Under these circumstances, it is justifiable to ask whether it is fair and wise to allow this competition to continue. During the war the import of Oriental carpets has been prohibited, and it cannot be claimed that the results have been disastrous. The stock of Oriental carpets existing in the country when the prohibition was initiated has changed hands at steadily increasing prices. In other words, the people who wanted the carpets keenly enough have got them, and have had to pay handsomely for them. Why should not this prohibition, or alternatively a high import duty, be maintained? No one would suffer except the Turk, about whose financial welfare we need not perturb ourselves, and possibly the semi-European middleman and agent. The _bona fide_ dealer in Oriental carpets, located in Great Britain, would be able to convert his capital and his technical knowledge towards the building up of a big British hand-tufted industry; and in a few years we should see in private houses, hotels, and clubs, instead of the Asiatic product, for which our money has been sent out of the country, real British hand-made carpets, which would have been manufactured under ideal conditions, and for good wages. And there is no reason in the world why such carpets should not equal or surpass in quality and artistic merit the finest productions of the East. CHAPTER V BRUSSELS OF machine-made carpets, that which naturally demands the first mention is the Brussels carpet, which was the first kind to be woven in this country by the aid of a Jacquard, a pattern-selecting mechanism to which allusion will be made later. Brussels is a loop-pile fabric, consisting of a strong woven foundation, composed of linen, jute, and cotton yarns, together with that portion of the worsted yarn which is not utilised on the surface to form the pattern. The pattern itself is formed on the surface by differently coloured looped threads of worsted yarns. The character of the fabric lends itself to patterns well-defined in design and colour. The smooth, gently-ribbed surface gives a clean and neat, but not a luxurious effect; and the carpet is generally more suitable for small and medium-sized rooms and simple furnishing schemes, than for bold or ambitious effects. The number of shades available is also limited. The processes of manufacture are comparatively few and simple. The yarn is received from the spinner in grease, that is, still containing the oil that was put into the wool for the purpose of spinning, and in skeins. Worsted spinners supply a large variety of counts and twists of yarn for Brussels and Wilton carpets, which need not be particularised. As a normal Brussels yarn we may take 16s, 2 × 3; a thread sharply twisted in the doubling, and loosely in the re-doubling, running about 100 yards to the ounce. The yarn should be spun from wool of a moderately long staple.