Gammer. “Go hie the, Tib, and run along, to th’ end here of the town.
Didst carry out dust in thy lap? seek where thou porest it down;
And as thou sawest me roking in the ashes where I morned,
So see in all the heap of dust thou leave no straw unturned.”
Hodge. “Your neele lost? it is pitie you shold lacke care and endles sorrow.
Tell me, how shall my breches be sewid? shall I go thus to-morrow?”
Gammer. “Ah, Hodge, Hodge, if that I could find my neele, by the reed,
I’d sew thy breches, I promise the, with full good double threed,
And set a patch on either knee, shall last this months twain,
Now God, and Saint Sithe, I pray, to send it back again.”
Hodge. “Whereto served your hands and eyes, but your neele keep?
What devil had you els to do? ye keep, I wot, no sheep.
I’m fain abrode to dig and delve, in water, mire and clay,
Sossing and possing in the dirt, still from day to day
A hundred things that be abroad, I’m set to see them weel;
And four of you sit idle at home, and cannot keep a neele.”
Gammer. “My neele, alas, I lost, Hodge, what time I me up hasted,
To save milk set up for thee, which Gib our cat hath wasted.”
Hodge. “The devil he take both Gib and Tib, with all the rest;
I’m always sure of the worst end, whoever have the best.
Where ha you ben fidging abroad, since you your neele lost?”
Gammer. “Within the house, and at the door, sitting by this same post;
Where I was looking a long hour, before these folke came here;
But, wel away! all was in vain, my neele is never the near!”
“Gammer Gurton’s Needle,” says Hazlitt, “is a regular comedy, in five acts, built on the circumstance of an old woman having lost her needle which throws the whole village into confusion, till it is at last providentially found sticking in an unlucky part of Hodge’s dress. This must evidently have happened at a time when the manufactures of Sheffield and Birmingham had not reached the height of perfection which they have at present done. Suppose that there is only one sewing needle in a village, that the owner, a diligent notable old dame, loses it, that a mischief-making wag sets it about that another old woman has stolen this valuable instrument of household industry, that strict search is made every where in-doors for it in vain, and that then the incensed parties sally forth to scold it out in the open air, till words end in blows, and the affair is referred over to the higher authorities, and we shall have an exact idea (though, perhaps, not so lively a one) of what passes in this authentic document between Gammer Gurton and her gossip Dame Chat; Dickon the Bedlam (the causer of these harms); Hodge, Gammer Gurton’s servant; Tyb, her maid; Cocke, her ’prentice boy; Doll Scapethrift; Master Baillie, his master; Dr. Rat, the curate; and Gib, the cat, who may fairly be reckoned one of the dramatis personæ, and performs no mean part.”
From the needle itself the transition is easy to the needlework which was in vogue at the time when this little implement was so valuable and rare a commodity. We are told that the various kinds of needlework practised at this time would, if enumerated, astonish even the most industrious of our modern ladies. The lover of Shakspeare will remember that the term point device is often used by him, and that, indeed, it is a term frequently met with in the writers of that age with various applications; and it is originally derived, according to Mr. Douce, from the fine stitchery of the ladies.
It has been properly stated, that point device signifies exact, nicely, finical; but nothing has been offered concerning the etymology, except that we got the expression from the French. It has, in fact, been supplied from the labours of the needle. Poinct, in the French language, denotes a stitch; devise any thing invented, disposed, or arranged. Point devise was, therefore, a particular sort of patterned lace worked with the needle; and the term point lace is still familiar to every female. They had likewise their point-coupé, point-compté, dentelle au point devant l’aiguille, &c. &c.