Lewisburg chronicle. [volume] (Lewisburg, Pa.) 1850-1859, 1853-11-18


On the other side of the water, person
who should neglect the pleasure Of breath
ing the free air for couple of hours daily,
or should shun the duty Of exercise, is
suspected of slight lunacy and ladies who
should prefer continually to devote their
leisure to the solace of luxurious cushions
rather than an exhilerating ride or walk,
are thought little titc montce. What, in
short, is looked upon as virtue there, is
only regarded as a matter Of fancy here.
Hence, an American generally shivers in
an air that is grateful and bracing to an
Englishman, and looks blue, in Paris, in
weather when the Parisians sit with the
easement windows Of their saloons wide
open. Yet it is, undoubtedly, all matter
Of habit /; and We Yankees 1--WE mean those
of US who are not forced to trough it,
with the toughest natural constitutions in
the world, nurse ourselves, as people,
into the least robust and most susceptible
physiques in existence.
SO much for the habit of exercise in the
open air. Now let us look at our mode Cf
warming and ventilating our dwellings; for
it is here that the national poison is engen-
dered, and here that the ghostly expression
is begotten.
However healthy a person may be, he
can neither look healthy, nor remain in
sound health long, if he is in the habit of
breathing impure air. As sound health
depends upon pure blood, and there car
be no pure blood in ones veins unless it
be re-puritied continually by the action of
fresh air upon it, through the agency of
the lungs (the whole purpose of breathing
being to purify and vitaiize the blood), it
follows, that if a nation Of people will,
from choice, live in badly ventilated rooms,
full Of impure air, they must become pale
and sallow in comple1ions. 1t may not
largely affect the health of the men, who
are more or less called into the open air
by their avocations, but the health of wo-
men (ergo the constitutions of children,
and all who are confined to rooms or off,
ces heated in this way, must gaadually
give way under the influence of the poison
Hence the delicacy of thousands and tens
of thousands Of the sex in America.
"And how can you satisfy me-" asks
somc blind lover of stoves, " that the air
Of i room heated by close stove is dele
terious ?" Very easily, indeed, if you
listen to a few words of reason
1t is well established that healthy man
must have about pint Of air at breath !;
that he breathes above thousand times
an hour; and that, as matter beyond dis
pute, lie requires about titty-serea hoysheais
Of air in twenty-four hours.
Besides this, it is equally well settled,
that as common air consists Of i mixture
Of two gases, one healthy, Oxygen and
the other unhealthy, (nitrogen), the air
We have once breathed, having, by passing
through the lungs, been deprived Of most
Of the healthful gas, is little less than un-
mixed poison (nitrogen).
Now, room, warmed by an open fire.
place Or CRATE, is necessarily more or less
ventilated, by the very process Of comtus-
tion going on; becausej as a good deal of
the air of the room goes up the chimney,
besides the smoke and vapor of the fire, a
corresponding am cunt of fresh air coming
in at the windows and door creyices to
supply its place. The room, in other
words, is tolerably we'll supplied with fresh
air for breathing.
But let US take the case Of a room Lea-
ted by stove: The chimney is stopped
up, 70 begin with. The room is shut up.
The windows are made pretty tight to keep
out the cold and as there is very little air
carried out of the room BY the store-pipe,
the stove is perhaps on the air-tight prir-
cple, that is, it requires tho minimum
amount) there is little fresh air coming in
through the crevices to supply any vacuum.
Suppose the room holds 800 hogsheads of
air If single person requires 81 hogs
heads Of fresh air per day, it would last
four persons but about twenty four hours.
and the stove would require half as much
more. But as a man renders noxious as
much again air as he expires from his
lungs, it actually happens that in four or
five hours all tie air in this room has been
either breathed over, or is so mized with
impure air which he's been breathed over,
that it is all thoroughly poisoned, and unfit
for healthful respiration. A person with
his senses unbluntcd, has only to go into
an ordinary unventilated room, heated by
stove, to perceive at once, by the effect
on the lungs, how dead, stiaed aud desti-
tute of all elasticity the air is.
And this is the air which four-ffths Of
our countrymen and countrywomen breathe
in their homes-not from necessity, but