Milkmaids in London. Milk-street, north of Cheapside, is so called, "as is supposed, of milk sold there" (Stow); here was born Sir Thomas More, "the brightest star that ever shone in that via lactea"-milky way. The milkmaid has almost disappeared from our streets: she was never like "the country wench" of Sir Thomas Overbury, all whose care is, "she may die in her spring-time, to have store of flowers stuck upon her winding-sheet." The contrast with the London milkmaid is thus portrayed by Gay: On doors the sallow milkmaid chalks her gains; Ah, how unlike the milkmaid of the plains!-Trivia, b. ii. We have lost, too, the milkmaids' May-day festival, such as Pepys saw Nell Gwyn enjoying from her lodging door in Drury-lane. Alack, What's a May-day milking-pail without a garland and a fiddle?-Col. Martin, 1685. In Tempest's Cryes of London is a print of a merry milkmaid, named Kate Smith, dancing with a milk-pail, hung round with borrowed silver cups and tankards; flowers and ribbons upon her head. Later, the plate and other decorations were piled up, and carried by two chairmen upon a wooden horse, the milkmaids dancing before it. Sometimes was substituted a cow, with her horns gilt, and her body nearly covered with ribbons in bows and rosettes, interspersed with green oaken leaves and bunches of flowers. "Milk Fair," with its lowing cows and squalling children, is held to this day near the Spring Garden entrance to St. James's Park, by privilege granted to the gate-keepers. In Tom Brown's time, 1700, the noisy milk-folks in the park cried, 4 can of milk, ladies! A can of red cow's milk, sir! Asses' milk is a restorative of our day, and is a fashionable conceit in Gay's London, where Before proud gates attending asses bray, Or arrogate with solemn pace the way; These grave physicians with their milky cheer The love-sick maid and dwindling beau repair."—Trivia, b. ii. Laurencekirk Snuff-boxes. These beautiful boxes were first manufactured at the village of Laurencekirk, in Kincardineshire. The original inventor was a cripple, who made his own tools; but, instead of patenting his invention, confided his secret to a joiner in the same village, who, in a few years, amassed considerable property, whilst the inventor died, as he had lived, in the lowest poverty. The great difficulty of the manufacture lies in the formation of the hinge, which, in a genuine box, is so delicately made as to be hardly visible. Peculiar, or, as they were called, "secret tools," were required in its formation; and though they must have been improved by time and experience, the mystery attached to their preparation is so studiously kept up, that the workmen employed in one shop are rigorously debarred from having any communication with those employed in another. Early in the present century one Crawford, of Cumnock, in Ayrshire, by the aid of a watchmaker who made the tools, produced a box similar to a Laurencekirk one; and thus grew rich, and greatly enriched his native parish and province; the trade yielding from 7000l. to 80007. annually—a large product for a manufacture consisting almost exclusively of the wages of labour. The material is mostly plane-wood, which, for one box, costs ld., and paints and varnish 2d.; so that the raw material is less than one-half per cent. on the return it yields. Early in the manufacture ordinarily-sized snuff-boxes were sold at 27. 12s. 6d., and ladies' work-boxes at 257. each; but the cost has been much reduced.-(John M'Diarmid.) The box is cut out of the solid wood, a piece of which, costing 25s., has been known to make snuff-boxes to the value of 30007. The most usual decoration consists of the tartan patterns, the lines of which are drawn separately by pens fixed in a ruling-machine. A more recent style of ornamentation is the "Scoto-Russian," in imitation of the enamelled silver snuff-boxes of Russia. Wearing the Chain. A gold chain, as may be seen in many old pictures, and is still exemplified in the dress of the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs of London, was anciently a fashionable ornament for persons of rank and dignity. Sir Godfrey, in the comedy of The Puritan, is very particular in ascertaining the value and antiquity of his chain: it was worth above three hundred crowns;" "it had full three thousand links." In the old play of Albumazar, a gold chain is mentioned which cost "two hundred pounds besides the jewel." Rich merchants, also, who frequently lent out money, were commonly distinguished by a chain; hence we read of "an usurer's chain," in Much Ado about Nothing. All rich citizens were engaged in traffic; hence Belarius says: Did you but know the city's usuries, And felt them knowingly.