pitch sharply, so that the back seat is as pleasant as the front. The chancel is very wide, the platform broad and only four feet above the floor, and the pulpit low, with sliding shelf for the Bible and notes. The ceiling is not arched, and all unnecessary angles and curves were carefully avoided to prevent eddies and echoes. It challenges comparison with any other of its proportions, in its acoustic provisions. A clear conversational tone will reach every part of the auditory, however full. When the house is empty, conversation in a whisper has been carried on from its remotest corners. Its vestry arrangements are very convenient. The largest is 40×62. The Ladies' Room 35×32- the small vestry 35× 25, and there is also a small kitchen, which has pump, sink, boiler and closet for the convenience of the Ladies' Benevolent Circle. Both these small vestries connect with the largest by wide folding doors.

The audience room seats over one thousand adults, not including the orchestra. It is perhaps enough to say of the convenience and attractiveness of this structure, that within three years after its completion eighteen churches had adopted it essentially as a model. The entire cost, including organ, carpeting and cushioning throughout, gas fixtures and furnaces, was twenty thousand dollars. J. D. Towle, Esq., of Boston, was the architect. From this brief sketch, we pass to the main purpose of this article.

VENTILATION is not a science, but a study. Few points are so understood and settled as to be always and invariably reliable. Yet such is the practical importance of the subject, that it must not be let alone; and whoever can contribute even a little, must not withhold it, and if the experience of any one has given one ray of light, that light ought to shine out. It is in this way only that the end all desire can ever he reached. Bad air is a fearful health destroyer, and but very little impurity exposes to the worst results. Dr. Hall, of N. Y., in his Journal

of Health for August, has an excellent article on Impure Air," in which he says: "The men who worked in the Thames Tunnel suffered severely by emaciation, low fevers, and even death from breathing the deleterious gas of the place; where by the most critical chemical tests there was but one part of bad air to a hundred thousand. ... An atmosphere containing only two parts of carbonic acid gas in a hundred of common air, killed a puppy in two minutes and a half; and a dog which breathed an atmosphere containing only a quarter of one per cent. of the same gas, died in ten hours." But this deadly gas is an invariable product of respiration every where, and should never be re-inhaled.

Our readers will not complain, therefore, if their attention is again called to the subject, and a little addendum is here made to the very able and excellent article in our last; especially in connection with the accompanying elevation of the house of worship just described.

Ventilation is pretty well secured in this building in a way very simple and inexpensive. There are two chimnies, one flue in each. They are in the two corners of the auditory opposite the pulpit. The plastering and the sides of the building are at distances varying from two to eight inches from the walls of the chimnies on each side, and open thus into the attic through the ceiling. Into this space around each chimney, at the floor of the auditory a door about twelve by sixteen inches opens. On either side of the chancel, in the mop-board, a slide is made six inches by ten which opens into the space between the plastering and boarding of the building and thus into the attic.

The trap-door in the bell deck is made about six inches larger on three sides than the opening, and a flange, some six inches deep is secured to the outer edges, which rests upon the floor of the deck when the door is shut, and which—with a flange of like depth around the openingprevents the beating in of rain or snow

In the center of the ceiling is a window of stained glass, six feet in diameter, which can be raised eight inches, opening also directly into the attic.

The vestries, which are all well above ground, but under the auditory, are twelve feet in the clear, and are furnished with openings twelve inches square in the sides of the rooms, protected by rolling blinds or slats; and thus behind the plastering they connect with the attic.

This simple process for ventilation was adopted on the supposition that where air could get in, it could get out, and that it would go in the direction which the "balance in exchange " might happen to favor; and thus circulation would be secured, bence ventilation. No ventiducts, ejectors or injectors, therefore, were made. Experience has proved the correctness of the above theory. There is always immediate relief when the six ventilators of the large vestry are opened, and unquestionably it would be greater were they at the floor, instead of being eight feet from the floor.

The large window in the ceiling of the auditory, opening directly into the attic, is subject to counter currents, and sometimes seriously incommodes those who sit nearly under it. It should have a ventiduct to the bell-deck, if opened at all. But the openings around the chimies and on either side of the pulpit are always operative, efficient, and always in the right direction-a downward current never being known. And though the passage is somewhat zigzag and very rough, and varying much in dimensions, a heavy linen handkerchief is always turned up the chimney ventilators in winter; and with more force if the door in the bell-deck is raised. And strange as it may seem, this current is but a little less effective in summer, when doors and windows are closed,

and indeed is upward when windows and doors are open. It is always upward also when the attic and tower only are the recipients; and these spaces, in very cold weather, are generally quite sufficient for all needed ventilation. Unquestionably it were more complete if there were straight, smooth and lubricated ventiducts to each opening, and lighted fires were kept burning in their centers, well towards their tops, and properly constructed ejectors capped each of them; therefore let whoever can, avail themselves of these best means to secure an end so desirable, and they may not grudge a large outlay, in consideration of the benefits to be thus realized. And yet let not those who cannot have gas, nor furnaces, nor steeples, nor towers, nor money, despair of securing very good and very satisfactory ventilation in their churches; and dwellings too, where indeed it is not less needed, especially in sleeping apartments.

