In Flanders also these glasses were made and used. The "mediæval 'ourinals' are alike the retorts of the alchemist and the water-globes of the poor Flemish flax-thread spinners and lace makers." Old English Glasses. A. Hartshorne.
The larger pins had heads put to them with seeds of galium locally called Hariffe or goose-grass; the seeds when fingered became hard and polished.
Bobbins are usually made of bone, wood or ivory. English bobbins are of bone or wood, and especially in the counties of Bedford, Bucks, and Huntingdon, the set on a lace pillow formed a homely record of their owner's life. The names of her family, dates and records, births and marriages and mottoes, were carved, burnt, or stained on the bobbin, while events of general interest were often commemorated by the addition of a new bobbin. The spangles, jingles (or gingles) fastened to the end of the bobbin have a certain interest; a waistcoat button and a few coral beads brought from overseas, a family relic in the shape of an old copper seal, or an ancient and battered coin—such things as these were often attached to the ring of brass wire passed through a hole in the bobbin. The inscriptions on the bobbins are sometimes burned and afterwards stained, and sometimes "pegged" or traced in tiny leaden studs, and consist of such mottoes as "Love me Truley" (sic), "Buy the Ring," "Osborne for Ever," "Queen Caroline," "Let no false Lover win my heart," "To me, my dear, you may come near," "Lovely Betty," "Dear Mother," and so forth.—R. E. Head. "Some notes on Lace-Bobbins." The Reliquary, July, 1900.
Too much stress cannot be laid on the importance of using fine linen thread. Many well-meant efforts are entirely ruined by the coarse woolly cotton thread used for what ought to be a fine make of lace. That good thread can be got in Great Britain is evident from the fact that the Brussels dealers employ English thread, and sell it to Venice for the exquisite work of Burano. Needless to say, no Englishman has attempted to make a bid for the direct custom of the 8,000 lace-workers there employed.
Catalogue of lace (Victoria and Albert Museum).