the adoption of a groundwork of roughish close-textured canvas of a canary hue also militated against this ensemble of the colour scheme, which is now and again too vivid, especially in the reds, a fact which may, in part, be due to their retaining their original tint with a persistency that has not endured with the other dyes.

During the early Georgian era sampler workers seem to have pa.s.sed through a stage of affection for deep reds, blues, and greens, with which they worked almost all their lettering. The same colours are met with in the large embroidered curtains of the time; it is probably due to the influence of the tapestries and the Chinese embroideries then so much in vogue.

In the opening years of the eighteenth century a pride in lettering gave rise to a series of samplers of little interest or artistic value, consisting, as they did, of nothing else than long sentences, not readily readable, and worked in silks in colours of every imaginable hue used indiscriminately, even in a single word, without any thought bestowed on harmony or effect of colouring.

Later on, towards the middle of the century, more sober schemes of colour set in, consisting in the abandonment of reds and the employment of little else than blues, greens, yellows, and blacks (see Plate IX.), which are attractive through their quietness and unity. Subsequently but little praise can be bestowed upon samplers so far as their design is concerned.

Occasionally, as in that of Mr Ruskin's ancestress (Plate X.), a result which is satisfactory, both in colour and design, is arrived at, but this is generally due to individual taste rather than to tuition or example. In this respect samplers only follow in the wake of all the other arts--furniture and silversmiths' work, perhaps, excepted, as regards both of which the taste displayed was also individual rather than national.

An evil which cankered later sampler ornamentation was a desire for novelty and variety. The earliest samplers exhibit few signs of attempts at invention in design. A comparison of any number of them shows ideas repeated again and again with the slightest variation. The same floral motives are adapted in almost every instance, and one and all may well have been employed since the days when they arrived from the Far East, brought, it may be, by the Crusaders. But it is in no derogatory spirit that I call attention to this lack of originality. A craftsman is doing a worthier thing in a.s.similating designs which have shown their fitness by centuries of use, patterns which are examples of fine decorative ornament that really beautifies the object to which it is applied, than in inventing weak and imperfect originals. No architect is accused of plagiarism if he introduces the pointed arch, and the great designs of the past are free and out of copyright. The Greek fret, or the Persian rose, is as much the property of anyone as the daisy or the snowdrop, and it was far better to make sound decorative pieces of embroidery on the lines of these than to attempt, as was done later on, feeble originals, which have nothing ornamental or decorative in their composition. The workers of the East, when perfection was arrived at in a design, did not hesitate to reproduce it again and again for centuries.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE IX.--SAMPLER BY E. PHILIPS. DATED 1761. _Author's Collection._

Were it not that this Sampler was produced by little Miss Philips at the tender age of seven, there would be a probability that it was unique through its containing a portrait of the producer. For in no other example have we so many evidences pointing to its being a record of actual facts.

For instance, there is clearly shown a gentleman pointing to his wife (in a hooped costume), and having round him his five girls of various ages, the youngest in the care of a nurse. In the upper left corner is his son in charge of a tutor, whilst on the right are two maid-servants, one being a woman of colour. This fashion for black servants is further emphasised by the negro boy with the dog. That these should be present in this family is not remarkable, for by the lower ill.u.s.tration it is evident that Mr Philips was a traveller who had crossed the seas in his ship to where alligators, black swans and other rare birds abounded. The work was executed in 1761, the second year of George the Third, whose monogram and crown are supported by two soldiers in the costume of the period. It has been most dexterously carried out by the young lady, and it is conceived in a delicate harmony of greens and blues which was not uncommon at that time. Size, 19 12-1/2. An adaptation of this Sampler has been utilised as the drop scene to the play of "Peter Pan."]

