Size of detail, about six feet by four.

PLATE IX.--_Cutwork Lettering taken from a XVIIth century English
Sampler._--The letters and surrounding decoration shown in this example
of cut or open work are built up on a square network of warp and weft
threads that were left at regular intervals throughout the space, when
the unnecessary threads were withdrawn, and then covered with a kind of
darning stitch. The letters are worked in buttonhole stitch, each fresh
line being taken into the heading of the last one. The other parts of
the work are carried out in either buttonhole or overcast stitch. The
complete sampler is a long narrow strip of linen, across which run
specimen bands of various kinds of work. It is exhibited in the Victoria
and Albert Museum.

Width of cutwork detail, six inches.

PLATE X.--_An Embroidered Sampler._--The work is carried out in coloured
silks in minute cross-stitch and occasional rows of satin stitch, upon a
ground of fine single-thread canvas. It is dated 1798, and was worked by
Alice Knight, the author's great-grandmother. The birds, trees, and
flowers, the charming little border patterns, and the comical cats
standing on either hillocks or housetops, are all characteristic of
sampler work. Working the sampler was once the regular introduction to
mending, marking, and embroidery, and one was done by almost every
XVIIIth century child as a part of education, indeed the practice of
working samplers was continued some decades into the XIXth century.

Actual size of original, eighteen inches by twelve.

PLATE XI.--_An Example of Persian Embroidery._--Formerly in the
collection of Lord Leighton, and now in that of the London County
Council's Central School of Arts and Crafts. The embroidery is carried
out almost entirely in chain stitch with brilliantly coloured silks,
upon a fine semi-transparent ground. The flowers that appear dark in the
reproduction are worked in a bright rosy red, others are yellow and
orange, and the leaves are in pale grey green outlined with a dark
myrtle shade of the same.

Size of panel, about five feet by four.

PLATE XII.--_A Detail from an Embroidered Tablecloth._--The entire
surface of this fine white linen cloth is strewn with a profusion of
beautiful flowers, worked in floss silk in bright colours. The flowers
were all drawn directly from nature by the worker, Mrs. W. R. Lethaby.

PLATE XIII.--_An Embroidered Altar Frontal, executed by Miss May