668 
NATURE 
[OcTOBER 30, 1902 
long ago have been driven into solving the problem of its dis- 
posal, as we have been driven to deal with the disposal of 
sewage, no matter how great the volume might be. 
In days not so very remote, the arrangements for the disposal 
of smoke might be regarded as comparatively in advance. The 
genius who first put in practice the idea of confining smoke toa 
narrow flue specially built for it wrought a revolution in house- 
building. There are still archeological survivals which show 
that before his day there were architects who were satisfied with 
the more simple provision of a hole in the roof, and there are 
even traces extant of a still earlier architectural style of in- 
habited dwelling in which such rudimentary provision asa special 
opening for smoke did not exist. I do not attempt to describe 
the corresponding stages in the development of the means of 
disposal of other kinds of refuse ; they could be traced—gardy 
Zoo is the survival of a warning with special meaning in the 
Scottish capital—and examples of present-day practice might 
be adduced in illustration. But while the disposal of sewage 
has been generally though slowly progressive since the first com- 
missioners of sewers were appointed in 1531, the invention of 
the chimney seems to have been so successful as to paralyse 
mechanical enterprise in that department until the subject was 
taken up in later years by cowl makers, who have devoted much 
ingenuity to the improvement of the terminal outlet. For domestic 
purposes, the simple chimney, with or without the assistance of 
a cowl, remains a sufficiently effective apparatus ; the practice of 
using it to throw smoke into the atmosphere to be carried away 
by any currents of air that may arise is universal. 
Demands beyond the range of Scientific Ambztion. 
One of the incidental obstacles to a scientific treatment of 
the smoke question is that at first sight the atmospheric currents 
appear to perform the duties of general scavenger with such ex- 
emplary efficiency that few people give any thought to the 
general success or failure of the method itself. On foggy days 
we become aware of the nuisance which we have created, 
and accordingly desire that steps should forthwith be taken to 
remove or prevent fogs, with the understanding that whatever 
does away with the fog will, at the same time, do away with 
the smoke nuisance. Now the prevention of fog as a meteor- 
ological phenomenon is one of the demands which I think we 
are not legitimately entitled to ask of practical men of science ; 
it is beyond the ambition even of physical science. To use the 
parallel further, it would be just as reasonable for us to throw all 
our refuse into the streets and, when we found that it accumu- 
lated beyond endurance, demand of men of science that they 
should provide showers at suitable intervals to wash it all away. 
The well-known meteorological conditions for the formation 
of inland fog are my justification for this opinion. 
Nor can we hope for the removal of fog by the actual removal 
of the foggy air of London. I have on several occasions seen 
suggestions which seemed to regard such a scheme as possible, 
but I have never been able to understand where the air would 
be sent to and by what it would be replaced. Any such pro- 
posal has always seemed to me to come perilously near to a 
scheme for sweeping away the Atlantic with a mop. The re- 
moval of foggy air from the streets is as hopeless a matter as the 
prevention of fog, and when once smoke has been allowed to be 
discharged into the free atmosphere, all chance of removing it 
is gone. 
Gravity of the Smoke Nuzsance. 
It is not only on foggy days that the method of leaving the 
atmospheric currents to act as the smoke scavengers fails. In 
large towns, the system is generally speaking inefficient. In sup- 
port of this assertion, I quote from the figures giving the average 
amount of sunshine recorded at a large number of stations in the 
British Isles during the twenty years from 1881 to 1900, a 
comparison between the records for London and the average of 
those for other places in the southern district of England. The 
amounts given as percentages of the possible duration of sun- 
shine for the several months are as follows :— 
ve ey educa Ouse Sr is 
Bee ah ied pe ears Caney ete NON ese 
3 “ Oe Sj =i s) ° oO 
Parsee) tel =n cay Cota Oa Ae) 
London ...10 15 23 31% 38 36 38 39 34 24 14 
Q percent. of 
pcssible duration. 
Average for 
the southern 
district of 
England ...21 28 38 42 46 
London loss 
in approxi- 
matefigures } 
43 46 47 44 37 
Big Oh ES SS ate Be ath ee 
NO. 1722, VoL. 66] 
It appears that in summer London loses one-sixth of its sun- 
‘shine, and presumably also about the same fraction of its day- 
light, on account of its smoke, while in winter its loss amounts 
to one-half for a similar reason. 
