CLOTHS AND WOOLLENS

“In the space of ten years the kingdom of Valencia has yielded six million pounds of silk, which makes a yearly average of six hundred thousand pounds; and as the whole of Spain produces a million pounds per annum, we see from this that Valencia alone supplies more than half of the entire quantity. The silks of Valencia are the finest of the whole Peninsula, and fit to be compared with the best of Europe generally, but the spinning is still imperfect, because in Spain there are not, as in France and elsewhere, houses where the women who spin are gathered together under the eye of an inspector to see that all the silk is spun evenly. In the kingdom of Valencia the spinning is distributed among several thousand hands, who introduce six, seven, eight, or even more ends in a thread of silk which should always have the same number; hence the unevennesses in the fabrics which are woven from them, while for the same reason we do not utilize for any delicate work the raw material which we import from Spain. The silk we employ for our costlierfabrics is of the kind which we import from Piedmont and the southern provinces of France. Also, for the last few years we have felt less need of the Valencian silk. The laws prohibiting the exportation of this Spanish silk have stimulated the cultivation of mulberry-trees in Languedoc, where the peasantry, alive to the profit which these trees could render them, have preferred them to other kinds for planting round their property. This is why, in the year 1783, French silk could be bought for a lower price than the Valencian silk purchased in that region, plus the dues levied upon its exportation. I know of a merchant who at this time enjoyed the privilege of exporting for six years a hundred thousand pounds free of all dues, but who throughout the year 1783 was unable to find a purchaser in France. Spain could perhaps remedy the egress of her raw material by further increasing (as, indeed, she daily does) the number of her looms, and by exporting a greater number of her products to her American possessions; but her silk-stuffs will never be perfected until she markets them in foreign countries, where the taste of her customers may tend to better that of her manufacturers.

“The silk raised in the kingdom of Valencia isestimated, during an average year, to be worth six or seven millions ofpiastres(nineteen to twenty-two millions oflivres.) At the time of my visit to this city, she only employed one half this quantity, although her looms of every size amounted to four thousand. The rest, in spite of the prohibitions laid upon its extraction, is smuggled off to foreign countries, escaping, sometimes to France by way of Barcelona, and sometimes to Portugal by way of Seville and Extremadura. Nevertheless, there is probably more silk in Spain to-day than formerly, and measures have been earnestly adopted to encourage the industries which make use of it. For some time past, silk-looms have been scattered over the whole of Cataluña, and in the kingdoms of Granada, Cordova, Seville, etc., producing handkerchiefs, ribbons, and other stuffs in sufficient quantity to supply, or nearly so, the national market: nevertheless this still left a large market for our stocking-factories of Languedoc. The Spanish Government, by the law of 1778, limited itself to excluding these stockings from forming part of the foreign cargoes to the Colonies, but as they continued to beimported into Spain, this law was readily evaded, since it sufficed to stamp the French article with the mark of a Spanish factory. It would have required an excessive vigilance, almost a positive inquisition, to guard against a fraud of this kind, prompted by the avarice of traders. The Spanish Government next sought, by the law of 1785, to put a stop to it by totally excluding our silk stockings, and this measure, together with the establishment of a number of new looms in Spain, has produced an almost absolute stagnation in the market which our factories of Languedoc had formerly enjoyed in the Peninsula. But let me return now to the Valencian factories.

“This city has no one building in which might be performed the whole of the processes through which the silk must pass. Any person who wishes to examine them, must visit several workshops; and this was the course which we adopted, under the guidance of a manufacturer as intelligent as he is amiable, named Don Manuel Foz, a gentleman who has travelled extensively in order to perfect his knowledge of handling silk, and who, among other secrets, has brought from Constantinople the art of watering silken stuffs. As a reward for his activity, he has beenappointedIntendenteof all the factories of Valencia.

“There are hardly any merchants at Valencia who are not more or less concerned in silk-making: indeed, they look upon this industry as quite apoint d'honneur. Some of them supply with silk no more than four or five looms, which work at their expense, while others have under their control as many as several hundred.

“After the silkworm has cleverly built its cell, the first thing to be done is to stifle it before it can pierce the cocoon in search of a new existence. For this purpose the cocoons are thrown into a moderately heated oven; and then, when once the worm is killed, they can be kept without being spun for as long as may be needed.

“In order to strip them of their covering of silk, they are thrown into hot water, after which the women workers pick up, and with surprising quickness, the threads of several of them, join them, and deal them out, thus joined, on wheels constructed for this object. On the design of the wheels depends the degree of thoroughness with which the silk is spun; but those which are employed in Spain are generally the most imperfect, as I shall presently explain.

“I have already said that the slip of silk shouldbe drawn from at least four cocoons, and even then it only serves for making slender fabrics, such as taffeta or ribbon. We were shown, indeed, a skein which was assured to contain no more than two cocoons; but so slight a slip is of no use at all. Most of them are made from seven or eight cocoons, and two of the former are joined in order to form a thread sufficient to be placed upon the loom.

“My readers are sure to know that all woven fabrics consist of two distinct parts, the woof and the warp. The woof is that which is passed by the shuttle from one side of the loom to the other, and which is enchased between the two surfaces formed by the warp. As the woof is subjected to more wear and tear than the warp, it should be stouter. For this reason each of the two ends of which it is composed is twisted separately before the two are twisted together, while for the warp the latter of these processes is sufficient. The result of this difference is that, when looked at beneath the microscope, the thread of the woof has an uneven look, as though it were a small cable, while that of the warp looks flat and smooth, and is therefore adapted to reflect thelight, receiving the shiny look which makes a silk-stuff so attractive.

“But the beauty of these fabrics depends, above all else, upon the way in which the silk is divided as it is drawn from the cocoon. This first stage of the spinning is performed in one or other of three ways, according to the kind of wheel which is employed for it. The method which the Spaniards have adopted from an early period has the following drawback; that the small threads of six, seven, and eight cocoons which are stripped at the same time, go to form a single thread, and are deposited upon a small spindle without the thread rubbing against another one, which friction serves to lay the little hairs which bristle up, so that the slip of silk thus formed retains a hairy nap and is easily frayed. In the Piedmontese method, on the other hand, each slip is joined to another, and is not drawn apart until it has been twisted round it four or five times.

“The third method, known as that of Vaucanson, is more expensive than the one last mentioned. In the wheel invented by Vaucanson, the two silk-slips are reunited after the first twisting, in order to be twisted once again. This operation is called the ‘doublecroissade.’

“If these threads, thus placed on bobbins, areintended for the woof, they are enchased perpendicularly in a machine consisting of several compartments, in which they are twisted separately. Thence they are transferred to another machine, in which they are twisted all together; after which they are ready for the loom. Those which are destined for the web are not twisted (as I have explained above) until the moment when they are united. Both at Valencia and at Talavera de la Reina these machines, so precious to the weaver's craft, and which economise manual toil, are not unknown.[20]

“At the latter of these towns I had alreadyseen a single toothed-wheel, which set in motion up to a thousand of these tiny bobbins on which are wound the twisted slips of silk. The wheels I saw at Valencia were smaller, because in this city there is not, as there is at Talavera, a royal factory self-contained within a single building. At Valencia each manufacturer, in order to carry out these various processes, requires to deal with workmen and machines distributed through several quarters of the town, and chooses from among them such as he best prefers.

