Inquiry into the nature and cause of miasmata, more particularly illustrated in the former and present state of the Campagna di Roma / P. Murphy.

  • Murphy, Patrick, 1782-1847.
Date:
1825
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Inquiry into the nature and cause of miasmata, more particularly illustrated in the former and present state of the Campagna di Roma / P. Murphy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    perature of the air to nearly the freezing point. Now aerial combustion, which originates in the sudden compression of volume* of the gaseous matter of the atmosphere thus entering into condensation, suspends their further action, by extending its ex- plosive effects throughout their extent, therein per- fecting the process of condensation, and bursting the nucleus round which they were collecting. Thus the atmosphere, having discharged the aqueous matter formed in it, shortly recovers its equilibrium. When, as is the case about the time of the equi- noxes, the opposite temperatures of the atmo- sphere are most generally blended, during their respective transits of ascendency, it is, (as is well known), that the aqueous condensation becomes most extended and copious, particularly the autumnal, from the redundance of caloric with which at that time the atmosphere is saturated. But when the temperature of its lower region ex- ceeds not a certain degree of warmth, the aqueous * According to experiments made by M. Gay-Lussac, a con- densation of volume in atmospheric air, amounting to four-fifths, is sufficient to ignite tinder, and as it has been ascertained, that in a cubit inch of water there are 1325 cubit inches of hydrogen and 662 of oxygen gas; or that a condensation of nearly two thousand volumes into one takes place in its formation in the atmosphere; I, therefore,conceive myself justified in my inference, that it is owing to the rapid condensation of volume attendant on the formation of water, that the ignition and consequent combustion in thunder- clouds are to be ascribed.