OPEN AIR AND HEALTH. 219 



four walls against wind, rain, and cold ; but, now that we employ win- 

 dow-glass, coal for heating, and iron stoves, and rent is becoming 

 higher, while rooms, especially sleeping-rooms, are growing smaller, 

 we have all the greater reason to keep open ventilating apertures, 

 since our lungs cannot live with less than six hundred cubic feet of 

 fresh, pure air per hour. The man who has but once made trial for 

 one week of sleeping with the window open will never give up the 

 practice. 



I once spoke to a lady about this matter, but she replied by telling 

 me the story of a " thoughtless person " who, having left the window 

 open through the night, awoke in the morning blind. She had also 

 read in some newspaper that a man had a stroke of apoplexy produced 

 by the same cause. I was amazed. But, calling to mind that this 

 lady's husband had served in the army, I remarked : "Your husband 

 lay for so long in the open air in the rain-drenched trenches at Stras- 

 burg ; did he ever write to you that he had taken cold, or that any 

 of the men had ever overnight been struck blind, or had met with any 

 other misfortune ? Did he ever contract a catarrh ? Did he ever 

 write for licorice, and not rather for tobacco ? Your brother-in-law 

 tramped in the deep snow to Besoul, your cousin learned at Le Mans 

 what is the meaning of a fall of freezing rain, and thousands of our 

 countrymen have had like experiences ; still, coughs and rheumatism 

 were not frequent, and most of the men came back strong and healthy ! " 



More rational opinions are gradually making their way, and, 

 in one particular at least, a beginning is being made of a revolu- 

 tion, namely, the system of treatment followed in " climatic " sanita- 

 riums, and establishments for the cure of disease by air, difference of 

 elevation, etc. The proprietors of such places, it is true, speak of the 

 "specific" virtues of their climate; but, inasmuch as chemistry shows 

 that atmospheric air all over the earth has the same constitution, 

 the specific virtue must reside in the special purity of the air a thing 

 wanting in cities, but found in all villages, provided they do not pos- 

 sess large factories. Further, it is an error to suppose that in the 

 south Florida, Colorado, or in the Tyrol, or by the lake of Geneva 

 it is as warm as in a hot-house. In those regions, too, it is now and 

 then cold ; yet it is easier to be out-of-doors there, for usually the sun 

 shines and the landscape is beautiful. But, since we cannot send all 

 the sick to the south, we must devise some substitute at home, the 

 benefits of which may be enjoyed even by the poorest. Then, too, 

 when we consider that the majority of those who have spent the win- 

 ter in a southern clime return as embalmed corpses, because it is only 

 when it is too late that people make up their minds to make the costly 

 voyage, there is reason to expect better results from timely recourse 

 at home to " air-cure." With the means of treatment at hand, dis- 

 ease might be nipped in the bud, and lung-complaints in general 

 would be rarer. 



