Star.
London, England, 1831-06-03 00:00:00

'LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.

r,'


Jawing added four additional columns to our paper, we
hope in future to be able, in general, to devote one of them
to topics of Literature and Lime. We think it may be
practicable to gratify the prevailing taste on such subjects,
as much as in Politics and Social Economy—and we there-
fore invite the reciprocal attentions of Men of Literature
and Science, Authors and Inventors—to this department of
the STAR, which will be conducted with such spirit and
liberality as to command public notice.
Effects of Me Principal Aria. Trades, and Professions,
and of Clic Civic Stales, and Habits of Living, on Heals
and Letwevity.—By C. Tonere TIIACKRAH.
(From the Mcdico.Chirurgical Raview.)
Dr. Thackrah asks two questions—do the fifty
thousand men employed in the manufactories of
Leeds enjoy that vigour of body which is ever a
direct good, and without which all other advantages
are worthless ? Do they live as long as the ng,ri-
culturists ? The unhappy appearance of the popu-
lation affords an unequivocal reply to the first
question. The bills of mortality answer in the ne-
gative to the second. For the convenience of en-
quiry, our author divides the inhabitants of Leeds
into four classes—the operatives, dealers, master-
manufacturers and merchants, professional men.
Dr. T. commences with those operatives that live a
good deal in the open air, and who " come nearest
the perfection of the physical state."
At the head of this list stand the butchers.
These are much in the open air, take active exer-
cise, and eat fresh animal food nt least twice a day.
They are plump and rosy—cheerful and good-na-
tured—nor does their bloody occupation render
them savage, as theorists pretend, or as the English
law presumes. They live in easier circumstances
than most other operatives, for meat is always in
requisition, whether the times be good or bad.
They are subject to few ailments, and those
chiefly from plethora. It is very rare to see
any of them phthisical. Yet they are not re-
markable for longevity, they are rather even shorter
lived than people less healthy. In fact, they live
too well to live very long.
Fishmongers, who bring fish from the coast, are
much exposed to the weather, and are generally
temperate, hardy, and healthy. Not so the town
retailers of fish. They are addicted to dram-drink-
ing, and are sickly and short-lived.
Cart-drivers, labourers in husbandry, sand-
dealers, bricklayers, and such people, would be
healthy, if they were well fed ; but this, unfor to-
nately, is not the case. The bricklayers, though
so much exposed to wet and cold, are seldom af-
fected by rheumatism, catarrhs, or pneumonia.
Chaise drivers and postillions would be very
healthy, did they not drink so much spirit. Postil-
lions, indeed, from their postures, exercise some
parts of the body more than others, and are liable,
for obvious reasons, to curvatures of the spine.
The atmospheric vicissitudes to which all drivers are ex-
posed, are thought to produce rheumatism and inflammation
ter the lungs. I conceive, however, that these diseases would
rarely occur to abstemious mar. It is intemperance which
gives the susceptibility to such maladies ; and it is intempe-
rance which produces much greater, the fatal affections
which we have just mentioned. I scarcely need add, that
the whole class is short lived. They generally die before
they reach the age of fifty. Among all the Leeds men, we
could only find three individuals who are old, and two of
these have the chancier of great temperance.
Passing over some subordinate class of operatives
we come to those who carry on their avocations in
confined and impure air. The air of Leeds is nearly
as much impregnated with carbon as the air of
London. This state of atmosphere affects the
inhabitants. Their complexion is pallid —" and
the tongue skews that digestion is disordered and
imperfect." Doctor T. thinks that not a tenth
part of the inhabitants of Leeds enjoy full
full health. The lungs suffer much less from the
sooty atmosphere than might be expected. Tai-
lors, from their accumulation in crowded rooms,
and the want of air and exercise, are very un-
healthy. Disorders of the stomach and bowels aro
general, and often obstinate. Pulmonary con-
sumption is also frequent. We see no plump and
rosy tailors—none of fine form and strong muscle.
The spine is generally curved. We are rather
surprised at this—for the muscles of the spine are
more worked than any other muscles of the body,
except those of the right arm. The tailor, like
other men whose physical energies are depressed,
seeks the baneful comfort of ale and ardent
The following suggestion, we fear, will not
adopted:
The position of the tailor might be amended. Ile now
a cross-legged on a board, because in the ordinary sitting
posture he could not hold r. heavy piece of cloth high enough
for ' eyes to direct his needle. Let a hole be made in the
of the circumference of his body, and place his seat
i it. The eyes and the hands will then be sufficiently
this work ; his spine will nut be unnaturally bent, and
.4 chest and abdomen will be free. I am aware that old
workmen will he unwilling to regard this or similar sugges-
tions ; for every man is formed to his habit*. If, however,
masters and medical men would urfe an alteration; and if,
especially, buys apprenticed to the trade, were taught to
work in the posture recommended, tailors would assuredly
become much more healthy. The practice of drinking might
be easily reduced, if masters discharged front their cm.
every man who absented a day without proper cause."
re must pass over numerous description of work-
, only selecting a class here and there. We
that curriers and leather-dressers are generally
healthy and long-lived, though subject to the
posture in the process of shaving. This af-
the head. The smell of the leather is not

