Carpetbagger

“ Rag carpets have generally been woven of rags cut from any old garments cast aside by the household—coats and trousers too old for patching, sheets and pillow-cases too tender to use, calico, serge, bits of woolen stuffs old and new, went into the carpet basket, to be cut or torn into strips, sewed indiscriminately together, and rolled into balls until there should be enough of them for the work of the loom. ”

“ Taking up and Cleaning Carpets. Have two strong sheets made of unbleached cotton. Remove the carpet tacks with a tack-lifter, being careful to put every one of them in a box or bowl. It is not only extremely painful, but also dangerous, to step on a rusty tack, and the housekeeper should make it a matter of conscience to see to it that none are left lying about. When all the tacks have been removed fold the carpet carefully, lengthwise ”

“ The surface of the carpet then is inspected by the pickers, who mend any faults left from the weaving. Their work is supervised and checked by the passers. At this stage, some manufacturers pass their Brussels carpets, particularly the cheaper qualities, through a pressing machine, in which heavy pressure on the looped pile is exerted by rollers, the object being to obtain better cover, and to prevent grinning. It is questionable, however, whether the process is of any real benefit to the carpet, as it tends to impair the handle of the fabric and the resiliency of the pile. ”

“ Heavy carpets, Brussels, velvets, Wiltons, Axminsters, and Moquettes, need not be lifted oftener than every two or three years, unless the presence of moths about bindings, corners, or seams is detected, when they must come up at once. The ravage of moths can be prevented by drawing the tacks occasionally, turning back the edge of the carpet half a yard or so, laying a cloth wrung out of hot water on the wrong side, and pressing with a very hot iron, holding the iron on until the cloth is dry and then moving on until all the edges are thoroughly steamed and dried. ”

“ At this moment many such carpets are found in our county, and are probably thought imported by those who are not aware how much work of the kind is done among our rural population. Some are made on the Venetian patterns, like stair carpeting, but others are imitations of ingrain. There is still another kind of carpeting, more humble in quality, much used in the country, rag carpeting, some of which may be seen in every farm-house, and common in the villages also ”

“ What I should like to see, especially in all London bedrooms, is a fresh, inexpensive carpet of unobtrusive colours, which can be constantly taken away and cleaned or renewed, rather than a more costly, rich-looking floor-covering, which will surely in time become and remain more or less dirty. But light carpets are seldom soft in tone, and I should be inclined to suggest felt as a groundwork, if the bare boards are inadmissible, with large rugs thrown down before the fireplace, dressing and writing-tables, &c. These should of course contrast harmoniously with the walls. ”

“ The most tasteful carpets are those which are made of various shades of the same color, or of all shades of only two colors; such as brown and yellow, or blue and buff, or salmon and green, or all shades of green, or of brown. All very dark shades should be brown or green, but not black.
In laying down carpets, it is a bad practice to put straw under them, as this makes them wear out in spots. Straw matting, laid under carpets, makes them last much longer, as it is smooth and even, and the dust sifts through it. ”

“ Morris has Kidderminster carpets for bedrooms, in pale pink, buff, and blue, &c., which are simply perfect in harmony of colour and design.
People who consider themselves good managers are very apt to turn the half worn-out drawing-room carpet into one of the bedrooms, but this is not a good plan, for it seldom matches the draperies, and is also apt to become frowsy and [Pg 19] fusty. I am not so extravagant as to recommend that a good carpet with plenty of possibilities of wear yet in it should be thrown away because it is not suitable for a bedroom. ”

“ Then buy one of the many charming carpets Smee & Cobay, or Wallace, or Hewetson sell, according to taste and means; remembering that all carpets are merely backgrounds to the furniture, and should never attract attention to themselves in any way. One very soon tires of a pattern, an obtrusive pattern that is to say, while one never can tire of soft shades of the same colour, or else of the excellent ‘drawing-room’ Turkey carpets or Bokhara carpets, sold by Bartholomew & Fletcher and Shoolbred, which suit almost any room, and fit in with any style of decoration. ”