-Cymbeline. When the dignity of the fashion had a little worn off, the chain became a distinction for the upper servant in a great family, particularly for the steward. Malvolio is, therefore, supposed to have one : Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs.-Twelfth Night. Thou false and peremptory steward, pray, Beaumont and Fletcher's Love's Cure. When the Venetian ambassador, Sebastian Giustinian, visited England, he received from Henry VIII. a gold chain worth about 1007. At the period of the death of Sir Thomas Gresham, then a banker in Lombard-street, a considerable portion of his wealth consisted of gold chains. We read also of Sir William Herbert, of Wilton, who lived so magnificently, that in the year 1553, "he rode into London to his mansion at Baynard's Castle, with three hundred horse in his retinue, whereof one hundred were gentlemen in plain blue cloth, with chains of gold, and badges of wyvern on their sleeves." Wearing the Amulet. This custom has continued to our time, when amulets consist of a black scented composition, made into ornamental forms, mounted with metal. Richardson derives the word from the Latin "Amuletum, from amolin, amolitus (from a and moles, a heap or mass), to heave away, to drive away, to repel. That which throws off, expels, repels, wards off any evil or mischance: and further, that confers some charms." The Latin amuletum is, without doubt, derived from the Arabic hama-il, a small Kuran, suspended from the neck as a preservative; it is also worn as a necklace of flowers. The amulets of the Persians and Egyptians were small cylinders, ornamented with figures and hieroglyphics; of the Greeks and Romans, gems, corals, &c., placed around the neck, especially of children, against envy and the evil-eye, or they were hung on the jambs of doors, so that in opening, a bell was rung; and the Greeks placed the same at the entry of the shop, or forge, just as our shop-door bell. Charms and talismans are nearly allied to amulets. In the sixteenth century, we read of amulets worn round the neck against pestilence, made of arsenic, and warehoused in large quantities: one item says, A hundryth wight of amletts for the neke, xxxs. iiijd.”— (Gage's Hengrave.) It is not too much, therefore, to date from plague visitations our wearing of amulets; but many who in the present day wear coins appended to their watch-chains and chatelaines, are, probably, not aware that our superstitious Henry III. preserved coins of St. Helena, among other amulets and relics, which coins, Ducange tells us, were a remedy against epilepsy. Indeed, all coins marked with a cross were worn as phylacteries, suspended from the neck; hence we find that these coins are perforated for this purpose. Dyeing the Hair. Aubrey, in his Natural History of Wiltshire, tells us that the juice of the dwarf-elder, (ebulus,) "turnes haire black; and being mingled with bull's fat, is Dr. Buller's remedie for the gowte." "The best way to dye haire browne is to take alkanna in powder, mixt with fair water as thick as mustard: lay it on the haire, and so tye it up in a napkin for twelve houres time. This will keep the haire browne for one whole yeares time after it. The alhanna does prepare the hair and makes it of a darke red or tawny colour. Then they take takout, which is like a small gall, and boyle it in oyle till it hath drunk up all the oyle; then pulverize it, and mix it with water and put it on the haire. Grind a very little of alkohol, which they use in glazeing of their earthen vessels, in a mortar with the takout, and this turnes the haire to a perfect black. This receipt I had from my worthy and obligeing friend Mr. Wyld Clarke, merchant of London, who was factour many yeares at Scta. Cruce, in Barberie, and brought over a quantity of these leaves for his own use and his friends. "Tis pity it is not more known. leaves of a tree like a barbery leafe. above half a peck of the alhanna. "Dr. Edw. Brown, M.D., in his Travells, sc. description of Larissa and Thessalie, speaks of alhanna. Mr. Wyld Clarke assures me that juice of lemons mixt with alhanna strikes a deeper and more durable colour either in the hands or nailes." "Tis Mr. Clarke hath yet by him (1690) The alhanna is a species or variety of the genus Lawsonia known by the Arabic name of hinna or henna, and in their medical works, as in that of the Serapion, is described under that of al kanna, where, it is interesting to observe, he quotes the description by Dioscorides of kupros as applicable to this plant. This kupros, or Cyprus, is moreover supposed to be the copher of Scripture. No