“Nothing can be simpler than the working of these silk-twisting machines, when once the toothed-wheel has set them going. The perpendicular movement of all these little bobbins is looked after by women, and even children.[21]

“If they should happen to clog, a touch of thefinger disengages them. If one of the slips should break, the harm is mended in a trice: the practised fingers of the machinist pick up the broken ends with marvellous despatch, tie them together by an imperceptible knot, and the bobbin which was thus delayed loses no time in overtaking its neighbours.

“The slips of silk, before being twisted two by two, are put through another process which I ought to mention. When they are still in skeins they are spread upon a large tub in which is a quantity of viscous substances heated to boiling point, the gases from which tend to make them adhere to one another. This is termedpasser à la brève.

“Thence they are removed to the machine for twisting them. The silk, on issuing from this machine, is called organzine; and it is only when it is in this state that it can be exported from Piedmont, where the twisting process was better executed than elsewhere, until the time when itwas rendered yet more perfect by Vaucanson.[22]This clever mechanic has combined all possible advantages relating to the business of the silk-weaver. His system, and no other, is practised in the Lyons factories; but these wheelsà double croissadeare only available for silk produced in France; since that which is exported from abroad and which is principally used in these factories, requires to be reduced to organzine before it can again be taken out of the country.

“In this respect Spain possesses a sensible advantage over other manufacturing nations; since she raises a greater quantity of silk than she is able to consume, and could easily put it through the most advanced and perfect processes; in spite of which she has clung for ages to her faulty method. The present government has attacked this method by the only means efficient to bring about a change; that is, the slow but certain influence of persuasion. In 1781 the Count of Floridablanca contracted with a French merchant settled in Madrid, that he should supply a hundredtoursof the Vaucanson pattern for spinning silk,first to the Murcian factories (of which province the Count was a native), next to the Valencian, and subsequently to any others that might wish for them; and with this object he granted to the merchant in question the privilege of exporting, free of duty, six hundred thousand pounds of silk in six years. Nevertheless, it is possible that this measure may yet remain fruitless for many years owing to the apathy of the Spanish manufacturers, who were loth to use a finer, closer quality of silk, because it must be woven with greater care owing to its containing three ends instead of two, the work being greater on this account without a corresponding increase in the gain. It has also been found necessary to employ Frenchmen in the earliest trials made in Spain of this new method.

“The success of the Spaniards should not be counted on, if we are to judge of it by a factory, which was founded some years since atLa Milanesa, a league's distance from Valencia, by an intelligent man named La Payessa.[23]

“He introduced the method of Vaucanson, butwhen I went to see his factory he had not seen his way to recover the money which this improvement had cost him. He employed barely two hundred persons for the most important work; nothing more was done than to spin the silk, divide it, and convert it into organzine. Thus treated, it cost from fifty to sixtyrealesmore per pound than that which is prepared according to the Spanish method, so that its success was but small.

“I shall not describe in detail either the method of dyeing the silk, or that of weaving it. The first of these operations is readily imagined; the second is hard to understand, and still more so to explain, unless one is assisted by engravings. I will merely observe that all silk is dyed in skeins, just before it enters the loom. If it be required occasionally to dye it after it is woven, this isonly when the silk is spotted, or when the dyeing of the skeins has proved a failure. At the time of my visit to Valencia, there were a hundred and seventeen master-dyers in that city, but not all of them were working.

“The stuffs in which the factories of Valencia are most successful are principally of the smooth sort; they also make there handsome damaskbrochéswith large flowers for wall-hangings; but generally all that is undertaken is by order of the Court, Madrid, and the provinces. The Valencians follow as closely as possible the rapidity with which the French designs are changed, and those who profess to invent new ones are but copying the French ones in a greater or less degree. Notwithstanding, the Valencian Fine-Arts Academy is taking serious steps to form designers, and a school has been founded which has already developed able pupils—amongst others, a young man called Ferrers, who had died a short while before our arrival at the city, and some of whose designs of flowers we had occasion to admire.

“But the process in which the Valencians particularly excel is that of watering stuffs, which M. Foz has rendered absolutely perfect. He gaveus a clear account of this process, which consists in passing a cylinder over the stuff to be watered, this cylinder being pressed upon by a heavy mass moved to and fro by a mule which draws a lever round and round. The stuff is folded in the manner of a closed jalousie, and these folds require to be often varied so as to distribute the undulations evenly. M. Foz admitted that the shape and the arrangement of these undulations are more or less a matter of chance, but he proved to us that it is possible to influence them to some extent by moistening the stuff in a certain manner and direction, and this is the particular secret which he alone possesses in the whole of Spain. The excellence of this method is demonstrated by the beauty of the watered silk which issues from these presses. M. Foz himself set us to judge of this by asking us to compare the blue ribbon of the Order of Charles the Third, watered by himself, with those of the Order of the Holy Spirit. The comparison, I must admit, was far from advantageous to these last.”

The subsequent vicissitudes of the Valencian silk trade are indicated by Laborde, who wrote, some few years later than the conscientious and observant author of theNouveau Voyage en Espagne:—

“The mulberry-trees are of great importance;the fields of Valencia are covered with them, particularly in the environs of that town, in the dale of Elda, in the county of Carlet, in almost all the places situated on the sea coast, etc. There are white mulberry-trees, which are lopped every two years.

“The leaves of these trees serve as nourishment to silkworms, which are raised almost everywhere in the kingdom of Valencia. Algemesi, Alcira, Carcagente, Castillo of San Felipe, the county of Carlet, Undasuar, Gandia, Denia, Orihuela, and all the villages near the sea are places which produce the greatest quantity.

“The silk made from them is the finest in Spain. It would be equal to the best and finest silks of Europe, if the Valencians, in spite of the vivacity of their imagination, did not obstinately persist in their old routine in the skeining; for in the skein they put an undetermined number of threads. The government has hired a man who has the most experience in this kind of work; but in vain does he endeavour to instruct them, since the manufacturers continue their bad custom just the same. The quantity of silk wound annually is, on an average, about 1,500,000 poundsof twelve Valencian ounces (1,312,500 pounds of sixteen ounces avoirdupois). It is commonly sold raw for fifty reals of vellon a Valencian pound, which gives a total of 75,000,000 reals of vellon (£731,250)….

“Silk is twisted in different places in the kingdom of Valencia, for which purpose machines and mills are established at Gandia, San Felipe, Carcagente, Orihuela, and Valencia. The most important establishment of this kind is at La Milanesa, near the last mentioned town. Nevertheless, these machines are not able to furnish as much as the manufactures of the country require. Part of the silk is sent to Priego and Toledo in Andalusia, whence it is returned into the kingdom of Valencia to be worked….

“A great many impediments are thrown in the way of the exportation of silk, which is only allowed for six months after the harvest. If in that period the national manufacturers want it, they are at liberty to take it from the merchants who have bought it, on reimbursing them the purchase-money together with six per cent. interest. The consequence is that the merchants, uncertain whether they will be allowed to export the silk which they have purchased, no longertake any foreign commissions for it, and so this branch of exportation has fallen. Besides this, a duty has been laid upon the silk sent out of the kingdom, of nine reals of vellon and one quartillo (1s. 11¼d. sterling) on every pound of twelve Valencian ounces, which is almost a fifth of its value. This is another obstacle to the exportation of it. A very small quantity, twisted and dyed, is sent into Portugal.

“Generally 1,500,000 pounds of silk are made annually, of which 1,100,000 are consumed in the province, and 400,000 pounds are exported to Talavera de la Reina, Requeña, Toledo, Granada, Seville, Priego, and Cataluña. From this results a product of 20,000,000 reals (£208,333, 6s.).”

