n their work and
ambitious to excel. Now that there is a greater demand for rugs, and not
enough women to supply the demand, men and boys have come into the
business, but generally only in places where there are large factories,
and especially in the cities. This is noticeably the case in India,
where boys from nine to fifteen years of age do much of the weaving.

There are two classes of weavers, the sedentary and the nomadic. The
former weave in their houses during the Winter, and in their courtyards
during the Summer. The nomads spend the Winter in mud villages, and in
the Summer go to the mountains with their flocks and live in tents made
of goat's hair. The manner of life of the sedentary weaver works havoc
with her constitution even in her youth; and consequently one is not
surprised at her frail appearance. In Summer she is oppressed with heat
as she sits before the frame, and in Winter she is almost frozen, for
she has to work in the open air in order to have sufficient light. Hers
is not an easy life. It would be pleasant to believe that in her toil,
which she carries on with wondrous patience and in the humblest
surroundings, the conscientious weaver finds the same inward
satisfaction that comes to the true artist elsewhere.

The duties of the male portion of the family are to tend the flocks,
shear the sheep, separate the various qualities of the wool into
bundles, dye it, and make the framework for the rug. With the extension
of the industry, a class of workers has arisen whose sole task is to
manipulate and dye the wool for use. The reason why men do not usually
weave is that the occupation, besides not being a paying one, requires
an amount of patience not within the power of men accustomed to work out
of doors. Nor is it a remunerative occupation. The reader, who is
perhaps also a prospective rug-buyer, may be interested in the following
calculation of the amount of labor bestowed upon a given piece of the
best type, the cost of the materials, and its value when completed. A
square foot of the best Persian rug is worth about ten dollars, and it
takes a single weaver twenty-three days to complete this portion. This
allows the weaver about forty-four cents per day for her wool and her
labor; but as three-fourths of this amount goes to pay for the wool,
only eleven cents per day is left for her labor. The wages of the
producer of the inferior article are somewhat better. A square foot of
an inferior rug is