But our artist
must fit his stems to certain angles so that their lines may be
continuous, constantly repeating themselves, the same group recurring,
yet in a hidden monotony.
My pattern of to-day had always pleased me, for we had woven many yards
of it before,--the machines and I. There were rich green leaves and
flowers, gay flowers that shone in light and hid themselves in shade,
and I had always admired their grace and coloring. To-day they had
seemed to me cold and dusky. All my ideas that I had gained from
conventional carpet-flowers, which, woven almost beneath my hand, had
seemed to rival Nature's, all these ideas had been suddenly swept away.
My eyes had opened upon real flowers waving in real sunshine; and my
head grew heavy at the sound of the clanking machine weaving out yards
of unsunned flowers. If only that sunshine, I thought, would light up
these green leaves, put a glow on these brilliant flowers, instead of
this poor coloring which tries to look like sunshine, we might rival
Nature. But the moment I was so thinking, the rays of sunlight I have
spoken of fell on the gay threads. They seemed, before my eyes, to seize
upon the poor yellow fibres which were trying to imitate their own glow,
and, winding themselves round them, I saw the shuttle gather these rays
of sunlight into the meshes of its work.
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