| Show III ART OF PAPER CUTTING An Accomplishment the Last Century Cen-tury Bevived The quaint old accomplishment of paper cutting has become almost a lost art except where it is still remembered re-membered by a few old ladies as hayIng hay-ing been fashionable when they were young Perhaps some of them can still take a piece of paper and a pair of scissors and cut out designs but their hands are too old and tremulous to execute as delicate and complex patterns pat-terns as thev used to make The designs for these cut paners were never drawn but the paper was generally doubled so that the pattern when unfolded was duplex giving a certain resularity The girls of 50 years ago became very skilfull at this work and one lady tells of often seeing her old mother as the family sat talking after dinner draw outa pair of Somaliscissors pick any envelop or bit of paper and seemingly without any thought or trouble cutout 1 c < the most exquisite flowers and ara besques Cut papers were used for many purposes pur-poses of decoration Sometimes they were cut with a ring at one end that slipped over a candle the leaf of delicate I deli-cate paper lace hanging down in front of the candlestick like an apron These candle papers when dipped in melted wa = and then allowed to harden had almost the look of exquisitely carved Ivory Sometimes the naners were cut in rounds to fit into the lids of watches and were presented by young ladies to the gentlemen of their accualntance and the young men of that day counted I their popularity by the number of watch papers that they had received I Youriir ladles exchanged cut papers with each other as tokens of friendship friend-ship and these shaped like hearts ovals or envelopes were often further embellished by delicately painted I wreaths and flowers and by the sentimental sen-timental verses of the day written upon a space left for them Sometimes the cut papers were merely considered as works of art and as such were mounted on black haircloth hair-cloth and framed No paste was used in the mounting as the papers were too delicate and besides it would have yellowed them The edges were simply sim-ply smoothed out with a soft brush and the class out over them to hold them in olace These large cut uapers were often done in memory of some one loved and lost and the center would be cut In the shape of a funeral urn and tablet tab-let Upon this tablet might appear some verse the letters cut out with a sharp penknife after the rest was finished fin-ished A favorite one was Now to the winds let all my sighs be gIven And reachtho lost on earth the ear of heavn Then would follow the date and perhaps per-haps the words Beloved tho Lost The only branch of this art that still seems to be well known is that of silhouettes sil-houettes but this requires much more talent than the others for the power of catching a likeness is comparatively rareThe The most elaborate silhouettes had the eyes and hair afterwards touched rmr 4 I I in with white or gold paint The silhouettes sil-houettes themselves were generally black but there are someexamples left where the profile was cut out in white and laid on black About 50 years agQ a little dwarf I Miss Hunnywell made herself quite famous as a professional paper cutter and it was considered the thing among the young gentlemen of that day to have a watch paper cut by Miss I Hunnywell The manner of her cutting was very ingenious for she had neither hands nor feet On her right shoulder was something like a thumb on her left side something that might pass for a hand with two fingers and with these I and her mouth she managed to cut out the most exquisite designs and lace I with marvelous rapidity Her work was so much in demand I not only for its beauty but I because of its bein somewhat of a curiosity that 11156 4 Pg3 L Ii J1iID OR S ILW15 m k1Tr i 1 ± the dwarf traveling from place to place and exhibiting herself and her work earned quite a little fortune It i was enough to make her a mark for a rogue who married her and then ran I away with her money leaving her penniless pen-niless I It is said that after he deserted her I the little dwarf would never cut papers again and died in an absolute state of Demirv I There was a certain Mistress Dolly Nichols of Petersburg who was quite wonderful at this art of paper cutting I and her drawing room was decorated I with a whole series of pictures from Mazeppa wild horses and all which she I cut out without the aid of pencil or any guide but her own fancy tl But this art goes further back than I the time of Miss Hunnywell or Mistress Nicholas It is some tirrre early In 1700 fi I that Mrs Delaney in her Autobiography Autobio-graphy and Correspondence writes of her closet at the farm as decorated I with little drawings and cut papers of my own doing I Later on when spa5ngof a young Mr Twyford who wasdeeply in love with her she says i His mothers cruel treatmentof him and absolute refusal of her consent for his marrying me affected him so deep Iv I as to throw him into the palsy He lived in this wretched state about a year after my marriage After he was dead thev found under hispillow a cut paper that he had stolen out of my closet at the Farm When Mrs Delaney was over 70 years old she made her first attempt at copying flowers in cut paper j Her manner of doing it was thus described de-scribed Having a piece of Chinese paper on the table of > a bright scarlet a geranium caught her eye of a similar color and taking her scissors she amused herself in cutting out each 1 flower by her eye in the paper She laid the paper petals on a black background back-ground and was so pleased with the effect that she proceeded to cut out J the calyx stalks and leaves in shades J of green and pasted them down and after she completed a sprig of geranium in this way the Duchess of PortlaStf 1 I came in and exclaimed What are you doing with that geranium having taken the paper imitation for the real flower I This was tne beginning of the collection col-lection of cutpaper flowers which before be-fore her death numbered 9SO sheets each one different I That wonderful collection has disappeared disap-peared now as has Mistress Nicholas wonderful Mazeppa series Only here and there do we come upon a cutpaper laid away in some old portfolio or writing writ-ing desk or see it hanging framed on the wall of some oldfashioned room and the young ladies of today find it more convenient to send a booklet or a printed card to their friends instead of the more personal tokens that used to be exchanged In the old days of cut papers KATHERINE PYLE |
