BY S. H. W.
There is lying beside me on the table as I write a sampler, worked in pink, green, blue, and dull purple-red silks, on which I read these wise sentences, "Order is the first law of Nature and of Nature's God," "The moon, stars, and tides vary not a moment," and "The sun knoweth the hour of its going down." Below, inclosed in a wreath of tambour-work,[1] are two words, "Appreciate Time." Under the first four alphabets (there are five in all) comes the date, "September 19, 1823," and in the lower corner another date, "October 24," when the square was completed, with the name of the child who wrought it, long since grown to womanhood, and now nearly forty years dead, but there recorded, in pink silk cross stitch, as "aged eight years."
Fig. 1.
And these dainty stitches, set so exactly, assure me that the little girls for whom I write are not too young to embroider neatly. Will you let its two mottoes remind you that a few moments carefully used each day will make you as good needle-women as your grandmothers were, and that your work-boxes or baskets should be in such order that you can find your thimbles in the dark, and can tell each several shade of wool by lamp-light? But I leave you to apply the mottoes for yourselves.
If you are to begin work with me, will you buy a few crewel-needles, No. 5 or 6, and two or three shades of crewel of any given color, such as old blue, dull mahogany, or pomegranate reds, or old gold shading into gold browns? These are colors that will always be useful.
Fig. 2.
First, your wools must be prepared so they can be used in making tidies, or anything that must be washed. The best crewels are not twisted, and will wash; still, as you are never sure of getting the best, it is well to unwind your skeins, pour scalding water on the wools, and rinse them well in it, squeeze out the water, shake the wools thoroughly, and hang them up. When dry, cut the skein across where it is tied double, and with a bodkin and string, or with a long hair-pin, draw the crewel into its case. This case (see Fig. 1) is made by folding together a long piece of thin cotton cloth a foot wide, and running parallel lines across its width half an inch or so apart. When the wools are drawn in in groups—reds, blues, greens, yellows, each by themselves, carefully arranged as to shades—cut the upper end so you need not be tempted to use too long needlefuls, and there your wools are neatly put away, and soon you can distinguish any shade by its position in the case, no matter how deceptive the lamp-light may be. Still, you will not need your case till you have a dozen different colors. If you buy your wools at first by the dozen, which is the cheaper way, be sure that your pinks, blues, greens, etc., have, so far as may be, a yellowish tone. Remember that yellow is the color of sunlight, and that without it your work will look cold and lifeless; and always avoid vivid greens and reds.
