Pilgrimages to the Spas in Pursuit of Health and Recreation: With an inquiry into the comparative merits of different mineral waters: the maladies to which they are applicable, and those in which they are injuriousJohnson, James
Science
Pilgrimages to the Spas in Pursuit of Health and Recreation: With an inquiry into the comparative merits of different mineral waters: the maladies to which they are applicable, and those in which they are injurious
Johnson, James
Balneology; Health resorts; Mineral waters
Many circumstances had, long ago, impressed me with a high sense of the
value of a TRAVELLING CONSTITUTION, as a kind of Mackintosh against
“skiey influences;” but none more so than an occasional glimpse at the
mysteries of the laundry. If a traveller happens to forget some valuable
article at his hotel, and hastens back to his chamber about mid-day,
he will be rather surprized to find the bed-linen on the floor, nicely
sprinkled with water, preparatory to a squeeze under a high-pressure
engine, which renders it of a glossy smoothness, and diffuses the watery
element so equally, that it feels delightfully cool to the next—and
even to the tenth tenant of the caravansera! I fear that this is often
the case nearer home, and where there is no “_travelling constitution_”
to resist the vapour-bath of exhalent sheets in our foggy and cold
atmosphere! The contracts between masters and chamber-maids for the
supply of damp linen to hotels, are too often contracts for the supply
of coughs, consumptions, and rheumatisms to travellers—greatly to the
advantage of doctors, druggists, and undertakers afterwards!
Tourists who can afford space for leather sheets among their luggage,
should take these useful articles with them, as there are more maladies
than colds and rheumatisms _contracted_ in caravanseras, and for which
there is no provision made in the _contract_ between host and passenger.
It must be acknowledged, however, that, of late years considerable
improvements have taken place in the bedding line. In several parts of
Germany, in the Autumn of 1840, we found very comfortable mattresses,
blankets, coverlets, and sheets, to our no small joy and surprize.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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