' The embroidered sides have been badly damaged by time
and probably more so by repair. The book has been rebound in leather,
the old embroidered back quite done away with, and the worked sides
pulled away from their original boards and ruinously flattened out on
the new ones. After the Felbrigge Psalter no other embroidered binding
has been preserved till we come to one dating about 1536, which is in
satin, and will be described under that head.
_The Miroir or Glasse of the Synneful Soul._ MS. by the
Princess Elizabeth. 1544.
The Princess Elizabeth, afterwards Queen, in her eleventh year, copied
out in her own handwriting the _Miroir or Glasse of the Synneful Soul._
She says it is translated 'out of frenche ryme into english prose,
joyning the sentences together as well as the capacitie of my symple
witte and small lerning coulde extende themselves.' It is also most
prettily dedicated: 'From Assherige, the last daye of the yeare of our
Lord God 1544 ... To our most noble and vertuous Quene Katherin,
Elizabeth her humble daughter wisheth perpetuall felicitie and
everlasting joye.'
The book is now one of the great treasures of the Bodleian Library; it
is bound in canvas, measures about 7 by 5 inches, and was embroidered in
all probability by the hands of the Princess herself. The Countess of
Wilton in her book on the art of needlework says that 'Elizabeth was an
accomplished needlewoman,' and that 'in her time embroidery was much
thought of.
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