2. Fumigation.  Fumigation with sulphur is the only practicable method for disinfecting the house.  For this purpose, the rooms to be disinfected must be vacated.  Heavy clothing, blankets, bedding, and other articles which cannot be treated with zinc solution, should be opened and exposed during fumigation, as directed below.  Close the rooms as tightly as possible, place the sulphur in iron pans supported upon bricks placed in washtubs containing a little water, set it on fire by hot coals or with the aid of a spoonful of alcohol, and allow the room to remain closed for twenty-four hours.  For a room about ten feet square, at least two pounds of sulphur should be used; for larger rooms, proportionally increased quantities.[55]

3. Premises.  Cellars, yards, stables, gutters, privies, cesspools, water-closets, drains, sewers, etc., should be frequently and liberally treated with copperas solution.  The copperas solution is easily prepared by hanging a basket containing about sixty pounds of copperas in a barrel of water.[56]

4. Body and bed clothing, etc.  It is best to burn all articles which have been in contact with persons sick with contagious or infectious diseases.  Articles too valuable to be destroyed should be treated as follows: 

(a) Cotton, linen, flannels, blankets, etc., should be treated with the boiling-hot zinc solution; introduce piece by piece, secure thorough wetting, and boil for at least half an hour.

(b) Heavy woolen clothing, silks, furs, stuffed bed-covers, beds, and other articles which cannot be treated with the zinc solution, should be hung in the room during fumigation, their surfaces thoroughly exposed and pockets turned inside out.  Afterward they should be hung in the open air, beaten, and shaken.  Pillows, beds, stuffed mattresses, upholstered furniture, etc., should be cut open, the contents spread out and thoroughly fumigated.  Carpets are best fumigated on the floor, but should afterward be removed to the open air and thoroughly beaten.

Books for Collateral Study.  Among the many works which may be consulted with profit, the following are recommended as among those most useful:  Parkes Elements of Health; Canfield’s Hygiene of the Sick-Room; Coplin & Bevan’s Practical Hygiene; Lincoln’s School Hygiene; Edward Smith’s Health; McSherrys Health; American Health Primers (12 little volumes, edited by Dr. Keen of Philadelphia); Reynold’s Primer of Health; Corfield’s Health; Appleton’s Health Primers; Clara S. Weeks’ Nursing; Church’s Food; Yeo’s Food in Health and Disease; Hampton’s Nursing, its Principles and Practice; Price’s Nurses and Nursing; Cullinworth’s Manual of Nursing; Wise’s Text-Book of Nursing (2 vols.); and Humphrey’s Manual of Nursing.

Chapter XV.