Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1858-11-03
1.-THE SALT, IF YOU PLEASE"

1.-THE SALT, IL YOU fLEASE.
Every body has partiality for dinner, and
one Of the most frequent expressions at dln-
ner table is the one which forms our caption,
and in order that our readers may know some
thing of the substance they are using, we VIII
tell them few facts about salt. Salt is chem
ical compound of twenty-three parts by weight
of silver white but soft metal called sodium,
discovered by Sir III. Dsvy in 1907, and thirty
five parts of pungeant, yellowish green gas,
called chlorine, discovered by Scheele in lII4
these two combined form this, the most
widely diffuSed and useful of any one COM
pound in the world. 1t is found in the sea, and
in the rocks, from which our principal supply
comes. The most wonderful deposits are in
Poland and Hungary where it is quarricd like
a rock, one of the Polish mines having been
worked since 1851. These Polish salt mines
have heard the groan Of many poor captive,
and have seen the last agonies OF many brave
man. for until lately, they were worked entire
ly by the state prisoners of Austria, Russia or
Poland, whichever happened to be in power at
the time; and once the offender, or fancied
hindrance to some other PERSONS advancement,
was let down into this subterranean prison, he
never the light of day again. So salt has
its history as well sciebce. Other large de-
posits are found in Cheshire. England, where
the water is forced down 10y pipes into the salt,
and is again pumped up brine, which is C.
yaporated and the salt obtained. To such an
extent has this been carried that one town in
the sssalt country as it is called, has scarce
ly an upright house in it. all the foundations
having sunk with the ground, to fill up the
cavity left by the extracted salt
In Virginia there are beds of salt, and the
Salmon Mountains, in Oregon, capable of
affording large quantities OF the same material.
The brine springs of Salina and Syracuse are
we'll known, and from about forty gallons of
their brine, one bushel of salt is obtained--
There also extensive salt springs in Ohio,
and in Western Pennsylvania salt water is pro-
cured by boring to great depths into the earth.
The brine is pumped up from wells made in
the rock, and into which it flows and runs into
boilers. These boilers are large iron kettles
set in brickwork, and when fires are lighted
under them, the brine is quickly evaporated-
The moment the brine begins to boil, II be-
comes turbid, from the compounds of lime
that it contains, and which sOiuable in cold,
but not in hot water these first sediments are
taken out with ladies' called ssbittern ladies', )"
and the salt being next deposited from the
brine is carried away TO drain and dry. The
remaining liquid contains great quantity OF
magnesia in various forms, and gives ii the
name of ssbittern' from the taste peculiar to
magnesia in every form.
sSBut how did this salt come into the rock ~
is the natural query, and the wonder seems
greater when we recollect that salt-beds are
found in nearly every one of the strata COM
posing the carth's crust. This fact proves an
ciIcE, luat the hlaJoFiiS ol tAcSo Sdit-Utus
have come from lakes left in the hollow of the
rocks by the rccedence of the sea, the sea has
through all the geologic ages been as salt as it
is to-day. Let us take the Great Salt Lake as
an illustration. it bein G the greatest salt lake
in the world, but by no means the only one,
such inland masses of saline water found
over the whole earth, but ours is the great
est in extent, it will form the best example.
1t is situated at an elevation of 4 200 feet a.
bove the sea, the Rocky Mountains and has
an area of 1000 square miles; yet, high as it
is, ssonce upon time," as the Story-book of
our juveniity used to say. it was part of the
sea, which retired, by the upheaYal of the
rocks, and that great basin took its salt wafer
up with it. Should this in time evaporate,
and its salt become covered with mud and
sand, and the land be again depressed then,
at some distant future age. the people would
be wondering how the salt got there, little
thinking that theMormons had ever built city
on its shores when it was great salt lake.
There also, however, salt rocks taking
their place in regular geologic series with 9TH
er rocks, interspersed between red sandstone,
magnetism and carboniferous strata; these We
can only account for, as do for other strait
fed rocks, viz, that they were deposited from
their solution in water or carried mechanical
ly to the spot where now found by that ever
mobile liquid. We fear we should be accused
of an attempt to put our readers in pickle, SO
will stay our pen, hoping they will remember
these bits of information when next they say,
''The salt, if you please"