He is now attempting to establish a true needle-lace Normal School, which will offer courses in commerce, English, history, and all the branches necessary to a complete lace education. This will supplement the instruction of the Bruges bobbin-lace Normal, already well under way. He holds that the teaching of the fine needle points is more tedious and difficult than the teaching of the bobbin points, and that it takes more years to become expert in needle laces than in others.
On the way home, Stéphanie asked what she might do for me. “You may pray for me, if you wish, Stéphanie.” She was silent a moment. “But, Madame, should I not make a pilgrimage to Lourdes for you? On one of my trips in the wagon, I saw the sea, and for three years after that the sea was every day just before my eyes. And to-day will remain until I die just in front of my eyes. Madame, should I not go to Lourdes for you?”
[Illustration: Map showing important lace areas in 1919, especially prepared for this volume by the Brussels Lace Committee.
The size of the circles indicates the approximate geographical extent of lace-making activity, and has no reference to the quality produced.
The finest varieties are made in the areas indicated by circles 3 (noted for Valenciennes, Bruges, Cluny), 4 (Bruges, Valenciennes, Cluny), 11 (Duchesse, Application, Rosaline), 15 (Maline, Pt. de Paris, Pt. de Lille, Binche).
Second quality, circles 5 (Val., Cluny), 6 (Val., Bruges, Cluny), 7 (Duchesse, Needle Point, Val., Cluny), 9 (Point d’Hollande, Val., Venise, Needle Point, Cluny).
Third quality, circles 8 (Duchesse, Needle Point), 12 (Venise Needle Point, Duchesse, Chantilly), 10 (Bruges, Duchesse, Val., Cluny), 14 (Needle Point, Application), 13 (Cluny, Torchon), 16 (Cluny).
The least important laces are found in regions 17 (Venise, filet), 18 (filet, Torchon), 19 (Point de Paris, Chantilly).]
[Illustration: _b._ Worker’s piqure made from pattern]
_With Drawings by the Directrice of the Brussels School of Design, Mme. Lucie Paulis_
From the point of view of technique, all laces are divided into two groups; laces made with the needle, and laces made with bobbins.
All needle lace is executed in the same manner. First, the design of the whole is divided into details sufficiently small to allow of their being easily held and turned by the worker. The design of each of these details is reproduced on a special kind of black paper by means of tiny pricked holes that follow all its lines.