The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1881-07-27
Single or Double Beds.

l cannot do better than commence
what l have to say concerning beds
and bedding by protesting against
the double bed. The system of hav
ing beds in which two persons can
sleep is always, to some extent, un-
healthy. No two persons are so
constituted as to sleep naturally
under the same weight of bed-clothes
and on the same kind of bed or mat
tress. But sleep to be perfect and
profound and restorative should be
so prepared for that not single dis
comfort should interrupt it. A good
illustration of the fact to which l IN
directing attention is shown at the
industrial school at Annerley. The
visitor to those schools in which
children most unhealthily born are
reared into condition of health which
is singularly good, and which seems
to prove that even hereditary evils
may be educated out OF the bodies
almost i'll one generation-the visitor
to those schools will find in the dor.
mitories there that each has its own
little bed. 1t will be asked perhaps
in fact, heard it asked-whethe
this plan is not very expensive and
troublesome, causing doubles bed.
making, double bed. airing, double
laundry work, and double cost of bed
linen and coverings. Well, the re,
ply was, that there is an extra cost
i'll regard to those particulars, but
that, on the whole there is an untold
saving in relation to health. The
children rise from their beds really
refreshed and in every way better
tor the separate occupation. In this
manner the sick list is kept free to
great extent; and as one sick
child in its infmary sick.couch
is anxiety by night as well as
by day, and as one sick child con.
fined to it's bed by its sickness
is more trouble and anxiety than
half a dozen healthy children occu-
plying each separate bed during the
sleeping hours, there is a positive
saving of trouble and of expense in
the course of the year from the prac-
tice OF the single bed system. 1t is
not difficult to discover the reason OF
the saving OF health The fact that
no two persons are constituted to re-
quire the same kind OF clothes and
the same kind of bedding has been
already adverted to, to which may
be added the further fact that no
children or persons can sleep under
the same covering without one bel NC
a cause of some discomfort to the
other, by movement, position, or
drag of clothing. Beyond these dis
comforts, moreover, there is the
question of emanations from the
breath. At some time or other the
breath Of one OF the sIeepers must in
some degree affect the other; the
breath is heavy, disAgreeable, it may
be. so intolerable that in waking
hours, when the senses are alive to it
it would be sickening, soon after a
short exposure to it. Here in bed
with the senses locked up, the dlsa.
greeable odor may not be realized,
but assuredly because it is not de.
tected it is not less injurious.
l need not pursue this subject
much further, common sense will tell
everybody who will reflect on the
subject with common sense that
am correct, and that IL is best for
persons of every age to have to
themselves the shelter within which
they pass one-third of their whole
lives-thirty years of lite if they live
TO be ninety years old, l dwell,
therefore, only on one point more in
favor Of the single bed, and that is
to enforce the lesson that under the
single bed system it is rendered lm>
possible to place very old and very