AMERICAN INDUSTRIES SINCE COLUMBUS. 311 



Homer describes a product of Creusa's shuttle, in which appeared 

 a gorgon and dragons. The damasks and tapestries of the an- 

 cients were as elaborate in figure-work, woven into the warp and 

 woof, and more beautiful in coloring, than modern machinery has 

 ever achieved. The famous Gobelin tapestries, with their elabo- 

 rate allegorical scenes, present a development of the art impossible 



Fig. 24. Carpet-loom, with Jacquaed Attachment. 



to automatic machinery. Neither has machinery increased the 

 number or variety of the weaves in common use. But a single 

 invention, that of Joseph Marie Jacquard, and known by his name, 

 has made possible in power weaving the making of figured pat- 

 terns without limit of variation, thus robbing the hand-loom of 

 one of its last points of superiority. Jacquard perfected his 