“ Other floor coverings are and have been made also without such a tufted surface, and of these some are simple shuttle-woven materials plain or enriched with needlework or printed with patterns, others are woven after the manner of tapestry-weaving (see Tapestry) or in imitation of it, and a further class of carpets is made of felt (see Felt) . This last material is entirely different from that of shuttle or tapestry weaving. Although carpet weaving by hand is, and for centuries has been, an Oriental industry, it has also been, and is still, pursued in many European countries. ”

“ Should there be grease spots, apply a mixture of beef-gall, fuller's-earth, and water enough to form a paste; put this on before tacking the carpet down. Use tacks inserted in small leather caps. Carpets in bedrooms and stair-carpets may be kept clean by being brushed with a soft hairbrush frequently, and, as occasion requires, being taken up and shaken. Larger carpets should be swept carefully with a whisk-brush or hand-brush of hair, which is far better, especially in the case of fine-piled carpets. Thick carpets, as Axminster and Turkey, should always be brushed one way. ”

“ Carpets not only keep the dirt in the house, but they involve that annual bugbear, house-cleaning. Even when the floors are old and poor, the space around the edge of a rug may be puttied and painted so as to look very well when the rug is put down. By rugs, I do not mean several little rugs, like oases in the slippery surface, or at the doorways to trip the unwary, but a good, generous-sized rug which just escapes the edges of the heavier furniture around the sides of the room ”

“ The harness part of the carpet draw-loom is furnished with mails, or metallic eyes, to save friction; two threads being drawn through each eye. The design or pattern of a carpet is drawn upon cross-rule paper, exactly in the same way as every other kind of fancy-loom work, and is transferred from the paper to the mounting by the rules for damask weaving. Suppose that a double web is so mounted that every alternate thread of the one may be raised, so as to form a sufficient shed-way for the shuttle, without depressing the other in the least. ”

“ If we are rich, we can have pile; if not, let us have either the three-ply Kidderminster, or the satisfactory ‘Dunelm’ carpets, recently brought out by Wallace, or one of the carpets kept by Hewetson, Smee & Cobay and Wallace, at my earnest request, where the pattern only shows sufficiently to break up the plain surface. No doubt entire absence of pattern would be the more correct, did that not mean that every atom of fluff, dirt and dust showed at once, and fidgeted the owner all day long. ”

“ The accompanying illustration of a woman weaving rag carpet on an old hand-loom is from a fine photograph taken by Mrs. Arthur Sewall of Bath, Maine, and gives an excellent presentment of the machine and the process.
The warp of these carpets was, in olden times, a strong, heavy flaxen thread. To-day it is a heavy [240] cotton twine bought machine-spun in balls or hanks. The weft or rilling is narrow strips of all the clean and vari-colored rags that accumulate in a household. ”

“ Carpet-weaving is somewhat of the nature of Tapestry: it also is wholly unmechanical, but its use as a floorcloth somewhat degrades it, especially in our northern or western countries, where people come out of the muddy streets into rooms without taking off their shoes. Carpet-weaving undoubtedly arose among peoples living a tent life, and for such a dwelling as a tent, carpets are the best possible ornaments. ”

“ When there are rugs, they are sufficiently light to be easily shaken. Fitted carpets are taboo. Had money been no object the floors of the sitting-rooms would have been of polished wood, but in these two cases the surrounds were of linoleum and the carpets square, tightly strained and not of too thick a pile. These can be quickly swept with a Bissel sweeper and cleaned from time to time with a suction cleaner, while of course long-handled mops are used for the linoleum. ”

