The drawn-work, "opus tract'," seems to have been but a drawing of thread worked over silk. We have smocks thus wrought and decorated "cum lez ruffs et wrestbands."[[827]]
In addition to the already enumerated laces of Queen Elizabeth are the bride laces of Coventry blue,[[828]] worn and given to the guests at weddings, mentioned in the Masques of Ben Jonson:[[829]]—
"Clod.—And I have lost, beside my purse, my best bride-lace I had at Joan Turnips' wedding.
"Frances.—Ay, and I have lost my thimble and a skein of Coventry blue I had to work Gregory Litchfield a handkerchief."
When the Queen visited Kenilworth in 1577, a Bridall took place for the pastime of her Majesty. "First," writes the Chancellor, "came all the lusty lads and bold bachelors of the parish, every wight with his blue bridesman's bride lace upon a braunch of green broom." What these bride laces exactly were we cannot now tell. They continued in fashion till the Puritans put down all festivals, ruined the commerce of Coventry, and the fabric of blue thread ceased for ever. It was probably a showy kind of coarse trimming, like that implied by Mopsa in the Winter's Tale, when she says—
"You promised me a tawdry lace:"[[830]]
articles which, judging from the song of Autolycus—
"Will you buy any tape,
Or lace for your cape?"
were already hawked about among the pedlars' wares throughout the country: one of the "many laces" mentioned by Shakespeare.[[831]]