Fig. 18.Fig. 18.Section and Plan of an Enamelled Iron Ceiling.
Glazed brickwork for the walls of hot rooms, &c., should be specified to be executed with an extra neat joint, and should bond to less than 12 in. to the foot; otherwise the effect of the unwieldy mortar joints is clumsy. This applies equally to walling and to arches and vaults. Work which may pass as fair in ordinary cases, looks coarse and rough in the glazed interior walls of a bath. In selecting glazed bricks there is some difficulty in obtaining really delicate tints; much of the work produced is unfortunately of a very crude colouring.
One portion of the tepidarium, and other bath rooms, admits of being rendered very attractive; and that is the flooring. Mosaic work is always pleasing, if it be designed with taste and executed artistically. Marble and tile mosaics are both good, the former admitting of a richness of effect quite its own, and the latter of brilliant colouring. In designing marble-mosaic floors, however, one may well fight shy of including that senseless, purposeless description which is nowadays so often employed as a filling-in between borders. I refer to the heterogeneous jumble of every colour mixed without regard to one another, and giving at a distance a dirty grey tone, and near at hand an effect like a gravel walk covered with faded cherry-blossom—to be flattering. Despite the fact that this method of design is of antique origin, and has a real classical designation, I cannot but think that it is to be avoided, and that fillings-in should be made with tesseræ of one tint, or that mosaic should be abandoned altogether.
Given the means, it is easy to render a set of bath rooms elaborate, with faïence and modelled glazed ware, marbles and painted encaustic tiles, and many other suitable but expensive materials; but for my own part I prefer to see comparative simplicity in a sudatory chamber, though by this I do not mean monastic severity of style.
The general air of the frigidarium requires some consideration. It should have an effect of its own, quite distinct from anything else. It should have something of the conservatory in it. It should be richly carpeted, have much woodwork about it, andbe pleasant with plants and laden with the murmur of falling waters. It should be light, certainly; cheerful, cool, and airy looking; and as lofty as possible within reason and common sense. The ceiling should be of a light tone. A lantern-light where the light may come in, rather than be seen, and where the vitiated air may go out, is a pleasant and useful addition.
Points for emphasising with a view to ultimate effect are the stairs to hot rooms—if a staircase be needed—the divans or screens for couches, and an ornamental fountain as above described. The staircase may be rendered attractive with bowl newels, and perhaps white marble treads to the stairs. The divans may be rendered things of beauty by designing ornamental, open-work wood partitions, in either an Oriental style or otherwise. It is not easy to make small dwarf partitions, enclosing a couple of couches, look handsome. As a rule, they are of a flimsy and gimcrack order of architecture. They should be made as solid as possible. For effect there is nothing better than prettily-designed divans.
As regards style, I do not see why one method of design should be more suited than another for the bath. Having become popularly known as the "Turkish" bath, an Eastern or Saracenic style has been often adopted in the past. And, inasmuch as such style is essentially an interior style of architecture, there is something to be said on this score. It is, moreover, a style in which surface decoration pertains rather than modelled work, or, at least, the modelling is in very low relief. There is yet ample scope for the display of skill in the designof a bath in an Oriental style, as hitherto such attempts have only been made in a half-hearted manner; and in many smaller commercial baths the unskilful use of the style has vulgarised it to no small extent.[3]
Considering that the old Romans brought the bath to a great pitch of excellence—far, very far, I should be inclined to say, in advance of our present knowledge of the subject—their style of architecture would seem fitted to its design at this day; and for large public baths, larger than any yet erected in this country, one can imagine that a very interesting design could be made in the Roman style, founded on a study of the old baths, and, for the sake of the interest attaching to them, reproducing many of the original mosaics, pictures, details, &c., of the public baths of the time of the Empire. In a like manner in the Moorish style one could obtain a very elegant effect by a careful study of old baths in Eastern countries,[4]drawing, perhaps, some inspiration from the courts of the palaces of the Moors, with their pleasant retired air, for the frigidarium. I have often thought, when looking at the late Owen Jones' splendid model at the Crystal Palace, what an admirable frigidarium the Court of the Lions would make, with itsspacious central area, and retired nooks suitable for couches, and its pretty sparkling fountain and green plants, its brilliant colouring, and general cheerfulness of effect. Similarly, in a Roman style, a Pompeian court seems suggestive of the arrangement of a fine frigidarium, with itscubiculafor couches, and its central area and fountain.
