morning to
remove the dust. The French _parquet_ is always more or less dusty,
although infinitely superior in point of cleanliness and healthiness to
our absorbent floor.

For a sick room, a carpet is perhaps the worst expedient which could by
any possibility have been invented. If you must have a carpet, the only
safety is to take it up two or three times a year, instead of once. A
dirty carpet literally infects the room. And if you consider the
enormous quantity of organic matter from the feet of people coming in,
which must saturate it, this is by no means surprising.

[Sidenote: Papered, plastered, oil-painted walls.]

As for walls, the worst is the papered wall; the next worst is plaster.
But the plaster can be redeemed by frequent lime-washing; the paper
requires frequent renewing. A glazed paper gets rid of a good deal of
the danger. But the ordinary bed-room paper is all that it ought _not_
to be.[29]

The close connection between ventilation and cleanliness is shown in
this. An ordinary light paper will last clean much longer if there is an
Arnott's ventilator in the chimney than it otherwise would.

The best wall now extant is oil paint. From this you can wash the animal
exuviae.[30]

These are what make a room musty.

[Sidenote: Best kind of wall for a sick-room.]

The best wall for a sick-room or ward that could be made is pure white
non-absorbent cement or glass, or glazed tiles, if they were made
sightly enough.

Air can be soiled just like water. If you blow into water you will soil
it with the animal matter from your breath. So it is with air. Air is
always soiled in a room where walls and carpets are saturated with
animal exhalations.

Want of cleanliness, then, in rooms and wards, which you have to guard
against, may arise in three ways.

[Sidenote: Dirty air from without.]

1. Dirty air coming in from without, soiled by sewer emanations, the
evaporation from dirty streets, smoke, bits of unburnt fuel, bits of
straw, bits of horse dung.

[Sidenote: Best kind of wall for a house.]

If people would but cover the outside walls of their houses with plain
or encaustic tiles, what an incalculable improvement would there be in
light, cleanliness, dryness, warmth, and consequently economy. The play
of a fire-engine would then effectually wash the outside of a house.
This kind of _walling_ would stand next to paving in improving the
health of towns.

[Sidenote: Dirty air from within.]