Economy of Fuel. 323 



^f the room has been wholly neutralized, by the currents from doors, 

 windows, and other apertures. Thus is the body kept in a manner 

 oscillating between extremes of temperature, until a confirmed "cold" 

 or catarrh has taken possession of the system. 



That pulmonary complaints should ensue, is but the natural con- 

 sequence of this artificial variableness of climate, to which we are 

 frequently exposed, and such a consummation has, it is believed, of- 

 ten been brought about by the very prudent caution of keeping near 

 a goodjire for a single evening.* 



It were needless to enumerate the dangers to which the inmates 

 ©f a house, and even the house itself are exposed where young chil- 

 dren have free access to an open fire. The many appalling acci- 

 dents which are annually recorded as resulting from this cause, are 

 sufficient to make us desire some more secure method of keeping up 

 an agreeable warmth among the tender objects of maternal and paren- 

 tal solicitude. 



That the nursery may be secure from danger, recourse is had to 

 close stoves; but in attendance upon these, many of the same evils are 

 experinced which belong to the open fire. In apartments for the 

 sick, and particularly when wood is the fuel, they are objectionable 

 on account of the constant watchfulness, required for preserving a 

 uniform temperature. Hence it is not in the construction only of 

 houses and chimnies, or in the arrangements of receptacles for the 

 burning fuel, that a want of economy is visible. The very manner 

 in which the combustion is carried on, and the disposal made of its 

 products, are widely at variance with philosophical principles. Every 

 mode of producing combustion, in which more cold gaseous matter 

 is allowed to approach the ignited mass, than is actually required for 

 the support of combustion, involves a loss of useful effects depen- 

 dent on the quantity and capacity of the gas, and on the elevation of 

 temperature which it acquires by passing over the fire. But the 

 quantity of unburnt air which passes up an open chimney where 

 wood is consumed, bears a very large proportion to the gaseous pro- 

 ducts of the combustion. In stoves, the economy is but little better, 

 especially where the gas-pipe passes almost immediately from the 

 presence of the fuel into the chimney. The occupants of some an- 



* In a house heated in the manner horeafler desciibeu, there has for three winters 

 been scarcely a cold, or any kindred disease experienced by the inmates. In the 

 winter of 1831 — 32, when influenza was nearly universal, tlie family was wholly 

 exempt from that troublesome and dangerous complaint. 



