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Once re-established there, she answered no more questions, but with truly aristocratic composure resumed her interrupted task of stuffing a costly bonnet of embroidered cambric and quilled lace with sand. When the bonnet would hold no more, she had arranged to fill her shoe: she was perfectly clear upon the point of having no other engagement so absorbing.
The street is filled with promenaders: strangers who saunter along with the red book in one hand, a man and his wife, the woman dragged reluctantly past the windows of fancy articles, which are "so cheap," the man breaking his neck to look up at the buildings, especially at the comical heads and figures in stone that stretch out from the little oriel-windows in the highest story of the Four Seasons Hotel, and look down upon the moving throng; Munich bucks in coats of velvet, swinging light canes, and smoking cigars through long and elaborately carved meerschaum holders; Munich ladies in dresses of that inconvenient length that neither sweeps the pavement nor clears it; peasants from the Tyrol, the men in black, tight breeches, that button from the knee to the ankle, short jackets and vests set thickly with round silver buttons, and conical hats with feathers, and the women in short quilted and quilled petticoats, of barrel-like roundness from the broad hips down, short waists ornamented with chains and barbarous brooches of white metal, with the oddest head-gear of gold and silver heirlooms; students with little red or green embroidered brimless caps, with the ribbon across the breast, a folded shawl thrown over one shoulder, and the inevitable switch-cane; porters in red caps, with a coil of twine about the waist; young fellows from Bohemia, with green coats, or coats trimmed with green, and green felt hats with a stiff feather stuck in the side; and soldiers by the hundreds, of all ranks and organizations; common fellows in blue, staring in at the shop windows, officers in resplendent uniforms, clanking their swords as they swagger past.
The flax was spun on a quill which ran by the foot and the quills or spools holding the thread were used in a shuttle when the cloth was woven. The old loom stood in the hog-pen chamber, and there Mother wove her linen, her rag carpets, and her woollen goods. I have "quilled" for her many a time that is, run the yarn off the reel into spools for use in the shuttle.
It was a chintz valance with birds of paradise patterned on its pink back-ground, and there was pink silk quilled into the quaint tester overhead, reminding her of old Jeremy's favorite quill dahlias. Usually when she went into this room which was seldom opened, she mounted the steps to gaze up at that fascinating pink loveliness. Also she walked around the valance, counting its birds of paradise.
The street is filled with promenaders: strangers who saunter along with the red book in one hand, a man and his wife, the woman dragged reluctantly past the windows of fancy articles, which are "so cheap," the man breaking his neck to look up at the buildings, especially at the comical heads and figures in stone that stretch out from the little oriel-windows in the highest story of the Four Seasons Hotel, and look down upon the moving throng; Munich bucks in coats of velvet, swinging light canes, and smoking cigars through long and elaborately carved meerschaum holders; Munich ladies in dresses of that inconvenient length that neither sweeps the pavement nor clears it; peasants from the Tyrol, the men in black, tight breeches, that button from the knee to the ankle, short jackets and vests set thickly with round silver buttons, and conical hats with feathers, and the women in short quilted and quilled petticoats, of barrel-like roundness from the broad hips down, short waists ornamented with chains and barbarous brooches of white metal, with the oddest head-gear of gold and silver heirlooms; students with little red or green embroidered brimless caps, with the ribbon across the breast, a folded shawl thrown over one shoulder, and the inevitable switch-cane; porters in red caps, with a coil of twine about the waist; young fellows from Bohemia, with green coats, or coats trimmed with green, and green felt hats with a stiff feather stuck in the side; and soldiers by the hundreds, of all ranks and organizations; common fellows in blue, staring in at the shop windows, officers in resplendent uniforms, clanking their swords as they swagger past.
The place seemed a perfect Eden, with its green lawn kept ever verdant by the sparkling stream which flowed down on one side from the hill above, bordered by the graceful and variously shaped trees of the tropics the tall maple arrow, surrounded by its flowering crown of yellow; the Spanish needle, with its dagger-like leaves; the quilled pimploe, a species of cactus; and numberless others, from the branches of which hung lilac and purple wreaths in rich festoons while the sweet notes of the feathered songsters ever and anon burst forth, and here and there could be seen tiny humming-birds flitting from flower to flower, fluttering for a moment and then darting off with the speed of lightning, their gem-like plumage glittering in the sun.
They cost fifteen and twenty dollars; and girls that I know have one or two every season, besides all sorts of quilled and embroidered and ruffled and tucked and flounced ones.
All over the Low Countries, women made caps, in new fashions, of lace or plain linen, with horns and wings, flaps and crimps, with quilling and with whirligigs. In time, kings, queens and nobles made huge ruffs, often so big that their necks were invisible, and their heads nearly lost from sight, in rings of quilled linen, or of lace, that stuck out a foot or so.
Well, the funny part of this was that Old Brin had gone to sleep suckin' his off fore foot, jest like a little baby, and when I had piled in on top of him I had knocked his paw out of his mouth and he was tryin' to git it back. But he was all quilled up with himself under them leaves, and his claws was so long he couldn't git that foot back into his mouth nohow.
His scarlet and white beaded sporran swung to his knees; his ankle moccasins were quilled and feathered in red and white; the Erie scalps hung from his girdle, hooped in red, and he bore only a light pack-slung, besides his rifle and short red blanket. "Salute, O Sagamore! Roya-neh!" I said in a low voice, passing him.
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