Of the city of Valencia, Laborde wrote:—

“The manufactories of silk are the most considerable. They employ nearly 25,000 persons, and make taffetas, serges, silks, satins, plain damasks, striped, printed, of one colour and of mixed colours, full velvets, flowered velvets, plain and of various colours. The plain stuffs are those in which they succeed best. There are also fine damasks made and worked with large flowers.”

According to the same writer, the manufacture at Valencia of silk stockings, galloons, silk ribbon,handkerchiefs, and sashes revived to such an extent, that in the year 1799 the looms for producing these articles were 423 more than they had been in 1769. “There are 3618 silk looms, which work about 800,000 pounds of silk annually; the handkerchiefs, sashes, and other little articles of lace consume 100,000 pounds.”

see captionVIIITHE DAUGHTERS OF PHILIP THE SECOND(By Sanchez Coello. Prado Gallery)

VIIITHE DAUGHTERS OF PHILIP THE SECOND(By Sanchez Coello. Prado Gallery)

Equally as instructive is Laborde's account of Barcelona.[24]After remarking that the decay in her manufactures lasted from the end of the sixteenth century till the middle of the eighteenth, he continues:—“They are at present in a very flourishing state, and are more numerous and varied than ever…. There are 524 looms of silk stuffs, and 2700 of ribbons and silk galloon. The silk works consist of taffetas, twilled and common silks, satins, and velvets of every kind and colour. These are mixed with gold and silver. Gold cloths and brocades are also made there.[25]The manufactures are not carried on by companies, but dispersed among the workmen themselves, by which perhaps the qualities may in some degree be injured. It is remarked that the stuffs would be better if they were closer, for their texture is commonly loose; they are also different in the gloss, which is seldom fine, and is never equal to that in the manufactures of France. Another fault in all these stuffs is the imperfect preparation of the silk, which leaves it nearly always shaggy:the cause of this is the silk being spun or twisted in an uneven manner. The same unpleasant effect is observed in the silk stockings. They cannot be fine, their stitches being uneven, and often large and shaggy. They do not last long, and are as dear as the French stockings after the duty on their entrance into Spain has been paid.

“At Barcelona, laces, blonds, net-work, and tapes employ about twelve thousand persons. Galloons, laces, and gold and silver fringes, are likewise made here; but these are of no great importance. Silk, gold, and silver embroideries are very common, and the embroiderers are so numerous that they are to be found in every street.

“Silk Stuffs.—These are manufactured at Manresa, Cardona, and Mataró, which has forty-eight looms; but principally at Barcelona, where there are five hundred and twenty-four. There they make velvets, satins, damasks, silks, taffetas, and gold and silver stuffs. The town of Barcelona alone uses annually 300,000 pounds of raw silk.

“Taffetas, Handkerchiefs, and silk sashes.—They make a great quantity of these at Barcelona, where there are a good many little manufactories of this kind. There are a hundred and fifty looms at Reus, and six hundred at Manresa.At the last place sixty thousand dozen handkerchiefs are made, which take about seventy thousand pounds of raw silk.

“Silk twisters.—There are some of these in several towns, and a great many in Barcelona. There are eighteen frames at Mataró, which twist, one year with another, one hundred and twenty-four quintals of silk; and thirty-seven at Tarragona, which twist eleven thousand quintals.”

Elsewhere in the course of his exhaustive tomes, Laborde sums up the general revival of the Spanish silk-trade in the following terms:—

“Silk stockings are woven at Málaga, Zaragoza, Valencia, and at various other places in the kingdom of Valencia; at Valdemoro, and at Talavera de la Reina in New Castile; also in different parts of Cataluña, more especially at Mataró, Arenys del Mar, and Barcelona. The most extensive manufacture is carried on at the latter city, where the number of frames amounts to nine hundred. In the city of Mataró are fifty-two, in Valencia one hundred and fifty, and nearly as many in Talavera. The stockings made in Spain are of a loose texture; owing to the improper method in which silk-throwsting is conducted, they are badly dressed and worse glossed.The Spanish people themselves prefer French stockings, and most of those manufactured in the country are exported to America.

“Ribbons hold a distinguished place among the manufactured articles of Spain. Some few are woven at Jaen, Granada, and Cordova; but more at Talavera. Cadiz has but twenty ribbon-looms, Manresa five hundred, Mataró eighty, Vich twenty-two, Requeña two hundred, Valencia four hundred, Murcia twelve hundred, and Barcelona nearly three thousand. These looms are not in factories, but individually dispersed. The Spanish ribbons are in general thin and flimsy, have little lustre, and their colours are neither brilliant nor permanent. Ribbons are made of floss-silk at Toledo, where there are about twelve looms, and at Manresa, where there is a greater number.[26]

see captionIXACHARRAOR PEASANT WOMAN(Salamanca, A.D. 1777)

IXACHARRAOR PEASANT WOMAN(Salamanca, A.D. 1777)

“Silk taffetas, serges, and other articles, suchas common and figured satins, damasks, and plain and flowered velvets, are made at Jaen, Granada, Murcia, Valencia, and the adjacent villages; at Málaga, Zaragoza, Toledo, Requeña, Talavera de la Reina, Mataró, Manresa, Cardona, and Barcelona. The silk-trade of Jaen and Granada is at present in a very languishing state; the manufacture of Murcia is dwindled to a few individual looms. At Toledo are fifty looms, fifty at Mataró, forty at Málaga, six hundred at Requeña, four hundred at Talavera, which consume annually two hundred thousand pounds of silk; five hundred at Barcelona, which annually manufacture, in conjunction with those of Cardona and Manresa, about three thousand pounds weight of silk; and in the city of Valencia are three thousand, whose annual demand of silk is eight hundred thousand pounds, while twenty-two thousand persons are employed in the trade. In Zaragoza are sixty looms, which consume fifty thousand pounds of silk; but taffetas only aremanufactured there. The cities of Toledo and Talavera de la Reina are the only places where the looms are collected together in factories: in all other places they are separated, and are found individually at the houses of the respective weavers.

“A great portion of the silks manufactured in Spain are stout and excellent, but they are destitute of the brilliancy observable in French silks. The damasks made at Valencia are extremely beautiful, and in that city they excel in the art of mixing silk and mohair, and produce mohair stuffs which appear to be superior to those of France and England.

“Quantities of silk handkerchiefs and bands are manufactured at Reus, Manresa, and Barcelona. Reus had five hundred looms, Manresa six hundred, and annually made sixty thousand dozen handkerchiefs; Barcelona, a much larger quantity.

“At Barcelona is a very considerable manufacture of white, coloured, plain, and figured gauzes.

“The art of silk-throwsting tends greatly to improve the silk manufactures in Spain. Machines invented in other countries have been adopted here, and in many places profitable changes andcorrections have taken place in the trade. Silk is principally thrown at Priego, Toledo in Andalusia, at Murcia in the kingdom of the same name, at Cervera near Talavera de la Reina in New Castile, at Valencia, at Milanesa near that city, at Gandia, San Felipe, and Carcagente in the kingdom of Valencia. The silk-throwsters, who work at their own houses, and are paid in the great, that is, according to the quantity of work they perform, are very numerous in Murcia; but they perform the business there in a very slovenly way. In the city of Murcia a factory is established, where silk is thrown in an excellent manner by means of an ingenious machine, which has been already described. The establishment at La Milanesa is a very important one, and well administered. At Cervera are a dozen silk-mills, each having four large dividers, and six machines for doubling and twisting, by which seven thousand and seventy-two threads are divided, doubled, and twisted at the same time.”