The contrast of the figures for summer and winter is remark- 
able. As regards smoke, the difference rests chiefly on the fact 
that there are fewer domestic fires in summer, and we may 
therefore legitimately conclude that the domestic smoke is the 
most serious item to be reckoned with in considering the smoke 
question. It is, in fact, two-thirds of the problem. Anyone who 
wishes to satisfy himself as to this aspect of the question can 
easily do so. During the past winter, Captain Carpenter, 
R.N., D.S.O., who has been conducting an inquiry for the 
Meteorological Council into the prevalence and distribution of 
fogs in London, found that the Victoria Tower at Westminster 
and St. Paul’s Cathedral—two buildings a mile and a half apart 
as the crow flies—are invisible the one from the other until 
March is well established. There is here no question of per- 
sistent fog in the meteorological sense ; even on windy days, 
when fog is meteorologically impossible, there is no possibility 
of seeing’ a distant object in London on account of the domestic 
smoke from the thousands of chimneys, each using the primitive 
plan of pouring its refuse into the atmosphere. Not only is the. 
magnitude of the task too great, but the manner in which the 
atmosphere deals with it is not by any means satisfactory. It does 
not consume or annihilate the smoke, or render it harmless ; it 
carries its load a little way, longer or shorter according to the 
state of the weather, and then drops it regardless of conse- 
quences. The results are easily recognised. Sooty rains are 
not by any means an unusual phenomenon, and that is not all. 
A special type of heavy, dull, oppressive atmospheric condition 
may generally be noticed on the lee side of all great smoke centres. 
That we endure the presence of all this burden of refuse in 
the air which we breathe, and which carries all our daylight, 
while we have eliminated the corresponding refuse from our 
streets and our drinking-water, is partly to be accounted for by 
the fact that ideas about the treatment of smoke are still in an 
almost primitive stage ; partly also because the inefficiency of 
the atmospheric currents for renewing the air of our great cities 
in ordinary weather is not fully realised. It is only during per- 
sistent fog that the failure is complete and unmistakable. On 
foggy days when we thrust our, refuse into the atmosphere, it 
simply descends upon our heads and into our houses. We 
might almost as well have no chimneys atall. The experience 
of Sir W. Thiselton-Dyer at Kew could easily be shown to be 
the experience of all of us who live in large towns if we were 
able to make such measurements as he made in 1891, when after 
a week of fog he found upon the greenhouses at Kew—a com- 
paratively favoured atmospheric position for London—a deposit 
of tarry matter at the rate of six tons to the square mile. 
So far as I know, the only practical suggestion put forward by 
those interested in the abatement of the smoke nuisance is to 
invite householders and compel factory owners not to make 
smoke, or to consume it if they make it, or, in the third event, 
to make as little as may be, consistently with their own 
interests. As regards factories, very considerable improvement 
has followed these efforts, and I do not wish to be adversely 
critical when I point out, first, that the distinction drawn 
between the factory and the domestic establishment is unscientific 
if the smoke nuisance is to be really removed, and secondly, that 
that was not the plan adopted in the parallel case of the removal 
of sewage, for which the local authorities have used common 
funds. 
Further Development of the Analogy. 
In following the analogy somewhat further, I suppose it 
agreed that the proper course to be pursued is, not merely to 
1 The corresponding figures for Glasgow as compared with Douglas (Isle 
of Man), the only otherstation inthe same meteorological district, indicate 
that domestic smoke is only responsible for one-half of the smoke problem 
in the Glasgow district, though the want of stations makes the comparison 
incomplete. The figures are as follows :— 
ie = : Te 
Go SRS SSP as | 8 
=H Se ts oe fain 8 4 A 
Glasgow 
sunshine 10 17 24 30 33 31 28 28 26 22 11 8 percent. of 
possible duration. 
Douglas 
sunshine 21 26 37 43 46 43 39 38 38 32 24 18 do. 
Glasgow, 
loss in ap- 
proximate 
figukesmemeae S$ 4) ed tee ek cs see 
