DANGER IN ORIENTAL RUGS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 49, 21 November 1907, Page 3

DANGER IN ORIENTAL RUGS.

Dr. Remlinger, head of tho Pasteur Institute in Constantinople, hue been making an investigation of Oriental rugs and carpets and has published a summary of his results in the German "Journal of General and Applied Hygiene." Ho finds that tho carpets of the better class, tho highly-prized antiques or near antiques, constitute a serious menace to health unless they aro put through a radical cleansing and disinfecting. process The real antiques which have been in use in Oriental houses or bazaars for years or generations have been exposed to tho contagion of countless disease germs. Their toxturo fits them in a peculiar way to gather anil ro tain these indefinitely. These genuine antiques are far less objectionable than tho counterfeit antiques which have been artificially mellowed. Ono of the.least objectionable methods used to soften the colours 111 the degree that the European and American market calls for is t.9 bury tho carpets in trenchcs with quantities of stable refuso. ■\Vhon taken up they are little likely to receive a thorough cleansing. Sometimes the carpets are laid down in frequonted places to be walked on, thus accumulating the bacteria laden dust of tho Eastern city strcots. Or a rug may bo leut to a beggar or streot vendor, who sits on it'and sleeps m it until it acquires the semblage of age. Dr. Romlinger points out that tnhorculosis, throat diseases, and catarrh arc prevalent in the rug and carpet trado. Ho is of opinion that they arc contracted from handling the fabrics and breathing tho air in which

they are opened ' and agitated as they are shown to customers. 'I'lio doctor also oxpresses the opinion that some otherwise unaccountable outbreaks of tropical enteric disorders that have taken place in Paris were due to infection from Oriental rugs. The most thorough and efficient process of cleansing would ue disinfection by steam. This would do no harm to the rum, and it is an absolutely certain method of killing bacteria. He thinks that it should bo generally adopted as a preliminary to the importation of Eastern fabrics into any Occidental country.