Gr. H. F. Nuttall 
565 
after the manner of a permanently installed steam or hot-air disinfestor. 
This simple arrangement may serve in small stations, but in larger ones 
the department constitutes a complex by itself; the disinfestation in such 
cases may have to be coupled with a laundry establishment, etc. 
With regard to the personnel it is eminently desirable that the men 
composing it should be permanently engaged in the work of the station, 
otherwise there will be errors committed and a lack of continuity in the 
application of methodical treatment. Only efficient and trustworthy men 
should be members of the staff. The staff should be thoroughly instructed 
in the duties they have to perform, be subject to periodic inspection and 
control, be provided with impervious protective clothing (see p. 420), 
and be allowed frequent changes of garments, and adequate bathing 
facilities. 
A Lousing Station near the Front. 
The following graphic description of the working of a station in 
France is given by Lelean (1917, pp. 206-8) who writes: 
“The organization required here may be illustrated by a brief 
description of a modus operandi which achieved marked success at the 
front in France. The buildings were those of a large clothing factory, 
which proved most suitable for the purpose. One regiment was dealt 
with per diem, and marched from the trenches to the premises where 
batches of the men were dealt with at a time. They first shed their outer 
clothing, which was removed on lorries to be dealt with as will be 
presently described. The men then passed into the old soaking-room, 
where there were three huge vats filled with hot water. The under¬ 
clothing was thrown off and put into tubs of strong disinfectant, while 
the men got into the vats—ten at a time—and washed themselves 
thoroughly with soap. As considerations of time, space, and facilities 
for heating water did not permit of fresh water being provided in the 
vats for each lot of men, two lots had to use the same water in succession, 
and in the interim the vat contents had to be chlorinated to reduce the 
impurities to reasonable proportions. On emerging from the bath the 
men rubbed themselves with the lysol soft-soap lather, and then rapidly 
got into clean underclothing left over from the regiment treated on the 
preceding day and meanwhile sterilized and washed. While the men 
bathed, an army of women were employed in an adjacent room in hot 
ironing the inner seams of the men’s outer clothing, into which some of 
the lather was subsequently rubbed. The men then donned their serge 
and marched off to billets. Such men as specially required it got their 
