ESSAY IV.
ADVERTISEMENT
The Author thinks it his duty to explain the reasons which have induced him to change the order in which the publication of his Essays has been announced to the Public.—Being suddenly called upon to send to Edinburgh a person acquainted with the method of altering Chimney Fire-places, which has lately been carried into execution in a number of houses in London, in order to introduce these improvements in Scotland, he did not think it prudent to send any person on so important an errand without more ample instruction than could well be given verbally; and being obliged to write on the subject, he thought it best to investigate the matter thoroughly, and to publish such particular directions respecting the improvements in question as may be sufficient to enable all those, who may be desirous of adopting them, to make, or direct the necessary alterations in their Fire-places without any further assistance.
The following Letter, which the Author received from Sir John
Sinclair, Baronet, Member of Parliament, and President of the
Board of Agriculture, will explain this matter more fully:
You will hear with pleasure that your mode of altering Chimnies, so as to prevent their smoking, to save fuel, and to augment heat, has answered not only with me, but with many of my friends who have tried it; and that the Lord Provest and Magistrates of Edinburgh have voted a sum of money to defray the expences of a bricklayer, who is to be sent there for the purpose of establishing the same plan in that city. I hope that you will have the goodness to expedite your paper upon the management of Heat, that the knowledge of so useful an art may be as rapidly and as extensively diffused as possible.—With my best wishes for your success in the various important pursuits in which you are now engaged, believe me, with great truth and regard, Your faithful and obedient servant John Sinclair Whitehall, London, 9th February 1796.
CHAPTER. I.
Fire-places for burning coals, or wood, in an open chimney,
are capable of great improvement.
Smoking chimnies may in all cases be completely cured.
The immoderate size of the throats of chimnies the principal
cause of all their imperfections.
Philosophical investigation of the subject.
Remedies proposed for all the defects that have been discovered
in chimnies and their open fire-places.
These remedies applicable to chimnies destined for burning
wood, or turf, as well as those constructed for burning coals.
The plague of a smoking Chimney is proverbial; but there are many other very great defects in open Fire-places, as they are now commonly constructed in this country, and indeed throughout Europe, which, being less obvious, are seldom attended to; and there are some of them very fatal in their consequences to health; and, I am persuaded, cost the lives of thousands every year in this island.
Those cold and chilling draughts of air on one side of the body, while the other side is scorched by a Chimney Fire, which every one who reads this must often have felt, cannot but be highly detrimental to health; and in weak and delicate constitutions must often produce the most fatal effects.—I have not a doubt in my own mind that thousands die in this country every year of consumptions occasioned solely by this cause.—By a cause which might be so easily removed!—by a cause whose removal would tend to promote comfort and convenience in so many ways.
Strongly impressed as my mind is with the importance of this subject, it is not possible for me to remain silent.—The subject is too nearly connected with many of the most essential enjoyments of life not to be highly interesting to all those who feel pleasure in promoting, or in contemplating the comfort and happiness of mankind.—And without suffering myself to be deterred, either by the fear of being thought to give the subject a degree of importance to which it is not entitled, or by the apprehension of being tiresome to my readers by the prolixity of my descriptions,—I shall proceed to investigate the subject in all its parts and details with the utmost care and attention. —And first with regard to smoking Chimnies: