WORSTED MANUFACTURE. 



Knitting-yarn is twined much liarder than yarn for the 

 frame. For mixed coloured ftockings, part of the wool is 

 dyed and mixed with the white in the procefs of combing. 

 The principal feats of the worded hofiery manufafture in 

 England were Nottingham and Leicelter ; but of late years 

 the worded hofiery has declined at the former place, the trade 

 there being principally confined to filk and cotton articles. 

 Formerly hofiery comprifed a variety of worded articles, 

 particularly caps, which were generally worn in England 

 before the introduftion of hats. 



At Aberdeen, in Scotland, there is a confiderable manu- 

 fafture of hofiery, the wool being principally fupplied from 

 i London. Worded doclungs, and lamb's-wool hofiery, to 

 I the amount of from fifty to feventy thoufand pounds, are 

 [ faid to have been annually exported from Aberdeen to 

 1 Holland. Of the number of hands employed in worded 

 hofiery in England, or the annual value of the goods made, 

 [ we have no correft account. Perhaps fome edimate may be 

 formed from the amount of exports of woollen hofiery given 

 under the head Woollen Manufanure,m the table of exports, 

 in which it will be feen, that in the year 1816 the worded 

 hofiery exported amounted to one hundred and fifty-one 

 thoufand and fixty pounds. This, we believe, includes 

 the hofiery made of woollen yarn, or what is generally 

 called lamb's-wool yarn, an article which, fince the begin- 

 ning of the prefent century, has been greatly increafing 

 in demand. Soft worded yarn for hofiery, during the 

 lad twenty years, has been principally fpun and doubled 

 by machines in large worded-mills. Previoufiy to that time, 

 worded-making by hand-fpinning was a didinft trade from 

 hofiery. The worded-maker bought his different forts 

 of combing-wool from the wool-dapler, combed and fpun 

 it, and fold the yarn to the hofier. Since then, the hofiers 

 have been principally fupplied withworded yarn from large 

 mills edablidied in Leicederdiire, Nottinghamdiire, andWar- 

 vvickdiire. Of late, however, many of the hofiers are manu- 

 faftui-ing their own yarn on machines or mules turned by the 

 hand, or in fmall mills turned by horfes or water. 



The combing-wools of Kent are better fuited for hofiery 

 worded yarn than any other in England, particularly for 

 machine-fpinning. Tiiis excellence is derived partly from 

 the foftnefs as well as foundnefs of the wool ; but particu- 

 larly from the daple being nearly of one uniform thicknefs 

 from the bottom to the top. See Wool. 



Picardy and Normandy were the principal feats of the 

 worded hofiery in France. Under the article Woollen 

 Mamifadure, it will be feen that 1,250,000 pounds weight 

 of wool were con fumed annually in the manufafture of 

 hofiery in Picardy before the French revolution. 



The docking-frame was invented by William Lee, M.A. 

 of Cambridge, in 1589, and was afterwards introduced into 

 France. This invention took place in England only 

 s8 years after the knitting of hofiery yarn on needles had 

 been introduced from Spain. See STOCKING-Frawf. 



Hard worded yarn for worded duffs or pieces is fpun 

 much fmaller, and twided much harder, than the foft 

 worded yarn for hofiery. In all the douter kinds of worded 

 goods, tlie long or heavy combing-wool is ufed. (See 

 Wool.) Under the article Woollen ManufaSure we 

 have noticed the introduftion of the worded trade into Eng- 

 land, and various places where it was fird edablidied. 

 Norwich and fome of the towns in Norfolk and Suffolk ap- 

 pear to have been tlie fird where any confiderable quantity 

 of worded pieces or duffs were made. The names which 

 the different kinds of worded pieces have received are very 

 numerous, being often derived from the manufafturer who 

 introduced a flight change either in the mode of weaving or 



finidiing the goods. Thefe names foon became obfolete, 

 being fupplanted by other kinds of worded goods, fo that 

 we do not know at prefent to what particular kind of 

 pieces fome of them were formerly applied ; the effential 

 difference confiding in their being woven plain, twilled, or 

 figured, or made with a w.-irp of fingle or doubled yarn, and 

 woven douter or more flightly, or of greater or lefs width, 

 and whether they were glazed or not in the finidiing. 



The mod important didinftion between worded pieces 

 and woollen cloth confids in the former not being milled 

 or raifed, fo as to cover the furface with a pile, but the 

 thread is left bare. To take off the loofe hairs which rife 

 from the furface, the worded pieces are paffed over a red- 

 hot cylinder, in the fame manner as many kinds of cot- 

 ton (fee Cotton ManufaSure'): this procefs is called 

 Jtnging. For fome particular purpofes, a flight degree of 

 milling has recently been attempted to be given to worded 

 pieces in the fulling-mill. The glazing communicated to 

 fome kinds of worded goods is given by preffing them be- 

 tween dieets of diff glazed prefs-paper and heated iron 

 plates, which are compreffed in a drong preffmg-frame. 

 For the weaving of figured pieces, fee Weaving, and 

 Draught of Looms. 



Some kinds of very fine worded goods are made with a 

 warp of mohair or filk, as filk camlets and bombazines. 

 The latter goods, with a filk warp and wefted with hard 

 worded yarn of the fined kind, are manufaftured at Nor- 

 wich. The term bombazine appears to be derived from 

 bombycina, a kind of filk drefs ufed by the Romans, and 

 faid to come from Affyria. It is generally underdood to 

 have been made from the threads of an infeft called the 

 bombyx. Bombycina is fometimes confounded by com- 

 mentators with byffinum and fericum. Byffmum appears 

 to have been a very fine kind of linen or lace ; fericum 

 unquedionably means filken duff, fo called from the Seres, 

 the nation whence it was procured. Probably bombycina 

 was a coarfer kind of filk. In the middle ages, the word 

 bombycina was applied to cotton. Macpherfon's Annals 

 of Commerce. See Byssus. 



Bombazines are woven with a twill, and have, as before 

 dated, a warp of filk and a wett of fine worded yarn. 

 The Dutch refugees, who fled from the perfecution of the 

 duke of Alva, introduced the manufafture of this article 

 into Norwich in the year 1675, when the Dutch elders, 

 according to Blomefield, prefented bombazines in court at 

 Norwich. (Blomefield's Hid. of Norfolk, vol. ii. p. 205.) 

 Worded goods were made in Norwich as early as the reign 

 of Edward II. This appears from a patent granted to 

 John Peacock, for the ineafuring every piece of worded 

 made in the city of Norwich or county of Norfolk. Nor- 

 wich has continued from that time one of the principal feats 

 of the worded and ftuff trade. The fale of duffs made in 

 Norwich only, in the reign of Henry VIII., amounted to 

 100,000/. annually, befides worded dockings, which were 

 computed at 60,000/. 



Norwich is at this day the only part of England where 

 any confiderable number of the very fined duffs and bom- 

 bazines are made. The manufafture of the coarfer kinds 

 of wordeds, except camlets, has been transferred in a great 

 meafure into Yorkfliire. The period preceding the Ame- 

 rican revolution, from the year 1743 '^f '7'^3' ""^y perhaps 

 be regarded as the mod flourifliing era of the worded 

 manufaftures of Norwich. According to the account of 

 Arthur Young in 1 771, the manufaftures of this place had 

 increafed four-fold in the preceding 70 years. The number 

 of looms was then edimatcd at 12,000, and eacli loom was 

 fuppofed to employ fix perfons in preparing and finiflung 

 4U 2 the 



