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HISTORY OF LACE.

CHAPTER XVII.

VALENCIENNES (Dep. du Nokd).

“ Ils s’attachoient a considerer des tableaux de petit point de la manufacture doVnlencienue qui representoient des fleurs, ct comme ils les trouvoient parfaitementbeaux, M. de Magelotte, leur bote, vouloit les leur donner, muis ils ne les acceplerentpoint .”—Voyage dee Ambaeeadeurs de Siam, 1688.

Paut of the ancient province of Hainault, Valenciennes, togetherwith Lille and Arras, is Flemish by birth, French only by conquestand treaty. 1 The date of its lace manufacture is unknown, but itearly made lace with straight edge and a ground of running pattern,its first productions being attributed to a Pierre Chauvin andIgnace Harent, who employed a three-thread twisted flax. Itflourished under Louis XIV., and reached its climax from 1725to 1780, when there were from 3000 to 4000 lace-makers in thecity alone.

Coloured Plate XII. shows the style of patterns till themiddle of the eighteenth century—flowers and scrolls of theRenaissance, later replaced with the reseau ground.

From 1780 downwards, fashion changed. The cheaper andlighter laces of Brussels, Tulle, and Arras, obtained the preferenceover the costly and more substantial products of Valenciennes—“ les etornelles Valenciennes,” as they were called—while the sub-sequent disappearance of ruffles from the costume of the mengreatly added to the evil. Valenciennes fell with the monarchy.During the war of liberty, foreign occupation decimated its popu-lation, and the art became nearly lost. In 1790 the number oflace-workers had diminished to 250; and though Napoleon usedevery effort to revive the manufacture, he was unsuccessful. In1851 there were only two lace-makers remaining, and they bothupwards of eighty years of age.

1 French Hainault, French Flanders Louis XIII. and Louis XIV., confirmedand Cambre'sis (the present Dc'p. du to France by the treaties of Aix-la-Nord), with Artois, were conquests of Chapelle (1G68), and Nimcgucn (1678).