i 7 8 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



May, 1913 



pression and chal- 

 lenge recognition in 

 one sampler. Most 

 of the map samplers 

 which have been pre- 

 served seem to have 

 been the work of 

 English makers, al- 

 though all of the 

 maps embroidered 

 are by no means 

 those of England. 

 Maps of England, 

 Wales and Scotland, 

 were favorite sub- 

 jects, however, and 

 are generally worked 

 with scrupulous fidel- 

 ity so that the various shires appear 

 in correct proportions and properly 

 labeled. Rivers and large cities and 

 islands are sometimes included, the 

 surrounding bodies of water are duly 

 named and such neighboring coun- 

 tries as France and Ireland are often 

 indicated. Map samplers do not al- 

 ways include the maker's name nor 

 their ages, nor the place of their 

 homes — they are maps of needlework 

 and not a great deal else. 



When a little English girl under- 

 took the making of a sampler upon 

 which was to appear a map of a 

 foreign land, the task was not the 

 simple work of making a map of her 

 own country where the details were 

 by long association quite familiar. A 

 map of a foreign country called for 



Two exquisitely worked map samplers (on silk moire), from the collection of Mr- 

 Power, New York 



B. 



is one which bears a 

 map of North and 

 Central America. In 

 this particular in- 

 stance American 

 geography suffers 

 some violence, due 

 probably to the some- 

 what vague and hazy 

 knowledge of the sub- 

 ject which prevailed 

 in Europe in 1788 

 when the sampler 

 was made. The en- 

 tire area now occu- 

 pied by the north- 

 eastern states is 

 labeled "New Eng- 

 land," though this, to be sure, may 

 be because owing to the small size of 

 these states it was impossible to pre- 

 sent each one. New York occupies 

 only the tiniest fragment upon the 

 map and New Jersey and Delaware 

 are quantities almost negligible. 

 Pennsylvania is expanded to a size 

 much greater than it ever possessed, 

 and Virginia and the Carolinas are 

 represented by long horizontal strips 

 which extend from the seaboard to 

 the Mississippi River. Mexico, and 

 the greater part of Central America 

 appear in what is much their present 

 position, but a puzzling section just 

 north of Mexico is labeled "New 

 Navarre," and by far the greater part 

 of the continent is inscribed "un- 

 known land." 



Another English collection includes 



attainments far above the ordinary. 



Among the treasures in a noted col- 0val ma P samplers are very rare. This fine example a sampler map~of Africa, and it too is 



lection of samplers in England, there 1S from the Drake Collectlon (Continued on page 192) 



A remarkable map sampler, Eastern and Western hemispheres, worked by A. Mather, 1 802. From the collection of Mr. E. B. Power 





