LECTURES. 



163 



apartments, under different circumstances, when not constructed with 

 the resources explained. 



In all these examples, whether apertures alone were made in humble 

 apartments, or an extensive series of arrangements in first-class habi- 

 tations, nothing was done incompatible with the free use of an ordinary- 

 window, or the action of a stove or open fire-place. The only pecu- 

 liarity that required attention was, that there should be an ample 

 supply of air in proportion to the demands made upon it. There was 

 then no conflicting action between fire flues and the ventilating flues. 



It was strongly recommended that the shaft or flue for the escape . 

 of vitiated air should always be constructed so that external wind 

 should have no efi'ect in producing a back current. No external top 

 is better for this purpose than that recommended by a committee of 

 the American Academy of Sciences at Boston. It differed from the 

 cone in common use in this country, in having an addition above the 

 top of this cone which expanded the aperture slightly above the line 

 of the ordinary discharge. The ordinary form of cone of Mr. Emerson 

 had the advantage of being more simple, though not so powerful in 

 producing a draught. It ought to be recollected, however, that such 

 terminations to ventilating shafts or flues were principally important 

 in counteracting the influence of wind. They had no power in a calm. 

 If heated by the sun, they would promote ventilation ; if cooled by the 

 state of the atmosphere below the temperature within doors, they would 

 retard ventilation. 



Dr. Reid'concluded this lecture by a brief exposition of the condi- 

 tion of the habitations of the people in different cities in Europe, and 

 illustrated by a drawing the numbers often crowded on a given space 

 in many of the humbler dwellings, and houses of refuge for the des- 

 titute. 



Bad ventilation was by no means confined to the abodes of the 

 poor. None suflered more at times from this cause than the opu- 

 lent in palatial edifices where extreme illumination and air-tight 

 construction prevailed, though their wealth gave them great ad- 

 vantage in other respects. But great iraprovement^i had been made 

 in all classes of habitations within the last twenty years, however de- 

 fective individual examples might be. It was in vain, hoAvever, to 

 insist on ventilation where there was a deficient supply of warmth 

 and food. The general condition and health of the people was greatly 

 influenced by the air they breathed, and this, in the course of time, 

 afi'ected the appetite ; then the health gave way rapidly from the com- 

 bined influence of bad air and want of nourishment. The low tone 

 of the constitution induced a craving for unwholesome stimuli which 

 affected the system still more powerfully. In one house inspected, near 

 St. Paul's cathedral, in London, one hundred and twenty-three per- 

 sons were found crowded in a few rooms ; and in another, thirty or forty 

 people were occasionally found in a single room. So great was the 

 crowding of the poor in many of the most populous cities, that the 

 question had been publicly taken up, and model lodging houses in- 

 ■ troduced, which, with the supervision of licensed lodgings, promised 

 to be of inestimable value in improving the condition of the humblest 

 portion of the population. He found that model houses had also been 



