Art in Needlework Part 5

The st.i.tch employed for the central stalk, G, has really no business on this sampler, except that it has something of the appearance of a continuous Oriental-st.i.tch.

Oriental-st.i.tch is one of the st.i.tches used in Ill.u.s.tration 72.

ROPE AND KNOT St.i.tCHES.

A single sampler is devoted to ROPE and KNOTTED St.i.tCHES, more nearly akin than they look, for rope-st.i.tch is all but knotted as it is worked.

ROPE-St.i.tCH is so called because of its appearance. It takes a large amount of silk or wool to work it, but the effect is correspondingly rich. It is worked from right to left, and is easier to work in curved lines than in straight.

[Sidenote: TO WORK A, B.]

Lines A on the sampler, Ill.u.s.tration 29, represent the ordinary appearance of the st.i.tch; its construction is more apparent in the central stalk B, which is a less usual form of the same st.i.tch, worked wider apart.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WORKING OF A, B, ON ROPE-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

Having brought out your needle at the right end of the work, hold part of the thread towards the left, under the thumb, the rest of it falling to the right; put your needle in above where it came out, slant it towards you, and bring it out again a little in advance of where it came out before, and just below the thread held under your thumb. Draw the thread through, and there results a st.i.tch which looks rather like a distorted chain st.i.tch (B). The next step is to make another similar st.i.tch so close to the foregoing one that it overlaps it partly. It is this overlapping which gives the st.i.tch the raised and rope-like appearance seen at A.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WORKING OF C ON ROPE-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

[Sidenote: TO WORK C.]

A knotted line (C in the sampler, Ill.u.s.tration 29) is produced by what is known as "GERMAN KNOT-St.i.tCH," effective only in thick soft silk or wool. Begin as in rope st.i.tch, keeping your thread in the same position.

Then put your needle into the stuff just above the thread stretched under your thumb, and bring it out just below and in a line with where it went in; lastly, keep the needle above the loose end of the thread, draw it through, tightening the thread upwards, and you have the first of your knots: the rest follow at intervals determined by your wants.

[Sidenote: TO WORK D.]

The more open st.i.tch at D is practically the same thing, except that in crossing the running thread you take up more of the stuff on each side of it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 29. ROPE-St.i.tCH AND KNOT-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: 30. ROPE-St.i.tCH AND KNOT-St.i.tCH SAMPLER (BACK).]

[Sidenote: TO WORK E.]

What is known by the name of "OLD ENGLISH KNOT-St.i.tCH" (E) is a much more complicated st.i.tch. Keeping your thread well out of the way to the right, put your needle in to the left, and take up vertically a piece of the stuff the width of the line to be worked at its widest, and draw the thread through. Then, keeping it under the thumb to the left, put your needle, eye first, downwards, through the slanting st.i.tch just made; draw the thread not too tight, and, keeping it as before under the thumb, put your needle, eye first, this time through the upper half only of the slanting st.i.tch, making a kind of b.u.t.tonhole-st.i.tch round the last, and draw out your thread.

These knotted rope st.i.tches, call them what you will, are rather ragged and fussy--not much more than fancy st.i.tches--of no great importance.

KNOTS used separately are of much more artistic account.

[Sidenote: TO WORK F.]

BULLION or ROLL-St.i.tCH is shown in its simplest form in the petals of the flowers F on the sampler, Ill.u.s.tration 29. To work one such petal, begin by attaching the thread very firmly; bring your needle out at the base of the petal, put it in at the tip, and bring it out once more at the base, only drawing it partly through. With your right hand wind the thread, say seven times, round the projecting point of the needle from left to right. Then, holding the coils under your left thumb, your thread to the right, draw your needle and thread through; and, dropping the needle, and catching the thread round your little finger, take hold of the thread with your thumb and first finger and draw the coiled st.i.tch to the right, tightening it gently until quite firm. Lastly, put the needle through at the tip of the petal, and the st.i.tch is complete and ready to be fastened off.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WORKING OF F ON KNOT-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

The leaves of these flowers consist simply of two bullion st.i.tches. The bullion knots at the side of the central stalk are curled by taking up in the first instance only the smallest piece of the stuff.

[Sidenote: TO WORK G.]

To work FRENCH KNOTS (G), having brought out your needle at the point where the knot is to be, hold the thread under your thumb, and, letting it lie to the right, put your needle under the stretched part of it.

