remains during the day. The beds part very gradually with the exhalation they have received from the sleeper during the night, and continue to vitiate all day long the air of the room, even though it had been thoroughly aired in the morning.

Six busy watchmakers do not spoil the air nearly so much as two workmen engaged in sawing wood. I would therefore advise that the workshops in manufactories, especially where much corporeal exercise is employed, should be built rather too high than too low, rather too airy than too close, and be they ever so cleanly and well situated, they should be frequently aired. It is incredible in how short a time in such cases the air of the room becomes vitiated and unfit for respiration. The miserable, sick aspect and the great mortality of the workmen in many manufactories renders further proof of my proposition superfluous.

Working with unclean wool, with oil-colours, or with things for which burning charcoal is employed, is for other reasons not innocuous. But even though the air should not be altered in its composition, it may become hurtful in another way by the mixture of something extraneous. Such is especially moisture.

Reservoirs attached to chamber-stoves, wherein the water is kept hot for domestic use, are in this respect injurious. For this reason, also, workmen who are engaged in drying wet things in highly heated rooms, cabinet-makers, turners, potters, bookbinders, &c., are very liable to swellings and other affections proceeding from relaxation of the absorbents.

A person who from an idea of extreme convenience should, notwithstanding the vicinity of a water-closet, keep a night-chair in his sleeping apartment, should bear in mind that the disgusting exhalation from it spoils the air uncommonly, and renders the bed-chamber in which we pass a third of our life (if it be not very roomy) a very unwholesome place of abode. There are, however, many houses so ill-arranged as either to have no water-closet at all, or where it is at such a distance as not to be very accessible in the night.

If this be the case, and cannot be remedied, we should have a small closet constructed of stone in the corner of some public room near the bed-chamber, which has a good opening to the outside of the house, and a well fitting door to enter at. In this place we may, under such circumstances, place the night-chair, and have it carried out afterwards, without having to fear any vitiation of the air or bad smell.

We should not permit large, thickly-leafed trees to stand close to the windows of a house. In addition to their preventing the access of daylight and of the pure air, their exhalations in the evening and at night are not very favourable to health. Trees at a distance of from ten to twelve paces from the house admit the air much more readily, and cannot be sufficiently recommended, as well on account of their beautiful appearance and their pleasant shade, as on account of the wholesomeness of their exhalations by day. If we have the choice we should have the windows of our bed-room to the east, where the view is quite free, uninterrupted by very close trees, and unpoisoned by the febrile exhalation from a marsh.

Poverty has brought many injurious habits into this world, one of the worst of which is that where persons in the lower ranks of life, especially women, sit over a vessel filled with red hot charcoal, in order thereby to save themselves the expense of a stove in winter. The closer the room is shut up in such circumstances, and the more the external air is excluded, the more dangerous and fatal is this habit, for the air inside will thereby soon become a stupifying poison.

We feel a pressive, stupifying headache, that seems to bore through both temples, at the same time we experience an inclination to vomit, which, however, is soon suppressed by a rapidly increasing comatose state, in which we sink helplessly to the ground, and generally die without convulsions.

When the person falls down the clothes are apt to catch fire from the burning charcoal, and, indeed, fires have often originated in this manner, which are all the more dangerous because it is only when they have fairly burst forth that they will be observed by strangers, seeing that the person who originates it is too stupified to be able to extinguish the first flames.

Not less dangerous to life is it to close the valve in the chimneys of stoves that are heated from within, as long as the stove continues full of glowing cinders. From motives of economy, people often like to retain heat in the room. An economy that is very ill-directed. The more glowing charcoal there is in the stove, and the tighter the valve is closed, the quicker is the air vitiated, just as it is by a brazier full of red hot charcoal standing free in the room, and there ensue accidents just as bad as those above described, and not unfrequently fatal.

The valves in the chimneys of stoves are solely intended to moderate the draught of air into the stove and the violence of the fire, or in the event of the soot in the chimney catching fire to prevent a destructive conflagration by entirely shutting the chimney. If this latter should happen, every sensible person will, as soon as he has shut the valve, at once open the doors and windows in order to remove the air of the room that has been deteriorated by the confined fire.

We should rather seek to save wood by using well constructed stoves, than, by stopping up every hole and cranny in the doors and windows, exclude every breath of air, as is done by many persons of slender and of moderate means. Such persons must be ignorant of the incalculable value of air, who paste up with paper every chink and hole, and even hang up cloths before their doors, and thus retain all the unwholesome exhalations from the pores of the skin and from the lungs in their small rooms, so as to respire, instead of life and health, disease and death. I have seen melancholy examples of this nature, and I fear that my warning will have some difficulty in penetrating to the miserable cellars they have themselves selected.

