TAPESTRIES AND COSTUMES.t
Mn. KENDRICK in his introduction gives a short but very interesting account of his subject, telling us something of the designing, the weaving, and the use of tapestry in ancient and modern times. He then describes the work
• The English Year: Summer. By W. Beach Thomas and A. K. Collett. With DInstrations by Sir Alfred East and others. London: T. C. and E. C. Jack. [10a. 6d. net.) t (1) Catalogue of Tapestries. By A. F. Kendrick. London: His Majesty's Stationery Office. [18.]—(2) Le Costume Civii en Francs. Par Camille Piton. London: H. Greve' and Co. [12s. net.]
of various countries, chiefly as it is represented in the Victoria and Albert Museum. "Records of tapestry weavers and their work in England may be traced as far back as the fourteenth century," he tells us ; and the art, though sometimes falling into obscurity, has had interesting revivals, and still exists at the present day. William Morris, for instance, in "The Goose Girl," of which there is an illustration, follows many of the old designers in the close filling of his background. The beat tapestries are of Flemish origin, and their craftsmen exercised great influence in the factories of the rest of Europe. Raphael's cartoons, however, as Mr. Kendrick remarks, revolutionized the work of the Low Countries. The illustrations to this book, which, though excellent, are not very large, are supple- mented by others (12 in. by 10 in.), which may be obtained at the Museum. The study of the costumes of our ancestors is at some epochs closely linked with that of tapestry, and each adds something to the interest of the other. IL Piton's delightful book is an example of this, and among his illustra- tions we have many reproductions of tapestries. The reader who has admired the mysterious and charming "Dame it la Lic,orne " of the Cluny Museum will be delighted to find her again in these pages. The volume is, indeed, a treasure- house of curious and beautiful things, in which we can see the dress, and incidentally the customs, of the French from the thirteenth to the nineteenth century. Besides the pleasure that may be obtained from this book, we would recommend it for the interest that it could add to a lesson in French history. It is also curious to notice that some everyday things, such air the shape of a peasant woman's straw hat and a loaf of bread,1 have not changed since the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. There is, unfortunately, no index to this book.
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