The sumptuous "Spanish point," the white thread heavy arabesque lace, was an Italian production originally. It was imported for the Spanish churches and then imitated in the convents by the nuns, but was little known to the commercial world of Europe until the dissolution of the Spanish monasteries[272] in 1830, when the most splendid specimens of nun's work came suddenly into the market; not only the heavy lace generally designated as "Spanish point," but pieces of the very finest description (like point de Venise), so exquisite as to have been the work only of those whose "time was not money," and whose devotion to the Church and to their favourite saints rendered this work a labour of love, when in plying their needles they called to mind its destination. Among the illustrations are some photographs received from Rome of some curious relics of old Spanish conventual work, parchment patterns with the lace in progress. They were found in the Convent of Jesù Bambino, and belonged to some Spanish nuns who, in bygone ages, taught the art to the novices. None of the present inmates can give further information respecting them. The work, like all point, was executed in separate pieces given out to the different nuns and then joined together by a more skilful hand. In Fig. 44 we see the pattern traced out by two threads fixed in their places by small stitches made at intervals by a needle and aloe[273] thread working from underneath. The réseau ground is alone worked in. We see the thread left as by Sister Felice Vittoria when she last plied her task. {94}Fig. 45 has the pearled ground, the pattern traced as in the other. Loops of a coarser thread are placed at the corners, either to fasten the parchment to a light frame, like a schoolboy's slate, or to attach it to a cushion. In Fig. 46 the pattern is just worked. [Illustration: Fig. 44. UNFINISHED WORK OF A SPANISH NUN.] PLATE XXIX. [Illustration: SPANISH. MODERN THREAD BOBBIN LACE MADE AT ALMAGRO.--Slightly reduced.] PLATE XXX. [Illustration: SPANISH, BLONDE. WHITE SILK DARNING ON MACHINE NET.--Nineteenth century. Much reduced. Photos by A. Dryden from private collections.] _To face page 94._