The above are but theoretical suggestions as to what might be done should the bath make such progress in this country as may necessitate the provision of handsome public baths for the people. In everyday practice there is not a great field for elaborate designing in baths. Although only the Roman and Eastern styles have been mentioned, there can be no manner of reason why an architect should not design his bath in whatsoever style he may please.
I have spoken of the plunge bath as a feature capable of being rendered a thing of beauty. This is in reference as much to its plan as to the materials of the sides and floor, &c. There is no reason why a plunge should always be a plain oblong on plan. It may be of any of the shapes indicated at Fig. 19. Many bathers, especially in warm weather, like to stay some minutes in the plunge, and not go straight through; they may like to swim up and down the bath, and thus require room to turn, and a keyhole plan, such as at A, is suitable, and especially useful where the bather has to return to the end of bath he entered. Another shape is shown at B. In ladies' baths still more margin for novel planning is allowable, as here the true dive seldom pertains. A delicate semi-oval plan, such as that at D,which is much after the pattern of the Roman bath recently discovered at Box, could be employed; or a plain, circular bath with steps around, such as that of the PompeianBalneum, shown at C; or, again, such a plan as that at E, after the classic one at Bognor in Sussex. For inspirations as to the plans of plunge baths, we cannot do better than refer direct to the old Roman remains, either in Italy itself, or in Great Britain and other provinces and colonial dependencies of the oldEmpire. The Romans were fully alive to the possibilities of the plunge bath as a subject for artistic design, and often produced baths of great beauty.
Fig. 19.Fig. 19.Plans of Plunge Baths.
The flooring and sides of these baths should be of a light tint, and there should always be more or less pure white. Nothing really is better than plain white glazed bricks, with neat joints. With this bottom the water always looks clean when it is clean, and shows contamination when it exists. Marble-mosaic floorings should be chiefly of white tesseræ, any simple patterns being executed in light tints. Delicate tints, such as strawberry, pea green, and peacock blue, look well through the water. The floor of the plunge bath may thus be made very pretty. The sides are best of glazed brickwork, neatly executed, and coping and treads of steps of so-called white marble.
Furnishing.
The work of the upholsterer in fitting up a Turkish bath comprises the complete furnishing of the cooling room with couches, lounges, ottomans, carpets, mats, and any chairs and tables that may be required, besides the usual furniture common to all rooms. In the sudatory chambers may be required easy chairs of peculiar construction, with stretched canvas seats; in some cases movable wooden benches in lieu of fixed marble-topped ones; and any carpeting, matting, felt for benches, curtains (if any), and Indian matting for dadoes. These are the principal requirements that need consideration, the remaining furnishing of subordinateapartments being, of course, of commonplace and ordinary description. The refreshment department requires possibly a coffee-maker, refrigerator, ice-box, and shelf fittings; but, as a general rule, no arrangements for actual cooking.
The cooling room couches are usually made 6 ft. by 2 ft.; but 6 ft. 6 in. by 2 ft. 6 in. is a more liberal allowance. They should be made of polished wood, strongly framed, stuffed with horsehair and covered with a red Turkey twill, as at A, Fig. 21. Where divans are adopted, on the Eastern model, the benches must be framed of wood, permanently fixed, and covered with mattresses kept in their places by a wooden fillet, as Fig. 20. Above the couch thus formed it is well to stretch a dado of Indian matting, affixed above to a moulded rail.
The carpets employed in the cooling room should be soft to the tread. Nothing, of course, equals a Persian or Turkey carpet, and one or the other should be provided when their cost can be afforded. A rich carpet adds greatly to the effect of the room. In cases where a polished wood floor is adopted and shown, soft durable matting or strips of carpet must be placed along any routes, such as from and to the hot rooms and the boot-room, by the sides of couches, to lounges and tables, &c.—anywhere, in fact, where the bather may require to tread. Anything in the nature of fastenings likely, by any possibility, to injure the feet, must be carefully avoided.
A table or two for books, papers, magazines, &c., should be provided in the cooling room. The provisionof lounges, &c., must depend upon the design of the room, and whether nooks or angles are available for their accommodation. Little wooden or metal tripod tables must be placed by the heads of the couches (Fig. 21, B).
