Dangers Lurking in the Walls.

Manufacturer and builder 3, 1877

It has often been found in old cities like London, that where, in papering rooms, the new paper was simply put on top of the old paper, quite a thick coat of wallpapers was found superposed; and us wall-papers absorb and retain all kinds of exhalations, such walls may be store-houses of miasma; hence the practice of leaving the old wallpaper when repaperiug a room is condemned by sanitarians. Very often the wholesomeness of an apartment has been established by the total removal of the old wall-paper and old furniture, while in hospitals the replastering of walls and ceilings from time to time is a necessity. We find it, recently reported in the newspapers that an English-man, several members of whose family had been sick with typhoid fever, had a room repapered, and found that there were no less than twenty-five wallpapers already on the wall. The presence of this mass of decomposing paste and paper sufficiently accounted for the disagreeable smell that was always noticeable, although drains and water-closets were well trapped. The paper was all removed, the walls whitewashed, so as to cause the caustic lime to destroy the miasmatic organisms, and the room left with open windows exposed to the free access of the air. After a few weeks it was repapered, and all disagreeable smell was found to have ceased, while the typhoid fever disappeared without medical treatment or doctor's bills.