Various

“ Gas stoves are made in many forms, and in a few cases can be employed with advantage; but I believe they are more expensive than a coal fire, and it is most difficult to prevent the products of combustion finding their way into the dwellings. Gas is a useful agent in the kitchen for cooking purposes, but I never remember entering a house where it was so employed without at once detecting the unpleasant smell resulting. It is rare to find any special means for carrying off the injurious fumes, and without such I am sure gas cooking stoves cannot be healthy adjuncts to our homes. ”

“ The best time is when the morning has just dawned and the dew is on the grass. One then can find an abundance, while after the sun is up and the air is hot the plants disappear; probably burst and scatter the spores in billions, which, as night comes on and passes, develop into the mature plants, when they may be found in vast numbers. It would seem from this that the life epoch of a gemiasma is one day under such circumstances, but I have known them to be present for weeks under a cover on a slide, when the slide was surrounded with a bandage wet with water, or kept in a culture box. ”

“ Physical geology is the science which deals with the past changes of the earth's crust, and the causes which have produced the present geographical features, everywhere seen about us. The subject of the present address must therefore be considered as one of geology rather than of geography, and I propose to trace for you the early history of the great Mississippi River, of which we have only a diminished remnant of the mightiest river that ever flowed over any terrestrial continent. ”

“ But it is with shame I must confess that, notwithstanding the advance which sanitary science has made, and the excellent appliances to be obtained, many a house is now built, not only by the speculative builder, but designed by professed architects, and in spite of sanitary authorities and their by-laws, which, in important particulars are far from perfect, are unhealthy, and cannot be truly called sweet homes. ”

“ There is daily a considerable amount of refuse found in every home, from the kitchen, from the fire-grate, from the sweeping of rooms, etc., and as a rule this is day after day deposited in the ash-pit, which but too often is placed close to the house, and left uncovered. If it were simply a receptacle for the ashes from the fire-grates, no harm would result, but as all kinds of organic matter are cast in and often allowed to remain for weeks to rot and putrefy, it becomes a regular pest box, and to it often may be traced sickness and death. ”

“ When the main sewers are badly constructed, and, as a result, sewer gas is generated and allowed to accumulate, ordinary precautions may be useless in preventing its entrance by some means or other to our homes, and special means and extra precautions must be adopted. But with well constructed and properly ventilated sewers, every architect and builder should be able to devise a suitable system of house drainage, which need cause no fear of danger to health. The glazed stoneware pipe, now made of any convenient size and shape, is an excellent article with which to construct house-drains. ”

“ A greater evil yet is the privy. In the country, where there is no complete system of drainage, it may be tolerated when placed at a distance from the house; but in a crowded neighborhood it is an abomination, and, unless frequently emptied and kept scrupulously clean, cannot fail to be injurious to health. Where there is no system of drainage, cesspools must at times be used, but they should be avoided as much as possible. They should never be constructed near to dwellings, and must always be well ventilated. ”

“ Then, as regards the soil; our earth has been in existence many an age, generation after generation has come and passed away, leaving behind accumulations of matter on its surface, both animal and vegetable, and although natural causes are ever at the work of purification, there is no doubt such accumulations are in many cases highly injurious to health, not only in a general way, but particularly if around, and worse still, under our dwellings. ”

“ So long as we are obliged to employ coal in its crude form for heating purposes, and are content with the waste and dirt of the open fire, we must be thankful for the cheer it gives in many a home where there are well constructed grates and flues, and make the best use we can of the undoubted ventilating power it possesses.
A constant change of air in every part of our dwellings is absolutely necessary that we may have a "sweet home," and the open fireplace with its flue materially helps to that end ”

“ Good, dry walls are of little use without good roofs, and for a comfortable house the roofs should not only be watertight and weathertight, but also, if I may use the term, heat-tight. There can be no doubt that many houses are cold and chilly, in consequence of the rapid radiation of heat through the thin roofs, if not through thin and badly constructed walls. Under both tiles and slates, but particularly under the latter, there should be some non-conducting substance, such as boarding, or felt, or pugging. Then, in cold weather heat will be retained; in hot weather it will be excluded. ”

“ By no means do I disparage a striving to attain artistic effectiveness, but to the study of the artistic, in domestic architecture at least, add a knowledge of sanitary science, and foster a habit of careful observation of causes and effects. Comfort is demanded in the home, and that cannot be secured unless dwellings are built and maintained with perfect sanitary arrangements and appliances.--The Building News. ”

“ However healthy a district is considered to be, it is never safe to leave the top soil inclosed within the walls of our houses; and in many cases the subsoil should be covered with a layer of cement concrete, and at times with asphalt on the concrete. For if the subsoil be damp, moisture will rise; if it be porous, offensive matter may percolate through. It is my belief that much of the cold dampness felt in so many houses is caused by moisture rising from the ground inclosed within the outer walls. Cellars are in many cases abominations. ”