Fig. 20.Fig. 20.Section of Benches in Hot Rooms and in Cooling Room Divans.
The chairs in the hot rooms must be designed upon some such lines as at C and D, whereat are shown an iron, and a wooden, framed chair. Beechen frames are best, and the seat formed of rather closely-woven canvas fixed at top and bottom and hanging in a curve. A few of these seats should always be provided in the hot rooms. Movable woodenbenchesare constructed of beech, oak, or well-seasoned yellow deal, as at E. The head end is best raised as shown. Very carefully-seasoned wood should be employed, for all joinery purposes, in the hot rooms.
In the boot room, the pigeon-holes must not be forgotten, and a cushioned seat, perhaps, for taking off boots and shoes. A shelf or shelves for linen checks is useful in this position.
Sometimes the floor of the calidarium is carpeted all over, butstripsof matting or carpet are better. The hot laconicum is best carpeted throughout. The tepidarium should have strips of carpet where the bathers must necessarily tread. In some baths it is the custom to provide, instead of carpet, felt sandals for use in the hot rooms. For similar reasons to the carpeting—the non-conduction of heat—fine white felting is sometimes placed in strips along the marble benches, as at Fig. 20. Of the Indian matting for a portion of the walls above the benches, I have already spoken.
In the shampooing rooms, little blocks of wood shaped as at E, Fig. 5, are required as head-rests. They should be about 12 by 5 by 4 in., and hollowed to fit the head.
Fig. 21.Fig. 21.Furniture of a Turkish Bath.
The Turkish bath in the house may be designed on any scale, from a single room heated to the required temperature by a common laundry stove, to an elaborate suite of apartments, providing all that is found in the public bath, and even added luxuries. It may be an addition to an existing building or a feature designed at one and the same time as the house.
There are, of course, many expedients for producing perspiration by heated air much simpler than by the special construction of a suite of bath rooms; but as they will be familiar to all studying the subject of baths, I will pass them over here as mere makeshifts. For although there is something to be said in their favour, in that the head is free and one can breathe cooler air, there are serious objections to their use, as the lamps employedburn the air, and there is also an absence of that rapid aërial circulation which is so much to be desired. Besides the actual objections to their use, more or less inconvenience attends the employment of the sheet and lamp (or cabinet and lamp) baths, and there is little of the luxury of a true sudatorium about the extemporised bath, admirable as it may be as a hydropathic expedient.
The bath in the house may consist of one of the following arrangements:—(1) A single room used as a sudatory chamber and for washing; (2) a hot room and a washing room; (3) a combined hot room and washing room, and a cooling room; (4) a cooling room, washing room, and hot room; or (5) a suite of chambers of such extent as to provide every possible luxury, such as even the old Roman gentlemen would have coveted. Where there is no second room the bather must use his bed room as a cooling and reposing room, as he must also in the cases where only a washing room and a hot room are provided.
Fig. 22.Fig. 22.Plan of Mr. Urquhart's Small Private Bath and of the Hot Room at Sir Erasmus Wilson's Bath at Richmond Hill.
For a simple sudatory chamber, where washing operations are also conducted, all that is required is a room with brick walls and fire- and heat-proof floor and ceiling, with an adjoining lobby, a flue to conduct smoke from a simple stove, and a sunk washing tank orlavatrina. Allowance must be made for a couchopposite the stove. Fig. 22 (A) shows the simplest form of a bath room possible; it is that which Mr. Urquhart constructed, and has described in his 'Manual of the Turkish Bath.' It was erected by him to show how cheaply an effective bath room might be built, the whole arrangement, with water fittings and building of three of its walls, only costing 37l.
The room or rooms forming the Turkish bath in a private house should be cut off by a lobby from the other apartments of the house, with carefully-fitting self-closing doors at either end; and in the case of an elaborate bath, another little lobby with double doors and heavy curtains, should be placed between the cooling room and the two bathing rooms, as at Fig. 24. The air of the hot rooms should, of course, be perfectly and absolutely cut off from that of the house.
The position of the bath in a house will depend upon the size of the bath and the house and its situation. In town houses, where the bath consists of only a washing and a hot room, the first floor will be the most convenient. Where a cooling room is provided, the ground floor is as handy as anywhere; and this position allows of the easier construction of the heating apparatus. In the country, the bath is best built away from the house, connected by a short lobby, which may be utilised for boots, &c., as at Fig. 24. The main difficulties to be overcome are the heating of the bath, and the non-conduction of heat to places where it is not wanted.
