The authorities must see to it at once that children shall have as much air and breathing space in their homes by night as they have in the schools by day. What sense can there be in demanding and compelling a certain amount of air space in places where children are detained for five and a half hours, and then allow those children to stew in apologies for rooms, where the atmosphere is vile beyond description, and where they are crowded indiscriminately for the remaining hours? This is the question of the day and the hour. Drink, foreign invasion, the House of Lords or the House of Commons, Tariff Reform or Free Trade, none of these questions, no, nor the whole lot of them combined, compare for one moment in importance with this one awful question. Give the poor good airy housing at a reasonable rent, and half the difficulties against which our nation runs its thick head would disappear. Hospitals and prisons would disappear too as if by magic, for it is to these places that the smitten manhood finds its way. I know it is a big question! But it is a question that has got to be solved, and in solving it some of our famous and cherished notions will have to go. Every house, no matter to whom it belongs, or who holds the lease, who lets or sub-lets, every inhabited house must be licensed by the local authorities for a certain number of inmates, so many and no more; a maximum, but no minimum. Local authorities even now have great powers concerning construction, drains, etc. Let them now be empowered to make stringent rules about habitations other than their municipal houses. The piggeries misnamed lodging-houses, the common shelters, etc., are inspected and licensed for a certain number of inmates; it is high time that this was done with the wretched houses in which the poor live. Oh, the irony of it! Idle tramps must not be crowded, but the children of the poor may be crowded to suffocation. This must surely stop; if not, it will stop us! Again I say, that local authorities must have the power to decide the number of inhabitants that any house shall accommodate, and license it accordingly, and of course have legal power to enforce their decision. The time has come for a thorough investigation. I would have every room in every house visited by properly appointed officers. I would have every detail as to size of room, number of persons and children, rent paid, etc., etc.; I would have its conditions and fitness for human habitation inquired into and reported upon. I would miss no house, I would excuse none. A standard should be set as to the condition and position of every house, and the number it might be allowed to accommodate. This would bring many dark things into the light of day, and I am afraid the reputation of many respectable people would suffer, and their pockets too, although they tell us that they "have but a life-interest" in the pestiferous places. But if we drive people out of these places, where will they go?