As for the tapestry, pray don't confound it with the worsted dogs and Rebekahs-at-the-Well with which we sometimes adorn (?) our homes, since one would never in any way suggest the other. In these every delicate line is faithfully reproduced, and the effect exactly that of an oil painting. After long years the colors fade; and we were startled sometimes, in the old palaces, to come upon one of these gray shadows of pictures, out from which, perhaps, a pair of wonderful eyes alone would seem to shine. In old times the rough walls of the grim prison palaces were hung with tapestry wrought by the fair fingers of court ladies, the designs of tournament and battle being rudely sketched by gay gallants. Many a bright dream was worked into the canvas, I doubt not, never found upon the pattern; many a sweet word said over the task that beguiled the dull hours, and kept from mischief idle hands. But in the reign of Louis XIV. the art of weaving tapestry was brought from Flanders, and a manufactory established on the outskirts of Paris which still remains. To visit it a pass is required. Accordingly we addressed a note of solicitation to some high official, and in due time came a permit for Madame K. and family; and an ill-assorted family we must have appeared to the official at the gate. There were the rooms, hung with specimens of the tapestry, for which we did not care, and then the six devoted to the weaving; long, low, and narrow they were, with hand-looms ranged down one side. Through the threads of the warp we could see the weavers sitting behind their work, each with his box of worsteds and pattern beside him. The colors were wound upon quills, numbers of which hung, each by its thread, from the half-completed work. Taking one of these in one hand, the workman dexterously separated the threads of the warp with the other, and passed the quill through, pressing down the one stitch thus formed with its pointed end. You can imagine how slow this work must be. How tiresome a task it is to delight the eyes of princes! The making of carpets, which has been recently added, is equally tiresome. This, too, is hand work, they being woven in some way over a round stick, and then cut and trimmed with a pair of shears. To make one requires from five to ten years, and their cost is from six to twenty thousand dollars. About six hundred weavers are said to be here, though we saw but a small proportion of that number. They receive only from three to five hundred dollars a year, with a pension of about half as much if they are disabled.