The heating apparatus of a private bath may be, for the simplest, a common laundry stove, as at Fig. 22 (A) and at Fig. 23; for bigger baths, a small convolutedstove, as at Fig. 24; or a furnace of firebrick with an iron flue, as at B, Fig. 22—a plan of the hot room (15 ft. by 12 ft.) of the bath which Sir Erasmus Wilson built at Richmond Hill. For elaborate baths, a small furnace wholly constructed of fireclay, such as that of which I have given complete plans in the chapter on "Heating and Ventilation," would be the best. A furnace of this description is shown in the design for an elaborate private bath, at Fig. 25. Should the bath be heated regularly every day, a firebrick furnace is certainly the best, as such furnaces retain their heat a long time. It should be "banked" at night. A bath only required at times, and quickly, is best heated with a thin iron stove. A portable iron stove and a long length of iron flue will rapidly raise the temperature. The simple baths illustrated at Figs. 22 (A) and 23, are therefore very convenient and effective. The principle of heating by the transmission to the hot rooms of freshly-heated air is also a very convenient one for private purposes, as on this system the bath may be on an upper floor, and yet have its heating apparatus conveniently stowed away below, as at Fig. 24. A small furnace chamber, such as that at Fig. 6,ante, must be constructed, and a hot-air flue of large section built up to the hot room. If the bath be on the ground floor, the construction of any form of heating apparatus is rendered easier.
To prevent the transmission of heat to other apartments of the house, the precautions hereinbefore mentioned must be observed. Hollow walls must be provided round the heated chambers, to prevent loss of heat onthe external side, and the transmission of heat through internal walls. The floors above and below should—if not of solid fireproof construction—be formed as described in the section dealing with the design of the sudorific chambers, with puggings of slag-wool, asbestos, sawdust, or materials having similar properties. Windows should be double. Wherever possible, concrete floors should be provided to the hot rooms and washing rooms, so that they may be covered with tiles or mosaics, and on account of the spilling of water. It should be needless to point out the necessity of having most careful regard to safety from fire by the stoves or furnaces.
The ventilation of private baths should receive as much careful attention as those for public use. The hollow external walls may often be used with advantage for the extraction of the vitiated air, which must be let into the cavity at the floor level. If the bath be constructed on the ground floor, with nothing beneath, the system of carrying off the vitiated air by horizontal conduits—recommended for public baths—should be employed, as in the accompanying design for a large private bath, where the whole of the foul air is drawn into one vertical shaft of sufficiently wide section. Much that I have said on the heating and ventilation, and, indeed, on many matters in connection with the design of public baths, applies in the case of the private one, and the reader is therefore referred to preceding pages for many hints as to its construction.
In the accompanying figures I have endeavoured to explain the arrangement and construction of privatebaths, from those formed by converting existing rooms into bath rooms, to an elaborate and complete design. Fig. 22 (A) is a plan of Mr. Urquhart's cheap private bath, an apartment only measuring 11 ft. by 16 ft., yet forming an effective sudatory chamber, with simple iron stove, couch, seat, and sunk tank or lavatrina. On this principle I have arranged the plans of the baths adapted to existing rooms in a house, shown at Fig. 23. One plan shows a hot room built on to an existing ordinary bath room. A doorway is formed in the old external wall, and the new chamber constructed with hollow walls, with glazed bricks internally. An extra room would, of course, be thus formed on the floor below. A fireproof floor would be provided, and the pipes from iron stove conducted to old fireplace in bath room, which would become the lavatorium, and undressing room if necessary. A double-doored lobby is formed in the latter apartment, and the slipper bath used as ordinarily. It will be seen that by appropriating the adjoining bed room, a frigidarium is obtained, by taking away the flue-pipe to a new chimney, and knocking a doorway through the old partition wall, thus making a complete set of bath rooms.