Deathly pale and spiritless, they feel an unknown poison permeating all their blood-vessels, they feel their health gradually being undermined, just as the water that runs down from their windows rots the window-frames; cachexy, dropsical swellings and pulmonary consumptions carry them off after having seen their children die around them of low, wasting diseases, which they attribute principally to teething or bewitchment, or reduced by rickets to cripples. Where is the compassionate man who will teach them something better?

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE LATE WILLIAM P. ESREY, M. D.

BY SILAS S. BROOKS, M. D.

The subject of this memoir was the oldest son of Joseph Esrey, of Maple Township, Delaware County, Pennsylvania, and was born at the residence of his father in the year 1818.

Very early in his childhood he manifested a desire to obtain knowledge, especially from books, with which he was wont to retire almost as soon as he could read; seeming to take the same delight in such a course as most other children do in active sport, and instead of appropriating his little means in the usual manner of children, would expend all he could get in the purchase of books. Yet he was social, lively, fond of company, would act his part in fun and frolic, and formed strong friendships with his associates during this period.

His early literary education was obtained at the public schools in the neighborhood, while the latter part was received at an academy in the vicinity, which was ably taught by the worthy pastor of the Presbyterian church in said township, the Rev. John M. Bear.

In the year 1841 he commenced the study of medicine with Walter Williamson, M. D., now Emeritus Professor of Clinical Medicine in the Homœopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania.

There being no homœopathic medical college at that time, he attended lectures and graduated at the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia.

His first course of lectures was in the session of 1842-3; the next in the following winter; and in 1844 he graduated.

During these two sessions of Lectures it was the lot of the author to form his acquaintance and enjoy his friendship; and he takes pleasure in testifying, that Dr. Esrey was a hard and successful student, and pleasant companion. Many hours were spent in each others, company, each rendering to the other that valuable assistance which is always in the power of fellow-students. They sympathized with each other in the anxiety which is usually experienced, as the time draws nigh for entering the "Green Box," and administered to one another in the attack of "fever" that is often suffered at this period. Frequently testing their knowledge by examinations on those points in which they feared a deficiency. And now, right well does the author remember the last time they "quizzed" each other; which was the day previous to their examination by the faculty, for their degrees.

After graduation, their views of the right mode of practice led them in such different paths that the close intercourse was interrupted for a few years; though they always entertained profound respect and friendship for each other.

Having received his degree, Dr. Esrey still remained with his preceptor, for the purpose of obtaining a more thorough knowledge of homœopathy; until the next autumn, when he went to Norristown, and commenced business for himself.

Having resided there about a year, an invitation from Dr. Williamson brought him again to Philadelphia, as an assistant to Dr. W. Here he remained nearly a year, and then opened an office on his own account in this city.

After the reception of his medical degrees, he was obliged to struggle on unaided by pecuniary means from any source but that which accrued from his practice; for though his father was abundantly able to assist him, he thought his son, like other young men, more likely to succeed when made to feel self-dependent. Here the parent acted wisely, for, to a young physician, poverty is generally one of the elements of success. This acts as a stimulus to exertion, causing him to work energetically and to some purpose; a something which must be done to ensure success in a crowded city; but a something which the affluent fondling is not likely to do.

This peculiar stimulus which the father made the son to feel had the desired effect, though it is most probable that the early fondness of Dr. Esrey for knowledge, and the zeal manifested in acquiring his profession, with the industrious and persevering habits as the father had taken care to establish in his son, would have carried him on successfully without this particular element. His sister says of him that she never knew him to fail in anything he undertook.

And we see that he did work, for he so gained the confidence of his preceptor and patients, that when he parted from Dr. Williamson, many of the patients were disposed to follow Dr. Esrey, and his preceptor encouraged them to do so. Of these he took so good care that through their influence more were soon added to their number. Some who had known him from childhood were among his first patients, and most, if not all his early patients continued with him as long as he practiced. He was in practice here about eight years, and during the last three years of that time, was very actively engaged, doing as much business as he desired, and more than his physical system justified. Indeed his success in practice was far greater than is usual in so large a city; in the short period of time allotted to his course.

He not only worked faithfully and diligently for his patients, but took time from his proper hours of rest, for continuing his literary as well as medical studies. The midnight lamps witnessed him in translating several medical works from the German into the English, and compiling others for the benefit of his fellow practitioners.

Some of these have received a place among our standard works. Among them may be mentioned the "Repertory to the Materia Medica of American Provings," a work on "Anatomy and Physiology," a translation from the German of "Caspari's Homœopathic Domestic Physician," and several smaller works and articles connected with medicine.

Here the author would take the opportunity to express his full approbation of such a course, or such a manner of spending the unemployed time of a young physician. How infinitely better than passing it in social company, seeking favor with this or that individual of influence to obtain aid in securing practice; running after the petty public offices with the vain hope that their occupancy will bring remunerative business; or resorting to the many other "claptrap" modes of seeking employment.

Let every young physician attend closely to the patients he may have, and diligently strive to maintain his own dignity and that of his profession, by ardently pursuing those studies which will enhance