_Cisterns._--Cisterns should be in a cistern-room if possible, but, at all events, placed where they can be got at, covered over with suitable fittings, and ventilated to the open air. A drinking-water cistern should never be placed in a water-closet, for no amount of disconnection in such a case will suffice to counteract its evil surroundings. Neither should it be placed in a bath-room, which is liable to a steam-laden atmosphere. Nothing can be said against a site out of doors, on the flats, or below (if away from dustbins and ash-heaps); but in such cases the cistern, with its service pipes, should be well protected from frost. The position of a cistern should be equally carefully chosen no matter whether the supply be constant or intermittent, or whether there be a high or a low pressure cistern. And not only should it be made certain that the “standing waste” pipe of the cistern delivers in the open air, but that any “overflow” pipe of the cistern delivers in like cleanly fashion. It is too common to take these wastes down to the nearest sink. It might prove expedient to thus disconnect a cistern waste when time presses, and when the alternative is costly, but the practice is not to be commended. Eassie’s strictures with regard to cisterns apply equally to those feed cisterns which supply hot-water circulating cisterns or boilers where water is heated for kitchen, scullery, still-room, or bath-room uses. It is too common to find the feed cistern, which is the small iron cistern that automatically keeps the kitchen or other basement boiler full, placed in the darkest corner of the commonest stowaway cupboard, with its overflow pipe joined to the drain. The materials of which cisterns are constructed vary much in town and country. In old houses will be frequently found cisterns formed of slabs of stone, just as they have been raised from the quarry, and sometimes of slabs of rough slate, and than these, provided they are regularly cleaned out and the waste pipes disconnected, probably no better basement cistern could be found. The same might perhaps be said of brickwork cemented inside. Cisterns composed of slate possess a drawback in their weight, which sometimes prevents them from being adopted upstairs. It has become a frequent practice now to have them enamelled white inside, so that the slightest discoloration of the water, or sediment at the bottom, can be instantly detected.