Part 4 (2/2)
In the winter of 1841-2, I visited a school in which the nitude of the evil under consideration was clearly developed Five of the citizens of the district attended me in my visit to the school We arrived at the school-house about the hteen by twenty-four feet on the ground--two feet less in one of its di calculation is made There were present forty-three scholars, the teacher, five patrons, andthe school-house, one of the trustees reht to be healthy” I made no reply, but secretly resolved that I would sacrifice my comfort for the remainder of the afternoon, and hazard my health, and my life even, to test the accuracy of the opinions I had entertained on this important subject I marked the uneasiness and dullness of all present, and especially of the patrons, who had been accustomed to breathe a purer atmosphere School continued an hour and a half, at the close of which I was invited to make some remarks I arose to do so, but was unable to proceed till I opened the outer door, and snuffed a few times the purer air without When I had partially recoveredinfluence of the current of air that entered the door,the fluid poison that filled the rooh I was standing at therestored to life After a short pause, I proceeded with a few remarks, chiefly, however, on the subject of respiration and ventilation The trustees, who had just tested their accuracy and bearing upon their comfort and health, resolved iestions in the article on school-houses in the last chapter of this work
Before leaving the house on that occasion, I was infor week, which they were obliged to dismiss before the ordinary exercises were concluded, because, as they said, ”We all got sick, and the candles went alht of life became just as nearly extinct as did the candles Had they reether, and there would have been reacted the edy of the _Black Hole_ in Calcutta, into which were thrust a garrison of one hundred and forty-six persons, one hundred and twenty-three of who suffocated by the confined air
What has been said in the preceding pages on the philosophy of respiration was first given to the public nearly ten years ago, in a report of the author's in the State of New York He has since seen the same sentiments inculcated by many of our most eminent practical educators, some of whom had written upon the subject at an earlier date
Allen and Pepy showed by experiht and a half per cent of carbonic acid, and that no continuance of the respiration of the same air could make it take up more than ten per cent Air, then, when once respired, has taken up as that it can be s
Dr Clark, in his work on Consumption, remarks as follows: ”Were I to select two circurowth of the body, norant at present, ought to be well informed, they would be the proper adaptation of food to difference of age and constitution, and the constant supply of pure air for respiration” Dr Williaiven especial attention to this subject, after quoting the preceding remark of Dr Clark, adds: ”We believe this is the opinion of all medical men who have studied the constitution of uished surgeon[14] of Leeds, England, goes so pure air than most of his contemporaries ”Be it remembered,”
says he, ”that man subsists more upon air than upon his food and drink” There is some novelty in this remark, I admit: but is it not truthful? Men have been known to live _three weeks_ without eating But exclude the ats for the space of _three enerally ensues We thus see that life will continue with abstinence fro as it is safe to protract an atmospheric fast
[14] Dr Thackrah, author of a most valuable work on the ”Effects of Eevity of Mankind”
Let us take another view of the subject Men usually eat _three times_ in twenty-four hours This is all that is necessary to, or coood health But we involuntarily breathe nearly _thirty thousand tith of time We need, then, fresh supplies of pure air ten thousand times as often as it is necessary to partake of meals Is it not apparent, then, that _man subsists more upon_ AIR _than upon his_ FOOD _and_ DRINK?
