t, according to the coarseness of
the stuff, two or four threads, below the edge of the turning, and tack
your hem down to the line thus drawn. Fasten your thread in to the left,
and work your hem from right to left, taking up three or four
cross-threads at a time, and inserting your needle, immediately above,
into the folded hem, three or four threads from the edge, and then
drawing it out.

[Illustration: FIG. 55. SINGLE HEM-STITCH.]

The same stitch is used for preventing the fringes, that serve as a
finish to so many articles of house-linen, from ravelling.

SECOND HEM-STITCH (fig. 56).--Prepare your hem as for fig. 55, and
work from left to right; with this difference, that after drawing two or
three cross-threads together, from right to left, you skip the same
number of perpendicular threads you took up below, and insert your
needle downwards from above, bringing it out at the bottom edge of the
hem.

[Illustration: FIG. 56. SECOND HEM-STITCH.]

These stitches, which can be used for the right side also, form a kind
of little tress, along the edge of the hem.

LADDER STITCH HEM (fig. 57). Complete the hem, as already directed in
fig. 55, then draw out three or five threads more, turn the work round,
and repeat the process, taking up the same clusters of threads which
you took up in the first row of stitches, thus forming little
perpendicular bars.

[Illustration: FIG. 57. LADDER STITCH HEM.]

DOUBLE HEM-STITCH (fig. 58). Begin as in fig. 55, forming your
clusters of an even number of threads; and then, in making your second
row of stitches, draw half the threads of one cluster, and half of the
next together, thereby making them slant, first one way and then the
other.

[Illustration: FIG. 58. DOUBLE HEM-STITCH.]

ANTIQUE HEM-STITCH (figs 59, 60, 61 and 62). In the old, elaborate,
linen needlework, we often meet two kinds of hem-stitching seldom found
in modern books on needle-work. Figs. 59 to 62 are magnified
representations of the same. At the necessary depth for forming a narrow
hem, a thread is drawn, in the case of very fine textures where the edge
is rolled, not laid; then fasten in the working thread at the left, and
work the stitches from left to right. Passing your needle, from right to
left, under three or four threads, draw the thread round the cluster and
carry your needle on, through as many threads of the upper layer of
stuff, as you took up below, so that the stitch may always emerge fro