Fig. 23.Fig. 23.Methods of constructing Turkish Baths in existing Houses.View larger image
The other plan, given at Fig. 23, shows an existing room divided into a combined hot room and washing room, and a cooling room. Three of the walls being ordinary external walls, the hot room is lined with lath and plaster on quartering, leaving an air-space between to prevent loss of heat by absorption and radiation. One or two of the spaces between the quarters should be formed into lath and plaster flues,for the withdrawal of the vitiated air, being connected below with the hot room, and above lead into the open air. A pugged partition and double-doored lobby separate the rooms. Space is left in the hot room for a full-length couch opposite the radiating stove, which has a metal screen around to protect the more adjacentwalls from the heat. A lavatrina is provided, as shown at the enlarged section. A nook is formed for a shower. This recess could be fitted with enamelled iron screen and hood, as at the end of elaborate slipper-baths. A couple of couches, lavatory, and toilet table are compactly arranged in the little frigidarium.
Where these plain iron radiating stoves are employed, the fresh air should be admitted as near the stove as possible, and if the inlet be connected with a space formed round the stove by a sheet-iron jacket, the air will enter the room at a considerably raised temperature. The temperature of the incoming air in a bath where the heat radiates directly from the stove or furnace to the body of the bather, is not a matter of such vital importance as it is in cases where the heat is transmitted through the agency of the air itself.
Fig. 24.Fig. 24.A complete Private Turkish Bath.View larger image
Cost of construction being now so constant a factor in every consideration, I have been led to give the above plans and descriptions of cheaply-formed baths as suggestions for the adaptation of other rooms. But plans of more elaborate baths are occasionally required, and at Fig. 24 I give the plan and cross section of a bath constructed as an appendage to, and at one and the same time as, the house. In this plan all necessaries are liberally provided for, but there is no extravagant outlay on elaboration of features and decoration. It is arranged on the first floor of a projecting wing off the main building. The frigidarium is cut off from the corridor or landing of the house by a lobby, which provides a w.c. and a space for boots and shoes and linen and towels. Between the frigidarium and bathrooms is a double-doored lobby of a kind that is very useful in both public and private baths. Hung with heavy curtains over the inner face of either door, it forms a perfect preventive against the entry of the airof the hot rooms into the cooling room. Between the combined tepidarium and lavatorium and the laconicum is a glazed partition with a doorway, fitted with a curtain if necessary. The walls are 18 in.—9 in. and 4½ in., with 4½ in. cavity, used for ventilation. The bath rooms are lined with glazed brickwork. The floor is of fireproof, iron and concrete, construction. Enamelled iron sheets are screwed to the ceiling joists in the hot rooms, and pugging placed over. Under the laconicum is the stokery and furnace chamber, fitted with a small convoluted stove, a hot-air shaft leading to the bath room. Fresh air comes to the stove by horizontal flues from either side of the building. The windows in the bath rooms are double. In the laconicum are two felt-covered wooden benches, as at Fig. 21 (E),ante, and a similar bench occupies one side of lavatorium, opposite which is the lavatrina, 18 in. deep, partly sunk into the floor and partly raised. The shower should be placed over this. In the frigidarium are two couches, hooks for clothes, lavatory, and toilet tables, &c. This would be a very effective plan for a comfortable private bath.
The ordinary "slipper," "length," or "shallow" bath is out of place in the rooms of a Turkish bath; but where the bath has to be adapted with economy to an existing bath room, as at Fig. 23, and in cases where, say, some members of a family take the Turkish bath and others the ordinary warm bath, it may remain as at the last-named figure, and serve the purposes of a lavatrina. The lavatrina, as designed in the plan of the large Turkish bath appended, however, is the most convenient apparatus to facilitate the orthodox method of lathering andwashing oneself in this style of bathing, as distinct from the ordinary method of immersion in a large body of water; and as the former manner is the most economical of water, it is unnecessary, in providing a Turkish bath in a house, to make any increased provision for the supply of hot and cold water over and above that which would be allowed for an ordinary slipper-bath.
In a private bath the lavatorium will also serve the purpose of a tepidarium. This chamber should therefore be as large as possible. In it may be required a shampooing slab, and, possibly, a small plunge bath, in addition to the lavatrina, reclining-bench, and what water fittings are to be provided. All that will be required are hot and cold water taps over the edge of the lavatrina, which should also have a waste and overflow. Having to be worked by the bather himself, the shower arrangement should be such as shown at Fig. 17,ante. This will serve all purposes, unless a douche and a needle are desired, when the regulating valve of this appliance must be placed conveniently within the bather's reach while standing in the bath.
