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In the first place, we are told, with infinite regard to the probability as well as the novelty of the fiction, that in this drawing-room there were two great lions couching at the feet of the Royal Pair; the Prince's being very lean and in poor condition, with the hair rubbed off his neck as if from a heavy collar and the Princess's in full vigour, with a bushy mane, and littered with torn French flags.
It is not possible here to point out in detail the system on which the various examples illustrated have been worked; the reader must worry that out for herself. But one may just point out in passing how well the various stitches go together in some few instances. The harmony between appliqué work and couching or chain-stitch outline has been alluded to already.
My dreams that night were of a mighty chain of redoubts and masked batteries couching perdus among the sand-dunes of desolate islets; built, coral-like, by infinitely slow and secret labour; fed by lethal cargoes borne in lighters and in charge of stealthy mutes who, one and all, bore the likeness of Grimm. On the bridge I halted and fell into torments of indecision.
As soon as these saw the Moslems they encircled them from all sides, couching lance and baring the white sabre blade; and the Infidels shouted the watch word of their faithless Faith and set the shafts of their mischief astring.
Hence arises some confusion between the two methods of work laying and couching. Laid floss is sewn down en masse, couched silk in single or double threads; and accordingly laid answers best for surface covering, couched for outlining, except in the case of gold, which even for surface covering is always couched.
These are large panels filled with foliage and flowers growing about architectural columns. No. 517-522, 1896. Couching Braid Work Laid Work Applied Work Inlaid Work Patch Work. Couching is the name given to a method of embroidery in which one thread is attached to the material by another one.
"I hear the eulogy, I know the sonnet," said Violetta, smiling, and described the points of a brunette: the thick black banded hair, the full brown eyes, the plastic brows couching over them; it was Vittoria's face: Violetta was a flower of colour, fair, with but one shade of dark tinting on her brown eye-brows and eye-lashes, as you may see a strip of night-cloud cross the forehead of morning.
In its mellow, magical glow, the fine paintings suspended on the walls seemed to catch a gleam of "that light that never was on sea or land," for their dim, purplish Alpine gorges were filled with snowy phantasmagoria of rushing avalanches; their foaming cataracts braided glittering spray into spectral similitude of Undine tresses and Undine faces; their desolate red deserts grew vaguely populous with mirage mockeries; their green dells and grassy hill-sides, couching careless herds, and fleecy flocks, borrowed all Arcadia's repose; and the marble busts of Beethoven and of Handel, placed on brackets above the piano, shone as if rapt, transfigured in the mighty inspiration that gave to mankind "Fidelio" and the "Messiah."
This practically explains the couching; variety is obtained by change of pattern, but the method of carrying it out is always the same. Figs. 126, 127, and 128 show three patterns taken from old examples of this couching.
Couching is useful in a variety of ways, e.g. for carrying out work in line or for outlining other embroidery, applied work for instance, which is frequently finished off by means of a couched thread; in the case of a difficult ground material, it is one of the most manageable methods of working.
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