ORIGIN OF LINEN FABRICS. 557 



finally becomes the commonest material for sheets, shirts, 

 surplices, and ordinary table linen. Bultel is a fabric also 

 which appears early (1420), and is frequent. It is of two 

 qualities, fine and coarse. The Corporal cloth of 1427 is fine 

 linen used to cover the Host. Cupboard cloth (1437) also 

 appears to be a fine kind of linen. It is found at a very high 

 price in 1583. Shaving cloth is generally dearer than other 

 kinds of linen. Buckram was probably from the first a stiffened 

 material employed for lining, often dyed. But it also is 

 used for the ordinary purposes of linen. Busk, a kind of table 

 linen, occurs first in 1458, and occasionally afterwards. Dowlas 

 occurs in 1527, is employed in 1555 to make amices, half an 

 ell going to each of them, and in 1 556 for surplices. 



There are also narrow fabrics employed for special purposes. 

 Such are the bever for stot collars in 1423, the pyghtelyn for 

 horse collars, which is found in 1445 (the pythyng cloth of 

 1487 is probably the same), the pikeling of 1512, 1513, 

 1519, 1520, and 1543, and the Hardyn of 1495, 1 5^ I 53 1 ^ 

 1533, the latter being a north-country name. All these articles 

 are generally at the same price, from 2s. to is* 6d. the dozen 

 yards or ells. 



Here I must refer to trie sail cloth purchased for Elizabeth's 

 dockyards in 1561, 1562, 1563, 1569, 1573, and 1578. These 

 articles, called Olderon canvas, Poldavies, and Midrenaxes, are 

 purchased in bolts or pieces ; Vittery or Vetry canvas by the 

 ell; lockram and Dowlas canvas, the latter it is stated for 

 flags, by the piece. The price of lockram and Dowlas is more 

 than three times as high as that of the ordinary sail canvas. 

 These terms were retained in the Admiralty as late as the end 

 of the seventeenth century. 



It will be convenient here to make a few notes on the entries 

 contained in Vol. Ill, pp. 474, 494. An attempt has been 

 made to bring the principal articles under four heads of table 

 linen, shirting, coarse canvas, and sacking, and generally to 

 omit such entries as are irreducible, or are of such a character 

 as would render the averages deceptive. 