The private bather, unless he can afford to engage a bath-man, must look upon shampooing as aluxurybut not anecessityof the bath. Dr. W. J. Fleming, in a lecture on the "Physiology of Turkish Baths," read before the Glasgow Physiological Society some years back, said that the accessories of shampooing, &c., are, despite the popular opinion to the contrary, non-essential. A shampooing slab—which must be of marble—is therefore not a necessary provision in any but very elaborate private baths.
A complete private bath must contain thepiscina, or plunge. Unless space and expense be no object, this cannot well be made capable of affording a vigorous dive; but endeavours should be made to secure a bath of such dimensions as will admit of a refreshing immersion of the whole body. It will be constructed and fitted exactly as a small public plunge bath.
The frigidarium of a private bath should be as pleasant, cheerful, and comfortable as possible. It should be a cosy place where the bather may recline and cool, and smoke and read, or otherwise divert himself to his heart's content. If so preferred, it might be arranged like an Eastern divan; or it might be a simple, homely room, fitted with one or two comfortable couches. A fireplace may here be a desirable feature, for appearance sake, during the winter months. The room should bereallyventilated—viz. well supplied with pure, fresh air, and with effective means of withdrawing the vitiated atmosphere, since, as I have pointed out in the chapters on public baths, the cooling process is, in its way, as important as the heating, it being essential that the bather should expose the whole surface of his skin to volumes of pure cool air.
Fig. 25.Fig. 25.Design for a Private Turkish BathLongitudinal Section.
Fig 25.Design for a Private Turkish Bath.View larger image
At Fig. 25, pages 130 and 131, I give plans of a large private Turkish bath. It is such a building as would be a most desirable and pleasing addition to a country mansion; and considering the money prodigally lavished over the appurtenances of the modern mansion house, it is indeed surprising that more has not been attempted in the way of appending a feature that is at once a talisman of health, a cure for disease, and an untold luxury. Thepublic bath may be a blessing, but for comfort and luxury it cannot compare with the well-appointed private bath.
The design I give as a suggestion, to be modified and adapted to any style of design. The building could be connected to the house by a corridor, or by a glazedxystos, either abutting on to the main wall of house or a little detached. Off the lobby to the frigidarium are recesses for boots and for linen. The frigidarium—about 15 ft. square—has benches fitted up like one side of a divan, bay windows with space for plants and flowers, lavatory and toilet-table, and an ornamental fountain. A lobby separates this apartment from the bath rooms, and off it are a w.c. and a towel closet, which latter could be supplied with hot air. The combined lavatorium and tepidarium—14 ft. square—is a domed chamber, with semicircular recesses containing the plunge bath and lavatrina. A shampooing bench is shown. A marble dado surrounds the walls, and marble corbels are provided to pendentives of dome—which could be of brick or terracotta and concrete—and marble springers to horse-shoe arches. The shower is placed over the lavatrina. Plenty of space is left for a bench or chair in this chamber. Adjoining is the laconicum with a firebrick furnace, after the nature of that of which I have before given full detailed drawings. The vitiated air is drawn through flues in the floor, to a shaft on the opposite side to the chimney. The stokery and coke-store adjoin the laconicum. Fresh air would be admitted to the furnace as explained in the detailed description of the furnace illustrated at Fig. 10. If therewere no available supply of water from house, a boiler and tank could be placed in the stokery, and a cistern on the flat roof. The flat roof, if of iron and concrete, would form an abutment to dome. If thought desirable, the same flat roof could be carried over the combined tepidarium and lavatorium. An air space should be left between the masonry of dome and covering of copper or other material. The lights should be double glazed. With the radiating stove there is no objection to the loftiness of the dome. This bath could be perfectly ventilated and supplied with pure heat of a most hygienic character.
The bath for the hydropathic establishment will generally be required in connection with, and—what is of greater moment—in harmony with, other baths, such as medicated baths, Russian or vapour baths, and the ordinary douche, wave, spray, and needle baths, which, where the Turkish bath is included, may often be efficiently administered with the appliances usually provided in the shampooing and washing room. Moreover, if the establishment include the pumilio-pine treatment, or system of pine-therapeutics, there will be required rooms or halls for the inhalation of dry pine and pinal vapour. The nature of the communication between these different baths, as the medicated, Russian, &c., and the Turkish bath, and their relative positions, must be carefully studied. It should be compact and the various passages and corridors as short as possible, these passages and corridors being provided with means for maintaining them at a suitable, and uniformly equable, temperature. This latter point we do not find so carefully studied in hydropathic establishments as its importance would warrant. The consequence is that, in passing backwards and forwards toand from the different bath rooms, the delicate invalid contracts a serious chill.
