I he. 1 1 , 



1884] 



NA TURE 



139 



quently employed at the present time, and the sale of which, 

 while benefiting one class, seriously injures another, by substi- 

 tuting an inferior article for one of better quality. 



Considerable good, it may be hoped, was done by the Health 

 Exhibition by the exhibition of these so-called substitutes. The 

 prominent display of this instructural series in a National Ex- 

 hibition has, we trust, done something towards putting a stop 

 lo a trade which, while it enriches the unscrupulous trader, 

 places the honest manufacturer in an awkward position. 



How far it has fulfilled this intention is of course not yet 

 a] 'parent, but I shall certainly feel it a part of my duty in 

 another capacity, as Chairman of the Parliamentary Bills Com- 

 mittee of the British Medical Association, to endeavour to keep 

 the attention of our legislators to this important subject. It 

 may lie hoped that, when the political horizon is sufficiently 

 cleared to enable Parliament to devote some time to interest- of 

 almost as important, if less strictly party, a character as those 

 which are now occupying their attention, that it may be possible 

 to secure for the people of England, or at least for the people of 

 this metropolis as an example to other great towns, some of 

 those better securities against the adulteration of food which 

 mntry was the first to set the example of creating by legis- 

 lative action, but as to which it has at the present moment fallen 

 behind some of those countries which followed us, such as 

 France, Belgium, and America. It is within my knowdedge, 

 and in fact within my personal experience, that in all 

 countries our English legislation was originally the model which 

 they set before them. In fact, in the case of several of these 

 countries, I have had the opportunity of receiving the gentlemen 

 a sent over by their various Governments, and of 

 furnishing them in several instances with the opportune 



1: of which the respective Governments have 



I themselves to create model laws respecting adulteration; 

 I would refer here especially to the German code. 



It is hardly to our credit that we have allowed 

 distanced in a race in which we had so considerable a start, and 

 in which the sole goal is the public benefit, and the main 



public health. These are questions largely affecting the 

 health of the whole nation, and especially affecting the welfare 

 of the poor, who suffer most by the substitution of woi 

 inferior, or adulterated articles in the fabrication of apparently 

 cheap, but often very dear because worthless, articles of food. 



Heating, Ventilition, and Smoke Abatement. — The 

 exhibits in Classes 24 and 25 — Heating and Ventilating — were 

 carried out on a considerable scale. Some 120 kitcheners — 

 burning solid fuel, and some gas — were tested. A large 

 house was rented for conducting these trials, under conditions 

 approximating to those which woul 1 be found in the actual use 

 of the apparatus by the public, and a large number of 1 

 cooking joints, &c, in the kitcheners, &c, were made. The 

 importance and necessity of exact I Smoke 



merit Committee of 1SS1, and since carried on in a sys- 

 tematic manner by the National Si 



were fully recognised by 1 of Health 



Exhibition. The - tgs were conducted by the 



acting engineer to the Smoke Abatement Institution. Mr. D. 



jury of the Exhibition dealing wit] 

 exhibits included Prof. W. Chandler I: Robert 



Harris, President of the Gas Institute, and other members of 

 -moke Abatement Institution whose special knowledge 

 peculiarly fitted them for the work. 



The practical advantages of such testin manifested 



great interest taken by exhibitors in the work, their 

 general desire to submit their manufactures for testing, the 

 evidently accelerated course of improvemen nee the 



Smoke Abatement C I the system of 



- and the advanced knowledge derived from the results of 

 s. 

 At the Health Exhibition these beneficial influ 

 clearly traceable in the adoption of good lied in 



apparatus shown at the Smoke Abatement Exhibition ii 

 and brought into notice by the testing treatments adopted there, 



II as in the rejection of plausible but impracticable methods 

 of heating and ventilation which found place in the earlier 

 exhibition. The detailed report of the tests of the apparatus 

 shown at the Health Exhibition I trust will be published, for it 

 will form a valuable addition to a continuous and advancing 

 series of tests. The importance of this branch of my 



can hardly be exaggerated. We can follow, in the light of the 

 knowledge derived from the result of the later tests, a regular 



and most encouraging course of improvements. For example" 