plant is more highly esteemed or more frequently employed than the hinna, and it would appear to have been applied to the very same purposes from very remote antiquity. All Oriental travellers describe the use of this plant by Asiatic women in dyeing their nails and the tips of their fingers, as well as the soles of their feet, of an orange hue, with the leaves of the hinna. It is also used by the men for dyeing their beards, the orange colour being afterwards converted to a deep black by the application of indigo. That this plant was similarly used from very early times is highly probable from the allusions to it by poets, as well as from some of the Egyptian mummies appearing as if the nails had been similarly dyed. Weaving and Spinning. From many passages in the Bible, and from the general character of dress, it is apparent that woven fabrics were known in very early times. In all probability, weaving was practised before spinning: that is, the combination of reeds, strips of leather, and rude fibres, into a material for dress, by a process analogous to that of weaving, preceded the practice of spinning yarn from a congeries of elementary fibres. The Egyptians, from a most remote era, were celebrated for their manufacture of linen and other cloths: their fine linen and embroidered work, and their yarn and woollen stuffs, are frequently mentioned, and were eagerly purchased by foreign nations. The looms found depicted on the tombs at Thebes are of a very rude description; but, we must remember that this does not militate against the production of fine fabrics; for the Hindu weaver of the present day produces exquisite muslins on his rude loom. A specimen of Egyptian mummy-cloth has been found of close and firm texture, yet elastic, and the yarn of both warp and web remarkably even and well spun: the weft single, and the warp-yarn of two threads doubled together; and in this and other specimens, the number of threads to an inch in the warp uniformly exceeds that in the weft, a difference not commonly observable in European fabrics. In cloths brought to England by Salt and Belzoni, the selvages are well made; it also appears that striped goods, similar to modern ginghams, were often made by the Egyptians, and that indigo was used as one of their dyes. Pictures at Thebes, Beni Hassan, and Eileithyas represent weavers at their looms: in one instance, the loom is horizontal; in another vertical, with the weft driven upwards; and the shuttles seem to have been about half a yard in length. The weavers were men. Weaving was carried on as a distinct trade in the larger towns of Greece and Rome; but every considerable private establishment had also a loom, at which the females of the family were employed; the weaving being carried on chiefly by female slaves, superintended by the mistress and her daughters. In large houses, a particular room was set apart for the occupation. Plato mentions one of the most important differences between the warp and the weft, viz., that the threads of the former are strong and firm, in consequence of being more twisted in spinning; while those of the latter are comparatively soft and yielding; a comparison which is strictly applicable at the present day. The ancient Greek loom resembled the modern loom of Iceland; both having the warped threads vertical; whereas, in our looms, the warp is horizontal. The Greeks evidently understood "mounting a loom," that is, arranging strings so as to separate the warp thread into groups, between which the weft be introduced. After the weft was thrown, it was driven up may close, either by a kind of bat, or comb; both of which appear to be combined in the batten or lay of the modern loom. Checks and stripes were known to the Greeks and Romans, as well as fancy weaving from the two combined; and Mr. Yates, in Smith's Dictionary, concludes, as far as we can form a judgment from the language and descriptions of ancient authors, the productions of the looms appear to have fallen in ancient times very little, if at all, below the beauty and variety of the damasks, shawls, and tapestry, of the present age." Weavers are considered to have been, from time immemorial, generally good singers. Their occupation being sedentary, they have an opportunity of practising, and sometimes in parts, while they are at work. Warburton adds, that many of the weavers in Queen Elizabeth's days were Flemish Calvinists, who fled from the persecution of the Duke of Alva, and were therefore particularly given to singing Psalms. In our days, the famous Lancashire and Yorkshire chorus-singers are weavers and spinners trained partly in their occupation. |