large noble opening, that rather than change it, they would submit to have damaged furniture, sore eyes, and skins almost smoked to bacon.

3. Another cause of smoky chimneys is too short a funnel. This happens necessarily in some cases, as where a chimney is required in a low building; for, if the funnel be raised high above the roof, in order to strengthen its draft, it is then in danger of being blown down, and crushing the roof in its fall.

Remedies. Contract the opening of the chimney, so as to oblige all the entering air to pass through or very near the fire; whereby it will be more heated and rarefied, the funnel itself be more warmed, and its contents have more of what may be called the force of levity, so as to rise strongly, and maintain a good draft at the opening.

Or you may in some cases, to advantage, build additional stories over the low building, which will support a high funnel.

If the low building be used as a kitchen, and a contraction of the opening therefore inconvenient, a large one being necessary, at least when there are great dinners, for the free management of so many cooking utensils; in such case, I would advise the building of two more funnels joining to the first, and having three moderate openings, one to each funnel, instead of one large one. When there is occasion to use but one, the other two may be kept shut by sliding plates, hereafter to be described; and two or all of them may be used together when wanted. This will indeed be an expense, but not a useless one, since your cooks will work with more comfort, see better than in a smoky kitchen what they are about, your victuals will be

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See Notes at the end of the letter, No. II.

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cleaner dressed, and not taste of smoke, as is often the case; and, to render the effect more certain, a stack of three funnels may be safely built higher above the roof than a single funnel.

The case of too short a funnel is more general than would be imagined, and often found where one would not expect it. For it is not uncommon, in ill contrived buildings, instead of having a funnel for each room or fireplace, to bend and turn the funnel of an upper room so as to make it enter the side of another funnel that comes from below. By this means the upper room funnel is made short of course, since its length can only be reckoned from the place where it enters the lower room funnel; and that funnel is also shortened by all the distance between the entrance of the second funnel and the top of the stack; for all that part being readily supplied with air through the second funnel, adds no strength to the draft, especially as that air is cold when there is no fire in the second chimney. The only easy remedy here is, to keep the opening shut of that funnel in which there is no fire.

4. Another very common cause of the smoking of chimneys is their overpowering one another. For instance, if there be two chimneys in one large room, and you make fires in both of them, the doors and windows close shut, you will find that the greater and stronger fire shall overpower the weaker, and draw air down its funnel to supply its own demand; which air descending in the weaker funnel, will drive down its smoke, and force it into the room. If, instead of being in one room, the two chimneys are in two different rooms, communicating by a door, the case is the same whenever that door is open. In a very tight house, I have known a kitchen chimney on the lowest floor, when it had a great fire in it, overpower any other chimney

in the house, and draw air and smoke into its room, as often as the door was opened communicating with the staircase.

Remedy. Take care that every room has the means of supplying itself from without, with the air its chimney may require, so that no one of them may be obliged to borrow from another, nor under the necessity of lending. A variety of these means have been already described.

5. Another cause of smoking is, when the tops of chimneys are commanded by higher buildings, or by a hill, so that the wind, blowing over such eminences, falls like water over a dam, sometimes almost perpendicularly on the tops of the chimneys that lie in its way, and beats down the smoke contained in them.

Remedy. That commonly applied to this case is a turncap made of tin or plate iron, covering the chimney above and on three sides, open on one side, turning on a spindle, and which, being guided or governed by a vane, always presents its back to the current. This, I believe, may be generally effectual, though not certain, as there may be cases in which it will not succeed. Raising your funnels, if practicable, so as their tops may be higher, or at least equal with the commanding eminence, is more to be depended on. But the turning cap, being easier and cheaper, should first be tried. If obliged to build in such a situation, I would choose to place my doors on the side next the hill, and the backs of my chimneys on the furthest side; for then the column of air falling over the eminence, and of course pressing on that below and forcing it to enter the doors, or Was-ist-dases on that side, would tend to balance the pressure down the chimneys, and leave the funnels more free in the exercise of their functions.

6. There is another case of command, the reverse

of that last mentioned. It is where thé commanding eminence is farther from the wind than the chimney commanded. To explain this a figure may be necessary. Suppose then a building whose side A happens to be exposed to the wind, and forms a kind of dam against its progress. (Plate, Fig. 3.) The air, obstructed by this dam, will, like water, press and search for passages through it; and finding the top of the chimney B, below the top of the dam, it will force itself down that funnel, in order to get through by some door or window open on the other side of the building. And if there be a fire in such chimney, its smoke is of course beat down, and fills the room.

Remedy. I know of but one, which is to raise such funnel higher than the roof, supporting it, if necessary, by iron bars. For a turncap in this case has no effect, the dammed up air pressing down through it in whatever position the wind may have placed its opening.

I know a city in which many houses are rendered smoky by this operation. For their kitchens being built behind, and connected by a passage with the houses, and the tops of the kitchen chimneys lower than the top of the houses, the whole side of a street, when the wind blows against its back, forms such a dam as above described; and the wind, so obstructed, forces down those kitchen chimneys (especially when they have but weak fires in them) to pass through the passage and house into the street. Kitchen chimneys, so formed and situated, have another inconvenience. In summer, if you open your upper room windows for air, a light breeze blowing over your kitchen chimney towards the house, though not strong enough to force down its smoke, as aforesaid, is sufficient to waft it into your windows, and fill the rooms with it; which, besides the disagreeableness, damages your furniture.

7. Chimneys, otherwise drawing well, are sometimes made to smoke by the improper and inconvenient situation of a door. When the door and chimney are on the same side of the room, as in the figure, if the door A, being in the corner, is made to open against the wall, (Plate, Fig. 4,) which is common, as being there, when open, more out of the way, it follows, that, when the door is only opened in part, a current of air rushing in, passes along the wall into and across the opening of the chimney B, and flirts some of the smoke out into the room. This happens more certainly when the door is shutting, for then the force of the current is augmented, and becomes very inconvenient to those who, warming themselves by the fire, happen to sit in its way.

The remedies are obvious and easy. Either put an intervening screen from the wall round great part of the fireplace; or, which is perhaps preferable, shift the hinges of your door, so as it may open the other way, and, when open, throw the air along the other wall.

8. A room, that has no fire in its chimney, is sometimes filled with smoke, which is received at the top of its funnel, and descends into the room. In a former paper * I have already explained the descending currents of air in cold funnels; it may not be amiss, however, to repeat here, that funnels without fires have an effect, according to their degree of coldness or warmth, on the air that happens to be contained in them. The surrounding atmosphere is frequently changing its temperature; but stacks of funnels, covered from winds. and sun by the house that contains them, retain a more equal temperature. If, after a warm season, the outward air suddenly grows cold, the empty warm funnels

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* See Notes at the end of the letter, No. II.

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