Footnotes:[13]Don Martin de Ulloa,Discurso sobre las fábricas de seda de Sevilla.[14]In former times, linens and cottons painted, stencilled, or stamped with decorative patterns from an iron or boxwood matrix, were considered to be luxurious fabrics, and are denounced as such in the sumptuary pragmatic (quoted by Miquel y Badía) issued by Jayme the Conqueror ina.d.1234: “Item statuimos quod nos nec aliquis subditus noster non portet vestesincisas,listatas, vel trepatas.”Latterly, these kind of stuffs were made in great quantities at Barcelona, and exported to other Spanish provinces, as well as to America. “Several manufactures of printed linens are established here,” wrote Swinburne, in 1775, “but have not yet arrived at any great elegance of design or liveliness of colour.” The manuscript (dated abouta.d.1810) attached to my copy of Pigal's plates of Spanish costume, says that thepañoletaorfichu(neckerchief) of the women of Cartagena in their gala-dress was at that time of “mousseline blanche, quelquefois brodé, et três souvent n'est qu'un mouchoir d'indienne des fabriques de Barcelonne, avec une brodure en fleurs rouges, le fond blanc et parsemé de petits bouquets.” The same manuscript describes the dress of a cook at Granada:—“Le jupon (refajo), qui est toujours três court, est en hiver de laine avec une garniture au bas: en été il est en indienne. Cetteindienneest une sorte de percale ou toile de coton peinte, dont il y a plusieurs fabriques en Catalogne. On en exportait autrefois une quantité, immense que l'on portait dans les Amériques Espagnoles; c'est ce qui lui a fait donner le nom d'indienne.”From the same source we learn respecting another cotton fabric, which might easily be thought by the unwary reader of to-day to have been of Spanish manufacture, that “l'habitant de Mahon fait en été un grand usage de l'étoffe des Indes appeléenankin. Cette étoffe n'est connue dans plusieurs parties de l'Espagne que sous le nom deMahon.”[15]In 1799 the Marquis of Monte-Fuerte declared the silk of Seville to be of as fine a quality as that of Valencia and Carmona. (Discurso sobre el plantío de moreras en Sevilla y sus inmediaciones.)[16]Granada was especially renowned for her velvets (Platevi.), grounded or relieved, in the oriental manner, with gold or silver.[17]Similar companies were formed at Toledo, Zaragoza, Burgos, Seville, and Zarza. For the Crowncedula, dated February 10th, 1748, authorizing the Real Compañía de Comercio y Fábricas of Toledo, see Larruga'sMemorias, Vol. VII., p. 63.[18]Toledo en el Siglo XVI.Miquel y Badía says that in the fifteenth century Toledo, together with Genoa and Venice, manufactured superb velvets, coloured crimson, blue, purple, or yellow, and figured with pineapples or pomegranates (Plateiv.). The latter tree and fruit are commonly related, in Spain, with the city ofGranada; but quite apart from this, the pomegranate was formerly regarded as a symbol of fecundity and life. (See Goblet d'Alviella,La Migration des Symboles, p. 184, and also Madame Errera's Catalogue, No. 50.) In these velvets the gold thread is woven with consummate skill, and forms, in the costliest and most elaborate specimens, a groundwork of exceedingly small rings. These fabrics were used as hangings for beds and walls, as well as for the clothing of great lords and ladies. Touching the use of silk for certain articles of dress, an amusing story is told in the MS. account of Valladolid, published by Gayangos in theRevista de España. “One day, Don Pedro de Medicis is reported to have paid a visit to a married lady, to whom he had presented some damask curtains, and he was wearing at the time some taffeta hose which made a creaking as he walked. The lady came out of her room, and, finding him in one of the lower apartments, exclaimed, ‘Why do you come here at such an hour, and with that silk on you which creaks so loudly? Take care my husband does not hear it.’ Whereto the gentleman replied; ‘Good God, madam, is it possible that the two hundred yards of damask which I gave you for that curtain have made no noise at all, but that a mere four yards of simple taffeta about my breeches should put you in such consternation?’”[19]“The mulberry of Valencia is thewhite, as being most suitable to a well-watered plain. In Granada they give the preference to theblack, as thriving well in elevated stations, as more durable, more abundant in leaves, and yielding a much finer and more valuable silk. But then it does not begin bearing till it is about twenty years of age. In this province they reckon that five trees should produce two pounds of silk.“I had the curiosity to examine their method of feeding the silkworms. These industrious spinners are spread upon wicker shelves, which are placed one above the other, all round, and likewise in the middle of each apartment, so as to leave room only for the good woman to pass with their provisions. In one house I saw the produce of six ounces of seed, and was informed that to every ounce, during their feeding season, they allow sixtyarrobasof leaves, valued at two pounds five. Each ounce of seed is supposed to yield ten pounds of silk, at twelve ounces to the pound. March 28th, the worms began to hatch, and May 22nd they went up to spin. On the eleventh day, from the time that they were hatched, they slept; and on the fourteenth, they awoke to eat again, receiving food twice a day till the twenty-second day. Having then slept a second time, without interruption, for three days, they were fed thrice a day; and thus alternately they continued eating eight days and sleeping three, till the forty-seventh day; after which they ate voraciously for ten days, and not being stinted, consumed sometimes from thirty to fiftyarrobasin four and twenty hours. They then climbed up into rosemary bushes, fixed for that purpose between the shelves, and began to spin.“Upon examination, they appear evidently to draw out two threads by the same operation, and to glue these together, covering them with wax. This may be proved by spirit of wine, which will dissolve the wax, and leave the thread. Having exhausted her magazine, the worm changes her form and becomes a nymph, until the seventy-first day from the time that the little animal was hatched, when she comes forth with plumage, and having found her mate, begins to lay her eggs. At the end of six days from this period of existence, having answered the end of their creation, they both lie down and die. This would be the natural progress; but, to preserve the silk, the animal is killed by heat, and the cones being thrown into boiling water, the women and children wind off the silk.”—Townsend;Journey through Spain in the years 1786 and 1787; Vol. III., pp. 264–266.[20]They certainly were not unknown at Valencia. I have before me a copy of the work,Disertacion descriptiva de la Hilaza de la Seda, segun el antiguo modo de hilar y el nuevo llamado de Vaucanson, written by the priest Francisco Ortells y Gombau, and published at Valencia in 1783, by order of the Royal Council of Commerce and Agriculture. This book, which clearly sets forth the superiority of Vaucanson's method over those which had preceded it, states that at first the Valencians were strongly opposed to the Vaucanson wheel, believing that it caused a loss and waste of silk. Probably the real reason was that it prevented the manufacturers from adding spurious weight to the silk by mixing it with oil. This practice, says Ortells, was then “so widespread an evil in the kingdom of Valencia, that there is hardly anybody who does not resort to it: notwithstanding it has been so often prohibited by His Majesty, yet openly, where all the world may witness, do the workers spin with much oil added to the silk.”The Vaucanson form of wheel was also more expensive. In the region of Valencia its cost was about thirtypesos, that of the older wheels being only fifteen or sixteenpesos. However, this difficulty was not insuperable, for in the year 1779 the Royal Council of Commerce presented a hundred and twenty Vaucanson wheels to the peasants who had raised a minimum crop of a hundred pounds of silk, requiring, in return, that the recipients of the gift should spin not less than fifty pounds of silk per annum.[21]At the time when Vaucanson's wheels began to be used in Spain, silk was spun by men all over the Peninsula, except in the immediate neighbourhood of Valencia (Orteils;Hilaza de la Seda, pp. 134et seq.) In every other region devoted to this industry such as the valley of the Jucar and the Huertas of Orihuela and Murviedro, as well as in the factories of Toledo, Seville, Granada, Cordova, Jaén, Baeza, Talavera, and Priego, the spinning was performed by men exclusively. Women, however, were often engaged in harvesting the cocoons.[22]“I should here remark that the silk which is spun and twisted according to the method of Vaucanson, forms a fabric a third part closer and stronger than ordinary silk-stuffs.”[23]This man, Joseph Lapayese or La Payessa, did not initiate Vaucanson's method in this region. He succeeded a Frenchman named Reboul, who, in 1769, and holding privileges from the Crown, began to work with Vaucanson wheels at Vilanesa, near Valencia—the same place which Bourgoing callsLa Milanesa. Both the king and his minister of finance, Don Miguel de Muzquiz, were keenly interested in these experiments, and Muzquiz, who owned an estate near the town of Sueca, in the same neighbourhood, imported four more of the new wheels there, under Reboul's direction. This craftsman, however, was not successful. Lapayese, who came after him and enjoyed the same Crown privileges, made considerably better progress, his efforts being seconded by the Royal Junta, the archbishop, and other bodies or individuals of Valencia, who awarded prizes of wheels and money to the best workers in the new style.[24]The art of weaving silk appears to have found its way into Barcelona comparatively late, for the veil-makers did not form a guild of their own tilla.d.1553, the velvet-makers till 1548, the silk-twisters till 1619, and the dyers of silk till 1624.[25]Brocade (Spanishbrocadoorbrocato) may be generally described as a silk-stuff woven with devices or raised figures in gold and silver thread, or either of these metals separately (Plateviii.). This costly fabric, which may be said to have superseded the earlier kinds of cloth of gold, was greatly in vogue in older Spain, especially throughout the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. It is constantly referred to by her writers (“No siendo nueva la que prohibe las telas de oro, losbrocados, y tabies.”—Fernandez Navarrete;Conservacion de Monarquías, p. 231), and denounced by her priests (Fray Luis de León, “Y ha de venir la tela de no sé donde, yel brocado de mas altos, y el ambar que bañe el guante”), or in the pragmatics of her kings (e.g.that of September 2nd, 1494, and of 1611: “Está prohibido todo género de colgaduras, tapicerias sillas, coches, y literas debrocados, telas de oro ó plata…. Asi mismo se prohiben bordaduras en el campo de los doseles y camas; pero no en las cenefas, que podrán llevar alamares, y fluecos de oro, ó plata, óbrocado”).Brocade was made in Spain at Toledo, Barcelona, Seville, Valencia and elsewhere, but as a rule it could not be compared in quality with that of Genoa or Venice. A cheaper, though showy and attractive modification of brocade was brocatel, in which the silk was mixed with common thread or flax. According to the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy, this commoner fabric was used for hangings for churches, halls, beds, etc., and a document of 1680 tells us that the price of brocatel made at Granada, and containing two colours, was twenty-tworealesthe yard.[26]Towards the nineteenth century, ribbon was a great deal worn upon, or together with, the regional costumes of the Spanish women; for instance, on the gala bodice orcotillaof thehortelanaof Valencia, who further used it to make fast heralpargatasor sandals, described in the manuscript account attached to Pigal's plates as “espèce de cothurnes, attachés avec des rubans en soie ou fil bleu ou rouge.” The same fabric served the peasant woman of Carthagena for securing the sleeves of her gala camisole, for lacing the bodice of the woman of Iviza, and in the other Balearic Islands, for tying therebocilloorrebociñobeneath the chin. Also it was with ribbon that the servant-girls of Granada suspended a cross round their necks, that thecharraof Salamanca (Plateix.) trimmed her hat, that the women of Madrid, La Mancha, and Andalusia bound up their knots of hair (moños con cinta), and that, in some localities, even ladies of the highest class secured their shoes about the lower leg and ankle.

