The Daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1845-1850, 1850-09-14
why Epidemics Rage at Night.

1t was one night that four thousand persisted in the
plague OF London of 1865. 1t was at night that the
army OF Sennacherlb destroyed. Both in Eng
land and on the continent large proportion of cho-
era cases In Its several forms have been observed
to have occurred between one and two o'clock in the
morning The 'danger of exposure to the night air.
has been a theme ofphysicans from time immemori
al but 1t is remarkable that they have never vet
called IN the aid of chemistry to account for the fact
IL Is at night that the streams of air nearest the
ground must always be the most charged with the
PARTICLES Of animaIized matter given out from the
skin, and deleterous gases, such as carbonic acid
gas, the product of respiration, and sulphureted hy-
drogen, the product of the sewers
In the day, gases and vaporous substances of all
kinds rise in the air by the ratification of heat at
night when the rarefacton leaves them they fall by
an increase oil gravity, if mperfectly mixed with the
atmosphere while the gases evolved during the night
instead OF ASCENDING remain at nearly the same level
1t Is known that carbonc acid gas at low tempera-
ture, partakes rly of the nature of fluid that
1t may he poured out of one vessel into another it
rises at the temperature at which it is exhaled from
the lungs, but It's tendency is towards the floor or the
bed OF the sleeper, in cold and unventiated rooms
AT Hamburg, the alarm of cholera at night. in
some parts OF the city so great, that on some
occasions many refused to 20 to bed lest they should
be attacked unawares in their Sleep Sitting up
they probably kept their stoves OF open fires burning
Tor the sake OF warmth, and that warmth giving the
expansion to any deleterious gases present, which
would best promote their escape and promote their
dlutlon In the atmosphere, the means ofsafety were
thus unconscously assured. AT Sierra Leone the ma
tives have practice in the sickly season. of keep
ing fires constantly burning in their hhts at night as
signing that the fires keep away the evil spirits, to
which, in their ignorance, they attribute fever and
ague. Latterly, Europeans have begun to adopt the
same practice, and those who have tried it, assert
that they have entire immunity from the tropical
levers to which they were formerly subject
In the epdemics ofthe middle ages, fires used to
be lighted in the streets for the publication othe air
and In the plague of London of 1865, fires in the
streets were at time burning necessarily, till ex
ngushed by violent storm ofrain Lattefly trains
OF gunpowder have been fired and cannon discharged,
for the same object. But it is obvious that these
measures, although sound in principle, must neces-
sarIy, out of doors, be too small scale as mea-
sured against an ocean of atmospheric air, to produce
any sensible effect Within doors, however the case
Is different. 1t is quite possible to produce heat in
room to produce ratification and consequent diluton
of any malignant gases it may contain and it is of
course the air ofthe room, and that alone at night,
which comes into immediate contact with the lungs
OF person asleep Westminister Reuiew.