(Vol. ix., p. 415.)
"Airs from heaven or blasts from hell."
The mistake which, it is very respectfully submitted, the professed
ventilationists fall into, and which may be considered the _fons et origo
malorum_, is the notion that foul air rises upwards, and that pure air
comes from below; which is just the reverse of the fact.
In any room containing animals or vegetables, the air undergoes a change by
respiration.
Leaving the vegetables to care for themselves, and considering the animals,
if such a title may be reverently given to members of the House and others
shut up in confined apartments for the benefit of their species, it is
obvious that the pure air of heaven must undergo a change by the
respiratory organs of the members, which change is absolutely necessary to
preserve their lives, and each such apartment is a manufactory for
converting pure into foul air. Its steam-power is seated in the lungs,
which, at each inspiration, take up the oxygen (the principle of life and
flame) of the air, and at each expiration give out the carbon of the blood,
conveyed by the veins from all parts of the body as refuse, and when purged
therefrom by oxygen inspired, convert the venous blood into arterial, and
bring life out of death.
What, then, becomes of the expired carbon? The professional ventilationists
say it _ascends_, and they provide mechanically, but not scientifically,
accordingly. On the contrary, it finally _descends_; and this is the reason
why our beds are always a few feet above the floor. If proof is needed, it
may be found by applying a candle to the door, slightly ajar, of a room
occupied by a few persons, when it will be found that the flame of the
candle will point, when held at the lower part of the door, outwards, and
at the upper part of the door inwards, showing how the currents of air
pass; and as every one knows carbon to be heavier than air, the lower
current is the one charged with carbon. The _Grotto del Cane_ derives its
name from the fact, that a dog passing the stream of carbon issuing from
the fissure in the rock, dies; whilst a man walking erect, with his mouth
above the stream of carbon, escapes. Our lime-kilns furnish a common
example of the fact of the density of carbon compared with atmospheric air.
Experiments in proof are constantly exhibited in chemical lectures.
The practical inference, _experto crede_, is that holes in the
skirting-boards should be made so as to draw off the foul air, whilst the
angelic visits of pure air should be sought from above. Bellows, such as
are used in diving-bells, with hot or cold air, might be necessary in an
extreme case--long debates in the Commons, for example,--which may require
extraordinary ventilation.