“In the description of Britain prefixed to Holinshed’s ‘Chronicles,’ we are told that formerly, before chimneys were common in mean houses, ‘each man made his fire against a reredosse in the hall, where he dined and dressed his meat.’”
The original word would appear to be dosel or rere-dosel; for Kelham, in his “Norman Dictionary,” explains the word doser or dosel to signify a hanging or canopy of silk, silver, or gold work, under which kings or great personages sit; also the back of a chair of state (the word being probably a derivative of the Latin dorsum, the back. Dos, in slang, means a bed, a “dossing crib” being a sleeping-place, and has clearly the same origin). A rere-dos or rere-dosel would thus appear to have been a screen placed behind anything. I am told, that in the old houses in the north of England, erections at the back of the fire may, to this day, occasionally be seen, with an aperture behind for the insertion of plates, and such other things as may require warming.
A correspondent says there is “a ‘reredos,’ or open fire-hearth, now to be seen in the extensive and beautiful ruins of the Abbey of St. Agatha, in the North Riding of Yorkshire. The ivy now hangs over and partially conceals this reredos; but its form is tolerably perfect, and the stones are still coloured by the action of the fire, which was extinguished, I need hardly say, by the cold water thrown on such places by Henry VIII.”
[58] It has been notorious for many years, that flowers will not bloom in any natural luxuriance, and that fruit will not properly ripen, in the heart of the city. Whilst this is an unquestionable fact, it is also a fact, that greatly as suburban dwellings have increased, and truly as London may be said to have “gone into the country,” the greater quantity of the large, excellent, unfailing, and cheap supply of the fruits and vegetables in the London “green” markets are grown within a circle of from ten to twelve miles from St. Paul’s. In the course of my inquiries (in the series of letters on Labour and the Poor in the Morning Chronicle) into the supply, &c., to the “green markets” of the metropolis, I was told by an experienced market-gardener, who had friends and connections in several of the suburbs, that he fancied, and others in the trade were of the same opinion, that no gardening could be anything but a failure if attempted within “where the fogs went.” My informant explained to me that the fogs, so peculiar to London, did not usually extend beyond three or four miles from the heart of the city. He was satisfied, he said, that within half a mile or so of this reach of fog the gardener’s labours might be crowned with success. He knew nothing of any scientific reason for his opinion, but as far as a purely London fog extended (without regard to any mist pervading the whole country as well as the neighbourhood of the capital), he thought it was the boundary within which there could be no proper growth of fruit or flowers. That the London fog has its limits as regards the manifestation of its greatest density, there can be no doubt. My informant was frequently asked, when on his way home, by omnibus drivers and others whom he knew, and met on their way to town a few miles from it: “How’s the fog, sir? How far?”
The extent of the London fog, then, if the information I have cited be correct, may be considered as indicating that portion of the metropolis where the population, and consequently the smoke, is the thickest, and within which agricultural and horticultural labours cannot meet with success. “The nuisance of a November fog in London,” Mr. Booth stated to the Smoke Committee, “is most assuredly increased by the smoke of the town, arising from furnaces and private fires. It is vapour saturated with particles of carbon which causes all that uneasiness and pain in the lungs, and the uneasy sensations which we experience in our heads. I have no doubt of the density of these fogs arising from this carbonaceous matter.”
The loss from the impossibility of promoting vegetation in the district most subjected to the fog is nothing, as the whole ground is already occupied for the thousand purposes of a great commercial city. The matter is, however, highly curious, as a result of the London smoke.
Concerning the frequency of fogs in the district of the immediate neighbourhood of the metropolis, it is stated in Weale’s “London,” that fogs “appear to be owing, 1st, to the presence of the river; and, 2ndly, to the fact that the superior temperature of the town produces results precisely similar to those we find to occur upon rivers and lakes. The cold damp currents of the atmosphere, which cannot act upon the air of the country districts, owing to the equality of their specific gravity, when they encounter the warmer and lighter strata over the town, displace the latter, intermixing with it and condensing the moisture. Fogs thus are often to be observed in London, whilst the surrounding country is entirely free from them. The peculiar colour of the London fogs appears to be owing to the fact that, during their prevalence, the ascent of the coal smoke is impeded, and that it is thus mixed with the condensed moisture of the atmosphere. As is well known, they are often so dense as to require the gas to be lighted in midday, and they cover the town with a most dingy and depressing pall. They also frequently exhibit the peculiarity of increasing density after their first formation, which appears to be owing to the descent of fresh currents of cold air towards the lighter regions of the atmosphere.
“They do not occur when the wind is in a dry quarter, as for instance when it is in the east; notwithstanding that there may be very considerable difference in the temperature of the air and of the water or the ground. The peculiar odour which attends the London fogs has not yet been satisfactorily explained; although the uniformity of its recurrence, and its very marked character, would appear to challenge elaborate examination.”
[59] The quantity of soot deposited depends greatly on the length, draught, and irregular surface of the chimney. The kitchen flue yields by far the most soot for an equal quantity of coals burnt, because it is of greater length. The quantity above cited is the average yield from the several chimneys of a house. It will be seen hereafter that the quantity collected is only 800,000 bushels; a great proportion of the chimneys of the poor being seldom swept, and some cleansed by themselves.
[60] Soot of coal is said, by Dr. Ure, in his admirable Dictionary of Arts and Manufactures, to contain “sulphate and carbonate of ammonia along with bituminous matter.”