Footnotes:

[13]Don Martin de Ulloa,Discurso sobre las fábricas de seda de Sevilla.

[14]In former times, linens and cottons painted, stencilled, or stamped with decorative patterns from an iron or boxwood matrix, were considered to be luxurious fabrics, and are denounced as such in the sumptuary pragmatic (quoted by Miquel y Badía) issued by Jayme the Conqueror ina.d.1234: “Item statuimos quod nos nec aliquis subditus noster non portet vestesincisas,listatas, vel trepatas.”Latterly, these kind of stuffs were made in great quantities at Barcelona, and exported to other Spanish provinces, as well as to America. “Several manufactures of printed linens are established here,” wrote Swinburne, in 1775, “but have not yet arrived at any great elegance of design or liveliness of colour.” The manuscript (dated abouta.d.1810) attached to my copy of Pigal's plates of Spanish costume, says that thepañoletaorfichu(neckerchief) of the women of Cartagena in their gala-dress was at that time of “mousseline blanche, quelquefois brodé, et três souvent n'est qu'un mouchoir d'indienne des fabriques de Barcelonne, avec une brodure en fleurs rouges, le fond blanc et parsemé de petits bouquets.” The same manuscript describes the dress of a cook at Granada:—“Le jupon (refajo), qui est toujours três court, est en hiver de laine avec une garniture au bas: en été il est en indienne. Cetteindienneest une sorte de percale ou toile de coton peinte, dont il y a plusieurs fabriques en Catalogne. On en exportait autrefois une quantité, immense que l'on portait dans les Amériques Espagnoles; c'est ce qui lui a fait donner le nom d'indienne.”From the same source we learn respecting another cotton fabric, which might easily be thought by the unwary reader of to-day to have been of Spanish manufacture, that “l'habitant de Mahon fait en été un grand usage de l'étoffe des Indes appeléenankin. Cette étoffe n'est connue dans plusieurs parties de l'Espagne que sous le nom deMahon.”

Latterly, these kind of stuffs were made in great quantities at Barcelona, and exported to other Spanish provinces, as well as to America. “Several manufactures of printed linens are established here,” wrote Swinburne, in 1775, “but have not yet arrived at any great elegance of design or liveliness of colour.” The manuscript (dated abouta.d.1810) attached to my copy of Pigal's plates of Spanish costume, says that thepañoletaorfichu(neckerchief) of the women of Cartagena in their gala-dress was at that time of “mousseline blanche, quelquefois brodé, et três souvent n'est qu'un mouchoir d'indienne des fabriques de Barcelonne, avec une brodure en fleurs rouges, le fond blanc et parsemé de petits bouquets.” The same manuscript describes the dress of a cook at Granada:—“Le jupon (refajo), qui est toujours três court, est en hiver de laine avec une garniture au bas: en été il est en indienne. Cetteindienneest une sorte de percale ou toile de coton peinte, dont il y a plusieurs fabriques en Catalogne. On en exportait autrefois une quantité, immense que l'on portait dans les Amériques Espagnoles; c'est ce qui lui a fait donner le nom d'indienne.”

From the same source we learn respecting another cotton fabric, which might easily be thought by the unwary reader of to-day to have been of Spanish manufacture, that “l'habitant de Mahon fait en été un grand usage de l'étoffe des Indes appeléenankin. Cette étoffe n'est connue dans plusieurs parties de l'Espagne que sous le nom deMahon.”

[15]In 1799 the Marquis of Monte-Fuerte declared the silk of Seville to be of as fine a quality as that of Valencia and Carmona. (Discurso sobre el plantío de moreras en Sevilla y sus inmediaciones.)

[16]Granada was especially renowned for her velvets (Platevi.), grounded or relieved, in the oriental manner, with gold or silver.

