Fabrics woven with gold and silver continue to be used on the largest scale to this day in India; and there the preparation of the varieties of wire, and the working of the various forms of lace, brocade, and embroidery, is at once an important and peculiar art. The basis of all modern fabrics of this kind is wire, the “gold wire” of the manufacturer being in all cases silver gilt wire, and silver wire being, of course, composed of pure silver. In India the wire is drawn by means of simple draw-plates, with rude and simple appliances, from rounded bars of silver, or gold-plated silver, as the case may be. The wire is flattened into the strip or ribbon-like form it generally assumes by passing it, fourteen or fifteen strands simultaneously, over a fine, smooth, round-topped anvil, and beating it as it passes with a heavy hammer having a slightly convex surface. From wire so flattened there is made in India io>ιm, a tissue or cloth of gold, the web or warp being composed entirely of golden strips, and ruperi, a similar tissue of silver. Gold lace is also made on a warp of thick yellow silk with a weft of flat wire, and in the case of ribbons the warp or web is composed of the metal. The flattened wires are twisted around orange (in the case of silver, white) coloured silk thread, so as completely to cover the thread and present the appearance of a continuous wire; and in this form it is chiefly employed for weaving into the rich brocades known as kincobs or kinkhâbs. Wires flattened, or partially flattened, are also twisted into exceedingly fine spirals, and in this form they are the basis of numerous ornamental applications. Such spirals drawn out till they present a waved appearance, and in that state flattened, are much used for rich heavy embroideries termed karchobs. Spangles for embroideries, &c., are made from spirals of comparatively stout wire, by cutting them down ring by ring, laying each Ø-like ring on an anvil, and by a smart blow with a hammer flattening it out into a thin round disk with a slit extending from the centre to one edge. Fine spirals are also used for general embroidery purposes. The demand for various kinds of loom-woven and embroidered gold and silver work in India is immense; and the variety of textiles so ornamented is also very great. “Gold and silver,” says Dr Birdwood in his Handbook to the British-Indian Section, Paris Exhibition, 1878, “are worked into the decoration of all the more costly loom-made garments and Indian piece goods, either on the borders only, or in stripes throughout, or in diapered figures. The gold-bordered loom embroideries are made chiefly at Sattara, and the gold or silver striped at Tanjore; the gold figured mashrus at Tanjore, Trichinopoly, and Hyderabad in the Deccan; and the highly ornamented gold-figured silks and gold and silver tissues principally at Ahmedabad, Benares, Murshedabad, and Trichinopoly.”

Among the Western communities the demand for gold and silver lace and embroideries arises chiefly in connexion with naval and military uniforms, court costumes, public and private liveries, ecclesiastical robes and draperies, theatrical dresses, and the badges and insignia of various orders. To a limited extent there is a trade in gold wire and lace to India and China. The metallic basis of the various fabrics is wire round and flattened, the wire being of three kinds—1st, gold wire, which is invariably silver gilt wire; 2d, copper gilt wire, used for common liveries and theatrical purposes; and 3d, silver wire. These wires are drawn by the ordinary processes, and the flattening, when done, is accomplished by passing the wire between a pair of revolving rollers of fine polished steel. The various qualities of wire are prepared and used in precisely the same way as in India,—round wire, flat wire, thread made of fiat gold wire twisted round orange-coloured silk or cotton, known in the trade as “orris,” fine spirals and spangles, all being in use in the West as in the East. The lace is woven in the same manner as ribbons, and there are very numerous varieties in richness, pattern, and quality. Cloth of gold, and brocades rich in gold and silver, are woven for ecclesiastical vestments and draperies.

The proportions of gold and silver in the gold thread for the lace trade varies, but in all cases the proportion of gold is exceedingly small. An ordinary gold lace wire is drawn from a bar containing 90 parts of silver and 7 of copper, coated with 3 parts of gold. On an average each ounce troy of a bar so plated is drawn into 1500 yards of wire; and therefore about 16 grains of gold cover a mile of wire. It is estimated that about 250,000 ounces of gold wire are made annually in Great Britain, of which about 20 per cent, is used for the headings of calico, muslin, &c., and the remainder is worked up in the gold lace trade.