homespun as speedily in America as in
England. When the poet Whittier set out from the Quaker farmhouse to go
to Boston to seek his fortune, he wore a homespun suit every part of
which, even the horn buttons, was of domestic manufacture. Many a man
born since Whittier has grown to manhood clothed for every-day wear
wholly with homespun; and many a boy is living who was sent to college
dressed wholly in a "full-cloth" suit, with horn buttons or buttons made
of discs of heavy leather.

During the Civil War spinning and weaving were revived arts in the
Confederate cities; and, as ever in earlier days, proved a most valuable
economic resource under restricted conditions. In the home of a friend
in Charleston, South Carolina, an old, worm-eaten loom was found in a
garret where it had lain since the embargo in 1812. It was set up in
1863, and plantation carpenters made many like it for neighbors and
fellow-citizens. All women in the mountain districts knew how to use the
loom, and taught weaving to many others, both white and black. A portion
of the warp, which was cotton, was spun at home; more was bought from a
cotton-factory. My friend sacrificed a great number of excellent
wool-mattresses; this wool was spun into yarn and used for weft, and
formed a most grateful and dignified addition to the varied, grotesque,
and interesting makeshifts of the wardrobe of the Southern Confederacy.

Though weaving on hand-looms in our Northern and Middle states is
practically extinct, save as to the weaving of rag carpets (and that
only in few communities), in the South all is different. In all the
mountain and remote regions of Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, the
Carolinas, and I doubt not in Alabama, both among the white and negro
mountain-dwellers, hand-weaving is still a household art. The
descendants of the Acadians in Louisiana still weave and wear homespun.
The missions in the mountains encourage spinning and weaving; and it is
pleasant to learn that many women not only pursue these handicrafts for
their home use, but some secure a good living by hand-weaving, earning
ten cents a yard in weaving rag carpets. The coverlet patterns resemble
the ones already described. Names from Waynesville, North Carolina, are
"Washington's Diamond Ring," "Nine Chariot Wheels"; from Pinehurst come
"Flowery Vine," "Double Table," "Cat Track," "Snow Ball and Dew Drop,"
"Snake Shed," "Flowers in the Mountains." At Pinehurst the old settlers,
of sturdy