Establishments for the Poor. 383 



assist the poor is by showing them how they may make 

 themselves more comfortable in their dwellings. 



Nothing is more perfectly miserable and comfortless 

 than the domestic arrangement of poor families in gen- 

 eral : they seem to have no idea whatever of order or 

 economy in any thing ; and every thing about them is 

 dreary, sad, and neglected, in the extreme. A little 

 attention to order and arrangement would contribute 

 greatly to their comfort and convenience, and also to 

 economy. They ought in particular to be shown how 

 to keep their habitations warm in winter, and to econ- 

 omize fuel, as well in heating their rooms as in cook- 

 ing, washing, etc. 



It is not to be believed what the waste of fuel really 

 is, in the various processes in which it is employed in 

 the economy of human life ; and in no case is this 

 waste greater than in the domestic management of 

 the poor. Their fire-places are in general constructed 

 upon the most wretched principles ; and the fuel they 

 consume in them, instead of heating their rooms, not 

 unfrequently renders them really colder and more 

 uncomfortable, by causing strong currents of cold air 

 to flow in from all the doors and windows to the 

 chimney. This imperfection of their fire-places may 

 be effectually remedied, these currents of cold air pre- 

 vented, above half their fuel saved, and their dwellings 

 made infinitely more comfortable, merely by diminish- 

 ing their fire-places and the throats of their chimneys 

 just above the mantel-piece, which may be done at a 

 very trifling expense, with a few bricks or stones, and 

 a little mortar, by the most ordinary bricklayer. And 

 with regard to the expense of fuel for cooking, so sim- 

 ple a contrivance as an earthen pot, broad at top, for 