 some of the exhibits shown at the Crystal Palace Exhibition last 

 year, in the class of gas-cooking and heating-stoves, were proved 

 to have a greater efficiency, by about 20 per cent., than those 

 shown at the Smoke Abatement Exhibition in 1881 ; wdiile at 

 the Health Exhibition the efficiency proved by the tests was 

 fully 25 per cent, greater than at the original Smoke Abatement 

 Exhibition. Besides this increased efficiency, or improvement, 

 to be measured by lower consumption of gas for equal work 

 done, there has been an improvement hardly less important in 

 numerous points of detail, affecting both the durability of the 

 apparatus, and the facility with which it can be cleaned. These 

 latter improvements, added to the lessened price of gas, and the 

 reduced consumption of it in the newer forms of stove, cannot 

 fail to tend towards the increased use of these cleanly con- 

 veniences and smokeless heating appliances for domestic purposes. 



The testings at the Health Exhibition brought out the merits 

 of a number of kitcheners and stoves very well adapted for using 

 coke and "slack," or small coal, as well as improved patterns 

 for using the ordinary lump coal, with lessened production of 

 smoke. In regard to the advance made in smoke prevention 

 from domestic fires, I may mention, on the authority of the 

 testing engineer, that the highest average smoke shade proved 

 5 of 1S82 was 4'iS from kitcheners ; and in the test at 

 the Health Exhibition, the highest average was only 2 '4 ; and 

 from open grates the average density of the smoke was 3 - o in 

 1882, and at the Health Exhibition it was only 175. The 

 importance of facilitating, by means of improved apparatus, the 

 use of coke and the cheaper fuels now generally wasted is 

 obvious, and I think I may fairly claim that this section of the 

 Exhibition achieved a highly useful and successful result. In 

 the bakeries department no less than five distinct systems of 

 heat in;,' bakers' ovens, practically without the production of any 

 smoke whatever, were shown — and not only shown, but were 

 proved by an extended course of actual working — to be more or 

 less well suited to the requirements of the trade. Varieties of 

 machine- for making dough by cleanly and expeditious methods 

 were successfully worked throughout the period of the Exhibi- 

 tion, and it is but reasonable to assume that the exhibition of 

 these machines, shown daily in satisfactory working, mi 

 a great future influence in putting a stop to the laborious and 

 filthy process of making dough by manual labour. 



The Library. — The library sub-committee report with great 

 satisfaction that the library has proved an unqualified 

 and that it has attracted not only a large number of reader-, but 

 a considerable proportion of serious students. 



Although no purchases of books have been m 

 5000 works are now included in the collection, of which, over 

 3000 relate to health subjects. The great majority are free 

 gifts, a small proportion are on loan. They express . strong 

 hope that a collection of books so useful as the nucleus for the 

 format. on of a special library will not be dispersed, but that the 

 Council will devise mean- to maintain the lil 

 . nt footing, as part of a memorial of this useful and 

 successful national undertaking. 



The library was altogether a novel feature in any exhibition 

 of the kind, and its value was attested by the considerable number 

 of serious students who availed themselves of its extensive re- 

 sources, many of the 11 being University students, who used this 

 unwonted opportunity in preparing for examinations. The ad- 

 vantages to be derived from retaining the library as a permanent 

 institution would be great. I put before you a co] 

 catalogue, made entirely by Mr. Carl Thimm. This catalogue 

 is in itself a publication of no small interest, being the most 

 complete catalogue of sanitary literature with which I am ac- 

 quainted (although of course it cannot be said to be complete in 

 even an approximate sense, but must only be regarded as a very 

 valuable nucleus for a larger library), in which the hygienic 

 literature of foreign nations, and especially their official hygienic 

 literature, is very largely and well represented. 



The Sanitary anil Insanitary Hou .::. — Of the sanitary and 

 insanitary houses a special handbook has been published, which 

 will be preserved among the literature of the Exhibition, and 

 which constitutes a small epitome of the ordinary defects of 

 existing houses, and the simple means by which such defects 

 may in future be avoided. I shall not enter into any description 

 of these houses, for they are already well known to most of you, 

 and may, I yet hope, be further studied on some future occasion. 

 But I wish to draw your attention to the very important confer- 

 ences on the sanitary arrangement of houses which were held 