Jrious. Compositors are not healthy. The
standing posture, Dr. T. observes, injures the diges-
tive organs. Consumption is frequent among
them ; and we seldom can find any who have at-
tained 50 years of age.
Smiths have an employment remarkably conducive to
muscular power. The use of the large hammer powerfully
excites all the muscles, and especially those of the arms,
throwing on them a large supply of blood, and consequently
producing their enlargement. Fwettio» like this, moreover,
has a considerable effect on the circulation in general, and
the functions with which it is connected. For youths of
strong constitution, no labour is better than that of the
smith. For those, however, naturally delicate, the exertion
is too great, and young men of scrofulous constitution ;sr.
particularly liable to sink under the employ. Smiths arc
subjected to high temperature, and frequent changes of tem.
perature, but with no obvious injury. They are rarely af-
fected with rheumatism and catarrh. The employ subjects
inoyancc of smoke, and to excitement from
heated iron. But our examination of the
neighbourhood does not prove them subject
nor does it show that vision is impaired
excitement of the retina. IVhen smiths are ill, the
—* frequently intemperance. 1 hey do not, how.
great age. We could hear but of one
town of Leeds.
rants, from confinement in a smoky
Adorn healthy. Girls from the country
their ruddy complexion, and suffer more
,ativcrpf the town.
hoe considerable muscular exertion,
sitting or kneeling posture, and with
to a very acute angle.
in an unusual atmosphere, and with

artificial light exposed to changes of air, and often'
to wet feet. Sometimes the perspiration is exces-
sive. They are generally spare men, with curved
spines and bowed legs. The skin, of course, is
loaded with dirt ; and when this is removed, the
complexion appears sallow and unhealthy. Their
eyes appear small, affected with chronic inflamma-
tion, and intolerant of light. Colliers are subject
to disorders of the head, muscular pains, rheuma-
tism, and asthma.

