[162]. Chaptal’s Elem. of Chem. vol. iii.
[163]. On Lazarettos, p. 25.
[164]. See Burns’s Ecclesiastical Law. Tit. Burial. Watson’s Clergyman’s Law—Gibson—Lindwood.
[165]. A popular fallacy has long existed upon this point, and it certainly receives a sanction from the usages of antiquity. At Athens those who died in debt had no right to human burial, until satisfaction was made; their bodies belonged to their creditors, whence it is said that Cimon had no other method to redeem the body of his father Miltiades, but by taking his debts and fetters upon himself.—Potter’s Antiq.
[166]. The peculiar gas to which this destructive quality is owing, is generally Sulphuretted Hydrogen, sometimes existing in combination with Ammonia (Hydro-Sulphuret of Ammonia). M. Dupuytren has also shewn that the Plomb is sometimes occasioned by Nitrogen gas. Hallé in his work entitled “Recherches sur le Mephitisme des Fosses d’Aisances” has proposed various methods for securing the nightmen from the dreadful effects of this gas, as by ventilation and fumigation. M. Dupuytren, however, has satisfactorily proved that Chlorine, by decomposing it, is its true antidote, by which Hydro-Choloric acid (Muriatic,) is produced, and Sulphur deposited.
In some cases the Sulphuretted Hydrogen has accumulated to such an extent, that explosions have occurred in privies on the introduction of a light. We have heard that dreadful ones have happened in the Fosses d’Aisances in the Rue St. Antoine, and in those of Gross Caillou, and Petit Bourbon; and very lately in that of the House of Correction at Clermont-oise, in which many lives were lost. A similar accident has happened in London; we copy the following paragraph from the Morning Advertiser of Friday Feb. 5, 1819.—“Singular Explosion,—A few evenings ago, at the Two Brewers Tavern, Redcross-street, Southwark, a person took a candle into the privy, and laid it upon the seat, the air confined underneath caught fire from the candle, and immediately exploded, the seat was forced up, and the person was burned considerably, but not dangerously.”
[167]. The writings of Portal, Gériel, Laborie, Parmentier, Alibert, Dupuytren, Cadet de Vaux, and Hallé, contain ample illustrations of this subject. The reader is also particularly directed to an Essay by Dr. Gerand, entitled “Essai sur la suppression des Fosses d’Aisances. Paris, 1786.” See also Dictionnaire de Police—Art. “Latrine.”
[168]. In the year 1809 a decree was passed in Paris, containing numerous rules to be observed in the future construction of privies, and which fixed upon the householder a very heavy expense. In 1819 the French King issued a Royal Ordinance relative to this subject; it contains thirty-four clauses or articles, thirty of which revive in their full strictness, all the statutes by which housekeepers are compelled to undertake most expensive and troublesome building, or repairs of privies. To relieve them, however, from vexatious costs, the 31st article was framed upon the recommendation of the Privy Council, and which liberates those from the obligation, who shall substitute their old privies by a new apparatus invented by M. Cazeneuve, entitled Messrs. Fauche-Borel’s Patent Moveable Inodorous Conveniences, of whose advantages almost all the learned Societies of Europe have reported most favourably. We have noticed this decree in order to shew our reader what a degree of importance the French Government attaches to the subject. And upon this occasion it is impossible to withhold the expression of those feelings of national pride and exultation which the contemplation of this subject must afford us; we have in our metropolis no less than 200,000 privies, of which 10,000 only are water closets. In Paris the number does not exceed 70,000, and yet with all the cumbrous enactments which that government has passed for their regulation, how far inferior they are in cleanliness, and how far greater are the effects of their effluvia, when compared with similar establishments in our city. The truth is, that the most elaborate system of medical police will never be so effective as the spirit of cleanliness which is so characteristic of this great and free people; and in this truth, so forcibly illustrated by the subject under discussion, we are to seek for the real explanation of that fact which has been so frequently commented upon by medical writers—The apparent indifference of our government to the subject of Public Health.
[169]. See Calis on Sewers.
[170]. Dr. Ratcliffe being asked the difference between a contagious and epidemic disease, attempted to explain it by the following illustration: “If you and I are exposed to the rain we shall both get wet, but it does not follow that we shall wet one another.”