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LIGHT IN THE HOME 



houses. About 1890, electricity began to come into general 

 use for lighting purposes, and is now one of our best known 

 servants in the home. 



Kerosene light. Kerosene oil lighting is still one of 

 the common methods of illumination, especially in country 



homes. When oil first came 

 into use, it burned with a 

 smoky flame, until in 1783, 

 Argand, a Swiss physician, 

 made a ring-shaped wick with 

 a central draft. This allowed 

 convection currents to be set 

 up inside the wick, and thus 

 a larger flame could be fed 

 with oxygen. Flat wick lamps 

 which give smokeless flames 

 are now in common use, but 

 the central draft lamp gives 

 more light. The gasoline 

 lamp and acetylene lamp, 

 although used in many places, 

 are not in sufficiently com- 

 mon use to warrant a full 

 description here. 

 Gas in the home. Although not all of us are fortunate 

 enough to have either natural or artificial gas in the home, 

 yet we should know something about the gas burner and 

 its uses. When a candle burns, as we know, the paraffin 

 wax melts, becomes a vapor, and burns. You can prove 

 that the gas inside of the candle flame is not on fire by 

 passing a small tube into it, leading out the gas, and then 

 lighting it. When gas, passing from the outlet of an ordi- 



AlR 



Central-draft oil lamp. 