The author next comes to those employments
which produce dust, odour, or gaseous exhalations.
He divides these into three classes—namely, where
the above substances are not apparently noxious—
, where they appear to be beneficial—and where they
are decidedly injurious.
1. In the first class he places workers in wool
and leather, butchers, provision-dealers, cooks,
starch-makers, rectifiers of spirit, bricklayers, plas-
terers, white-washers, wool-sorters, turners, tobac-
conists, snuff-makers, &c. &c. All these are ex-
posed to extraneous substances, tangible or gase-
ous, dispersed through the atmospheres which they
breathe, but without any appreciable bad conse-
quences to their health. We shall introduce the
following note on smoking and snuff taking, as a
specimen of our author's manner.
• It is amusing to read the opinions on the use of tobacco,
held a century or two ago by some eminent physicians.—
Bonetus quotes from Augustinus Thuncrus, that a certain
court physician, not contented with smoking in the day,
would have a lamp with wax candles and pipes suspended to
his bed. Dying a year after, and his head being opened.
" yes stupends !" the whole brain was so dried, that it
scarcely exceeded the magnitude of a nut. Pauvius men-
tions the dissection of i robust and healthy young man,
whose brbin was tinged with black smut. Ile accounted rot
the fact, when he found the man had been a confirmed to.
bacco smoker. Mention is made of a military ollicer, aged
seventy-three, who had been addicted Co tobacco front child-
hood. fie smoked and chewed incessantly. Or dissection
Krantrius found adherent to the cranium much of a dense
substance, resembling chimney soot in appearance as well us
taste. All the mischief was attributed to the tobacco. Du-
netus, Diemerbtoeck, and others, thought it necessary to
counteract this opinion by the relation of a number of nega-
tive cases, as amusin; in their details as those I have quoted.
" We are often asked, if the use of tobacco is injurious ?
Viewing the question in the abstract, we should answer, yes.
To a person in full health, nothing is required but puns air,
food, and drink ; every thing else is superfluous, and conse-
r.ner.ily oppressive to the constitution A narcoie substance
must be more than oppressive, because it makes a direct at-
tack
on the nervous system. It affects the stomach and the
brain: Bat viewing man as the creature of civilisation, sub-
jected how ly to excitement foreign to his suture, and injuri-
ous to his health, narcotics, by allaying nervous excitability,
may,iii contain circumstances and constitutions, be really
useful. We would nor, therefore, deprive the !smoker of I.is
consolation, but we would keep the practice from excess.—
We would guard especially egainst the unnecessary potation
to which the practice so frequently leads. Drinking is a
great and positive evil ; smoki.ig last best but a slight good.
If the two must be associated, banish them as decidedly ini-
mical to health and reason. Eatoking can never be proper
before the middle period of life. For young men to parade
the streets in the evening, with cigars in their mouths, is
either affectation, (use:nettling worse.
The use of tobacco, in fact, is like the use of
wine or other stimulant. It is only in excess that
the injury lies. In some countries too, where ma-
laria, excessive cold, or inordinate moisture pre-
vails, tobacco, we believe, is positively useful. It
is in such countries and localities that we see the
cigar most in use—and we should not always de-
spise vulgar habits and customs.—They have gene-
rally a basis in utility.
We now proceed to those employments where
extraneous admixtures in the atmosphere are sup-
posed to be beneficial. The following sentiment
contains good sense.
"To assert the existence of such an effect may seem a
contradiction to the statement before made, that whatever
alters the natural constitution of the atmosphere, must be
proportionately injurious. But shook' be renumbered
that injurious agents sometimes counteract each other. Me-
dicine is in itself an evil. Remedies often induce unnatu-
ral states, but these states supersede others much more sc-
rious and permanent. To • man In a perfect healthy eon.
dition, no substance arising from manufacture can be use.
iul ,
but men living in a huge town, and with the habits of
civil life, are gererally unhealthy ; and hence certain sat'
p- urs or other substances may be decidedly beneficial in ex-
citing their languid powers, or correcting the disposition to
disease."

Grooms and 'metiers daily inhale a large quantity
of amnioniacal gas generated in the stables.
" This appears beneficial rather than injurious."
" Glue and size boilers are exposed to strong putrid and
ammonia& exhalations from the decomposition of animal
refuse. The stench of the boiling and drying rooms is In.
deed well known to be highly offensive, even to the nelll-
- Yet the men declare it agrees well with thew—
nay, many assert that on entering this employ, they expe-
rienced a great increase of appetite and health. All the
glue and size boilers we saw, were remarkably fresh.looking
and robust. Though exposed to frequent and considerable
changes of temperature, to sudden changes also from al at.
mosphere of hot vapour to the dry cold air, they are not sub-
ject to rheumatism, pulmonary inflammation, or catarrh.
The only complaints we could hear of, were occasional
pains in the loins and limbs, attributable to posture anti
exertion.

Tallow chandlers, who are exposed to an offen-
sive animal odour enjoy good health, and attain
a considerable age. It was remarked that, dur-
ing the plague in London, this class of men suf-
fered much less than others.