But the mistress of a ladies' improving school would hardly like her pupils to copy time after time the same designs--designs which perhaps resembled those of a rival establishment. Such a one would be oblivious to the fact that an ornamentalist is born not made, that the best design is traditional, and that pupils would be far more worthily employed in perpetuating ornamentation which had been invented by races intuitively gifted for such a purpose, than in attempting feeble products of her own brain. So, too, results show that she was, as a rule, unaware that good design is better displayed in simplicity than in pretentiousness. As that authority on design, the late Lewis Day, wrote in his volume on Embroidery, "The combination of a good designer and worker in the same person is an ideal very occasionally to be met with, and any attempt to realise it generally fails."

Samplers show in increasing numbers as the end approaches that their designers were ignorant of most of the elementary rules of ornamentation in needlework, such, for instance, as that the pictorial is not a suitable subject for reproduction, nor the delineation of the human figure, nor that the floral and vegetable kingdom, whilst lending itself better than aught else, should be treated from the decorative, and not the realistic point of view.

We will now pa.s.s on to consider generally the forms of decoration most usually met with.

Sampler Design: the Human Figure

Whilst embroideries in imitation of tapestries deal almost entirely with the portrayal of the human figure, samplers of the same period, and that the best, for the most part avoid it. This is somewhat remarkable, for the design of the Renaissance, which was universally practised at the time upon which we are dwelling, was almost entirely given up to weaving it into other forms, and the volumes which treat of embroidery show how frequently it occurs in foreign pieces of needlework. The omission is a curious one, but the reason for it is, apparently, not far to seek. If we examine the earlier pieces we shall see that practically one type of figure only presents itself. Save in exceptional pieces, such as Mrs Longman's early piece (Plate IV.), where the figures are clearly copied from one of the small tapestry pieces so in vogue at that date (1656), or Mrs Millett's piece (Fig. 16), the figures which appear upon samplers are all cast in one mould, and in no way improve but rather mar the composition.

This last-named drawn-work sampler is a specimen altogether apart for beauty of design and workmanship. Doubts have been expressed as to its English origin, but portions of the ornament, such as the acorn, and the Stuart S in the lowest row, are thoroughly English; besides, as we have seen, design in almost every one of the seventeenth-century samplers is infected with foreign motives. The uppermost panel is supposed to represent Abraham, Sarah, and the Angel. To the left is the tent, with the folds worked in relief, in a st.i.tch so fine as to defy ordinary eyesight.

Sarah, who holds up a hand in astonishment at the angel's announcement, has her head-dress, collar, and skirt in relief, the latter being sewn with microscopic fleurs-de-lis. The winged angel to the left of Abraham has a skirt composed of tiny scallops, which may represent feathers. A rabbit browses in front of the tent. The centre of the second row is occupied by a veiled mermaid, her tail covered with scalloped scale in relief. She holds in either hand a cup and a mask. The lettering in the two flanking panels is "S.I.D. 1649 A.I." The decorative motive of the outer panels is peapods in relief, some open and disclosing peas. Roses and tulips fill the larger square below, and these are followed by a row (reversed) of tulips and acorns. Four other rows complete the sampler, which only measures 18-1/2 6-3/4. In order to give it a larger size the lowest row is not reproduced. I have seen another drawn-work sampler which antedates that just described by a year. It is of somewhat coa.r.s.e texture but is good in design, and bears in a panel at the side initials and the date. The Victoria and Albert Museum has also two somewhat similar drawn-work samplers--one by Elizabeth Wood, dated 1666, which contains the Stuart S's; the other (undated) has the arms of James I.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 16.--DRAWN-WORK SAMPLER BY S. I. D. DATED 1649. _Mrs C. F. Millett._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 17.--SAMPLER BY JEAN PORTER. 1709-10.]

A type of figure prevalent in early samplers has puzzled collectors who possess specimens containing it. It wears a close-fitting costume and has arms extended, and has received the name of a "Boxer," presumably from its att.i.tude and costume. It and a companion are continuously depicted for nearly a century, finally disappearing about 1742, but maintaining their att.i.tude with less variation than any other form of ornament, the only alteration being in the form of the trophy which they hold in one hand. It is this trophy, if we may use such a term, that negatives the idea of their being combatant figures, and it almost with certainty places them in the category of the Greek Erotes, the Roman Amores, or the Cupids of the Renaissance. It is difficult to give a name to the trophy in most of the samplers, and the worker was clearly often in doubt as to its structure.

