212 
THE SANITARY CARE OP THE SOLDIER. 
ranks of the army healthier and readier to go to war. Short service, 
no doubt, has also to be considered as a factor in this matter. While 
the death-rate has fallen and invaliding has fallen, it must be remem¬ 
bered that the soldier to-day stops with us but a short time, and the 
health returns may, perhaps, be vitiated somewhat on that account. 
I came home last year from India in a crowded Indian troop-ship, and 
I saw that point very marked. Many of the men there were not 
invalids officially (nor did they appear in any invaliding return), but 
they were no more fit to go into the English labour market and com¬ 
pete with healthy English labourers than any of us coming home seedy 
with ague would have been. Their unfitness was entirely owing to 
Indian climate, although it figured in no return. They had not, how¬ 
ever, re-engaged. Many said to me, “ It is too much bother to 
re-engage; I am constantly getting ague and feeling seedy, and I am 
going to the reserve.” In the old days when I joined we kept those 
men and they could not get away, in fact there was no chance of 
getting away except invaliding, whereas now men simply do not re¬ 
engage. 
This question of bad air and overcrowding of barracks is of the 
greatest importance for this reason. Impure air goes directly into the 
lungs,but bad water may be killed in the stomach; I may drink bad water 
and the juices in my stomach may kill the bad water, and I may sur¬ 
vive. It is well known that 2000 persons in a large church or building 
will in two hours give off 17 gallons of water, and as much carbon as 
would come from one cwt. of coal. That is not a very pleasant atmos¬ 
phere if it is not constantly changed. Do not forget also that 30 grains 
of organic matter are given off per man per day from his body in the 
shape of worn-out skin and debris of the body. The smell of the men 
in barrack-rooms may be very unpleasant and most trying, altogether 
caused by the closeness of the men and the want of fresh air. And that 
affects the men*s health and discipline. You must remember that the 
barrack-room is not only a dormitory ; the men are eating and drinking 
and sleeping in it, brushing their dirty boots in it, brushing their dirty 
clothes in it, pipeclaying their belts in it, and smoking in it, too, and 
the air can become very vitiated from all that. In dealing with the 
question of overcrowding, then, we have got to bear this in mind, that 
we are dealing with a fixed law which we should recognise very fully 
as to the danger of interfering with the cubic space allowed to the 
soldier, and I trust that whenever letters come to you on this matter 
that you will receive with great consideration any suggestions with 
regard to any question of overcrowding. 
It is very needful we should speak here about the question of urinals. 
There is still in all the barracks in England, or in most of them, this 
horrible urine tub—that is to say you have a horrible looking thing, a 
wooden tub ; of all things most highly absorbent, which is supposed 
to be tarred every quarter, and into this the men urinate. I must tell 
you that no light is allowed at night by the regulations for this tub ; the 
soldier comes out of the barrack-room on to the lobby, there is no light, 
and the consequence is (and we may see it in most barracks) that the 
ground round the urine tub is constantly saturated with urine. And a 
