OO ee 
Protection of Persons from Fire. 113 
NOTES. 
Note, referring to the Introduction.—The practice of burning the 
bodies of the Roman emperors, enveloped in sheets of asbestus, was 
hot, according to the author, so common as Pliny insinuates. They 
were burned in an enclosure of refractory stone, without any extra- 
ordinary precaution to prevent the ashes of the wood from mingling 
with those of the body. Suetonius, and other historians that have 
described the funeral of Augustus, Trajan, Severus, and other em- 
perors, make no mention of amianthus, though its use had been then 
long known, as is attested by Strabo, Dioscorides and others. 
Clement XI. presented to the Vatican library a magnificent urn of 
marble, which contained a winding sheet of amianthus, enclosing ash- 
ésandacranium. This fine relic was discovered outside the Vevia 
gate in 1702. It is the only one hitherto found in the tombs of 
petsons of distinguished rank. The tissue of this cloth is rather 
close, and the threads very coarse. The urn signified that it con- 
tained the head of aking or an emperor. The piece of cloth is 
ue palms long and seven wide. M. Aldini has made some as 
e. 
_ Note, after Chap. VI.—The report of Gay-Lussac on the exper- 
ments of M. Aldini, and the observations contained in the Acts of the 
lan Institute, perfectly agree in relation to the respiration of the 
firemen while in the midst of the flames. ‘The author having, be- 
fore he left Italy, made a head covering, consisting of a piece of 
loth and a cap of wire gauze, found that it rendered the respiration 
Painful, and he afterwards followed the advice of his friend Scarpa, 
=~ left an empty space for air between the envelope and the head. 
lis €ssential that the air in contact with the flames should not enter 
the lungs, not only because it is deprived of oxygen, according to the 
2 ervation of Gay-Lussac, but because the temperature is in equi- 
librium with that of the flames, and consequently at its maximum. 
"in the midst of these whirlwinds of flame, in appearance so 
threatening, the fireman introduces air which has not lost its oxygen, 
and whose heat is still far below that of the flames, and this serves 
lot respiration. The buckler opens a wide space for the column ol 
some air which precedes the man, and lowers around him the 
‘edperature of the medium in which he is plunging. Respiration ts 
*ea’y in danger, only when he remains motionless, which cannot con- 
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