In some it resembles a small vase with a lid, in others a spray with branches or leaves on either side. In one of 1673 it takes the form of a four-petalled flower, and in one of 1679 that of an acorn, which is repeated in samplers of 1684, 1693, and 1694, this repet.i.tion being probably due to the acorn being a very favourite subject for design under the Stuarts. In a sampler of 1693 acorns are held in either hand. In one of 1742 (Fig. 18), the object held is a kind of candelabra. The little figures themselves preserve a singular uniformity of costume, which again points to their being the nude Erotes, clothed, to suit the times, in a tight-fitting jerkin and drawers. These are always of gayest colours. On occasions (as in a sampler dated 1693) they don a coat, and have long wigs, bringing them into line with the prevailing fashion.

When these figures disappear their place is taken by those of our first parents in the Garden of Eden, the incongruity of which is well depicted in the sampler ill.u.s.trated in Fig. 17. This piece of work, which took nearly a year to complete--it was begun on 14th May 1709, and finished on 6th April 1710--is unlike any other that I have seen of that period, for it antedates, by nearly half a century, the scenes from real life which afterwards became part and parcel of every sampler. Adam and Eve became quite common objects on samplers after 1760.[5]

Mention need only be made here of the dressed figures which occur in samplers dated during the reign of George the Third. They are sometimes quaint (as in Plates IX. and XI.), but they hardly come into any scheme of decoration. The squareness of the st.i.tch used in later samplers renders any imitation of painting such as was attempted altogether a failure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 18.--SAMPLER. NAME ILLEGIBLE. DATE 1742. _Formerly in the Author's Collection._]

Sampler Design: Animals

Animals in any true decorative sense hardly came into sampler ornament.

Whilst the tapestry pictures teem with them, so that one wanting in a lion or stag is a rarity, in samplers, probably, the difficulty of obtaining rounded forms with the st.i.tch used in the large grained canvas was a deterrent. The lion only being found on the Fletwood sampler of 1654 (Fig.

44) and the stag, which in tapestry pictures usurps the place of the unicorn, appears but rarely on samplers before the middle of the eighteenth century, when it came into fashion, and afterwards occurs with uninterrupted regularity so long as samplers were made.

This neglect of animals is hardly to be deplored, for when they do occur they are little else than caricatures (see, for instance, those in Plate III.). Birds, which lend themselves to needlework, appear in the later samplers (Plate XI. and Fig. 18), but hardly as part of any decorative scheme.

Sampler Design: Flowers

With the practically insignificant exceptions which we have just noticed, the ornamentation of the sampler was confined to floral and geometrical motives, and whilst the latter were for the most part used in drawn-work samplers, the former const.i.tuted the stock whence the greater part of the decoration employed in the older examples was derived.

Amongst the floral and vegetable kingdom the selection was a wide one, but a few favourites came in for recognition in almost every sampler, partly because of their decorative qualities, and partly from their being national badges. With few exceptions they were those which were to be met with in English seventeenth-century gardens, and undoubtedly, in some instances, may have been adapted by the makers from living specimens.

Chief among the flowers was the rose, white and red, single and double, the emblem for centuries previously of two great parties in the State, a badge of the Tudor kings, a part of the insignia of the realm, and occupying a foremost place upon its coinage. In sampler ornamentation it is seldom used either in profile or in bud, but generally full face, and more often as a single than as a double flower. As a form of decoration it may have been derived from foreign sources, but it clearly owed its popularity to the national significance that attached to it.

