Spangles.—These are small variously shaped pieces of thin metal, usually pierced with a hole in the centre for fixing on to the material. They are frequently circular in shape, and either flat or slightly concave; the latter are the prettier. Many fancy shapes also are obtainable, but they are inclined to look tawdry, and suggestive of the pantomime.
Cloth of Gold and Silver.—This is a fabric manufactured of silk, with gold or silver thread inwoven in the making. It is not now so much used as formerly, when it was in great request for robes of kings and other high dignitaries of church or state.
A special make of silk for couching down gold thread is obtainable in various colours. It is called horsetail or sewings, and is both fine and strong.
Padding for use in raised gold work is usually yellow, and for silver, white or grey. Yellow soft cotton, linen thread, or silk, are all used for the purpose.
Various precautions can and must be taken to keep the gold thread bright, for under unfavourable circumstances it rapidly assumes a bad colour; the silver thread is even more liable to tarnish than the gold, and it turns a worse colour, going black. There is a special paper manufactured to wrap threads in, and the stock supply should be kept in a tin or air-tight bottle; this is in order to protect the metal from damp, which is most injurious; to do this is a difficult matter in the English climate. Linen used for working upon, or as backing, is best unbleached, for sometimes the chemicals used in the bleaching process have a deleterious effect upon the gold; a piece of gold embroidery wrapped up in cotton wool for preservation has been found completely spoiled by some chemical in this wool, which proved more disastrous than exposure to air would have been. Gas, strong scents, handling (especially with hot hands), all have an evil effect, and so should be avoided as much as possible. Work even whilst in progress should be kept covered as much as is practicable, and should not be allowed to hang about; the quicker it is done the better. A piece of finished work can be polished up with a leather pad or a brush, similar to a housemaid's brush for silver-cleaning purposes; this of course, must be used with care.
ANCIENT METHOD OF COUCHING
Gold thread can be couched on to the material in two distinct ways, one of them in use at the present day, the other one that was commonly practised in the XIIIth and XIVth centuries. About the second half of the last-named century the earlier method was supplanted by the present one. Almost every example of early gold thread work exhibits this obsolete and ingenious method of couching. The Syon cope and the Jesse cope in the Victoria and Albert Museum may be mentioned as famous examples. M. Louis de Farcy[11] draws especial attention to this beautiful method of working, to which he gives the name point couché rentré ou retiré, and strongly urges its revival; he points out many distinct advantages it has over the method now in use.
The durability is very great, owing to the couching thread being upon the reverse side, where it is protected from wear and tear, and being out of sight can be made strong and durable. If a thread is accidentally broken it does not necessarily give way along an entire line, as may easily happen in the present method. A proof of this point can be seen upon the beautiful Ascoli cope lately in the Victoria and Albert Museum, about which there has been so much discussion of late as to in what country it originated, and who was the rightful owner. The early couching worked entirely over the background of the cope is in a state of perfect preservation; portions of the gold thread drapery have here and there been couched by the other method, the tying down threads have, in those parts, mostly disappeared, and the gold hangs loose and ragged upon the surface.
By the way in which it is worked, there results a particularly pleasing and even surface, agreeably varied by play of light and shade. Another advantage of the ancient method is that the completed work is very flexible; this point will appeal to those who have experienced the extreme stiffness of a large surface of ordinarily couched metal threads. Flexibility is an invaluable quality for any work destined, like copes and curtains, to hang in folds.