“ You cannot get at the corners. Take a whisk-broom or a round, pointed brush, such as is used to clean buttoned furniture, called a furniture button-brush, and with it clean out the corners where the carpet is turned in. Have close at hand a pointed stick, which, with a cloth wrapped about it, will enable you to pry into every nook thoroughly. Every few weeks it is well to draw the tacks in the corners a little way, and, turning back the carpet on to a thick paper or old cloth, give the edges a faithful brushing. It is under and near these corners that moths love to secrete their eggs. ”

“ It has been stated that it is not an uncommon practice to expose a carpet to use in the bazaar or street with the object of enhancing its commercial value by giving it an artificial appearance of age. It is to be hoped, however, that this very insanitary method of faking is rare; but those who wilfully give preference to a carpet because it is dirty and faded, and apparently old, do not deserve too much sympathy. ”

“ If the housekeeper thinks that this is "hominess" carried to excess, she may cover the floor with an ingrain carpet, or better, plain filling of a medium shade, on which a few rag rugs are laid, light in color. Very artistic carpets and rugs are made out of old carpets and sold at reasonable figures, and there still remain in some small towns throughout the country weavers who weave into carpets the carpet-rags sewn together by housewives for the price of their labor alone. ”

“ This will not injure the carpet and kills the eggs and larvae. Follow this up by washing the floor with hot borax water, dry thoroughly, sprinkle with black pepper, and retack the carpet. Sometimes small pieces of cotton batting dipped in turpentine and slipped under the edges of the carpet will keep the moths away. If there are cracks at the juncture of baseboard and floor, pour in benzine and fill with plaster of Paris. Three-ply or ingrain carpets can be steamed and ironed without removing the tacks. ”

“ It largely grows from very fanciful dispositions of free-growing natural forms, as well as curiously curved and tenuous forms, many of which are bone-like and fibre-like in character, flat in treatment and rather thin and washy in colour, and its influence has slightly percolated into designs for pile carpets. This style, sometimes intermixed with the more robust, less fantastic and rather fuller-coloured English style, has found followers in England, America and Germany, but the bulk of the designs now used in power carpet looms seems to be mainly of Oriental descent. ”

“ The carpet can be turned round to ensure equal wear if the square is made as suggested, and should last quite ten years, which is as long as any carpet should be allowed to last, in my opinion; an older carpet being a repository of dirt and dust, and therefore cannot be healthy, a reason why I should never advocate very expensive carpets, as I much prefer to be able to have a new one without too much exertion on my part, especially in bedrooms, and in such rooms as nurseries and schoolrooms. ”

“ With this method the catcher beam is placed high up in the middle of the loom, and the sley is made of stronger reeds, open at the top to allow the catcher warp ends to descend between them.
From the loom the complete carpet passes to the finishing room, where it is picked back and front, brushed, steamed, combed, and shorn; all these processes tending to fill out and level the surface. It is then passed or examined for any defects that may have escaped notice in the first mending. The ends of the carpet, which are woven without fur, are turned over and hemmed, preferably by machine. ”

“ If the carpets are to be taken up, they should be removed at once, and if they are not, brush the ceiling, walls, woodwork, windows, blinds, and ledges, and then sweep the carpet. When the dust settles sweep a second time ”

“ The carpets should remain rolled until the last of the movers is departed; then after the floors have been most thoroughly scrubbed with carbolic soap, the carpets should be well beaten, and should be relaid if possible by the hands of some ‘professional,’ for on the proper laying of a carpet depends far more of the wear than we quite realise. The best furniture mover cannot resist—please remember this!—the exquisite temptation to which he is exposed to stuff up odd corners, and to prevent shaking by making ‘buffers’ out of our pillows, cushions, and odds and ends generally ”

“ During the 19th century the carpet industry was developed in government gaols. Produced in great quantities the prison-made carpets as a rule are less well turned out, and the competition, set up between them and the rugs and carpets of private factories has had a somewhat detrimental effect upon the industry generally. Older in origin than the cut pile carpets are those of thinner and flat surface texture, which from almost immemorial times have been woven in cotton with blue and white or blue and red stripes in the simplest way. ”