OCR Text |
Show THE SPINDLE AND DISTAFF. The extreme antiquity of the arts of spinning and weaving I no' more remarkable than the slowness of their i development Into their present condition condi-tion We cannot fix a date for thel: I primitive origin, but i is certain thai they retained the greater part of then-primitive then-primitive character until the beginning of the eighteenth century. Then, as from the earliest days, wool like all I other textile materials, was spun en tlrely bv hand and woven entirely by I hand The most primitive method of spin j nlng was by means of the distaff and spindle. It is 6aid nowadays that any I thing which has two ends can be incorporated in-corporated Into a woolen thread and cloth. But for the purposes of the primitive spinner th fiber to be spun must have had sufficient length to I enable It to be manipulated, drawn out and twisted by the fingers of the spinner, and even so the manual dex tcrlty whereby fibers not more than a few inches In length the longest cotton fiber, that of the best Sea Island cotton, Is under two inches long into a continuous and uniform thread many miles In length is one of the mo6t wondrous manifestations of primitive human ingenuity Tin-spindle Tin-spindle was a round stick of wood about a foot or less In length according ac-cording to the material to be handled tapering to either end and Imvinv a notch at the upper end to which th-extremity th-extremity of the yarn to be spun Is attached It was surrounded near its center by a perforated disk or whorl made of clay, stone, wood or other suitable materia! - it Is said that a potato or other tuber wa6 sometimes used lor the purpose Its function being be-ing to give steadiness and momentum to the spindle in Its rotation The distaff was a longer slick of wood with a loose ball or bunch of the material ma-terial to be spun suitably prepared by processes which need not here bo described attached to Its upper end. The spinner either fixed the lower end of the distaff In her girdle or car-i car-i Ing out a prepared end of the yarn. j rled It under her left arm Then draw - afterward called a "roving " from the distaff she twisted It with her fingers fing-ers until It had attained some hp proximatlon to the required degree of attenuation and fixed the end of the yarn to the notch In the spindle. The spindle was then made to rotate either ei-ther by twirling It with the finger, or more commonly by rolling It between be-tween the hand and the thigh, and casting It loose as soon as the re quired speed of rotation was attained As soon as It was loose fresh supplies sup-plies of fiber were drawn out from the distaff and manipulated by both hands Into an equal and uniform strand of yarn or thread having the degree of attenuation required The yarn thus formed was then wound on the spindle until the point was reached at which the roving was still insufficiently attenuated At that point the spun yarn w as caught Into the uotch of the spindle and the pro cess was repeated from time to time until the fiber carried bv the distaff was all spun Into yarn The use of the spindle In this process now gives the name of spindle" to n definite meas ur of length In the linen Industry, the opindle" of linen yarn betng taken ta-ken as measuring 14,400 yards in length. This la perhaps rather a length of convenience than a maxi mum attainable length, for It has long been vastly exceeded bv the native spinners of India London Times. |