Tanners, it is well known, are subject to disa-
greeable odours. They work in an atmosphere
largely impregnated with the vapour of putrifying,
skins; and this, combined with the smell of lime
in one place, and of tan in another. They arc
exposed constantly to wet and cold. Their fee,
are scarcely ever dry.
" Yet they are remarkably robust; the countenance flo-
rid; and disease almost unknown. Tanners are said to
exempt from consumption ; and the subject has of late lwer
repeatedly discussed in one of the medical societies of Lou.
don. We have carefully inquired at several tan yards, and
could not bear of a single example of this formidable dis.
' ease. We do not find old men actually in the employ; and
the reason assigned is, not the decline of health, but the in-
feriority of men past middle age, in undergoing the lnhour
of the process. Persons, however, in advanced life, yet heal.
thy are found In other occupations, who have before been Iv
many years in the tan yards, and have not apparently suf.
feted from the long continued exposure to their oCensive
odour. Hence we may infer that this employ, while it in.
vigorates the constitution in youth and middle age, does not
sensibly shorten life; dues nor, in other words, give tempo-
rary health at the expense of premature decline.
" Ramazzini tells us that at Padua the tan yards were
remitted only in the suburbs. Here also, as the stench
would be considered a nuisance, tan yards are at the out.
skirts. As a matter of medical police, however, we sec no
occasion for their exclusion from the town."

The third class includes those employments
which are actually deleterious to health—and un-
fortunately they are numerous.
Corn millers ale placed first on the list by the
author. They breathe an atmosphere loaded with
the particles of flour, and suffer considerably. The
mills indeed are exposed to the air—the men are
not crowded—and the labour is good. Yet millers
are generally pale and sickly, with defective ap-
petites and indigestion. Many of them are an-
noyed by morning cough and expectoration, and
some are asthmatic at an early period of life. The
average quantity of air thrown out at expiration,
among ten men that were examined, was seven
pints. The evils of the employ, the author thinks,

might be much diminished by labour in the open
air; but in this as in other employments, the men
are very careless of their health. They think no-
thing about injurious agents till their health is de-
stroyed. Malsters appear still worse off than the
millers.

" Workers in flax, from their number and the effect of
their employ, deserve particular attention. In the flex mills.
all the departments, with the exception of the spinning and
reeling, ranee dust. The roving rooms have a little, and
the dry-house has a varying quantity. The carding-roans
are also dusty; but the worst department is certainly the
heckling. This, in some mills, is carried on by hand, and
in such the rooms are greatly clouded.—ln other mills,
where the process is effected by machinery, the quantity of
dust is considerably less. Still, however. It is such that a
visitor cannot remain many minutes without being sensible
of Its effects on respiration. Children and a few overlookers
are here the operatives; but in the old mode, I believe, men
only are employed. Though attention is generally paid.to
ventilation, and the rooms for the several departments are
spacious, they arc not sufficiently lofty. A suffocating sen-
sation is also often produced by the tubes which convey
steam for heating the rooms. Persons in the dusty depart.
meats are generally unhealthy. They are subject to indi-
gestion, morning vomiting, chronic inflammation of the
bronchial membrane, inflammation of the lungs, and pulmo-
nary consumption. The dust, largely inhaled in respiration,
irritates the air-tube, produces at length organic disease of
its membrane, or of the lungs themselves, and often ex-
cites the developement of tubercles in constitutions predis-
posed to consumption. There is little doubt that a consi-
derable quantity is also swallowed with the saliva, and de-
ranges, in a greater or less degree, the functions of the
stomach."

Very few old persons are found in any depart-
ments of the flax-mills. Of 1079 persons em-
ployed in one large establishment, only nine could
be found above the age of fifty years.
We must now pass over a great portion of the
work., since the subjects are so multifarious as to
render it impossible to preserve any thing like a
chain of analysis. There are some observations,
however, on the effects of long-continued beat,
alternated with cold, which are deserving of notice.
" In refuence to catarrh in general, I might urge, were it
pan of my subject, that this disorder is often prevalent when
the atmosphere is comparatively mild, and where there have
been no great variations of temperature. I might also urge
the fact of bedridden persons being attacked with catarrh,
when no change his been made in the temperature or venti-
lation of their rooms. I might also repeat the general re.
mark, made in a former page, that those persons who take
most care to avoid atmortpherie transitions, are not least, and
are often indeed most, liable to catarrh and bronchitis;
while those, on the contrary. who expose themselves most
freely, are least and most rarely effected.

