The rich woman of the neighbourhood sees and feels that colour is
wanting (for the windows must wait till their use as pious memorials
fills them with glowing tints). The central point of the whole
edifice, the altar, calls for the first key-note in colour to be
struck, and a splendid altar-cloth is the fitting instrument.

She consults the architect, who probably is also an artist, and the
design is agreed upon, and hurriedly drawn and carried out; for there
is not a moment to lose if it is to be ready for the opening day. It
may be beautiful, and it sometimes is so, but the mere want of time
for due consideration often results in the commonplace ornamentation,
which neither satisfies the eye nor the mind. It is often only a mere
bit of colour and a mediaeval pattern, and has no apparent motive or
meaning to give it value.

One sometimes finds that a conventional form has been selected, of
which the emblematic intention it originally expressed has been
forgotten or overlooked. Therefore, while to the unlearned it conveys
no meaning, it is read as absolute nonsense by the ecclesiastical
archaeologist, simply because it is worked in a language of
undeciphered hieroglyphics--unknown to the worker--meaningless,
reminding us of the Graeco-Egyptian inscriptions, of which the pictured
words seem to have been copied at random for their prettiness, or the
Arabian lettering on some of the ancient Sicilian textiles, which is
nonsense. The sense and the emblematic meaning are forgotten, and the
conventional form--an empty shell--is alone retained, conveying no
idea, and reduced to the low purpose of being a pretty pattern, vague
and unintelligent.

I have so often said that a pattern always originally possessed, and
should always retain a meaning, that I fear to become tiresome; but I
repeat it here, as in ecclesiastical design it is more important than
elsewhere; the meanings are deeper, and convey more essentially solemn
traditions and allusions. If the motive of the designer is evident,
and is conscientiously worked out, its value receives an enduring
quality, and its present interest is enhanced.

Embroidery is not less eloquent than her sister-arts in the teaching
of divine lessons, and appealing through the beauty of form and
colour to the poetical instincts of the congregation, of which the
least educated members almost unconsciously feel the influence; and
besides, the people are always alive to the charms of symboli