Turn the needle so as to twist the thread once round it. That done, put the needle in again about where it came out, draw it through from the back, and bring it out where the next knot is to be.

For large knots use two or more threads of silk, and do not twist them more than once. With a single thread you may twist twice, but the result of twisting three or four times is never happy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WORKING OF G ON KNOT-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

The use of knots is shown to perfection in Ill.u.s.tration 24. Worked there in white silk floss upon a dark purple ground, they are quite pearly in appearance, whether in rows between the border lines, or scattered over the ground. They are most useful in holding the design together, giving it ma.s.s, and go admirably with chain-st.i.tching, to which, when close together, they have at first sight some likeness. A single line of knots may almost be mistaken for chain-st.i.tch; but of themselves they do not make a good outline, lacking firmness. A happier use of them is to fringe an outline, as for example in the peac.o.c.k's tail on page 38; but this kind of thing must be used with reticence, or it results in a rather rococo effect. Good use is sometimes made of knots to pearl the inner edge of a pattern worked in outline, or to pattern the ornament (instead of the ground) all over. Differencing of this kind may be an afterthought--and a happy one--affording as it does a ready means of qualifying the colour or texture of ground, or pattern, or part of either, which may not have worked out quite to the embroiderer's liking.

The obvious fitness of knots to represent the stamens of flowers is exemplified in Ill.u.s.tration 93. Worked close together, they represent admirably the eyes of composite flowers, as on the sampler; they give, again, valuable variety of texture to the crest of the stork in Ill.u.s.tration 85.

The effect of knotting in the ma.s.s is shown in Ill.u.s.tration 31, embroidered entirely in knots, contradicting, it might seem, what was said above about its unfitness for outline work. The lines, even the voided ones, are here as sharp as could be; but then, it is not many of us who work, knot by knot, with the marvellous precision of a Chinaman.

His knotted texture is not, however, always what it seems. He has a way of producing a knotted line by first knotting his thread (it may be done with a netting needle), and then st.i.tching it down on to the surface of the material, which gives a pearled or beaded line not readily distinguishable from knot st.i.tch.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 31. A TOUR DE FORCE IN KNOTS.]

The j.a.panese embroiderer, instead of knotting his own thread, employed very often a crinkled braid. This is shown in the cloud work in Ill.u.s.tration 85. The only true knotting there is in the top-knot of the bird.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 32. INTERLACING-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: 33. INTERLACING-St.i.tCH SAMPLER (BACK).]

INTERLACINGS, SURFACE St.i.tCHES, AND DIAPERS.

The samplers so far discussed bring us, with the exception of Darning, Satin-st.i.tch, and some st.i.tches presently to be mentioned, practically to the end of the st.i.tches, deserving to be so called, generally in use.

By combining two or more st.i.tches endless complications may be made; and there may be occasions when, for one purpose or another, it may be necessary, as well as amusing, to invent them. In this way st.i.tches are also sometimes worked upon st.i.tches, as shown on the sampler, Ill.u.s.tration 32. You will see, on referring to the back of it (33), that only the white silk is worked into the stuff: the dark is surface work only. There is no end to such possible INTERLACINGS. Those on the sampler do not need much explanation; but it may be as well to say that A starts with crewel-st.i.tching; B and C with back-st.i.tching; D with chain-st.i.tching; E with darning or running; F, G, and H with varieties of herring-bone-st.i.tch; J with Oriental-st.i.tch; and K with feather-st.i.tch. The interlacing on the surface of these is shown in darker silk. C and G undergo a second course of interlacing.

The danger of splitting the first st.i.tches in working the interlacing ones, is avoided by pa.s.sing the needle eye-first through them.

Other surface work, sometimes called LACE-St.i.tCH, is ill.u.s.trated in the sampler, Ill.u.s.tration 34. There is really no limit to patterns of this kind. Some are better worked in a frame, but that is very much a matter of personal practice.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WORKING OF F ON INTERLACING-St.i.tCH SAMPLER.]

[Sidenote: TO WORK H, 34.]

In the Surface Darning at H (34) long threads are first carried from edge to edge of the square, there only piercing the stuff, and then darned across by other st.i.tches, again only piercing it at the edges.

An oblique version of this is given at C (34).

[Sidenote: TO WORK B, 34.]