of the shafts, or so near the shaft, that the chimney might communicate with the top of the shaft, all air being excluded but what should pass up or down by the shaft, a constant change of air would, by this means, be produced in the passages below, tending to secure the workmen from those damps, which so frequently incommode them. For the fresh air would be almost always going down the open shaft, to go up the chimney, or down the chimney, to go up the shaft. Let me add one observation more, which is, that, if that part of the funnel of a chimney, which appears above the roof of a house, be pretty long, and have three of its sides. exposed to the heat of the sun successively, viz. when he is in the east, in the south, and in the west, while the north side is sheltered by the building from the cool northerly winds; such a chimney will often be so heated by the sun, as to continue the draft strongly upwards, through the whole twenty-four hours, and often for many days together. If the outside of such a chimney be painted black, the effect will be still greater, and the current stronger.

No. III.

It is said the northern Chinese have a method of warming their ground floors, which is ingenious. Those floors are made of tiles, a foot square and two inches thick, their corners being supported by bricks set on end, that are a foot long and four inches square; the tiles, too, join into each other, by ridges and hollows along their sides. This forms a hollow under the whole floor, which on one side, of the house has an opening into the air, where a fire is made, and it has a funnel rising from the other side to carry off the smoke. The fuel is a sulphurous pitcoal, the smell of which in the room is thus avoided, while the floor, and of course the

room is well warmed. But, as the underside of the floor must grow foul with soot, and a thick coat of soot prevents much of the direct application of the hot air to the tiles, I conceive that burning the smoke, by obliging it to descend through red coals, would in this construction be very advantageous, as more heat would be given by the flame than by the smoke, and the floor being thereby kept free from soot would be more heated with less fire. For this purpose I would propose erecting the funnel close to the grate, so as to have only an iron plate between the fire and the funnel, through which plate, the air in the funnel being heated, it will be sure to draw well, and force the smoke to descend, as in Plate XIV. Fig. 9, where A is the funnel or chimney, B the grate on which the fire is placed, C one of the apertures through which the descending smoke is drawn into the channel D of figure 10, along which channel it is conveyed by a circuitous route, as designated by the arrows, until it arrives at the small aperture E, through which it enters the funnel F. G, in both figures, is the iron plate against which the fire is made, which, being heated thereby, will rarefy the air in that part of the funnel, and cause the smoke to ascend rapidly. The flame thus dividing from the grate to the right and left, and turning in passages, disposed, as in figure 10, so as that every part of the floor may be visited by it before it enters the funnel F, by the two passages EE, very little of the heat will be lost, and a winter room thus rendered very comfortable.

No. IV.

Page 513. Few can imagine, &c. It is said the Icelanders have very little fuel, chiefly drift wood that comes upon their coast. To receive more advantage from its heat, they make their doors low, and have a

stage round the room above the door, like a gallery, wherein the women can sit and work, the men read or write, &c. The roof being tight, the warm air is confined by it and kept from rising higher and escaping; and the cold air, which enters the house when the door is opened, cannot rise above the level of the top of the door, because it is heavier than the warm air above the door, and so those in the gallery are not incommoded by it. Some of our too lofty rooms might have a stage so constructed as to make a temporary gallery above, for the winter, to be taken away in summer. Sedentary people would find much comfort there in cold weather.

No. V.

Page 532. Where they have the art of managing it, &c. In some houses of the lower people among the northern nations of Europe, and among the poorer sort of Germans in Pennsylvania, I have observed this construction, which appears very advantageous. (Plate, Fig. 11.) A is the kitchen with its chimney; B, an iron stove in the stove room. In a corner of the chimney is a hole through the back into the stove, to put in fuel, and another hole above it to let the smoke of the stove come back into the chimney. As soon as the cooking is over, the brands in the kitchen chimney are put through the hole to supply the stove, so that there is seldom more than one fire burning at a time. In the floor over the stove room is a small trap door, to let the warm air rise occasionally into the chamber. Thus the whole house is warmed at little expense of wood, and the stove room kept constantly warm; so that in the coldest winter nights, they can work late, and find the room still comfortable when they rise to work early. An English farmer in America, who makes great fires

in large open chimneys, needs the constant employment of one man to cut and haul wood for supplying them; and the draft of cold air to them is so strong, that the heels of his family are frozen, while they are scorching their faces, and the room is never warm, so that little sedentary work can be done by them in winter. The difference in this article alone of economy shall, in a course of years, enable the German to buy out the Englishman, and take possession of his plantation.

Miscellaneous Observations.

Chimneys, whose funnels go up in the north wall of a house, and are exposed to the north winds, are not so apt to draw well as those in a south wall; because, when rendered cold by those winds, they draw downwards.

Chimneys, enclosed in the body of a house, are better than those whose funnels are exposed in cold walls.

Chimneys in stacks are apt to draw better than separate funnels, because the funnels, that have constant fires in them, warm the others, in some degree, that have none.

One of the funnels, in a house I once occupied, had a particular funnel joined to the south side of the stack, so that three of its sides were exposed to the sun in the course of the day, viz. (Plate, Fig. 12,) the east side E during the morning, the south side S in the middle part of the day, and the west side W during the afternoon, while its north side was sheltered by the stack from the cold winds. This funnel, which came from the ground floor, and had a considerable height above the roof, was constantly in a strong drawing state day and night, winter and summer.

Blacking of funnels, exposed to the sun, would probably make them draw still stronger.

VOL. VI.

TT

In Paris I saw a fireplace so ingeniously contrived as to serve conveniently two rooms, a bedchamber and a study. The funnel over the fire was round. The fireplace was of cast iron (Plate, Fig. 13,) having an upright back A, and two horizontal semicircular plates B C, the whole so ordered as to turn on the pivots DE. The plate B always stopped that part of the round funnel that was next to the room without fire, while the other half of the funnel over the fire was always open. By this means a servant in the morning could make a fire on the hearth C, then in the study, without disturbing the master by going into his chamber; and the master, when he rose, could, with a touch of his foot, turn the chimney on its pivots, and bring the fire into his chamber, keep it there as long as he wanted it, and turn it again, when he went out, into his study. The room which had no fire in it was also warmed by the heat coming through the back plate, and spreading in the room, as it could not go up the chimney.