Metcalfe's Hydropathic Establishment, (Limited,) Wellington Square, Hastings : synopsis of the theory and practice of hydrotherapy with a sketch of the rise and progress of the Turkish bath / Richard Metcalfe.

  • Metcalfe, Richard
Date:
[1890?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Metcalfe's Hydropathic Establishment, (Limited,) Wellington Square, Hastings : synopsis of the theory and practice of hydrotherapy with a sketch of the rise and progress of the Turkish bath / Richard Metcalfe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ■of health and pleasure. No doubt the thermae were abused in the degenerate days which befell the Empire, especially when deprived of the patronage of the Emperor and the nobility on the removal of the seat of government to Constantinople, and made the lounging place of an idle and dissolute rabble. A new lease •of life and usefulness, however, awaited the bath at Constanti¬ nople, and throughout the Eastern Empire ; and when these fair regions were overrun by the Turks, and Constantinople fell into the hands of those barbarian conquerors, they not only spared the thermae; but had the sense to adopt and patronise the institution, which they have preserved until now, much to their own benefit, .and it is to be hoped to ours also. Travellers in the East having .•experienced great benefits from the use of the Turkish thermae, they pressed the consideration of them on the attention •of their countrymen. Foremost among such apostles of thermal hygiene was the late Mr. David Urquhart, who, after long .and apparently fruitless effort, at last succeeded in enlisting the sympathy of Dr. Barter, of St. Ann’s Hydropathic Establishment, Blarney, who at once adopted and improved the Turkish Bath. In this work of improving he derived aid from an examination of the remains of Roman hot-air baths scattered over Britain; the bath, therefore, as now established among us, though called the Turkish bath, is the child of the Roman thermts. The ■“ Improved Turkish bath ” of Dr. Barter, now in full operation in most of the large towns of the United Kingdom, is “ the Roman bath without its anointing; the Turkish bath without its undue moisture,” anointing being no longer required for the purposes for which the Romans used it, and the moisture of the Turkish and other baths mentioned, having been found to be an imperfection, .a clumsy substitute, in fact, for a proper heating apparatus. The improved Turkish bath is one of pure atmospheric air properly heated, having its due proportion of oxygen, making respiration pleasant, oxydation of the blood perfect, evaporation and depur¬ ation complete, and exalting the tonic influence of the subsequent •cold appliances. “ Under the influence of pure heated air,” says the late Dr. Barter, “ free from visible steam, and continuously renewed by a perfect system of ventilation, no one feels the distress which so frequently accompanies other heating appliances; for while perspiration is more fully obtained, the pulse is but rarely unduly excited.” This is the great feature of the improved Turkish bath, and one on which its perfect safety and curative property will be found mainly to depend. Steam, by saturating the atmosphere with moisture interferes with the free transpiration from the lungs and skin, and thus impedes the process which nature provides for cooling the body. It also fills the space which vital air should occupy, and thus from
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