CLOTHES 



451 



and this in spite of the temperature of the ehamber continuing to 

 rise. On putting off the fans the discomfort returned. The 

 occupants cried out for the fans " (Leonard Hill). Long bei'orc 

 the discomfort had become extreme the oxygen percentage became 

 so low that matches would not burn. The disinclination to smoke 

 cigarettes was not noticed until some time after it was impossible 

 to light them. In other experiments, Hill allowed the persons in 

 the cabinet to breathe fresh air through tubes and mouthpieces 

 piercing the walls of the chamber, or induced people outside the 

 chamber whose bodies were adequately cooled to breathe the 

 " vitiated " air from the cabinet. The former subjects received 

 practically no benefit from their " fresh " air, but suffered just as 

 they did in the experiment quoted above. The starting of the 

 fan brought relief as before. In the latter experiment the 

 " vitiated " air breathed by those whose bodies were in moving 

 air had no effect. They did not experience discomfort nor had 

 they any headaches nor other after effects popularly supposed to 

 be due to breathing " polluted " air. Clearly, then, neither the 

 lack of oxygen nor the presence of carbon-dioxide or other 

 excreted substance has any influence on the " badness " of the 

 atmosphere of a room. Discomfort is due to lack of cooling 

 power, i.e. to stagnation and the loading up of the air with 

 moisture. 



Clothes. The question of the maintenance of the human body 

 in comfort is so closely associated with the nature of clothing that 

 a few physical facts bearing on the nature and value of artificial 

 protective and decorative coverings are not out of place here. 

 Liebig made clear one aspect of the function of clothing, saying, 

 " Our clothing is, in reference to the temperature of the body, merely 



29—2 