[17]Similar companies were formed at Toledo, Zaragoza, Burgos, Seville, and Zarza. For the Crowncedula, dated February 10th, 1748, authorizing the Real Compañía de Comercio y Fábricas of Toledo, see Larruga'sMemorias, Vol. VII., p. 63.

[18]Toledo en el Siglo XVI.Miquel y Badía says that in the fifteenth century Toledo, together with Genoa and Venice, manufactured superb velvets, coloured crimson, blue, purple, or yellow, and figured with pineapples or pomegranates (Plateiv.). The latter tree and fruit are commonly related, in Spain, with the city ofGranada; but quite apart from this, the pomegranate was formerly regarded as a symbol of fecundity and life. (See Goblet d'Alviella,La Migration des Symboles, p. 184, and also Madame Errera's Catalogue, No. 50.) In these velvets the gold thread is woven with consummate skill, and forms, in the costliest and most elaborate specimens, a groundwork of exceedingly small rings. These fabrics were used as hangings for beds and walls, as well as for the clothing of great lords and ladies. Touching the use of silk for certain articles of dress, an amusing story is told in the MS. account of Valladolid, published by Gayangos in theRevista de España. “One day, Don Pedro de Medicis is reported to have paid a visit to a married lady, to whom he had presented some damask curtains, and he was wearing at the time some taffeta hose which made a creaking as he walked. The lady came out of her room, and, finding him in one of the lower apartments, exclaimed, ‘Why do you come here at such an hour, and with that silk on you which creaks so loudly? Take care my husband does not hear it.’ Whereto the gentleman replied; ‘Good God, madam, is it possible that the two hundred yards of damask which I gave you for that curtain have made no noise at all, but that a mere four yards of simple taffeta about my breeches should put you in such consternation?’”

[19]“The mulberry of Valencia is thewhite, as being most suitable to a well-watered plain. In Granada they give the preference to theblack, as thriving well in elevated stations, as more durable, more abundant in leaves, and yielding a much finer and more valuable silk. But then it does not begin bearing till it is about twenty years of age. In this province they reckon that five trees should produce two pounds of silk.“I had the curiosity to examine their method of feeding the silkworms. These industrious spinners are spread upon wicker shelves, which are placed one above the other, all round, and likewise in the middle of each apartment, so as to leave room only for the good woman to pass with their provisions. In one house I saw the produce of six ounces of seed, and was informed that to every ounce, during their feeding season, they allow sixtyarrobasof leaves, valued at two pounds five. Each ounce of seed is supposed to yield ten pounds of silk, at twelve ounces to the pound. March 28th, the worms began to hatch, and May 22nd they went up to spin. On the eleventh day, from the time that they were hatched, they slept; and on the fourteenth, they awoke to eat again, receiving food twice a day till the twenty-second day. Having then slept a second time, without interruption, for three days, they were fed thrice a day; and thus alternately they continued eating eight days and sleeping three, till the forty-seventh day; after which they ate voraciously for ten days, and not being stinted, consumed sometimes from thirty to fiftyarrobasin four and twenty hours. They then climbed up into rosemary bushes, fixed for that purpose between the shelves, and began to spin.“Upon examination, they appear evidently to draw out two threads by the same operation, and to glue these together, covering them with wax. This may be proved by spirit of wine, which will dissolve the wax, and leave the thread. Having exhausted her magazine, the worm changes her form and becomes a nymph, until the seventy-first day from the time that the little animal was hatched, when she comes forth with plumage, and having found her mate, begins to lay her eggs. At the end of six days from this period of existence, having answered the end of their creation, they both lie down and die. This would be the natural progress; but, to preserve the silk, the animal is killed by heat, and the cones being thrown into boiling water, the women and children wind off the silk.”—Townsend;Journey through Spain in the years 1786 and 1787; Vol. III., pp. 264–266.

“I had the curiosity to examine their method of feeding the silkworms. These industrious spinners are spread upon wicker shelves, which are placed one above the other, all round, and likewise in the middle of each apartment, so as to leave room only for the good woman to pass with their provisions. In one house I saw the produce of six ounces of seed, and was informed that to every ounce, during their feeding season, they allow sixtyarrobasof leaves, valued at two pounds five. Each ounce of seed is supposed to yield ten pounds of silk, at twelve ounces to the pound. March 28th, the worms began to hatch, and May 22nd they went up to spin. On the eleventh day, from the time that they were hatched, they slept; and on the fourteenth, they awoke to eat again, receiving food twice a day till the twenty-second day. Having then slept a second time, without interruption, for three days, they were fed thrice a day; and thus alternately they continued eating eight days and sleeping three, till the forty-seventh day; after which they ate voraciously for ten days, and not being stinted, consumed sometimes from thirty to fiftyarrobasin four and twenty hours. They then climbed up into rosemary bushes, fixed for that purpose between the shelves, and began to spin.

“Upon examination, they appear evidently to draw out two threads by the same operation, and to glue these together, covering them with wax. This may be proved by spirit of wine, which will dissolve the wax, and leave the thread. Having exhausted her magazine, the worm changes her form and becomes a nymph, until the seventy-first day from the time that the little animal was hatched, when she comes forth with plumage, and having found her mate, begins to lay her eggs. At the end of six days from this period of existence, having answered the end of their creation, they both lie down and die. This would be the natural progress; but, to preserve the silk, the animal is killed by heat, and the cones being thrown into boiling water, the women and children wind off the silk.”—Townsend;Journey through Spain in the years 1786 and 1787; Vol. III., pp. 264–266.

[20]They certainly were not unknown at Valencia. I have before me a copy of the work,Disertacion descriptiva de la Hilaza de la Seda, segun el antiguo modo de hilar y el nuevo llamado de Vaucanson, written by the priest Francisco Ortells y Gombau, and published at Valencia in 1783, by order of the Royal Council of Commerce and Agriculture. This book, which clearly sets forth the superiority of Vaucanson's method over those which had preceded it, states that at first the Valencians were strongly opposed to the Vaucanson wheel, believing that it caused a loss and waste of silk. Probably the real reason was that it prevented the manufacturers from adding spurious weight to the silk by mixing it with oil. This practice, says Ortells, was then “so widespread an evil in the kingdom of Valencia, that there is hardly anybody who does not resort to it: notwithstanding it has been so often prohibited by His Majesty, yet openly, where all the world may witness, do the workers spin with much oil added to the silk.”The Vaucanson form of wheel was also more expensive. In the region of Valencia its cost was about thirtypesos, that of the older wheels being only fifteen or sixteenpesos. However, this difficulty was not insuperable, for in the year 1779 the Royal Council of Commerce presented a hundred and twenty Vaucanson wheels to the peasants who had raised a minimum crop of a hundred pounds of silk, requiring, in return, that the recipients of the gift should spin not less than fifty pounds of silk per annum.

The Vaucanson form of wheel was also more expensive. In the region of Valencia its cost was about thirtypesos, that of the older wheels being only fifteen or sixteenpesos. However, this difficulty was not insuperable, for in the year 1779 the Royal Council of Commerce presented a hundred and twenty Vaucanson wheels to the peasants who had raised a minimum crop of a hundred pounds of silk, requiring, in return, that the recipients of the gift should spin not less than fifty pounds of silk per annum.

[21]At the time when Vaucanson's wheels began to be used in Spain, silk was spun by men all over the Peninsula, except in the immediate neighbourhood of Valencia (Orteils;Hilaza de la Seda, pp. 134et seq.) In every other region devoted to this industry such as the valley of the Jucar and the Huertas of Orihuela and Murviedro, as well as in the factories of Toledo, Seville, Granada, Cordova, Jaén, Baeza, Talavera, and Priego, the spinning was performed by men exclusively. Women, however, were often engaged in harvesting the cocoons.

