Hence we see that any method
of cooling the air for Indians, instead of adding moisture, should
rather take it out of the air, so as to make oxygen predominate as
much as possible in the combined draught of oxygen, azote, and a
certain quantity of the vapour of water, which will always be present;
and hardly any plan could be more pernicious than the favourite though
dreaded one by those who have watched its results--of the wet mats.
Cold air--that is, air in which the thermometer actually stands at a
low reading--by reason of its density, gives us oxygen, the food of
the lungs, in a compressed and concentrated form; and men can
accordingly do much work upon it. But air which is merely cold to the
feelings--air in which the thermometer stands high, but which merely
gives us one of the external sensations of coolness--on being made by
a punkah, or any other mere blowing machine, to move rapidly over our
skin--or on being charged with watery vapour, or on being contrasted
with previous excessive heat--such air must, nevertheless, be rarefied
to the full extent indicated by the mercurial thermometer, and give
us, therefore, our supply of vital oxygen in a very diluted form, and
of a meagre, unsupporting, and unsatisfying consistence.
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