In all the literature on Oriental Rugs no mention has been made of their sanitary condition when laid on the floors of our homes. In response to a letter of inquiry, one of our American missionaries, a young lady stationed at Sivas, Turkey in Asia, who very modestly objects to the use of her name, so well explained the condition of affairs that portions of her letter given verbatim will prove most interesting. She says:

"In Sivas there are a number of rug factories in which are employed many thousand little girls, ages ranging from four years upward. They work from twelve to fourteen hours a day and I believe the largest amount received by them is five piasters (less than twenty cents) and the small girls receive ten to twenty paras (a cent or two). These factories are hotbeds of tuberculosis and we have many of these cases in our Mission Hospital. Of course this amount of money scarcely keeps them in bread and in this underfed condition, working so long in ill ventilated rooms, they quickly succumb to this disease. These girls are all Armenians in that region. The Turks do not allow their women and children to work in public places. The Armenians are going to reap a sad harvest in the future in thus allowing the future wives and mothers of their race to undermine their health working in these factories. These rugs are all exported to Europe and America.

"No matter what part of the city you pass through this time of the year you will see looms up in the different homes and most of the family, especially the women and children, working on these rugs, and it is very interesting to watch them and to see how skilful even the small children grow in weaving these intricate patterns. Making rugs in the homes is quite different from making them in the factories, for in the summer at least they have plenty of fresh air.

"No doubt many rugs made in these homes are filled with germs of contagious diseases, for they use no precautions here when they have such diseases in the family, and usually the poor people only have one room, and if a member of the family is stricken with smallpox or scarlet fever the rest of the family continue to work on the rug often in the same room."

Another correspondent from Marash, Turkey in Asia, says, "If you are interested in humanity as well as in rugs, please put in a strong plea against some of these factories which are employing children who can scarcely speak. These little babies sit from morning till evening tying and cutting knots in damp and poorly ventilated places. Is it a wonder that diseases, especially tuberculosis, are developing rapidly among them?"

A third correspondent says, "Often rugs upon which patients have died from contagious diseases are sold without cleaning. In fact, they are rarely cleaned."

Upon receipt of the above a letter of inquiry was at once sent to the Treasury Department at Washington regarding the disinfection of textiles from the Orient immediately upon their arrival into this country, to which we were informed that "The Surgeon-General of the Public Health and Marine Hospital Service stated that such rugs, if originating in parts or places infected with quarantinable diseases, would be required to be disinfected under the quarantine laws." This sounds sensible, but when the rugs are sent from all parts of the Orient to Constantinople, from whence they are shipped in bales to the United States, pray how can the Surgeon-General discriminate? The only safe way is for the government to have strict laws regarding their immediate and thorough disinfection. We already have a law which requires the disinfection of hides before they are shipped to this country. It reads: "Officers of the customs are directed to treat hides of neat cattle shipped to the United States without proper disinfection as prohibited importations, and to refuse entry of such hides." Also, "the disinfection of such hides in this country or storage of the same in general order warehouses will not be permitted, for the reason that the passage of diseased hides through the country or their storage with other goods will tend to the dissemination of cattle disease in the United States." (See Section 12 of the Tariff Act of August 5, 1909.)

Ex-President Taft once recommended a new department of public health whose duty it would be to consider all matters relating to the health of the nation. If his suggestions are carried out no doubt the question of disinfecting Oriental imports will be satisfactorily disposed of.

Until then we should see to it that all Oriental rugs are at least clean and free from dust before allowing them to be delivered in our homes. The great majority of these rugs, when leaving the Orient, are impregnated with dust from their adobe floors and, if free of this dust, they have in all probability been pretty thoroughly cleaned by some reliable importer or dealer, the majority of whom are beginning to realize the importance of this procedure.