MODEL COTTAGE NEAR GUILDFORD.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."
SIR,—Your plans and specification have interested me very much. What height are the rooms ? What elevation ? Water, drains, dumbwell, &c.? Now, Sir, there are not half a dozen local authorities that would allow the erection of such a house, and to a certain extent they are quite right. The fact of fire insurance being 5s. instead of 2s. 3d. for £150 proves the risk of fire is very great. By the by, what about rates ? To enable us to erect dwellings for labourers, &c., the building by-laws must be modified and made to apply all over the United Kingdom.—I am, Sir, &c., CHAS. HOOK COLLETT.
Carlton House, High Street, Birmingham.
[The height of the downstair rooms is 7ft. 9in. The height of the upatair rooms is loft. bin. The water is from the Woking Water Company's mains. There are no drains. There is an earth closet. The sink waste-pipe discharges into a bucket which stands by the back wall. When it is full it is emptied on the garden—a proceeding as useful horticulturally as it is sanitary. There are plenty of local authorities whose rules allow wooden cottages to be built, though no doubt no by-laws should be allowed to forbid wooden cottages. There is no mystery or new invention about wooden houses. Half the world lives in them in America and millions in Northern Europe. There are also thousands of wooden houses a hundred years old and more all over England, and also plenty built in recent years. To talk as if the possibility of erecting wooden houses was something which remained to be proved is ridiculous. The risk of fire is no greater for the dwellers than in a brick cottage. Many insurance companies, we are informed, make very little increase in the premiums in the case of a weatherboard cottage which is plastered inside. The rates are paid by the tenant. —En. Spectator.]
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