Object number1960.9.53

Sampler

Date1805

CultureBritish

MediumSilk embroidery threads on wool ground with linen handling edge

DimensionsSight: 19 1/2 × 13 3/4 in. (49.53 × 34.93 cm)
Framed: 20 5/8 × 15 in. (52.39 × 38.1 cm)
Rabbet: 1/4 × 11/16 in. (0.64 × 1.75 cm)

Credit LineGift of Mrs. James W. Packard (Elizabeth Gillmer, class of 1894)

On View

Not on view

Period19th c

Classification(s)

Signed Sarah Bedford Pupil to M Allison Dec 1805

InscribedInscribed (on the center portion): For me kind Nature wakes her genial Pow'r / Suckles each Herb, and spreads out evr'y flow'r / Annual for me, the Grape the Rose renew / The Juice nectarious, and the balmy Dew / For me the Mine A thousand Treasures brings / For me, Health gushes from A thousand springs. / Tell me, ye knowing and discerning Few, / Where I may find A Friend both firm and true, / Who dares stand by me when in deep Distress, / And then his Love and Friendship most express./ Sarah Bedford Pupil to M Allison Dec 1805

BibliographyThanks be to my Friends: Selected Samplers from the Collection of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center (Poughkeepsie: FLLAC, 2004) Sampler ("For me kind Nature wakes her great Pow'r..." & "Sarah Bedford Pupil to M. Allison"), 1805Exhibition HistoryPoughkeepsie, New York, FLLAC, Vassar College, "Thanks be to my Friends: Selected Samplers from the Collection of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center," June 5-July 18, 2004
DescriptionWorked primarily in greens, creams, golds, light blue, mauve, and tans, with red, yellow, and black secondary colors, the Sarah Bedford sampler composition presents (from the top) a chinoiserie garden structure on a stepped hill edged with pine trees and sprinkled with eight point stars. The hill is flanked by flowering shrubs in urns and fruit trees. Below are two verses, one celebrating nature (from Pope's "Essay on Man"), the other a well know sampler verse on friendship. The verses are divided by a strawberry band and a floral band. The bottom register is a symmetrical arrangement of Scottish style pine trees, deer, baskets, two distinctive birds and two butterflies flanking an apple tree. Below the ground that is worked in brown satin stitch is the inscription line identifying both the sampler-maker and her teacher and the year. The composition framed in an undulating border of four different, regularly alternating flowers in light blue, cream yellow, mauve and yellow edged in gold.

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email loebcollections@vassar.edu