In ordering beds it is wise always to state the height from the ground that is desired, or low beds may be sent. About twenty-four or twenty-six inches is the usual height desired. It is possible to secure beds that can be adjusted to any desired height. The disadvantage of such beds is the difficulty of adjustment so that each corner will be exactly as high as the other corners. Each one must be measured, and the moving of the wire mattress up and down on the legs of the bed, makes it impossible to keep the enamel on the legs. By all means hospital beds should have castors, and care should be exercised to see that these castors are so constructed and adjusted that they will not fall out every time the bed is moved. There is a great difference in castors and in their durability. For the general wear and tear of a hospital, the cotton-felt mattress is giving better satisfaction than the hair mattress, and it is somewhat less expensive. It is a good plan to have a few pads made of bed ticking thickly inlaid with cotton batting. These should be made the same size as the bed, with rings at the corners to secure them. For very filthy or unconscious patients these pads are desirable, as they can be washed and boiled as often as necessary. A couple of these pads makes a bed as comfortable as a mattress. [Sidenote: Bed Making] The mattress should be carefully protected by a rubber sheet securely fastened at the corners. Every nurse thinks she knows how to make a bed before she goes to a hospital for training, but as a matter of fact very few do. It is sometimes a difficult thing for the nurse to learn, but it is one of the most important of the early lessons in ward work. The appearance of the ward beds, and the way in which they are made, is a good index to the character of the nurse in charge. If the spread is on crooked, the open ends of the pillow covers pointing in opposite directions, and the bed has the loose appearance of having been thrown together without method, one may naturally expect the general work of the nurse to be slipshod and unreliable. It is well to teach nurses to stand at the ward door occasionally, and take a critical survey of the ward, noting down the things out of order. A nurse who is watchful in observing signs of disorder in her ward may naturally be expected to be a careful observer of signs of disease. Order, which is said to be Heaven’s first law, should be one of the first laws of ward work. Even the height of the curtains of the windows add to or detract from the appearance of the ward. The beds should be an equal distance apart and in a straight line. The head of the bed should never be used as a drying-place for wash cloths or towels, nor as a hook on which to hang bath robes and wrappers. [Sidenote: Ward Lockers]