finement.

The Persians do most elaborate quilting on fine white linen, which they
sew with yellow silk; but the pattern is stuffed with cords of blue
cotton, the colour of which just grins through the white sufficiently to
cool it, and to distinguish it from the creamy white ground made warmer
by the yellow stitching.

Quilting is most often done in white upon colour, or in one colour upon
white. Yellow silk on white linen (as in the case of Illustration 69)
was a favourite combination, and is always a delicate one. But there is
no reason why a variety of colours should not be used in a counterpane.
When you stitch down the ground with coloured silk you give it, of
course, colour as well as flatness.

[Illustration: 70. RAISED QUILTING.]

STITCH GROUPS.

There are all sorts of ways in which stitches might be
grouped:--according to the order of time in which historically they came
into use; according as they are worked through and through the stuff or
lie mostly on its surface; according as they are conveniently worked in
the hand or necessitate the use of a frame; and in other ways too many
to mention. It is not difficult, for example, to imagine a
classification according to which the satin-stitch in Illustration 71
would figure as a canvas stitch.

In the Samplers they are grouped according to their construction, that
seeming to us the most practical for purposes of description. They might
for other purposes more conveniently be classed some other way. At all
events, it is helpful to group them. Designer and worker alike will go
straighter to the point if once they get clearly into their minds the
stitches and their use, and the range of each--what it can do, what it
can best do, what it can ill do, what it cannot do at all.

Anyone, having mastered the stitches and grasped their scope, can group
them for herself, say, into stitches suited (1) to line work, (2) to
all-over work, (3) to shading, and so on.

These she might again subdivide. Of line stitches, for example, some are
best suited for straight lines, others for curved; some for broad lines,
others for narrow; some for even lines, others for unequal; some for
outlining, others for veining.

And, further, of all-over stitches some give a plain surface, others a
patterned one; some do best for flat surfaces, others for modelled; some
look best in big patches, some answer only for small spaces.

With regard to shading stitches, there are vari