"Mary Isabella Grant Knitting a Shawl" (ca.1850)

"Mary Isabella Grant Knitting a Shawl" (ca.1850) by Francis Grant.

This lovely painting of the artist's daughter is also one that clearly shows that the artist knows what a piece of knitting looks like.  Mary Isabella is holding fabulously long needles (not "parlour style"), with the ball of wool in a little basket on her arm.  The knitting looks like a brioche stitch, very popular in the 1840s and 50s!

"Each rib of the design measures about half an inch"

"Lady's Knitted Under-Vest" from Harper's Bazar [sic], 10 December 1870, pp.789-790.

Anne L. Macdonald, in her No Idle Hands: The Social History of American Knitting (Ballantine, c1988) writes that

The first mention of gauge seen by this author, in Harper's Bazaar in 1870, was a "Lady's Knitted Under Vest ... to be worn under high-necked dresses instead of a vest."  Instructions called for "heavy wooden Needles in the common patent* stitch," the needle size to be determined by whatever produced this result: "Each rib of the design measures about half an inch, 8 rounds in length being 1 1/4 inches."  In 1885, "Jenny June" finally advised knitters to make a swatch (though she didn't use that term): "Knit a few rows, and then measure them carefully.  You will see thus how many rows of your work make an inch and can calculate exactly how many stitches will be needed."

The bibliographic note on p.390 gives the citations as 10 December 1879 [sic], p.789 for the Harper's Bazaar, and "Croly, p.14" for the Jennie June (the pen name of Jane Cunningham Croly), though the only title by Mrs. Croly in the bibliography is her Sorosis: Its Origin and History, and I confess I cannot find the quotation there.  It does, however, appear in her Knitting and Crochet: A Guide to the Use of the Needle and the Hook (Ingalls, 1886), on p.14 --

Gauge, or more accurately the lack thereof in period knitting patterns, is probably the bane of historical knitters' existence -- as it was very likely to many knitters in the past, as well. It seems astonishing now that it took some thirty years' worth of knitting "receipts" and books before a pattern writer took pity enough to include a note on gauge, so let us send a grateful sigh of thanks to the unnamed Harper's Bazaar author who not only included an illustration of the finished piece but gave an idea of gauge!

* For "patent knitting," note Mrs. Croly's "No. 37a. BRIOCHE, OR PATENT KNITTING. Cast on a number of stitches divisible by three. First (and every) row.— Cotton forward, slip 1, knit 2 together," which is not the modern "brioche" stitch but produces a similar thickly-ribbed fabric.

"The School-Girl's Hymn" (1859)

"The School-Girl's Hymn" by William Holman Hunt (1859). 

"The School-Girl's Hymn" by the Pre-Raphaelite painter William Holman Hunt, described as a "pot-boiler" by the Ashmolean (presumably on Holman Hunt's authority!), shows "'a girl going to school in a smiling summer Sunday morning, singing her hymn as she walks along'. The model was Miriam Wilkinson, a labourer's daughter Hunt met while staying with Thomas Combe at a farmhouse near Hastings in Kent in 1858."  It is rather unusual in clearly showing the sitter wearing a knitted garment -- two in this case, as she has a knitted muffler as well.

Since a significant characteristic of the Pre-Raphaelites was an intense realism, it comes as no surprise that the stitch used in the girl's jacket is meticulously depicted, almost certainly brioche stitch. A similar jacket pattern is the one below, from The New Guide to Knitting & Crochet by Marie Jane Cooper (Cooper, 1847).

Note that the number of stitches to cast on should be 225, not 25.

A POLKA COAT, FOR A CHILD.

Cast on twenty-five [sic, 225] stitches, which will make seventy-five ribs, in the Brioche stitch, which is done by bringing the wool forward, slipping a stitch the purl way, and knit two together; bring the wool forward, knit twenty-four rows, or twelve turns of white; then commence the scarlet, by leaving eighteen stitches on each side, knit twenty-four rows, or twelve turns of scarlet; then begin to take in, which is done by knitting the first thirty on each side, without decreasing; then bring the wool forward, slip one stitch, and knit five together; repeat this till within thirty on the other side, which, knit without decreasing, until you have only forty ribs, or one hundred and twenty stitches; knit forty-eight rows, or twenty-four turns, in this manner, still leaving the white on each side; put thirty stitches on another needle for the front, knit those backwards and forwards for thirty-six rows, or eighteen turns; then knit all the stitches but one rib, turn back, and finish the row, and so on, leaving one rib more each time, till it is the proper length for the shoulder. Cast off, but be particular that the slanting side is not in front; finish the other side in the same way, then take up the stitches for the back; knit thirty-six rows, to correspond with the fronts for the arm-hole; then knit backwards and forwards, leaving one rib each way, until it is the same length as the slanting part in front, which are to be joined together; cast off; now take up the white stitches on each side, and knit till it is long enough to go up the sides; for the sleeves; cast on seventy-two stitches, knit thirty rows, then twelve more, leaving one rib on the one side to form the wide part; for the collar; cast on seventy-six stitches, and knit twelve rows, leaving one rib on each side; then sixteen rows of white; cast off; cast on eighteen stitches for the cuff, and knit till it is long enough to go round the bottom of the sleeve; twist a cord of the same coloured wool, and put in the waist behind, with a tassel at the ends; the same under the collar. These may be done in four-thread fleecy, but they look much better in double Berlin wool, No. 9 pins, by the Eagle gauge. For a lady's, you must cast on stitches in proportion, and larger pins.

Another online version of Cooper's book is available through Google Books.