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of Edinburgh , Session 1866 - 67 . 
assemblages of persons were for many hours exposed to them ; but 
no attempt was made to alter the existing system till 1839, when 
a Committee of the House of Commons was appointed to inquire 
into the best method of lighting the house. Many eminent indi- 
viduals were examined ; and in consequence of the report of the 
Committee, the new system was adopted of lighting from without, 
or, in which the air breathed by the members is entirely separated 
from the air which supplies the burners. A similar change has 
been made in lighting many other public halls ; but the new system, 
in its most general aspect, has been carried out in one of the 
principal apartments in Buckingham Palace, where the light radi- 
ates from the roof, as if from the sky above, without any of the 
sources of light being visible. This method, of course, can be 
adopted only in halls, or apartments with an external roof. In all 
other cases difficulties must be encountered in houses already built ; 
but we have no doubt that the ingenuity of the engineer and archi- 
tect will overcome them, whether the method is to be accommodated 
to old buildings, or applied in its most perfect state to houses 
erected on purpose to receive it. But, however great may be these 
difficulties, it is fortunate that, whether we are to have the advan- 
tage of the electric light, or of a purer form of carburetted hydrogen 
gas, the mode of distributing it will be, generally speaking, the 
same, and we therefore need not hesitate to introduce the new 
method on the ground that it may be superseded by another. 
Having so recently escaped from the inhumanity of a tax which 
prohibited the light and air of heaven from entering our dwellings, 
we trust that the governments of Europe will freely throw these 
precious influences into the dark abodes of their overcrowded cities, 
and that wealthy and philanthropic individuals will promote the 
same object in more limited spheres, and set the example of light- 
ing, heating, and ventilating, according to the principles of science. 
Dr Arnott has already taught us how to heat our apartments with 
coal fires, without breathing either the gases or the dust which 
they diffuse. Why should we delay to light them also without 
breathing a noxious gas, and overlaying the organs of respiration 
with the nameless poisons generated in the combustion of the 
animal and vegetable substances employed in the furnishing of our 
apartments. 
