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usually in the hack-yard or basement, but sometimes a second, and one washhouse
which is either an out-building in the yard, or the back basement room.
Such houses as these—many of which are about a hundred years old or even
more —are occupied in a way that can be roughly expressed as one family on
each floor, the commonest tenement consisting of two rooms. There are,
however, a considerable number of one-room tenements, and also tenements of
three, and less commonly four rooms, which in such houses are necessarily
spread over more than one floor.
Besides the houses with two rooms to the floor, there is another considerable
class of tenement house, generally not quite so old, where there are three rooms
to the floor, through the device of a " back addition", and in these, of course,
three-roomed tenements on a single floor are to be found.
The principal faults in these tenements are the following:—
(1) The insufficiency of the number of rooms. It may be laid down with
confidence that in a dwelling for a family with several children,
there should be at the very least four rooms —one living room, and
one bedroom each for the parents, the boys and the girls
respectively—apart from a scullery and other necessary offices.
In contrast with this, in a two-room or even a three-room tenement
occupied by such a family, there is no room that can be set apart
as a kitchen or sitting room which is not already appropriated as a
bedroom.
(2) The absence of the necessary offices. It is in this respect that the
London tenement house is particularly noxious Take for instance
a typical two-roomed tenement on the second floor. The only
w.c. available for the occupants is one at basement or groundfloor
level, or in the back yard, which is used in common by all the
families in the Louse. There is no place out of the two rooms and
landing where the house-refuse can be kept except a bin in the
yard or area. There is no available scullery at all, so that the
washing up has to be done in the living room (which is also a
bedroom) and the nearest source of clean water or place for the
discharge of foul water is on the ground floor or basement, and
only to be reached by climbing several flights of stairs The
common washhouse often contains no proper scullery accommodation
and is commonly dilapidated. An attempt to meet the water
difficulty has been made in many houses by providing a tap and
small sink for common use on certain of the landings. This by no
means makes up for the absence of a scullery, and in the worst
class house is often the cause of serious nuisance. In such
dwellings also there is usually no proper accommodation for the
storage of food and other domestic supplies, which have to be
kept on shelves or in cupboards in the living and sleeping room;
no accommodation for coal except in one of the rooms ; and often
no suitable cooking range in either of them.
(3) The lack of privacy. The dwellings are not shut off by an outer
door from the rest of the house, but consist merely of a number