Portrait of Lincoln surrounded by a bouquet of "phantom leaves". Title from recto. Skeletonized leaves - also called “phantom leaves” or “phantom bouquets" -- were a popular 19th c. ladies pasttime. Information from http://nationalheritagemuseum.typepad.com/library_and_archives/john-p-soule/: Instructions on how to pursue this type of project were provided in numerous late-1800s household guides and ladies’ magazines. For example, the March 1870 issue of The Lady’s Friend reprinted directions from an 1867 issue for skeletonizing leaves “at the special request of new subscribers.” The writer acknowledged the popularity of this activity, “These Phantom Bouquets are more beautiful than could be believed by those who have not seen them…We had not thought that anything so dainty and airily graceful could be preserved in this way.” To make one of these arrangements, the leaves were gathered while green and then soaked. The “green matter” had to be rubbed off the surface of the leaf, leaving the “fibrous network” or skeleton of the leaf. Once the leaves were thoroughly dry, they could be bleached and then formed into an arrangement. Darrah, pp. 189-90, "Enthusiasm for stereo views of these arrangements was incredible. The first issue (1858) of William England's "Beautiful in Death" was simply titled "Skeletonized Leaves" and huge copies were sold by the London Stereoscopic Company until 1870." "The appeal of skeleton arrangements may be judged by the excellent photographers who produced stereos of them: Soule, Anthony and Charles Bierstadt. Scores of funeral skeleton leaf arrangements, especially wreaths, with a portrait of the deceased, are widely scattered in thw trade lists of American photographers 1867-1878.
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