My lady despised every kind of work that would now be called Fancy-work.

She considered that the use of coloured threads or worsted was only fit to amuse children; but that grown women ought not to be taken with mere blues and reds, but to restrict their pleasure in sewing to making small and delicate stitches.
She would speak of the old tapestry in the hall as the work of her ancestresses, who lived before the Reformation, and were consequently unacquainted with pure and simple tastes in work, as well as in religion.
Nor would my lady sanction the fashion of the day, which, at the beginning of this century, made all the fine ladies take to making shoes.
She said that such work was a consequence of the French Revolution, which had done much to annihilate all distinctions of rank and class, and hence it was, that she saw young ladies of birth and breeding handling lasts, and awls, and dirty cobblers'-wax, like shoe'-makers' daughters.
Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud to her, as she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving book.

It was generally Mr.Addison's "Spectator;" but one year, I remember, we had to read "Sturm's Reflections" translated from a German book Mrs.
Medlicott recommended.

Mr.Sturm told us what to think about for every day in the year; and very dull it was; but I believe Queen Charlotte had liked the book very much, and the thought of her royal approbation kept my lady awake during the reading.

"Mrs.Chapone's Letters" and "Dr.
Gregory's Advice to Young Ladies" composed the rest of our library for week-day reading.