Make your opening at the floor of the apartment to be ventilated equivalent to six inches or two feet square; being larger or smaller, according to the number of them and the dimensions of the room. Let the passage-ways or vent ducts be as direct, straight and uniform in size as may be convenient, diminishing, if at all, at their outlet. But do not hesitate a moment to use your passage-ways, though they must go quite round your building in their course, and be never so indirect or unequal or rough, provided only there are OPENINGS, and each successive one is higher than the last. Always have their outlet, whether many in common or singly, AT THE HIGHEST POSSIBLE POINT. It may be in or by the side of the chimney, or through the tower or turrets, or up ventilating tubes through ejectors made for the purpose. They may go up between studdings or in the spandrel of the stairs into the space in the entablature, and out through apertures cut in the plancier. Create the openings, and be sure that the outlets are as much as possible above the inlets, and a circulation, and thus ventila

tion is certain. The current will be upward and hence outward; and as a vacuum is impossible in rooms as ordinarily constructed, there will be an abundant supply from without, even though no injectors are made. The air taken from its lower stratum will be forced up these, even rough and circuitous, passages by the super-incumbent pressure, which creates a circulation where it is wanted, taking away the coldest air in winter, thus greatly facilitating the warming of the room; and in like manner, taking away the foulest air in the summer, as that which is breathed in so warm an atmosphere rises very slowly, if at all, above the heads of the respirants. Ventilators in the ceiling are hence of little worth, except to cool an overheated room in winter. It is better not to overheat, or quite as well, for the moment, to raise or drop a window. And this leads to the suggestion that windows should in all cases be protected by rolling blinds, and these should always be on the outside; both for the purpose of keeping out the heat of the sun, and for the convenience of regulating the drafts of air. By a proper adjustment of the blinds alone, when thus constructed, very good summer ventilation can be secured and cool air preserved, by keeping the blinds snugly closed, and the windows a little open at top and bottom, night and day, when the room is unoccupied. A

very little attention in this direction would save much discomfort during the hours of religious service, and would save the worshipper from many nodding assents to truths he does not hear. To construct windows in such form or of such materials as to preclude the use of outside, rolling blinds, is not good economy, and cannot be justified as a matter of fancy or taste, since it must be purchased so dearly. The great object of the sanctuary is too high and holy to be periled in the least for such a trifle.

A sure and cheap mode of ventilating churches is to make the flue or flues of the chimney, of cast-iron pipes or of brick, round, as suggested in the valuable article above alluded to,-build the chimney around it square-leaving a greater or less space, as needed, bringing the two, near the top, together, giving them a common outlet;—then opening at the floor into this air-chamber, a door, with coarse wire-netting to protect the passage; or put in a register, and depend on this or them-winter and summer-and know that you have very good ventilation. If this cannot be secured in this form, realize it in other ways as nearly as may be. If planned for in the beginning, scarce a dollar's additional expense is called for to realize the great object sought, viz: fresh, living, wakeful air to breathe in the house of the Lord.

THE following question, it is supposed, states the subject assigned for this Essay: Is there any standard by which Christians should be guided, as Christians, in building homes and churches, as to degree of ornament and amount of expense? or, in the absence of any positive and fixed standard, are there any principles which should guide them?

It is to be admitted that no definite absolute standard can be found; no one style, size, or cost of building which is becoming and right for every Christian household, and every Christian congregation. Families and congregations vary indefinitely in numbers and wants. Yet there are certain principles which ought to govern our domestic and sacred architecture Christian principles; and the observance of these would remove those wide and strange contrasts now to be seen in our houses and churches. Let it be remembered that expense is discussed in this Essay only as affected by ornamentation, not by cost of materials, labor, &c., &c.

Where these are cheap, it may be consistent to erect a house or church of a style which would not be consistent where these are more costly.

Is it not, then, one of these principles 1 The following article was read as an Essay, by appointment, before the GENERAL ASSOCIATION OF Iowa, at Muscatine, June 3, 1859, and its publication requested by vote. It took its occasion from a discussion in the Association at Dubuque, June, 1858, upon costly and richly ornamented churches. At first the subject of Congregational Church architecture and the application of Christian principles thereto, was given to the writer. It was subsequently enlarged to cover the relation of these principles also to domestic architecture, i. e., the domestic architecture of Christians.

that the real wants of a family or a congregation are to be provided for, before everything else? If there must needs be a choice, in any of the details of building, between an ornament and a comfort,— between something that will make the edifice beautiful, rich, or imposing, and something that will make it fit for its use,—— we must secure the latter even with the loss of the former. To gratify the sense of beauty and the love of elegance is one sort of benefit to an individual or a congregation, but it is not among the most substantial and primary. The observance of this plain principle would not only remove many architectural features of homes and sanctuaries which have been added at the cost of space, adaptation, and usefulness; but it would rase to the ground many stately, but undomestic and comfortless residences, and many temples so built for the worship of the Most High, as to be astonishingly unfit for the purpose. A handsome front and surroundings secured at the sacrifice of that interior room and convenience which health, refinement, and mutual benefit and happiness require in a home; carved facings and trimmings," or a lofty spire, absorbing the means that should have made a church commodious; or stained glass and decorations to correspond upon the walls, the roof, the galleries, the slips, the pulpit, paid for with the money that should have made it a place in which God's word can be spoken with ease and heard with distinctness-these Christianity, at least Protestant Reformed Christianity, does not sanction.

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Is it not another Christian principle which should govern us, that our religious wants are to be provided for, in a home or