The decorative value of the pink or carnation has been recognised from the earliest times, and a piece of Persian ornament is hardly complete without it. It is not surprising, therefore, that the old sampler workers utilised it to the full, and in fact it appears oftener than the rose in seventeenth-century specimens. Ten of the thirteen exhibits of that century at The Fine Art Society's Exhibition in 1900 contained it as against seven where the rose was figured. It maintains this position throughout, and the most successful of the borders of bordered samplers are those where it is utilised. Specimens will be found in Plates III., IV., and VI.

The decorative value of the honeysuckle was hardly appreciated, and it only appeared on samplers of the date of 1648 (Plate III.), 1662 (Plate V.), 1668, 1701, and 1711, in the Exhibition, and the undated one reproduced in Fig. 4.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE X.--SAMPLER BY CATHERINE TWEEDALL. DATED 1775. _Mrs Arthur Severn._

The Sampler is noteworthy not only on account of its harmonious colour scheme, its symmetry of parts, and the excellence of its needlework, but as having been wrought by a young lady who afterwards became Mrs Ruskin, and the grandmother of John Ruskin. Her name, Cathrine Tweedall, is worked in the lower circle, and is illegible in the otherwise admirable reproduction, owing to its being in a faded shade of the fairest pink. The verse was probably often read by her renowned grandson, and may perchance have spurred his determination to strive in the race in which he won so "high a reward." Mrs Arthur Severn, to whom the Sampler belongs, notes that the Jean Ross whose name also appears upon it was the sister of the great Arctic explorer. The date of the Sampler is 1775.]

Sampler workers were very faithful to the strawberry, which, after appearing in almost every one of the seventeenth-century long samplers, was a favourite object for the later borders, and it may be seen almost unaltered in specimens separated in date by a century at least. We give in Fig. 31 a very usual version of it. (See also Plate XIII.)

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 19.--SAMPLER BY MARY ANDERSON. 1831. _Lady Sherborne._]

Other fruits and flowers which now and again find a place are the fig, which will be seen in Plate III.; the pineapple, the thistle (Fig. 21), and the tulip in samplers dated 1662, 1694, 1760, and 1825 (Plate XIII.).

Although the oak tree acquired political significance after the flight of Charles II., that fact can in no way account for such prominence being attached to its fruit and its foliage as, for instance, is the case in samplers dated 1644 and 1648 (Plate III.), where varieties of these are utilised in a most decorative fashion in several of the rows of ornament, or in another of the following years (Fig. 16). But, curiously enough, after appearing in almost every seventeenth-century sampler, it disappeared entirely at the commencement of the eighteenth century.

Sampler Design: Crowns, Coronets, Etc.

The crown seems to have been suddenly seized upon by sampler makers as a form of decoration, and for half a century it was used with a tiresome reiteration. It had, of course, been largely used in Tudor decoration, and on the restoration of the monarchy it would be given prominence. But it probably was also in vogue because it lent itself to filling up s.p.a.ces caused by alphabets not completing a line, and also because it allowed of variation through the coronets used by different ranks of n.o.bility. We have seen in the sampler, Fig. 20, that the coronet of each order was used with a letter beneath, indicating duke, earl, etc. On occasions crowns were also used with some effect as a border. It is possible that the fashion for coronets was derived from foreign samplers, where this form of decoration was frequently used about the end of the seventeenth century, doubtless owing to the abundance of enn.o.bled personages; they may well have come over with many other fancies which followed in the train of the House of Hanover. The earliest sampler in the Exhibition before referred to which bore a crown was one of 1693; but the coronet was there placed in conjunction with the initials M. D., and might be that of a t.i.tled lady who worked it. After that it appeared in one dated 1705 (where it was clearly a royal one connected with "Her Majesti Queen Anne"), and in samplers dated 1718, 1726, 1728 (1740, in which there were at least fifty varieties), and so on almost yearly up to 1767, after which it gradually disappeared, two only out of seventy subsequent samplers containing it. These were dated 1798 and 1804. In countries where almost every family bore a rank which warranted the use of a coronet, there would be a reason for their appearance as part of what would have to be embroidered on table linen, etc.