Turkish Baths

ITS DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION.
Ill
spacious central area, and retired nooks suitable for
couches, and its pretty sparkling fountain and green
plants, its brilliant colouring, and general cheerfulness
of effect. Similarly, in a Roman style, a Pompeian
court seems suggestive of the arrangement of a fine
frigidarium, with its cubicida for couches, and its central
area and fountain.
The above are but theoretical suggestions as to what
might be done should the bath make such progress in
this country as may necessitate the provision of handsome
public baths for the people. In every-day
practice there is not a great field for elaborate designing
in baths. Although only the Roman and Eastern
styles have been mentioned, there can be no manner of
reason why an architect should not design his bath in
whatsoever style he may please.
I
have spoken of the plunge bath as a feature capable
of being rendered a thing of beauty. This is in reference
as much to its plan as to the materials of the sides and
floor, &c. There is no reason why a plunge should
always be a plain oblong on plan. It may be of any
of the shapes indicated at Fig. 19. Many bathers,
especially in warm weather, like to stay some minutes
in the plunge, and not go straight through ; they may
like to swim up and down the bath, and thus require
room to turn, and a keyhole plan, such as at A, is suitable,
and especially useful where the bather has to return
to the end of bath he entered. Another shape
is shown
at B. In ladies' baths still more margin for novel
planning is allowable, as here the true dive seldom
pertains. A delicate semi-oval plan, such as that at D,