Identifier: scotland00grie (find matches)
Title: Scotland
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Grierson, Elizabeth Wilson
Subjects: Scotland -- Description and travel
Publisher: London : A. and C. Black
Contributing Library: New York Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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n they areboiled, as those of you know who have tried to dyeEaster eggs with lichen from a wall. Then, when the spinning-wheels and old hand-loomswere whirring merrily in the huts once more, these ladiesformed themselves into an association, and they toldtheir fashionable friends about this wonderful Harristweed, as it was called (because most of it was madeat first in the island of Harris), which was all hand-made, hand-spun, hand-dyed, and hand-woven, andpersuaded them to buy some, and have coats andskirts and cloaks made of it. People soon found outhow warm and light and durable this Harris tweed is,and orders flowed in so rapidly that by and by shopswere opened in Edinburgh and London, and nowthousands of pounds worth of tweed is sold every year,and instead of sitting listlessly over their peat fires, thecrofters and their families are as busy as bees all thelong dark winter days. Would you like to know how they manage to turnthe soft fleeces of wool, which they get from the backs
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A HIGHLAND CROFTER IN H S HWT PAGE Scottish Home Industries of their little shaggy sheep, into bales of t\veed withoutsending it to a factory? Well, to begin with, the wool is washed over andover again with very hot water, until all the grease anddirt has been washed out of it ; then it is dyed. If she wants her yarn to be black, the crofters wifesends her children out to dig up iris roots, or the rootsof the common dock. If she wants it to be drab, shesends them to the hill-side to peel some bark from thetrunk of a birch-tree. If green is the colour shedesires, she sends them to pick some heather which isalmost ready to blossom. If she wants brown, they mustpick some yellow lichen off the nearest stone wall ; whilean apronful of bracken roots will produce a nice softyellow dye. When the children have brought her the special plantor root she wants, she hangs an enormous pot on thefire, and puts the wool and the plant or root into it,and covers them with water, and boils them togetherh

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