Fig. 26.Fig. 26.Plan of the Baths at the Hôtel Mont Dore, Bournemouth.View larger image
I give herewith, at Fig. 26, a plan of the baths at the Hôtel Mont Dore, at Bournemouth, which, though not confessedly a hydropathic institution, has yet a finebathing establishment of the hydropathic type, as well as complete arrangements for the administration of the pine cure. These baths include a Turkish bath, with three hot rooms, a shampooing room, and cooling room, connected by an anteroom with the suite of miscellaneous bath rooms of the gentlemen's department. The latter comprise a room for the tonic water baths, such as the needle, douche, sitz, hip, and wave; a room or "hall" for the inhalation of pine vapour, whilst in a bath of condensed steam; and a room for the administration of the Mont Dore cure, consisting of the application of pulverised Mont Dore water, or spray, to the eye, nose, or ear, as may be required, this room being also used for the inhalation of dry pine. In addition are a range of slipper baths, in comfortably fitted bath rooms, for the purposes of electric and medicated baths, such as those of pine extract, sulphur, iodine, &c., &c., and for ordinary hot and cold spring-water and salt-water baths. In connection are arranged dressing and reposing rooms, besides necessary subsidiary apartments. A somewhat similar suite of rooms is arranged for ladies on the other side of the block. There is no separate Turkish bath, however; certain days of the week are set apart exclusively for ladies' use. The steam boilers, which supply the steam to the vapour baths and pine-vapour baths, and the water super heaters, as well as the hotel lift and pumping machinery, are arranged in a basement under the stairs, anteroom, tepidarium, and shampooing room.
It will be seen that the compact little Turkish bath, which was arranged under the direction of the lateMr. Charles Bartholomew, is in direct communication with the other baths, allowing the bather to pass from the hot rooms, or shampooing room, to medicated or pine bath, orvice versâ. In designing the plan of baths of the type of those at the Mont Dore, this intercommunication between the various baths is the point to be most carefully studied. Direct communication is required between the Turkish, and the Russian, bath, inhalation hall, and medicated baths, as some methods of treatment render this an absolute necessity.
In a small establishment the hydropathic appliances are movable, and used in ordinary bath rooms, the Turkish bath being the only feature requiring special design.
A true hydropathic establishment of any size should be provided with two Turkish baths, one for ladies and one for gentlemen, as the power and efficiency of the treatment may depend upon the regularity and persistency with which it is carried out. Where there is only one bath, it has to be set apart on different days for the use of ladies and gentlemen, and it is evident that the benefit of a course of baths may be greatly lessened by the occasional unreadiness of the bath. Two suites of rooms should, therefore, be provided. It may be that they will be most economically constructed and worked if arranged side by side, so that they may have their furnaces together, and be stoked with economy.
Where, as in country establishments, there is plenty of room, it is often convenient to arrange the Turkish and other baths on the ground floor adjoining the main building, a corridor of connection being placed, if necessary. It should be remembered, however, that invalids have to be taken—often carried or wheeled in movable chairs—to the baths, and allowance should therefore be made for the passage of such a wheeled chair from the top story, by way of a lift, to the door of the baths.
In a large establishment, a full complement of rooms should be provided for the Turkish bath—viz. three hot rooms, a washing and shampooing room, and a cooling room. They will, of course, be on a small scale; but the whole number should be provided. A plunge bath should also be added, but in small hydropathics may be dispensed with altogether.
For hydropathic purposes the lavatorium is generally required to have rather more elaborate water-fittings than other baths. The needle bath should include the ascending shower, the back shower, and the spinal douche—a small nozzle behind the rose of the vertical shower. The regulating appliances for these various showers, sprays, &c., should be brought together, and conveniently placed for the attendant. A very ingenious appliance, suitable for a hydropathic bath, is a thermometer regulating valve, which indicates the temperature of the water being supplied to the bather. The waters mix in a ball, into which is inserted the bulb of a sensitive thermometer, which rises and falls as the hot or cold handles are turned.
