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CHAPTER XXII.

ENGLAND TO QUEEN ELIZABETH.

‘‘ We wcarp most funtastie.il fashions than any nation under the sun doth, DieFrench only excepted.”— Coryat’g CnuUtief, lull.

It would bo a difficult matter for antiquaries to decide at whatprecise time lace, as we now define the word, first appears as anarticle of commerce in the annals of our country.

A8 early as the reign of Edward III. 1 the excessive luxury ofveils, worn even by servant girls, excited the indignation of thegovernment, who, in an act, dated 1363, forbade them to be wornof silk, or of any other material, “ mes soulement de 111 fait deinzle Koialme,” for which veils no one was to pay more than the sum<if tcnpence. Of what stuff these thread veils were composed, wehave no record ; probably they were a sort of network, similar tothe caul of Queen Philippa, as we see represented on her tomb. 2That a sort of crochet decoration used for edging was already made,we may infer from the monumental effigies of the day. 3 Thepurse of the carpenter is described, too, in Chaucer, as “purledwith latoun,” a kind of metal or wire lace, similar to that foundat Herculaneum, and made in some parts of Europe to a recentperiod.

M. Aubry refers to a commercial treaty of 1390, betweenEngland and the city of Bruges, as the earliest mention of lace.This said treaty we cannot find in llymer, lhimont, or anywhereelse. We have, as Indore alluded to, constant edicts concerningthe gold wires and threads of “ Cipre, Yenys, Euk, and Jeane,”

' Rut. Purl. 37 Kdw. III. Printedp. '27S, till. 2, No. 2G.

2 See her monument in WestminsterAbbey. Sand ford’s *■ Genealogical Table.”

s “ Blanche, Duchess of Lancaster,wife of John of Gaunt, wears a quilted

silk cap with a three-pointed border ofbroad lace network.” (Sandford. St.Paul's monument, after Dugd.de.) “ Eliza-beth, Duohess of Exeter, died 1425(Sandford, p. 259), wore also a caul ofnetwork with a needlework edging.”