Chinese rugs: materials

Technical methods of preparing materials become apparent to the trained eye. The careful cleansing of natural products, while it refines them, some­times takes from the charm of crude methods of preparation.

Loose spinning and irregular yarn indicate that the fabric was made before the introduction of process work of any kind in the place of its manufacture, and though labor is simplified and reduced by mechanical means, there is a vastly different appearance to rugs made under modern factory control from those produced independently by domestic process.

The same conclusions may be drawn regarding the preparation of silk. Hard and compact surfaces are produced by the use of carefully prepared silk while soft and crude effects are due to the use of infe­rior grades of silk and often to the use of a raw tram silk spun direct from the cocoons.

This analysis, while in no way adding to or taking from the appreciation of the beauty of a rug, aids materially in determining its age.