Lace now seems to be called indifferently purle, passamayne or bone-work, the two first-mentioned terms occurring most frequently. The origin of this last appellation is generally stated to have been derived from the custom of using sheep's trotters previous to the invention of wooden bobbins. Fuller so explains it, and the various dictionaries have followed his theory. The Devonshire lace-makers, on the other hand, deriving their knowledge from tradition, declare that when lace-making was first introduced into their county, pins,[794] so indispensable to their art, being then sold at a price far beyond their means, the lace-makers, mostly the wives of fishermen living along the coast, adopted the {295}bones of fish, which, pared and cut into regular lengths, fully answered as a substitute. This explanation would seem more probable than that of employing sheep's trotters for bobbins, which, as from 300 to 400 are often used at one time on a pillow, must have been both heavy and cumbersome. Even at the present day pins made from chicken bones continue to be employed in Spain; and bone pins are still used in Portugal.[795] Shakespeare, in _Twelfth-Night_, speaks of "The spinsters and the knitters in the sun, And the free maids that weave their threads with bone." "Bone" lace[796] constantly appears in the wardrobe accounts, while bobbin lace[797] is of less frequent occurrence. Among the New Year's Gifts presented to Queen Elizabeth, we have from the Lady Paget "a petticoat of cloth of gold stayned black and white, with a bone lace of gold and spangles, like the wayves of the sea"; a most astounding article, with other entries no less remarkable but too numerous to cite. {296}In the marriage accounts of Prince Charles[798] we have charged 150 yards of bone lace[799] for six extraordinary ruffs and twelve pairs of cuffs, against the projected Spanish marriage. The lace was at 9s. a yard. Sum total, £67 10s.[800] Bone lace is mentioned in the catalogue of King Charles I.'s pictures, drawn up by Vanderdort,[801] where James I. is described "without a hat, in a bone lace falling band."[802] Setting aside wardrobe accounts and inventories, the term constantly appears both in the literature and the plays of the seventeenth century. "Buy some quoifs, handkerchiefs, or very good bone lace, mistress?" cries the pert sempstress when she enters with her basket of wares, in Green's _Tu Quoque_,[803] showing it to have been at that time the usual designation. "You taught her to make shirts and bone lace," says someone in the _City Madam_.[804] Again, describing a thrifty wife, Loveless, in _The Scornful Lady_,[805] exclaims-- "She cuts cambric to a thread, weaves bone lace, and quilts balls admirably."