Page 250 - down-and-out-in-paris-and-london

enclosed in a box, you cannot escape.
Above this come the common lodging-houses, with
charges varying between sevenpence and one and a penny
a night. The best are the Rowton Houses, where the charge
is a shilling, for which you get a cubicle to yourself, and the
use of excellent bathrooms. You can also pay half a crown
for a ‘special’, which is practically hotel accommodation.
The Rowton Houses are splendid buildings, and the only
objection to them is the strict discipline, with rules against
cooking, card-playing, etc. Perhaps the best advertisement
for the Rowton Houses is the fact that they are always full
to overflowing. The Bruce Houses, at one and a penny, are
also excellent.
Next best, in point of cleanliness, are the Salvation Army
hostels, at sevenpence or eightpence. They vary (I have been
in one or two that were not very unlike common lodging-
houses), but most of them are clean, and they have good
bathrooms; you have to pay extra for a bath, however. You
can get a cubicle for a shilling. In the eightpenny dormito-
ries the beds are comfortable, but there are so many of them
(as a rule at least forty to a room), and so close together,
that it is impossible to get a quiet night. The numerous re-
strictions stink of prison and charity. The Salvation Army
hostels would only appeal to people who put cleanliness be-
fore anything else.
Beyond this there are the ordinary common lodging-
houses. Whether you pay sevenpence or a shilling, they
are all stuffy and noisy, and the beds are uniformly dirty
and uncomfortable. What redeems them are their LAIS-