SMOKE ABATEMENT.

BY

ERNEST HART,

CHAIRMAN OF COUNCIL OF THE NATIONAL SMOKE ABATEMENT INSTITUTION, AND OF THE NATIONAL HEALTH SOCIETY.

VOL. III.-H. L.

N

JULY 21ST, 1884.

A LECTURE ON SMOKE ABATEMENT.

By ERNEST HART,

Chairman of Council of the Smoke Abatement Institution, and of the National Health Society; Member of the Executive Council of the International Health Exhibition.

Sir FREDERICK POLLOCK, Bart., in the chair.

THE CHAIRMAN, in introducing the lecturer, said the subject of smoke abatement was one of very great importance, and one to which Mr. Ernest Hart had devoted a great deal of time and attention. By the ability and energy which he had shown in initiating and directing the work of the Smoke Abatement Committee, he had done a great deal towards reducing the nuisance of smoke in London. However, still more remained to be done; activity on the question was going on on the part of the Smoke Abatement Institution, into which that Committee was now transformed, and the desirable thing now was to diffuse all the information possible, to point out the best remedies and to induce the public to adopt them. With a view to extending knowledge upon this subject, Mr. Hart had been good enough to come this evening in order to give any assistance that he might be able.

MR. ERNEST HART: There are so many sides upon which the question of smoke abatement may be considered, and there is so much to be said both from an historic point

of view and from the point of view of present action, that it is impossible that I should treat all parts of the theme in the short half hour to which these lectures are in mercy to their audiences usually confined. I shall not therefore to-day say much upon one aspect of the subject on which it is, however, extremely and essentially necessary that there should be some public enlightenment, I mean the subject of combustion generally, but I shall refer to the present and past position of smoke abatement as an administrative and legislative, rather than as a purely scientific movement. I have some hopes that other members of the Smoke Abatement Institution, specially well qualified to deal with the scientific part of the question, such as Professor Chandler Roberts, or Captain Douglas Galton, will, at a later date, deal with the technical side of the question.

The question is not a new one in this country, but has a history extending back nearly 600 years. We find that in the year 1306, when coal had come into considerable demand in London, Parliament complained of the injurious effects to health and property arising from the use of coal, and the king adopted an effectual means of checking the evils arising from smoke, for he absolutely prohibited the use of coal. Later on, in the reign of Elizabeth, a motion was introduced into Parliament to prohibit the use of coal on account of the noxious vapours and smoke arising from it, which were considered very prejudicial to the health, especially of persons who were unaccustomed to it.

From this time the minds of public and scientific men were occasionally exercised in protesting against the evils of smoke production and in devising suitable means for its abatement. But it will only be necessary to allude to Sir Hugh Platt in 1594, to Evelyn's eloquent protest in his Fumifugium in 1661, to Benjamin Franklin's efforts in 1745, to those of James Watt in 1795, and Count Rumford in the first decade of the present century, in their well-sustained warfare against smoke and its attendant evils. In 1819 the national importance of the smoke question was admitted in a very practical way by the appointment of a

Select Committee of the House of Commons, "to inquire how far persons using steam engines and furnaces could erect them in a manner less prejudicial to public health and comfort." The Committee reported that " so far as they had hitherto proceeded they confidently hope that the nuisance, so universally and so justly complained of, may at least be considerably diminished, if not altogether removed." In 1843, another Select Committee "inquired into the means and expediency of preventing the nuisance of smoke arising from fires or furnaces." The list of witnesses examined by the Committee comprised the honoured name of Faraday, and, as their Report points out, "they received the most gratifying assurances of the confident hope entertained by several of the highest scientific authorities examined by them that the same black smoke proceeding from fires and private dwellings, and all other places, may eventually be entirely prevented." They concluded by recommending "that a Bill should be brought into Parliament to prohibit the production of smoke from furnaces and steam engines." In May 1845 yet another Select Committee of the House reported "that in the present state of knowledge and experience upon the subject, it is not desirable to extend the provisions of an Act beyond furnaces used for the generation of steam."

In August 1845, Sir Henry de la Beche and Dr. Lyon Playfair reported to Lord Canning "that it cannot for a moment be questioned that the continued emission of smoke is an unnecessary consequence of the combustion of fuel, and that, as an abstract statement, it can be dispensed with." They added, however, "it is useless to expect, in the present state of our knowledge, that any law can be practically applied to the fireplaces of common houses, which, in a large town like London, contribute very materially to the pollution of the atmosphere."

It was not, however, till 1880 that a substantial attempt was made, by the National Health Society at my instance and with the co-operation of Miss Octavia Hill on behalf of the Kyrle Society to organise public opinion and scientific