We were asked to bring to the first lesson lialf yard of lawn, two white spools, 

 a 12 inch ruler, a pair of scissors, and a needle number 7, long, sharp; and thus 

 armed we betook ourselves to the library hall, where under the careful attentions 

 of Mrs. Altenburg we were instructed in the art of plain stitches, hemming, running, 

 back stitching, overcasting, rolled hem, gathered ruffle, button holes, decorative 

 stitches, chain (plain and fancy), braiding, birdseye, bias stitch (single, double, 

 fancy), herringbone, French knot, crowtacks. Quite a number of these operations 

 were not new to us, but Mrs. Altenburg had new and improved methods for many 

 of them, for instance, her method of making a button-hole was different from the 

 one in general favor here. She told us also that in making a button-hole in 

 cloth of a coarse loose weave, to stitch with the machine on each side before cutting 

 the hole. At this first lesson she took the measurement of each member of tbe 



MRS. N. H. ALTENBURG 

 Demonstration Lecturer in Sewing. 



class. Her French knot was a great improvement on the old way of making it. 

 But the real business seemed to begin with the shirt waist. To know exactly 

 how to put a plaquet on a shirt waist sleeve is information which no amateur 

 dressmaker will despise and Mrs. Altenburg's method required no pattern, which 

 seemed a special recommendation. Since then we have heard that a member of 

 ^Irs. Altenburg's Burford Class has said that she considers the lesson on the 

 l)laquet alone worth her fee. Then with our shirt waist fitted on^ some one 

 pinned the shaped collar closely to its place without putting her fingers inside 

 the neck band, and we in turn performed this duty for some one else. Besides 

 learning how to pin on the collar we learned to preserve a calm exterior although 

 suffering considerable anxiety as to the ultimate fate of our neck. We also 

 learned where to cut the armhole if it chanced to require trimming, where to 

 place the seam of The sleeve in relation to the sliirt waist and how to rcilncc the 



