The Philosophy of Health; Volume 2 (of 2): or, an exposition of the physical and mental constitution of manSmith, Southwood
Science
The Philosophy of Health; Volume 2 (of 2): or, an exposition of the physical and mental constitution of man
Smith, Southwood
Hygiene; Physiology
882. It has been further shown (469) that, together with the carbonic
acid, which passes off in the inspired air, there is always present a
quantity of aqueous vapour. This aqueous vapour is not visible at the
ordinary temperature of the air in its ordinary hygrometric state,
because the water is then dissolved in the air, and is carried off
in the form of invisible vapour; but it becomes abundantly manifest
at a low temperature, or when the air is loaded with moisture. By
the removal of this aqueous vapour, the lungs assist the skin in the
depuration of the blood. The water transpired by the lungs, like that
perspired through the skin, is separated from the blood by a true
and proper secretion constituting the pulmonary transudation. It is
commonly estimated that the lungs exhale about one-third as much as
the skin, or fifteen ounces daily. Dalton estimates it at twenty-four
ounces.
883. These estimates of the quantity of fluid lost by cutaneous
and pulmonary transpiration relate to the quantities lost at the
ordinary external temperatures in which the human body is placed. The
quantity lost when the body is exposed to an elevated temperature is
prodigiously increased. It did not occur to the physiologists, whose
experiments have been detailed (492, _et seq._), to ascertain this
by causing themselves to be accurately weighed immediately before
they entered their heated chamber and immediately after they left it.
Having heard that the loss daily sustained by the workmen employed in
gas-works is very extraordinary, I endeavoured to ascertain the amount
of it with exactness. This I have been enabled to accomplish by the
assistance of Mr. Monro, the manager of the Phœnix Gas Works, and of
Mr. Cooper. The following are the experiments by which this has been
ascertained.
EXPERIMENT I.—November 18, 1836, at the Phœnix Gas Works, Bankside,
London.
884. Eight of the workmen regularly employed at this establishment in
drawing and charging the retorts and in making up the fires, which
labour they perform twice every day, commonly for the space of one
hour, were accurately weighed in their clothes immediately before they
began and after they had finished their work. On this occasion they
continued at their work exactly three-quarters of an hour. In the
interval between the first and second weighing, the men were allowed
to partake of no solid or liquid, nor to part with either. The day was
bright and clear, with much wind. The men worked in the open air, the
temperature of which was 60° Farh. The barometer 29° 25´ to 29° 4´.
Weight of the Men Weight of the Men Loss.
before they began after they had
their work. finished their work.
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