[22]“I should here remark that the silk which is spun and twisted according to the method of Vaucanson, forms a fabric a third part closer and stronger than ordinary silk-stuffs.”

[23]This man, Joseph Lapayese or La Payessa, did not initiate Vaucanson's method in this region. He succeeded a Frenchman named Reboul, who, in 1769, and holding privileges from the Crown, began to work with Vaucanson wheels at Vilanesa, near Valencia—the same place which Bourgoing callsLa Milanesa. Both the king and his minister of finance, Don Miguel de Muzquiz, were keenly interested in these experiments, and Muzquiz, who owned an estate near the town of Sueca, in the same neighbourhood, imported four more of the new wheels there, under Reboul's direction. This craftsman, however, was not successful. Lapayese, who came after him and enjoyed the same Crown privileges, made considerably better progress, his efforts being seconded by the Royal Junta, the archbishop, and other bodies or individuals of Valencia, who awarded prizes of wheels and money to the best workers in the new style.

[24]The art of weaving silk appears to have found its way into Barcelona comparatively late, for the veil-makers did not form a guild of their own tilla.d.1553, the velvet-makers till 1548, the silk-twisters till 1619, and the dyers of silk till 1624.

[25]Brocade (Spanishbrocadoorbrocato) may be generally described as a silk-stuff woven with devices or raised figures in gold and silver thread, or either of these metals separately (Plateviii.). This costly fabric, which may be said to have superseded the earlier kinds of cloth of gold, was greatly in vogue in older Spain, especially throughout the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. It is constantly referred to by her writers (“No siendo nueva la que prohibe las telas de oro, losbrocados, y tabies.”—Fernandez Navarrete;Conservacion de Monarquías, p. 231), and denounced by her priests (Fray Luis de León, “Y ha de venir la tela de no sé donde, yel brocado de mas altos, y el ambar que bañe el guante”), or in the pragmatics of her kings (e.g.that of September 2nd, 1494, and of 1611: “Está prohibido todo género de colgaduras, tapicerias sillas, coches, y literas debrocados, telas de oro ó plata…. Asi mismo se prohiben bordaduras en el campo de los doseles y camas; pero no en las cenefas, que podrán llevar alamares, y fluecos de oro, ó plata, óbrocado”).Brocade was made in Spain at Toledo, Barcelona, Seville, Valencia and elsewhere, but as a rule it could not be compared in quality with that of Genoa or Venice. A cheaper, though showy and attractive modification of brocade was brocatel, in which the silk was mixed with common thread or flax. According to the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy, this commoner fabric was used for hangings for churches, halls, beds, etc., and a document of 1680 tells us that the price of brocatel made at Granada, and containing two colours, was twenty-tworealesthe yard.

Brocade was made in Spain at Toledo, Barcelona, Seville, Valencia and elsewhere, but as a rule it could not be compared in quality with that of Genoa or Venice. A cheaper, though showy and attractive modification of brocade was brocatel, in which the silk was mixed with common thread or flax. According to the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy, this commoner fabric was used for hangings for churches, halls, beds, etc., and a document of 1680 tells us that the price of brocatel made at Granada, and containing two colours, was twenty-tworealesthe yard.

[26]Towards the nineteenth century, ribbon was a great deal worn upon, or together with, the regional costumes of the Spanish women; for instance, on the gala bodice orcotillaof thehortelanaof Valencia, who further used it to make fast heralpargatasor sandals, described in the manuscript account attached to Pigal's plates as “espèce de cothurnes, attachés avec des rubans en soie ou fil bleu ou rouge.” The same fabric served the peasant woman of Carthagena for securing the sleeves of her gala camisole, for lacing the bodice of the woman of Iviza, and in the other Balearic Islands, for tying therebocilloorrebociñobeneath the chin. Also it was with ribbon that the servant-girls of Granada suspended a cross round their necks, that thecharraof Salamanca (Plateix.) trimmed her hat, that the women of Madrid, La Mancha, and Andalusia bound up their knots of hair (moños con cinta), and that, in some localities, even ladies of the highest class secured their shoes about the lower leg and ankle.

Although the history of Spanish cloths and woollens is not of great importance, I think itwell to briefly sketch their history. Sails and other fabrics of the coarsest kind are said to have been made, almost in prehistoric times, at Sætabi (the modern Játiva) and at Saguntum (Murviedro). From the thirteenth century cloths of good quality were made at Barcelona, Lerida, San Daniel, Bañolas, Valls, and other towns of Cataluña. A privilege of Alfonso the Learned, dated May 18th, 1283, contains the following technical disposition relative to the cloth-looms of the city of Soria: “Que la trenza cuando sea ordida que haya 88 varas, que pese una aranzada é 5 libras de estambre; é cualquier que la fallare menor, que peche 5 sueldos. Que todos los tejedores é tejedoras de la dicha cibdad é de su tierra, que pongan en las telas de lino 42 linnuelos é en las de estopazo 32 linnuelos; é en las de marga é de sayal 32 linnuelos.”

Segovia was another ancient centre of this manufacture, which Larruga considers to have been transferred hither upon the extinction of the factories of Cameros, Burgos, and Palencia. However this may be, thefueroof Sepúlveda, signed by Alfonso the Sixth, tells us that clothworks existed here as early as the eleventh century. Towards the end of the fourteenth,when Catherine of Lancaster was married to the Infante Don Enrique, the English princess brought over, as part of her dowry, a flock of merino sheep. These are believed to have pastured near Segovia—a city where Catherine made her home for many years. In any case, Segovian cloths improved considerably from about this time, and by the reigns of Charles the Fifth and Philip the Second, when thirty-four thousand persons were employed in the manufacture and twenty-five thousand pieces of cloth were produced annually, were thought (especially the baizes and the serges) to be unsurpassed in Europe.[27]Sovereigns, including Charles the Second and Charles the Fifth of Spain, and Henry the Eighth of England, were among the patrons of these fabrics, while as late as the year 1700 the Franciscan friars engaged in redeeming captives from the Turks, reported that “at Constantinople, whitherthey had carried Segovian cloths as presents to the principal rulers of that country, those cloths were spoken of in terms of high approval.”

Early in the seventeenth century, and owing to a series of causes such as impertinent or improvident legislation, heavy taxes, and the importation of foreign cloths, the trade showed symptoms of decay.[28]Bertaut de Rouen wrote in 1659, referring to the Spanish character at this time: “Bien souvent le pain leur manque, comme j'ay veu dansAlmagro, petite ville située dans le meilleur pays d'Andalousie, et dansSegovie, qui est une des grandes villes d'Espagne, et où il y avoit autrefois des plus riches marchands à cause des draps et des chapeaux que l'on y faisoit, qui a esté longtemps le sejour des Roys de Castille, et qui n'est qu'environ à douze ou quatorze lieuës deMadrid, où il n'y avoit point de pain dans toute la ville le jour que j'y arrivay, et il n'y en eut qu'à quatre heures après midy, que l'on le distribua par ordre duCorregidor, aussi bien qu'à Almagro.”

