Turkish Baths

70 THE TURKISH BATH:
and the furnace in a sub-basement, reached from a
passage at the end of the stairs for the bather. Two
convoluted stoves are shown in a vault ;
three air-inlets
are provided, and the foul air is drawn up into the smoke
flues, two in number, which, above, could join one another.
Let us follow the air in its passage through
the bath.
Entering at the intakes, any coarse impurities are thrown
off by the smooth louvres, and the tendency
of finer
particles to rush in is checked by the stretched canvas
cheese-cloths. Thus deprived of its actually visible impurities,
the air passes through a longer or shorter conduit
of glazed brickwork until it reaches the horizontal flues
running to beneath the furnace walls, along which it is
rapidly drawn, and, ascending between the walls and
heating
surfaces and between the two adjacent heating
surfaces, absorbs the radiating heat and enters the
laconicum by way of the rectangular shaft constructed
above the vault spanning the two stoves.
Questions of temperature I will omit for the present.
The air, on passing through the laconicum, will be
practically pure, as it is in such great bulk compared
with the number of occupants of this highly-heated
chamber, and it will not be absolutely necessary to
provide
ventilators. These should commence in the
calidarium, and should, in the scheme of ventilation
here considered, be so disposed that the nearer
they are to the lavatorium and shampooing-room,
the more frequent will they become. The object of
this disposition of outlets for vitiated air is, that the
cross currents thus created may not interfere with the
main flow from the heating chamber to the lavatorium.