The atmosphere which we so frequently inhale, and upon which our well-being so ht of about forty-five miles The surface of the earth contains about two hundred millions of square ht hundred ives to each individual about eleven cubic miles of air But the air is breathed by the inferior animals as well as by man It is also rendered impure by combustion If by both of these causes ten times as much air is consumed as by man, there is still left one cubicdwelling upon the surface of the earth This would allow hie allotted toany portion of the atmosphere a second time And still, as if to avoid the possibility of evil to man on this account, the beneficent Creator has wisely so ordered, that while we do not interfere with the laws of Nature, there is not even the possibility of rebreathing respired air until it has been purified and restored to its natural and healthful state; for carbonic acid, the vitiating product of respiration, although immediately _fatal_ to _anietation_ When brought in contact with the upper surface of the green leaves of trees and plants, and acted upon by the direct solar rays, this gas is decomposed, and its carbon is absorbed to sustain, in part, the life of the plant, by affording it one eleen is liberated and restored to the atetables and ani kindly offices, and each flourishes upon that which is fatal to the other It is in this way that the healthful state of the atmosphere is kept up
Its equilibrium seems never to be disturbed, or, if disturbed at all, it is ie of poison for alietable worlds
This interchange of kindly offices is constantly going on all over the earth, even in the highest latitudes, and in the very depths of winter; for air which has been respired is rarefied, and, when thrown fros, _ascends_, and is thus not only out of our reach, whereby we are protected fro it a second tireat aerial current which is constantly flowing froions, where it is converted into vegetable growth The oxygen which is exhaled in the processes of tropical vegetation, heated and rarefied by the vertical rays of the sun,into a returning current, in its appointed tiher latitudes
So wisely has the Divine Author ordered these processes, that air, in its natural state[15] in any part of the world, does not contain as, although, as already stated, air which has been once respired contains _eight and a half per cent_ of this gas, which is at least seventeen times its natural quantity
[15] It would be difficult to say whether carbonic acid gas is in the atmosphere constitutionally, or accidentally, or both--_Dr Wencies than carbonic acid gas which in civic life render the atas, which is produced in various ways This, says Dr Comstock, is immediately destructive to animal life, and will not support conant water, especially in eather, and is generated by the decoetable products Dr Arnott expresses the conviction that the immediate and chief cause of many of the diseases which i a considerable portion prerave, is the poison of at fros of the deco remnants of the substances used for food and in their arts, and of the iiven out from their own bodies If you allow the sources of aerial is, he continues, you are poisoning the people; and while es of fevers and other acute diseases, the remainder will have their health impaired and their lives shortened
There are ress of an epide instance is given by the writer last quoted ”When I visited Glasgoith Mr Chadwick,” says he, ”there was described to us one vast lodging-house, in connection with a manufactory there, in which for an opening froh a channel of communication to an air-pump coether The supply of pure air obtained by that mode of ventilation was sufficient to dilute the cause of the disease, so that it becaas is also exceedingly poisonous to the lungs and to every part of the systeas is described as instantly fatal to animal life Even when diluted with fifteen hundred times its bulk of air, it has been found so poisonous as to destroy a bird in a few seconds ”This gas,” says Dr Dunglison, in his Eleiene, ”is extremely deleterious[16] When respired in a pure state it kills instantly; and its deadly agency is rapidly exerted when put in contact with any of the tissues of the body, through which it penetrates with astonishi+ng rapidity Even when mixed with a portion of air, it has proved immediately destructive Dr Paris refers to the case of a chemist of his acquaintance, as suddenly deprived of sense as he stood over a pneuas From the experiments of Dupuytren and Thenard, air that contains a thousandth part of sulphureted hydrogen kills birds i a hundredth part, and a horse in air containing a fiftieth part of it”
[16] Sulphureted hydrogen gas is the deleterious agent exhaled from privies or vaults, which have been so fatal, at tiht men, who have been elison_
The preceding are far fro all the causes of atmospheric impurity
Besides these, there are nuases, that are poisonous Soht, and about the tiht ”Hence the importance,” says a writer on health, ”to those who are feeble, of avoiding the air at all hours except when the sun is considerably above the horizon”
Although the atmosphere, in its natural state, is not at all times perfectly pure, still it is comparatively so, and especially in the daytime All, therefore, ould retain and improve their health, should inhale the open air as h they can not, like Franklin's Methusalem,[17] be always in it This ree and condition of life
[17] Dr Franklin, in his usual huravity, relates, in one of his essays, the following anecdote, for the purpose, doubtless, of showing the influence of pure air upon health, happiness, and longevity
”It is recorded of Methusaleest liver, may be supposed to have best preserved his health, that he slept always in the open air; for when he had lived five hundred years, an angel said to him, Arise, Methusalem, and build thee a house, for thou shalt live yet five hundred years longer But Methusalem answered and said, If I aer, it is not worth while to build me a house I will sleep in the air as I have been accustomed to do”