Bronchitis. i8i 



in i860 was clearly traced by Dr. Bryson to the contamination of 

 the air. In a nursery hospital at Dublin with entire neglect of 

 ventilation, 2,944 children died in four years, whereas after the 

 ventilation had been imptoved only 279 died in the same length 

 of time. ' ' 



" Parkes (Practical Hygiene) says : 



But not only phthisis may be reasonably considered to have 

 one of its modes of origin in the breathing of an atmosphere con- 

 taminated by respiration, but other lung diseases, bronchitis and 

 pneumonia, appear also to be more common in such circumstances. 

 Both among seamen and civilians working in confined, close 

 rooms, who are otherwise so differently circumstanced, we find an 

 excess of the acute lung affections. ' 



In this connection, the statement of the air breathed by an ox 

 per hour and that supplied him on board a ship with insufficient 

 ventilation or none may be instructive. The ox takes in with 

 each breath about 5 liters of air. This is at the rate of 50 liters 

 per minute, or 3,000 per hour = 105.9 cubic feet. This amount 

 of air is therefore rendered all but irrespirable by each animal in 

 the course of an hour. And this, be it noted, is by breathing 

 alone, and makes no account of the contamination by perspira- 

 tion in the overheated hold, and by the emanations from the ac- 

 cumulating excrement. " 



' ' On board the steamers we have found the space alloted to each 

 bullock to vary from 150 to 240 cubic feet. On the steamship 

 "Holland," loaded at New York, August 21, 188 1, we found the 

 Stalls amidships allowed the full space of 240 cubic feet per head. 

 In the bow where there was less height between the decks the 

 space was con.siderably less. On the lower deck, where 129 cat- 

 tle were accommodated, the space allowed each was 217.4 cubic 

 feet. The port holes in the upper deck were nine inches in diam- 

 eter and there was one for each pair of stalls — central and lateral' 

 — or for eight oxen. These being well above the water line would: 

 be available for ventilation in ordinary weather. The port-holes, 

 in the lower deek, similarly arranged, were about two feet. above- 

 the water line, and consequently not available for ventilation, save 

 in exceptionally calm weather. The temperature on the main- 

 deck of this ship (between the outer and main deck) , when only 

 half the caittle had been loaded, was in the neighborhood of ga"' 



