Excerpt from Minutes of the Committee of Council on Education, Vol. 2: With Appendices; 1846

Often ampler means are not provi ed, through a dread of running into the expensive experiments which have been tried with various efi'ectin a number of schools under my inspection. But I am convinced that much of the excess of such expense, and its experimental character, equally arise from a confusion of the ele ments upon which self-acting ventilation and warming depend the former upon the unequal wei ht of two different columns of air, acting as through an inverted syphon, and the latter upon simple radiation -for the more distinct they are kept, the more economically may they be applied. A want of ventilation will not be felt where there are, besides windows turning on swivel hinges, at least two ample openings to the external air close to the Upper most part of the ceiling, at opposite ends of the room; openings which, when all the others are closed in winter, will alternately serve the purposes of a downcast and an upcast shaft, as the miners would say, according to the direction of the wind. The mere respiration of the children will constantly send a portion of warm air to be emitted upward, and a stream of carbonic acid gas to be swept up mechanically by the fire, so as to compel the en trance oi fresh supplies from the downcast opening, or any other which may exist. Such is very commonly the successful ventilation of the existing school-rooms; but while the one small open fire sufiices to perform its part of the ventilation, it is quite insufficient to furnish an ample supply of artificial heat during the winter. To obtain this, I would recommend warm-water pipes round every school-room as the most economical means of getting a moderate radiation equally distributed throughout the whole space. This is a means which occasions the least possible consumption of fuel; and, if sufficiently powerful in the first instance, may be regulated without either danger, doubt, difiiculty, or chance of disorder, by the mere drawing of a damper. With the addition of such warm water apparatus and the provision of two proper upward openings, there are few of the existing school-rooms, which would not be perfect in regard to health and comfort, except those which have no ceiling, under bare slates, and are therefore, if low, both hot in summer and cold in winter beyond power of remedy, without the interposition of some kind of ceiling, which had better follow the form of the roof, to avoid reverberation; a very annoying accom paniment of most of the flat ceilings. A want not so readily sup plied is that of more space for the exercise of the children, and apparatus to help them to every variety of muscular exertion.

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