Although the process cannot be said to be by any means perfect, on account of the deficient durability of the surface, it would be well worth while to try it in England, and, if it answers and if it were improved, the sick would gain much, and the Hospital staff would gain much--the latter much more even in Civil, than in Military Hospitals. But it would be incurring a great responsibility to have the whole of a large new Hospital floored in this way, because, I. An English climate has made, and makes, so many things which are good and suitable abroad, unsuitable and sometimes pernicious for England. II. Our coal-fires, whether assisting or assisted by our atmosphere, certainly give us an amount of soot and dirt unknown abroad. At Berlin, all fire-places are stoves, where sometimes coal, sometimes coal and wood are burnt. This flooring might not stand well either the damp climate, or the smoky atmosphere and amount of flying soot of England: but it would be well worth trying; as also trying to improve it. By all accounts, a great deal depends upon the manner in which these boards are prepared; a little more or a little less, whether of oil or laque, makes a great and lasting difference. It would never answer to make an English carpenter or painter do this from written or printed directions. If we obtain a trial of this floor--the best course would be, to let an English carpenter prepare a number of boards and skirtings, of due size, suitable for the new flooring of some few wards in one of Her Majesty’s hospitals, which requires new flooring; then to desire either the proper tradesman, or the Queen’s Minister at Berlin, to order the house-painter, Schonby, No. 5, Michael Kirchplatz, Berlin, to send an experienced, trustworthy foreman, with the proper tools and materials, and for this man, with a complement of English workmen, to prepare the boards. The mode of cleaning is extremely simple, though of course there is a knack to be learnt; and, like everything else, it can be done well, indifferently, or ill. Any English man or woman accustomed to cleaning would understand the thing in one morning, and would, if he or she opened instead of shutting the mind to the outlandish thing, be proficient in it in a week. All these things sound abstruse on paper, and are far more simple and more easily learnt by seeing done than by reading. The foreman ought to give one or two lessons to one or two Orderlies, or Nurses, as the case may be. [Sidenote: 14. Ventilation of Wards.]