The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-09-30
Eastern Rugs and Carpets.

WHICH WAS lucll, dS IL ID INV, tllC IOS'S
market of the world for Eastern fabrics.
The prices were high and the colors were
unattractive to people accustomed to the
gorgeous landscapes and enormous bou-
quets of brilliant flowers which then
formed the groundwork of all carpets.
Gradually the rugs made their way into
some rich houses, and with the introduce
ton of stained and polished floors too
handsome to cover up with carpets, rugs
became common, and vessels coming
from Smyrna and other Mediterranean
ports with figs and dates began to bring
a few rugs and carpets. About fifteen
years ago Americans began to give or
ders directly to the Turkish merchants
who act as agents for the purchase
of such stulfs, and now the business is a
large one, half a million dollars worth
of Eastern rugs coming into New York
every year, some of them direct, but
most of them by way of Liverpool, where
they are transhipped.
Rugs vary in price not so much be-
cause of the size us on account of the
quality Of the wool and the tinenesS of
the work. Now and then rug is found
in which the cOlors are of unusual
beauty, and in such cases it acquires an
exceptional value on that account. Deal
ers and connoisseurs in rugs designate
them by the districts in which they are
made-as, for instance, a Herman rug,
or Feraghan, or Kula, or Ushak, or
Kuba rug or carpet. Each community
or village in which carpet-making is
practiced is noted for certain peculiari-
ties of texture, material, design and
color, always producing the same pat
terms, with slight variations, over and
over again. The countries from which
we get rugs include Turkey in Asia, the
Caucasian districts, Armenia, Persia,
far into India into the Himalaya, where
the commercial outlet is Bombay. The
chief centers for the manufacture of car
pets in India are Mirzapore and Benares
in the northwest provinces, and Masuli-
ipatam in the Madras Presidency. Most
of the Turkey carpets and rugs brought
to this country come from Ushak, in the
province of Adm, about a week jour
ney from Smyrna. In the provinces of
Khodavendilliar, Adana and Nish, many
families pass their lives working at rugs.
Carpet-maker5 are also common in Boz
rah, Aleppo and the villages of Trebi
zond.
The business methods of buying rugs
are as follows: Turks are the chief
agents for American and English buyers,
because they are noted for honesty and
ability. If the Jews of Turkey believe
in any mans honesty, it is in that of the
Turkish buyers. When an American
buyer arrives in the heart of the rug
making country he selects the best agent
he can find, and gives him an order for.
say, one hundred rugs, of about the
COlors and sizes of certain samples which
he may find in the bazaars. The Turk
ish agent then employees natives of the
villages where the kind of rugs selected
are wanted, giving to each bag of gold,
and instructions to order four rugs. The
sub-agent then goes among the families
and talks rugs with them, drinking many
cups of coffee and discussing the price
for days at time. When a bargain is
concluded some money is furnished the
family for wool, dyes and food, and the
agent goes away, sure that in the course
of few months the rug will be ready.
Upon a carpet measuring eight et'by
twelve a whole family will work for
months. The cotton or wooden threads
which form the groundwork or warp of
the fabric. are stretched upon huge
frame the width of the rug, and the fam
lily, or such members of it as are able to
work, sit on the floor and tie knots in the
warp threads with the colored woods
tufts, tightening the finished fabric now
and then with rough comb. Each
worker takes about twenty-seven inches
of the rug and works along this strip.
From two to four inches day
is the speed at which the rug adj
vances if the family is large
enough for the whole width of
the rug to advance at the same time. A
rug eight Or nine feet wide requires four
persons, who work side by side. The
finishing Of the rug, smoothing, clip
ping, etc, is work requiring skill and
Judgment. The wages are very small
and the payments according to the num-
Der of square feet. The workers know GER
tain patterns by heart, and dye their own
woods. The old dyes have in some in
stances been supplanted by aniline col
ors, which do not keep their tones, and
fade without giving to the rug the soft
ness of tint which is the chief glory of a
fine Eastern rug. So many merchants
have refused to buy the carpets in which
aniline dyes have been used that the use
of them may eventually be stopped. The
rug-makers as a class are poor in money
very ignorant and very religious, but live
comfortably. Especially around the
borders of the Caspian Sea, in the coun-
try watered by the rivers from the eau
casian Mountains, are the people in COM
Portable circumstances, although about
three centuries behind the rest of the
world. Wine is still brought into Tifis
in ox-hides, holding a hogshead of wine,
and is sold for about fifteen cents gal
Ion. The rugs and carpets are brought
in from Persia and the neighboring dis
tricts on camels' backs, the arrival OF
camel-trains being one of the curious
sights of the town.
Old rugs, varying in age from ten tc
one hundred years, are to be found all
over the East, and are bought by trav
cling agents, who look chiefly for beauty
of coloring and fineness of material.
Prayer rugs, without one of which {
Mohammedan never travels, are about
two feet and half wide and four fee
long. They can be distinguished a