The rise, decay, and subsequent revival of the Spanish cloth industries, and particularly the Segovian, are well described by Laborde, Bourgoing, and Townsend. According to the first of these authorities, “at so early a period as 1629 the merchants (of Segovia) complained that there was every year a reduction in the fabrication of cloth, to the amount of five thousand five hundred pieces; and that there resulted from this deficiency an annual loss of 2,424,818 ducats and 2 reals, or about £274,000 sterling. In the eighteenth century it appeared, from the observations of the Economical Society, that the fabrication of stuffs and cloths employed but one hundred and twenty looms, in which only four thousand three hundred and eighteen quintals of washed wool were consumed.

“About forty years ago these manufactures began to revive, the looms were multiplied, and the consumption of wool considerably augmented. A single individual, Don Lorenzo Ortiz, has for some years accelerated their progress. In1790 there was an addition of sixty-three looms, which employed eight or nine hundred quintals of wool, and afforded occupation to two thousand four hundred manufacturers.”

The same author wrote that early in the nineteenth century, “the woollen manufactures of New Castile are the most numerous and important. Cloths are made at Toledo, Chinchon, Brihuega, Guadalajara; serges, stuffs, and flannels at Toledo and Cuenca. The cloths of Brihuega are of an excellent quality, but those of Guadalajara are still superior to them; in particular, the cloth of Vigonia. There are twenty-eight looms at Toledo, forty at Guasmenia, a hundred at Brihuega, and six hundred and fifty-six at Guadalajara.”

Bourgoing wrote, a dozen years or so before the close of the eighteenth century: “Spanish wool is eagerly demanded by manufacturing peoples of the rest of Europe. Nevertheless, it is not turned to so much advantage as it might be. French, Dutch, and English come to Spain to purchase the wools of Segovia and León at the ports of Bilbao and Santander.[29]Not even somuch as the commission on their sale is left in power of the Spaniards, for the foreigners buy up the wool straight from the shepherd, and wash it on their own account. Out of one million ofarrobas[30]of fine wool which Spain produces annually, she exports more than half in washed wool, and a lesser quantity, by far, of unwashed. It has been estimated that the export duties on this wool and which it has not been hitherto thought prudent to curtail, produce a sum of close upon five millions for the King of Spain. Here, therefore, is another reason for not suppressing the ‘abusive measure’ of which the patriotic Spaniards complain so loudly; since it is far from easy to do away with so appreciable a source of revenue unless one has at hand a swift and sure alternative measure by which it may be substituted. All thesame, government is endeavouring to derive a greater fiscal profit from the exportation of these wools, and at the same time to bring about a greater use of them in the Peninsula. For a long time past, all kinds of common woollen fabrics, such as clothing for the soldiery and lower classes, have been made in Spain. The exportation of these fabrics is prohibited. As for the finer wools, these also are employed in several places, but more than anywhere else at Guadalajara, where I visited the factories towards the end of the year 1783. I was surprised to remark that in several respects the manufacture had reached a great pitch of perfection. I sayI was surprised, because I had heard, times without number, that the Spaniards were completely ignorant of these processes, and did not know how to card, or spin, or weave, or dye, or full, or calender; that their stuffs grew loose and wore badly; that the price was exorbitant, etc. How many prejudices of this nature was I able to throw aside after fair and deliberate examination of the stuffs in question! I will only quote a single point to prove that the censures which are aimed at the Spaniards respecting the quality of their cloths are not applicable to them all, and that they arewell upon the road to being entirely undeserving of them. I was shown at Guadalajara a piece of scarlet cloth, which, both for its excellent quality and for its skilful dyeing, seemed to me to be quite comparable with the best cloths of Julienne. These latter cost at their place of manufacture as much as thirty-ninelivresthe ell. At Guadalajara, I noted from the tariff established in the factory, that the price of the finest scarlet cloth was only from thirty-one to thirty-twolivresthe ell. Comparing these and other figures on the tariff, I came to the conclusion that there was about the same difference in price between Spanish cloths and French cloths, in favour of the former. What seems more singular still is that the factories which work at the King's expense are generally administered in a thriftless fashion, and that the factory of Guadalajara was being greatly mismanaged at the time in question. However, subsequently to my visit, changes for the better have been introduced, which will improve the quality of, as well as cheapen, its products, though, even when I saw it, this factory was one of the most perfect to be seen anywhere. Within a space by no means large, it contained all the machines and apparatus requiredfor clothmaking, except the thin, polished pasteboards which are placed between the folds of a piece of cloth as it is passed through the press. These were still brought from England; but everything else was prepared upon the spot, even to the large scissors used in the shearing. There were eighty looms for the finest cloths, whose proper name iscloths of San Fernando, from the town where they were first produced; a hundred for cloths of the second quality; and five hundred and six for making serges, in which, in course of time, hopes are entertained of excelling those of England.[31]All these looms were contained in two buildings, and kept employed three thousand eight hundred and twenty-five persons, all of them paid by the King,[32]without counting some forty thousand more dispersed all over the Castilian and Manchegan tableland, engaged in spinning the wool which is made up into stuffs at Guadalajara. It would be difficult, I am sure, to find a factorybetter organized. Even the town in which it is, presents a striking contrast with others of that neighbourhood. I did not see one single mendicant or idler among all its fifteen or sixteen thousand inhabitants. Such are the good results of its manufactures, and, above all, those of cloth, including many small and detailed processes which women, children, aged people, or even the sick are able to perform. Here, where Nature seemed to have condemned these ailing folk to a tedious and useless existence, art, as it were, stepsin and finds employment and relief for them. Nevertheless, it must be owned that the Spaniards (as they themselves admit) are still a little behindhand in the method of dyeing and fulling their cloths, though when a people possess (as they) the raw materials needed, both for making and for dyeing, a few men skilled in these processes are all that is wanted to perfect several branches of this industry; especially when, as is the case in Spain, government spares no effort to achieve this end. Guadalajara is further the only place in Spain which produces the celebrated Vicuña cloth; an admirable fabric for which the rest of the world has cause to envy Spanish America.[33]As the use of this cloth has not as yet become general, it is not continually manufactured, nor is it easy to obtain a few ells of it without ordering them several months in advance. This stuff is also manufactured for the King of Spain, who makes presents of it to various other monarchs. In the year 1782, after concluding a treaty with the Porte, he sent twenty pieces of it to the Sultan of Turkey. They gave greatsatisfaction. It has been imagined from this circumstance that Spain would not be loth to supply the Turkish market with her cloths; and other of the manufacturing nations have felt some measure of alarm, perhaps unnecessarily. The Spanish government has too much sense to enter upon such a competition with other peoples as long as Spain does not supply the whole of the two and twenty million citizens who live beneath her rule. The same government, too, is well aware how remote is this degree of prosperity. The clothworks of Guadalajara have a kind of branch factory at Brihuega, four leagues distant. At Brihuega there are a hundred looms, all used for making fabrics of the finest quality.

“Segovia, famous at all periods for the excellence of her wool, was formerly not less so for the number and perfection of her clothworks. Now, every patriotic Spaniard must lament to see how she has fallen. In the year 1785 the number of her looms did not exceed two hundred and fifty. The most important factory was that of Ortiz, founded in 1779 under the title ofReal Fábrica: the King possessed an interest in it. In 1785 Ortiz was still employing three thousand workers in and about Segovia, andmanufactured every quality of cloth in sixty-three looms, from the pieces which contained the two thousand threads prescribed by theOrdenanzas, to those which should contain four thousand. His energy was only hampered by the indolent character of the Segovians. The privileges wherewith the government has sought to stimulate his first experiments in this craft are not at all injurious to the other manufacturers. They all concur to sell their goods, and at a reasonable price. In September of 1785, the most expensive cloths cost only ninety reals thevara; that is to say, about thirty-onelivresand tensolsthe ell.”

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