" The inhabitants of this country are brought up from
childhood in the fear of taking cold. It is the bugbear of
our youth; it haunts us through life. Few hare any dis-
tinct ideas of the nature of this frigorific agency; few have
fairly examined their experience; and few indeed are aware
of the fallacies of experience ; scarcely any hare made either
direct experiment or close observation. Yet all speak with
derision on the subject. Hence workmen when interro-
gated on the effect of change of temperature in producing
coughs and catarrhs, commonly reply from their prejudices,
rather than their Observation. 'We must take cold; we
are always in heats and cools.' But on cross-questioning I
them, 1 have not been able to satisfy myself, that men sub-
jected to the greatest changes, are especially liable to Ca-
malts and bronchial inflammation. We do not hear more
coughs in the foundries, dry-houses, or press shops, than in
other places. The men, it is clear, are not particularly sub-
jai to consumption ; and if the heat or transitions of their
employ frequently excite bronchial inflammation, a pa.
thoisealwia . t would surely expect the prevalence of that fatal
d:e"

Nothing can be more true than that constant and
regular exposure to atmospheric vicissitudes is the
only preservative against their effects. The more
quickly repeated these vicissitudes are, the less
danger there is from them. It is where the inter-
vals between the vicissitudes are long, and the vi-
cissitude great in range, as in Italy and many other
countries; and the detriment is considerable, be-
cause the alternations of temperature are not rapid
enough to accustom the human machine to their
occurrence.
Our author next proceeds to the second great
class, beginning with a very numerous one, shop-
keepers and dealers, who live a sedentary life, but
are not particularly prone to disease. The want
of pure air is the chief cause of their ailments.
Commercial travellers have great advantage in this
respect ; but they destroy their constitution by in-
temperance.

Merchants and manufacturers. These, as far as
Leeds is concerned, spend most of their time in the
counting-house or the mill, subject not only to im-
pure air, but occasionally to dust and effluvium
from the manufacture. These evils are occasion-
ally diminished by sleeping in the country, or at a
distance from the manufactory or warehouse ; but
generally these people keep near to the seat of their
business—eat their meals in a hurried manner, as
if they every moment expect to be summoned by a
stage coach driver—and take but little exercise in
the open air. Other mercantile men, though they
spend more time at their meals, are engaged in
close thought; so that they taste neither their food
nor their drink. The nervous energy required by
the stomach for digestion, is abstracted by the
mind. They think when they ought to eat. The
animal operations are sacrificed to calculation, spe-
culation, and commercial arrangement. The state
of the bowels is also neglected, and foundation for
serious disease laid.

' But of all agents of disease and decay, the most impor.
tent is anxiety of mind. When we walk the streets of large
commercial towns, we most be struck with the hurried gait
and care-worn features of the well.dressed passengers. Some
young men indeed we may remark, with countenances pos-
sessing neural cheerfulness and colour, but these appearances
rarely survive the age of manhood. Curies closes an do.
quent description of animal existence and change, with the
conclusion that " Life is in a state of force." What he
would urge in a physical view, we may mote strongly urge
its a moral. Civilisation has changed our character of mind
as well sea body.-- We live in a state of unnatural ex-
citement; unnatural, because it is partial, irregular, and ex.
moire. Our muscles waste for want of action ; our nervous
system la worn out by excess of action. Vital energy is
drawn from the operations for which Nature designed it, and
devoted to operations which Nature never contemplated.
Though we can scarcely adopt the doctrine of a foreign phi.
losepher, that a thinking man is a depraved animal," we
may without hesitation of rut, that inordinate application of
mind, the cares, anxieties, and disappointments of eommer
dal life, impair the physical powers and induce premature de.
cay. The various disorders knows under the name of indi-
gestion, disorders dependent on a want of circulation
of blood through the bowels, many derangements, coasdpa
don, and head-ache' are well known to be the general at-
tendants on trade, closely pursued. Indeed, in almost
every individual, this absorbing principle produces one or
other of the various maladies to which I have alluded.
More marked is the effect, when anxiety is added. This
greatly reduces the functions of the stomach; it produces
flatulency, and often diarrhea; it sometimes affects even
the kidneys; it almost always, when long-continued, pro-
duces permanent disease of the liver. Cancer of the
stomach, moreover, and other malignant diseases, occur
care most frequently among the victims of mental depression and
:

Our author makes many judicious observations
on professional men and their avocations. Clergy-
men have alternations of study and exercise in the
open air; but the latter is often on a very confined
scale, their avocations preventing them from parti-
cipating in sports or amusements.

PANORAMA OF THE BRITISH
EMPIRE.

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papa, has justified preference; but we reasonably expect
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