THE SANITARY CARE 01 THE SOLDIER. 
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flannel shirt—that is to say., the man has turned in and has not changed 
his clothes in any way. And we want to look into those questions. 
What, then, is done with the sheets ? They are used sometimes to 
put over the saddlery ; constantly to tie round his waist to keep him 
from soiling himself when he is doing up his accoutrements ; they are 
constantly put under the pillows and beds simply for safety and not 
used at all. The soldier says, u Why, sir, use the sheets ! I would as 
soon use a piece of coir matting/’ they also complain that the sheet is 
so rough that it wears out the flannel shirt which they are wearing as 
soldiers. A specialist in sheets told me he thought the soldier’s sheets 
would make excellent bath towels. 
Then a soldier marries, and among other boons that he gets is the 
right to use the hospital sheet ; every married soldier gets a pair of 
hospital sheets once a month. I asked a married woman how often 
they were washed, and she said, “ Once a week.” The police have 
their sheets washed once a week, and so do the paupers in the work- 
houses, but the soldier’s sheet is only washed once a month. In Egypt 
they are washed once a fortnight. In India the soldier gets two sheets 
given to him when he arrives out, and one sheet a year afterwards, and 
as there he is allowed to wash them at his own expense he washes them 
once a week. Then, as regards the straw pillow, or bolster rather, I 
find that the old soldier, the man who really likes comfort, always 
travels about with his own private pillow. And the married people 
never think of using the barrack beds; they have their own private 
mattresses, and they use the straw below them to make them softer. 
But I find that in some garrisons, such as Aldershot and Portsmouth, 
they have issued a better bed, a coir bed, which makes a capital bed ; 
it is used in India. The Government allows there a coir bed and it 
makes up a very good bed, and the men tease the beds themselves and 
wash the mattress case. There are 2000 of them now lying down in 
the Dockyard, and I was told that there were several hundred in use in 
London, and also at Aldershot and Portsmouth. They are distinctly 
an advantage. Therefore I think the straw bed might be replaced by 
the coir bed in Woolwich. Why should the soldier lie in a straw bed ? 
We have long since chucked away the straw bed for sick men. Florence 
Nightingale says if you want to kill a man who is seriously ill put him 
on a straw bed, because it takes out much of the vitality from a man. 
The soldier’s bedstead is 27 inches wide—his mattress is too narrow 
and his sheet is only 50 inches across-—while the hospital sheet is 72 
inches. We want a lighter bed with wire-woven mattress wider than 
the present. We want hospital pattern sheets, and blankets scoured 
at least once every six months; but the sheets must be washed every 
week. 
I have put down here under the head of bedding the guard-bed. 
A more brutal, useless and thoroughly unfit construction does not 
exist in the army. It is not of the least use to train a man for war. 
I have been in five campaigns myself, and everyone knows that 
no one is asked to lie on anything like the guard-bed. There is no 
reason whatever why the bedstead, with a mattress of hair, should not 
be found in the guard-room. If you speak to the soldier he will say, 
