On the other hand, certain traditions handed down in the county villages of a good Queen who protected their craft, the annual festival of the workers--in the palmy days of the trade a matter of great moment--combined with the residence of that unhappy Queen, for the space of two years[1106] at her jointure manor of Ampthill,[1107] lead us rather to infer {376}that the art of lace-making, as it then existed, was first imparted to the peasantry of Bedfordshire, as a means of subsistence, through the charity of Queen Katherine of Aragon. In the chapter devoted to needlework we have already alluded to the proficiency of this Queen in all arts connected with the needle, to the "trials of needlework" established by her mother, Queen Isabella, at which she, as a girl, had assisted. It is related, also, that during her[1108] sojourn at Ampthill, "she passed her time, when not at her devotions, with her gentlewomen, working with her own hands something wrought in needlework, costly and artificially, which she intended for the honour of God to bestow on some of the churches."[1109] "The country people," continues her contemporary, "began to love her exceedingly. They visited her out of pure respect, and she received the tokens of regard they daily showed her most sweetly and graciously." The love borne by the peasantry to the Queen, the sympathy shown to her in her days of trouble and disgrace, most likely met with its reward; and we believe Katherine to have taught them an art which, aided no doubt by the later introduction of the pillow and the improvements of the refugees, has now, for the space of nigh three centuries, been the staple employment of the female population of Bedfordshire and the adjoining counties. Until the latter half of the nineteenth century--though, like all such festivals in the present age, gradually dying out--the lace-makers still held "Cattern's day,"[1110] November 25th, as the holiday of their craft, kept, they say, "in memory of good Queen Katherine, who, when the trade was dull, burnt all her lace and ordered new to be made. The ladies of the court {377}followed her example, and the fabric once more revived." "Ainsi s'écrit l'histoire"; and this garbled version may rest on as much foundation as most of the folk-lore current throughout the provinces. Speaking of Bedfordshire, Defoe writes: "Thro' the whole south part of this country, as far as the borders of Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, the people are taken up with the manufacture of bone lace, in which they are wonderfully exercised and improved within these few years past"[1111]--probably since the arrival of the French settlers after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. At the same period the author of the _Magna Britannia_[1112] states that at Woburn "lace of a high price is made in considerable quantities." Savary and Peuchet both declare the town of Bedford alone to have contained 500 lace-workers.