with. But walls of wood are not fo. The queftion then is, whether air in which this moifture is left floating, or that which is deprived of it, be moft wholefome? In both cafes the remedy is eafy. A Httle fire kindled in the room, whenever the air is damp, prevents the precipitation on the walls: and this praftice, found healthy in the warmed as well as coldeft feafons is as neceffary in a wooden as in a ftone or brick houfe. I do not mean to fay, that the rain never penetrates through walls of brick. On the contrary I have feen inftances of it. But with us it is only through the northern and eaftern walls of the houfe, after a north-eafterly ftorm, thefe being the only one which continue long enough to force through the walls.
This however happens too rarely to give a jufi: charafter of unwholefomenefs to fuch houfes. In a houfe, the walls of which are of well-burnt brick and good mortar, I have feen the rain penetrate through but twice in a dozen or fifteen years. The inhabitants of Europe, who dwell chiefly in houfes of ftone or brick, are furely as healthy as thofe of Virginia. Thefe houfes have the advantage too of being warmer in winter and cooler in fummer than thofe of wood; of being cheaper in their firfl: