and with this the fire is fed, while the hotter impure air remains almost stagnant above, around the heads and mouths of the company. To remove the evil here referred to, I have shown, that even with an open fire, if the throat of the chimney be properly narrowed by a register flap, an opening made near the cieling into the chimney flue, with a valve in it to allow air from the room to enter the chimney, but allowing no smoke to come out—will serve very effectually; and that where there is no open fire the ventilation can, by the means described, be made still more complete.
The great error with respect to warming in rooms for many inmates has been to have all the heat radiating (none being given off by contact) from one focus or fire place, persons near to which consequently must receive too much, and those far from which will receive too little; while the supply of fresh air enters, cold, at a few openings chiefly, and pours dangerously on persons sitting near these. In common rooms, with open fires, the evils described may be lessened considerably by admitting fresh air through tubes or channels which open either near the fire, or all along the skirtings so that the fresh air is equally distributed over the room and mixed with the mass of air previously in it: but to have what is desirable, the air before distribution must be warmed by some of the simple means now known, as of warm channels in the brick work around the fire, or of the air being made to come into contact with the surface of properly regulated stoves, or tubes containing heated water. I have given detailed accounts of these means in the publication above referred to; and I have contrived and described various regulators applicable to stoves and to the furnaces of hot-water apparatus, which give complete
command over the rate of combustion, and save nearly all the ordinary trouble of watching fires.
Then, to give complete efficiency to both the warming and ventilating apparatus described, I have had made a simple air-mover, or ventilating pump, which may be worked by a weight, like a kitchen jack, or by a treddle, like a spinning-wheel or turning-lathe; and which, in all states of wind and of temperature, will deliver by measure any quantity of air into or out of any inclosed space.
The means of ventilating and of warming now referred to, may in different cases be adopted in part or in whole. In the dwellings of the poor of cities, where the same room serves for all purposes,—working at a trade, sleeping, cooking, and is never unoccupied, a brick taken out of the wall, from near the cieling, over the fireplace, so as to leave there an opening into the chimney-flue, removes great part of the evil; and if a simple chimney-valve, which I have described, allowing air freely to enter the chimney, but no smoke to return, be added, and there be an additional opening made in some convenient part of the wall or window to admit and distribute fresh air, where air enough cannot enter by the crevices and joints about the door and window, the arrangement might be deemed for such places complete. Even in a milliner’s or tailor’s crowded work room a larger opening of this kind into the chimney, with its balanced valve, and with a branching tube having inverted funnel mouths over the gas lamps, or other lights, and conveying all the burned air to the valved opening [287]
in the chimney, is so great an improvement on present practice, that many would deem it perfection. To this, however, may be added, at little cost, an opening for admitting, and channels behind the skirting for distributing, the fresh air; and to make the thing really complete, there must be also the means, by a stove or by hot water pipes, of warming the air before its distribution; and there must be the ventilating pump to inject and measure air when such action may be required. During the winter, in many cases the chimney draught would be sufficient to produce the desired currents of air without the pump.
All the means here spoken of have already been and are in satisfactory operation in various places. The chimney-valves have been made by Mr. Slater, gas-fitter, 23, Denmark Street, Soho, and Mr. Edwards, 20, Poland Street, Oxford Street. The pump by Mr. Bowles, 58, Great Coram Street, and Mr. Williams, 25, Upper Cleveland Street. The stoves by Mr. Edwards, Poland Street, Messrs. Bramah and Co. Piccadilly, Messrs. Bailey, Holborn, and others.
I am, my dear sir,
yours very truly,
N. ARNOTT.
charles whittingham, chiswick.