In 1711 Anne forbade the entry of gold and silver lace,[[1038]] of which the consumption had become most preposterous,[[1039]] under pain of forfeiture and the fine of £100. Ladies wore even cherry-coloured stays trimmed with the forbidden fabric.[[1040]] The point of Spain had the preference over thread lace for state garments, heads and ruffles excepted; and as late as 1763, when the Dowager Lady Effingham was robbed of her coronation robes, among the wonderful finery detailed there is no mention of thread lace.
The commerce of Flanders, notwithstanding the French taste, seemed now on a comfortable footing. "The Flander-kins," writes the British Merchant in 1713, "are gone off from wool, which we have got, to lace and linen.... We have learned better, I hope, by our unsuccessful attempt to prohibit the Flanders laces, which made the Flemings retaliate upon us, and lessened our exportation of woollen manufactures by several £100,000 per annum."[[1041]]
Men looked upon lace as a necessary article to their wives' equipment. Addison declares that when the China mania first came in, women exchanged their Flanders point for punch-bowls and mandarins, thus picking their husbands' pockets, who is often purchasing a huge china vase when he fancies that he is buying a fine head for his wife.[[1042]] Indeed, they could scarcely grumble, as a good wig cost from forty to fifty guineas—to say nothing of their own lace ties and ruffles. Only an old antiquary like Sir Thomas Clayton could note down in his accounts:—"Lace and fal-lalls,[[1043]] and a large looking-glass to see her old ugly face in—frivolous expenses to please my proud lady."
CHAPTER XXVI.
GEORGE I. AND II.
GEORGE I.
"Wisdom with periwigs, with cassocks grace,
Courage with swords, gentility with lace."—Connoisseur.
The accession of the House of Hanover brought but little change either in the fashions or the fabrics. In 1717 the King published an edict regarding the hawking of lace, but the world was too much taken up with the Old Pretender and the court of St. Germains; the King, too, was often absent, preferring greatly his German dominions.