BAD AIR AND BAD HEALTH. 823 



We now pass to other evidence affecting the poison that escapes 

 from lungs and skin. We all know that a room is offensive when 

 many people are crowded into it ; we know the unpleasantness of 

 a bedroom before the air has freely entered it ; we know how dis- 

 agreeable the breath and the clothes can be ; we know that ani- 

 mals die when submitted to air that has been breathed, even when 

 the carbonic acid has been removed ; * we know how necessary is 

 the continuous flood of pure air in hospitals — we have heard it 

 stated that this much freer admission of air is rendering unneces- 

 sary the antiseptic treatment of wounds ; how by treating men 

 in the open air and in tents recoveries have been made quicker 

 and better than in hospital ; f and how in the case of the Aus- 

 trian army "the most severe maladies ran their course much 

 more mildly " in the free air, while the recovery was quicker and 

 more perfect (Ransome, Health Lectures, 1875-'78, page 151). So 

 also Dr. Parkes says (page 181) in cases of blood-poisoning, the 

 best treatment is complete exposure to open air ; so also in typhus ; 

 and in a less degree in enteric fever, small-pox, and plague. " This 

 complete exposure," he adds, " of patients to air is the most im- 

 portant mode of treatment, before even diet and medicines." X Iii 



tissues, but only diseased tissues — the disease implying alteration of the tissue. All these 

 cases are cases, doubtless, of an extreme kind ; they imply the abnormal formation of 

 poisons to a serious extent, sufficient to constitute illness ; but it may well be that there 

 are many less serious formations of abnormal poisons, which, though not sufficient to pro- 

 duce illness, yet cause much discomfort, and which -are the consequence of the vitiated 

 state of the blood, arising from the habitual breathing of impure air. 



* If we remember rightly, both Parkes and D. Galton (Our Homes) refer to these ex- 

 periments — a mouse dying in forty-five minutes when submitted to air treated in this man 

 ner. Dr. Richardson also refers in one of his works to experiments, which were conducted 

 by himself, and which are more fully described in a report to the British Association. Dr. 

 Richardson had formerly a theory of " devitalized oxygen," but we suppose he would prob- 

 ably consider now that it was a truer statement to say that this special poison had not been 

 removed from the air which the creatures breathed. Experiments of the same kind have 

 also been made on rabbits in Paris. One of our number (A. H.) adds the following re- 

 mark : " Though I think probably it would be quite misleading to speak of the experiments 

 upon the mouse, and the experiments conducted by Dr. Richardson as in any sense cruel, 

 yet, speaking my own personal opinion, I remain opposed to all such experiments. While 

 I admit the neat and convenient evidence often supplied by them, and also admit that diffi- 

 culties of method would at first exist, were they renounced, yet I think the wealth of mate- 

 rials that exist on all sides of us for pushing forward knowledge is so vast, that however 

 convenient these experiments may be, they are not really necessary, while perhaps a keener 

 perceptive sense in tracing out the meaning of the things of common life, which are of 

 such vital importance, would be developed, as investigators renounced this particular 

 method. In writing this, however, I am governed by the moral side of the question, which 

 is the one that, apart from all other considerations, determines my view." 



f The case of the hospital is, of course, a complicated case, and it might be disputed 

 how far its evidence can be used for our purpose. 



\ " When our health commissioners were sent out to the Crimea to examine the heavy 

 mortality among soldiers in the hospitals, their first act was to use their sticks to break 



