A handbook of house sanitation : for the use of all persons seeking a healthy home ; a reprint of those portions of Mr. Bailey-Denton's lectures on sanitary engineering given before the school of military engineering, Chatham, which related to the "dwelling."

  • Denton, J. Bailey (John Bailey), 1814-1893.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A handbook of house sanitation : for the use of all persons seeking a healthy home ; a reprint of those portions of Mr. Bailey-Denton's lectures on sanitary engineering given before the school of military engineering, Chatham, which related to the "dwelling.". Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

    15/254 (page 3)
    cent, of saturation in the driest, to complete saturation in the dampest air, and which may therefore be considered, though varying in quantity, to be almost a normal constituent, the foreign matters to which I have before referred, and which impart to the air those impurities which vitiate its normal condition, are—(i) the gases which rise in the shape of ammonia from organic matters, as decay and putrefaction take place; (2) those acids or gases which emanate from inorganic matters in their natural state, or when brought into use by man; and (3) mechanically suspended impurities, i.e., those substances consisting of particles of the soil or dust, the pollen and seeds of plants, decaying tissue, &c,, which float in the air, are of minute size, and may be partially seen by the eye in any ray of light. It is these suspended and floating particles that have been shown by Professor Tyndall to reflect and scatter light itself The amount of watery vapour which in this country is con- sidered most congenial to health, is from 65 to 75 per cent, of saturation. [More than this checks evaporation from the body, while less causes too great evaporation, parching the mouth and drying the skin. It has been noted that in certain places, remarkable as health resorts, the degree of saturation is singularly uniform.—Meymott Tidy.] IV. Of Counteracting Agencies.—These deteriorating foreign materials, however, are counterbalanced by natural agencies, winds and currents, diffusion, oxidation, and the very powerful influences of vegetation. Beyond these, there is the action of that substance known as ozone. This valuable element is described by Dr. deChaumont as a modification of oxygen with which more than the usual number of atoms are brought together. Ozone, he says oxidizes _ (burns, in fact) organic matter in great rapidity, much more rapidly, in fact, than ordinary oxygen. In this way it may be considered the great scavenger of the air. Dr. Cornelius Fox describes the sources of ozone to be the oxidation of metals, the decomposition of rocks, the germination of seeds, the growth of plants, the falling of dew, rain, hail, and snow, the collison _ between air currents of diiferent degrees of humidity proceeding from opposite quarters with one another, or with the the earth; the evaporation which is continually proceeding from saline fluids, such as oceans, seas, and lakes; the dashing and splashing, the smashing and crashing of the restless waves on the rocky coast; which, he says, are all concerned in the simultaneous development of electricity and ozone. This description expresses not only the sources of ozone, but includes, in fact, the several agencies which counteract air pollution. [More ozone is found at high than at low levels.—Mey mo ft Tidy.] B 2