“ It is almost impossible, at times, to detect the fault, or if detected, to make good without great injury to other work, in consequence of the difficulty there is in getting at the pipes, as they are generally embedded in plaster, etc. All gas pipes should be laid in positions where they can be easily examined, and, if necessary, repaired without much trouble. In France it is compulsory that all gas pipes be left exposed to view, except where they must of necessity pass through the thickness of a wall or floor, and it would be a great benefit if such were required in this country. ”

“ Up the cellar steps is a favorite means of entrance for sickness and death. Light and air, which are so essential for health and life, are shut out. If cellars are necessary, they should be constructed with damp proof walls and floors; light should be freely admitted; every part must be well ventilated, and, above all, no drain of any description should be taken in. If they be constructed so that water cannot find its way through either walls or floors, where is the necessity of a drain? ”

“ As, in 1802, Volta's pile was already invented, several authors have supposed an application of it in Alexandre's apparatus. "Is it not allowable to believe," exclaims one of these, "that the electric telegraph was at that time discovered?" We do not hesitate to respond in the negative. The pile had been invented for too short a time, and too little was then known of the properties of the current, to allow a man so destitute of scientific knowledge to so quickly invent all the electrical parts necessary for the synchronic operation of the two needles. ”

“ Gas has certainly proved itself a very useful and comparatively inexpensive illuminating power, but in many ways it contaminates the atmosphere, is injurious to health, and destructive to the furniture and fittings of our homes. ”

“ The conditions upon which the working of a well conceived dynamo machine must depend were next alluded to, and it was demonstrated that when losses by unnecessary wire resistance, by Foucault currents, and by induced currents in the rotating armature were avoided, as much as 90 per cent., or even more, of the power communicated to the machine was realized in the form of electric energy, and that vice versa the reconversion of electric into mechanical energy could be accomplished with similarly small loss. ”

“ It is true that many w. c. apparatus are obviously defective in construction, and any architect or builder using such is to be condemned. The old pan closet, for instance, should be banished. It is known to be defective, and yet I see it is still made, sold, and fixed, in dwelling houses, notwithstanding the fact that other closet pans far more simple and effective can be obtained at less cost. The pan of the closet should be large, and ought to retain a layer of water at the bottom, which, with the refuse, should be swept out of the pan by the rush of water from the service pipe. ”

“ The utilization of a far greater percentage of heat and the consumption of all smoke must be aimed at. It is a question if such can be accomplished by means of an open fire, and it is a difficult matter to devise a method suited in every respect to the warming of our dwellings, which at the same time is equally cheering in appearance. ”

“ It is unhealthy, because of the cold draughts which in its simplest form are produced, and the stifling atmosphere which pervades the house when the products of imperfect combustion insist, as they often do, in not ascending the flues constructed for the express purpose of carrying them off; and even when they take the desired course, they blacken and poison the external atmosphere with their presence. Some of the grates known as ventilating grates dispose of one of the evils of the ordinary open fire, by reducing the amount of cold draught caused by the rush of air up the flues. ”

“ There should be a siphon trap at the bottom of each down pipe, unless it is employed as a ventilator to the drains, and then the greatest care should be exercised to insure perfect jointings, and that the outlet be well above all windows. Eaves spouting and rain-water down pipes should be periodically examined and cleaned out. They ought to be painted inside as well as out, or else they will quickly decay, and if of iron they will rust, flake off, and become stopped.
It is impossible to have a sweet home where there is continual dampness. ”

“ Thus, by means of two machines at a moderate distance apart, nearly 80 per cent, of the power imparted to one machine could be again yielded in the mechanical form by the second, leaving out of consideration frictional losses, which latter need not be great, considering that a dynamo machine had only one moving part well balanced, and was acted upon along its entire circumference by propelling force. ”

“ Sometimes in making railway cuttings it is possible to find an adjacent buried valley through which excavations can be made without cutting hard rock. In bridge building especially, in the western country, a knowledge of the buried valleys is of the utmost importance. Again, in sinking for coal do not begin your work from the bed of a valley, unless it be of hard rock, else you may have to go through an indefinite amount of drift and gravel ”

“ If washing must be done home, the architect may do something to lessen the evil by placing the washhouse in a suitable position disconnected from the living part of the house, or by properly ventilating it and providing a well constructed boiler and furnace, and a flue for carrying off the steam. ”

“ Gas tar and sand are sometimes used, but it deteriorates and cannot be depended upon for any length of time. The damp course should invariably be placed above the level of the ground around the building, and below the ground floor joists. If a basement story is necessary, the outer walls below the ground should be either built hollow, or coated externally with some substance through which wet cannot penetrate. Above the damp course, the walls of our houses must be constructed of materials which will keep out wind and weather. ”

“ The portions of the wires that run from the glass support to the machine have sufficient elasticity and stiffness to return to their primitive position after having been brought into contact with the battery. Very near to this same glass support, on the opposite side, there descends a ball suspended from each wire, and at a sixth or a tenth of an inch beneath each ball there is placed one of the letters of the alphabet written upon small pieces of paper or other substance light enough to be attracted and raised by the electrified ball. ”