If the shampooing and washing room of the Turkish bath is to be used for the administration of the tonic water baths to other bathers besides those taking the Turkish bath, it must be made of ample dimensions. So, also, if the cooling room is to be used as a reposingroom for other bathers, it must be made of large size.
Perfect ventilation is of paramount importance in baths used for the treatment of disease. Purity of atmosphere in the hot rooms is a vital necessity, and so also is it in the miscellaneous bath rooms of a hydropathic establishment.
Unreadiness is a great vice in the Turkish bath appended to these institutions. Hot rooms beneath their proper temperature, and lukewarm water, are unpardonable delinquencies, either in the early morning, in the evening, or during the day. For this reason I would recommend a furnace of fireclay, as it retains its heat for a long time, and is not subject to the rapid changes of iron stoves.
Much of that which I have said with respect to the hydropathic bath will apply to the design of the bath for hospital and asylum purposes. Here, however, efficiency is all that is required, and everything need be but of the plainest description. The conditions and exigencies of each case must determine the size, position, and nature of the suite of bath rooms. All that has been said upon the subject of the design and construction of the bath must be studied, and the principles, herein given, applied to the peculiar circumstances. So also in regard to Turkish baths for hotels, and for residential blocks of buildings, and for clubs.
There is a wide field for activity in Turkish bath building, in the increased provision of baths in hospitals, asylums, and public and private institutions of one kind and another; and also in hotels, "flats," and clubs.The hydropathic establishments have long adopted the Turkish bath as a powerful remedial and curative agent in perfect harmony with the principles of the Water Cure. But it is only occasionally that such provision has been made in hospitals and asylums; and although within the last few years noticeable innovations have been made in this respect, the subject has heretofore been greatly neglected. Seeing, too, the immense extent to which co-operative living has developed, and the consequent enormous increase in size of large hotels, residential blocks, &c., I cannot but think that the builders of such tenements could with advantage turn their attention to the supplying of small Turkish baths for the visitors and residents.
Animals of many kinds, including horses, dogs, cows, sheep, and pigs, have been experimented upon with regard to the bath, and with much success. But for practical purposes all we need here consider is the design of the bath for horses, since a bath for a horse will evidently be suitable for a cow, and might not be wholly beneath the dignity of a pig. It is, after all, only in connection with the training of horses that anything of practical importance has been accomplished in this direction. Several Turkish baths for horses have been erected in this country in connection with hospitals for horses, attached to large businesses, and appended to training stables. In the development of race-horses the treatment has, according to the opinion of several authorities, been found eminently beneficial.
The bath must be arranged in connection, and in direct communication with the stables. It may consist, as Fig. 27—a plan of a bath built for the Great Northern Railway Company's hospital for horses—of a washing, and two hot, rooms. An airy shed will do for a place for the animals to cool, and in fine weather they will derive more benefit from being turned out in the open. In the plan given it will be seen that the horse is ledthrough the washing room into the first hot room. Without turning round, he may be led into the second hot room and thence into the washing room again. In the hot rooms, which are heated by a convoluted stove, are stocks, wherein, if restive, the animal can be secured. A similar arrangement is made in the washing room, where, after undergoing the sweating process, the horse is groomed down, an operation that should be performed in part with an ironstrigil, much after the pattern of those employed upon their own bodies by the ancient Romans.
Fig. 27.Fig. 27.Plan of the Great Northern Railway Company's Turkish Bath for Horses.
These equine Turkish baths need be very inexpensive and simply constructed, though, where it is desired to do the thing well, glazed bricks should, for the sake of cleanliness, be used for lining the walls. All that will be required in the washing rooms is a couple of draw-off taps with hot and cold water, some pails, ascraper, and wash-leather. On leaving the sudatory chamber, the horse should first be well scraped with the scraper, carefully sponging, or dousing him, if necessary, with warm water. Buckets of hot, tepid, and cold water should then be thrown over him, and having been well rubbed down with the leather, he should then be covered with a cotton sheet, and his legs bandaged with cotton bands, the sheets, &c., being gradually removed after an interval of about a quarter of an hour, and the animal turned into a shed, or into the open, to cool.
THE END.