The Brookhaven ledger. (Brookhaven, Miss.) 1875-1883, 1882-07-13
POLLUTED AIR.
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X ( fals9
POLLUTED AIR.
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Fresh, pure air for breathing stands
IN the front rank Of the conditions Of
lite and health. And, unfortunately.
this condition Is the one most frequent
y and most fatally violated by all caasses
Of society. Food, drink and exercise
are required only at intervals, and may.
m case Of need, be dispensed with for
days together; but breathing must be
constant, through every minute Of life.
BY night and day. Loaded though It
be with dust and dirt, with foul and
deadly gases, with miasma and germs Of
disease, the afr must be received into
the lungs. Volumes have been written
TO prove and enforce the truth TINT pure
air is life and health, and that foul air is
disease and death but still we sin, and
suffer for our sin, against this truth.
Let u be known that no yschool-room
occupied, as is now the custom, by the
Whole school, during all the school
hours. can be sufficiently ventilated to
mako It entirely healthful. Let any
|plcslSloeist Do asksd % make the COM
putation Of the mir needed, and he must
confirm this statement. From the mo-
ment the children are assembled the'air
of the school-room begins to deterio-
rate and, since no system of ventila-
tion sweeps the whole body of impure
air out at once, the best it can do is to
keep the mixture from becoming as bad
as possible.
The first rule should be to use the
minimum Of confinement for each pupil.
The second should be to keep the fewest
possible seated at their studies in the
same room. Every pupil that can be
trusted to study his lesson elsewhere
should be advised to visit the school
room at lesson times only; and, instead
of the foolish ambition to keep every
seat filed, let it be sought to have as
many vacant seats as may be possible
without remitting any of the teaching.
It is not, however, in crowded parlors,
club-rooms, lecture halls and schools
alone that impure air is to be feared.
In all houses bad air can be found.
Dust and moldy damp haunt the rooms
reserved for special occasions, while
those in daily use are saturated with
the breath, smoke, steam and gases
from all the household life and work.
And frequently the source of corruption
is found i'll the very soil which the house
covers. This is especially the case with
those houses built in our prairie towns,
where, without removing foot Of the
soil, or opening foot Of drainage, the
house is set upon few low posts, and
then boarded around to prevent the cold
winds getting under the floor. In the
winter it is not uncommon to bank it
with straw or even with barn-yard litter.
The half-decayed mass beneath, in the
dark and damp, unvisited by sun or
wind, generates poisonous gases, which
are sucked up through every crevice in
the foor,. aud fill the house with their
lcatllful influence. Such houses are
,death-traps. I have known mono than
one family to pine, and even perish, in
such dwelling.
Half Of the i!l-health OF women over
that Of men must be charged to the in
door life which forbids them the life.
giving influence Of heavens free, pure
air and sunshine.
Our houses want more Window.
larger chimncys, more transoms, more
CRATE fires in winter, and less poisonous
furnaces. It is to the stoves within our
own bodies, fed by abundance of fresh
air, that we must look for healthfulest
heat, and not 60 much to the stoves
whose porous iron plates offer SO little
resistance to tie deadly carbonic-aeid
sas. We make our houses comfortable
at the expense of their healthfulness
when We shut out Gods sunshine and
pure air. Better, in this respect, the
wind-searched hovel of the poor man
silan the padded homes of luxury and
wealth.
Especially should our sleeping-room.
,e made larger, and be better ventilated.
2etter the opcn window and the night
t, # e,- fnc.be'lv .lreadnd. tho" III
aIow poisoning which the bad air gives,
md which leaves the rleeper to awake
weak and unrefreshed by his slumbers.
No more serious mistake Is made in our
house building than that Of the small
bed-chambers. Sanitary science says
hat these apartments should be the
largest, sunniest and airiest Of all in the
louse. Let them never be on the ground
iioor, and let the bed he rolled at night
into the middle Of the room, 30 that the
air may. move freely around the sleepers.
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