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6
Another cause is the defective condition of the yard paving: this is
usually so bad as to allow the surface water to soak into the foundations.
The original construction of many of the houses is extremely bad.
In some of the courts the houses are built back to back; such premises
can never be properly ventilated.
In a large number of otherwise unobjectionable houses the only
access to the closet and ash-bin is gained by descending some rickety
steps, then passing through a cellar without either light, ventilation,
or paving, and up some more steps into the yard. Some of these
cellars are only about five feet high, and are used as receptacles for all
sorts of abominable and worthless refuse. The consequence of this
arrangement is that the inhabitants decline to use the yards and
throw their slops and house refuse into the street, which is converted
into an open sewer, thereby increasing the already unsanitary condition
of the neighbourhood.
Some of the houses were built when land was much cheaper than at
present, and have large yards; the owners have utilised these by
building workshops upon them. When placed too near the backs of
the houses these buildings materially obstruct both light and ventilation;
in other instances a very much more objectionable condition of
things obtains, for dwelling-houses have been built and are occupied
in some of these yards—the only means of obtaining aecess to them is
by passing through the house in the main street. Most of these
houses so situated are in very bad condition.
The floors of many of the lower rooms are as much as eighteen
inches below the level of the street. (This form of construction very
much increases the difficulty of sweeping and cleansing the rooms);
and where there are no cellars, the joists are frequently laid on the
bare earth.
In almost every house I visited I found the yard paving and surface
drainage in a more or less defective condition, a quantity of black,
foetid mud having accumulated between and underneath the loose
brick ends of which this so-called paving is composed.
Many of the sinks are badly placed, the opening is frequently
above the level of the yard. Very few are provided with any form of
trap except bell-traps, and the bells are usually absent. Numbers
have five-hole sinks without any pretence of a trap; and where proper
traps exist they are frequently so badly set as to be useless;