Thermal ventilation, and other sanitary improvements, applicable to public buildings, and recently adopted at the New York Hospital : a discourse, delivered at the hospital, February 8th, 1851 / by John Watson.

  • Watson, John, 1807-1863.
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Thermal ventilation, and other sanitary improvements, applicable to public buildings, and recently adopted at the New York Hospital : a discourse, delivered at the hospital, February 8th, 1851 / by John Watson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    10/42
    The Hypocaust was first employed for heating bath- ing-rooms and sudatoria, but afterwards for warming private dwellings. It was without chimney, and with- out flues for the transmission of heat to the apartments above it—at least during the combustion of fuel. Its mouth or entrance was at the outer wall, and through this the smoke escaped, as from the mouth of an oven. The heat imparted to its mass of brick and stone, was transmitted by slow conduction through the tyle or marble pavement, to the room above. In some of its more complicated forms, there were concealed flues ri- sing in the wall to the first or second story, but with no outlet at the top. In others, these flues, after the fire beneath them had ceased to glow, could be opened by the removal of a lid or cover, and thus they allowed the warm air issuing through them to enter the upper apartments. These cumbrous furnaces were, of course, subject to frequent leakage. The Emperor Julian, by a defect in one of them, and the exhalation of vapor through the walls of his chamber, was completely overpowered, and his life was only saved by speedily removing him into the open air. His successor, Jovian, is said to have been suffocated by the fumes of a furnace while sleep- ing in a close apartment. The Hypocaust, for the simple purpose of imparting heat, has for many centuries been laid aside. The focus and brazier, even in ancient times, were usually prefer- red to it. Yet it may have early served as the proto- type of the German stove, as this latter has, in turn, served as the model upon which the air-chamber was engrafted in the original dry-air furnace. The Hypo- caust, with the addition of a smoke-flue, is still retain- ed in the malt kiln—a furnace with a low room above