VALENCIENNES.

201

h cellar: many of the women are said to have become almost blindprevious to attaining the age of thirty. It was a groat pointwhen the whole piece was executed by the same lace-worker.“All by the same hand,” we find entered in the bills oi the lace-fellers of the time. 8

The labour of making “ vraie Valenciennes” was so groat thatwhile the Lille lace-workers could produce from three to five ells

Fig. 9;

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U those of Valenciennes could not complete more than an-h and a half in the same time. Home lace-workers only made!; Ut iU1 e d (24 inches) in a year, and it took ten months, workinge cn hours a day, to finish a pair of men’s ruffles—hence thecostliness of the lace. 9 A pair of these now exploded articles of

8 “ 2 barites et rayon lie vrnio valen-eienne; 3 an. 3/4 collet graude hauteur;4 uu. grand jabot; lo tout do la memomain, de 2400 livrcs.”— Comities deMudtime du Harry. 1770.

0 Arthur Young, in 1788, bays ofValenciennes: ‘‘Lace of 30 t*> 40 lines’breadth for gentlemen's rutiles is from

1G0 to 216 livrcs (61. 9s.) an ell. Thequantity for a lady's head-dress from1000 to 24,000 livrcs. The women gaiufrom 20 to 30 sous a day. 3 600 personsarc employed at Valenciennes, and arcan object of 450,000 livrcs, of which theflax is not more than 1/30. The threadcosts from 24 to 700 livrcs the pound.”