The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1866-10-30
OUR EBEDRGOTlS.

construction of private DWELLINGS,
founded on the mischierous supposition
that almost ary place Is good enough to
sIeep in. 1t is common everywhere to set
anart the smallest rooms in the house for
sIeeping-apartments. TO show what ru-
inous mistake this is, let the reader remem-
Der that at least one-third of mans eXlS-
tence is spent in bed, in sleep. Eight
hours out of every twenty-four we are IN
our chambers. And when it is considered
that air is essential to heath, that without
it we cannot live two minutes, 1t must be
Of material importance whether we breathe
q pure or an impure cir for third or our
existence. A full sized man breathes, takes
into his lungs at each breath, about pint
of air:whiIe in there, all the lite-nutrlment
is extracted from it; and on It's being sent
out of the body, it is so entirely destitute
of life giving power, that if rebreathed into
the lungs again, without the admiXture Of
any pure air, the individual would satto-
cate, would die in sixty seconds. As a
man breathes about eighteen times IN a
minute, and pint at each breath, lie con
sumes over two hogSheads Of air every
hour or about sixteen hogsheads during
the eight hours of sleep. That Is, if man
were put in a room which would hold SIX
teen hog5heaAs of air, he would, during
eight hours sleep, extract from 1t every
atom of life nutriment and would die at
the end of eight hours, even if each breath
could be kept to itself, provided no air
came into the room from without. But
when it is remembered that, however pure
the air of the whole room may have been
at first, it becomes contaminated by the
first expiration, hence on Y the first lnSpl-
ration is pure, and each one thereafter be
comes more and more impure, unless there
be some ventiIating process going on.
Every individual has, in his own expe-
rience, demonstrative proof Of the impurty
of the air of a room in which person has
slept all night, by the "closeness' he has
observed on entering a sleeping apartment
after a mornings walk; and this even when
more or less fresh air has been coming IN
through the crevices about the doors and
windows during the whole night. The
most eminent physiologiSts at home and
abroad have estimated that no sleeping
apartment, even for a single person, should
have a floor surface Of less than what would
equal twelve feet long and Twelve feet
broad, or one hundred and forty four square
feet, and eight or ten feet high, or about
twelve or fifteen hundred square feet to
every sleeper. But the sleeping apart
ments Of many hotels, the "state-rooms" OF.
packet-ships and steamships, do not aver
AGE one-third of that cubic space to each
sleeper. The state-rcom Of steamer is
ordinarily eight feet long, seven broad, and
seven high, and even these are adapted for
two sleepers.
As, therefore, each outbreath vitiates the
whole air Of room, as a drop Of ink will
discolor the whole bulk of water in a tum-
bIer the sleeping-chamber8 for the mem
bers of families should not only be large
and commodious, but should be so arranged
that a system of ventilation-at least to a
small extent-shall be going on all the
time. In any case there should be a fire
place in each room-for by this means a
draft will be made by the cold air coming
in at the bottom of the doors and from
other places, passing over the floor toward
the open fireplace, driving the heavy car
bonic acid GAS before it up the chimney.
If a neglect of these things were invari-
ably followed by death before morning,
attention to them would be compelled. But
although the de'eterious effects do not thus
speedily and impressiveIy follow, they to
inevitably result to all persons, uuder all
coming on slowly, it IS true,
hut none the less surely and disastrousIy.
TO show what little taint in the atmos-
phere, not natural to it, may affect the
whole system, it is only necessary to state
an observed fact-that a man who sleeps
near poppy-feId, with the wind blowing
toward him from the field, viii die before
the morning. A canary bird in its cage
hung to the ceiling Of curtained bed
where there were two sIeepers, was found
dead in the morning, Professor Carpen-
ter, the great physiologist, ascertained that
an atmosphere containing six per cent. of
carbonic acid gas would produce immediate
death, and that less than half that amount
would prove fatal in a short time. But
every expiration of a sleeper brings out
with it some portion of carbonic acid gas
and disperses it through the room; ant j
six per cent, of carbonie acid gas will cause
speedy death, the effects of breathing i
nightly, even in very small quantities, fo
twenty or thirty years, cannot be other
wise than pernicious to the whole system
must lower the standard ofhuman health
and materially shorten life.
But rot only is the air in a close room
thus constantly being impregnated will
carbonic acid gas to the amount Of abou
twenty-einht cubic inches per minute fo