Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1858-11-13
From tie Scientific American.
THE SALT, IF YOU PLEASE"

THE SALT, IF YOU PLEASE" t
Everybody has a partiality for dinner, and one
of the most frequent expressions at a dinner ia ole
is the one which forms our caption, and in order
that our readers may know something of the sub.
stance they are using, we will tell them a few facts
about salt. Salt is q chemical compound of TWEEN.
~ty.three parts by weight Of a beautifully silver
white but soft metal, called sodium, discovered by
Sir Ii. Davy in 1907, and thirty.fve parts of q pun.
gent, yellowish green gas, called chlorine. disoov,
cred by Scheele in I'D these two combined form
this, the most widely difused and useful of any one
compound 10 the world. 1t is found in the rocks,
from which our principal supply comes. The most
wonderful deposits are in Poland and Hungary
where it is quarried like a rock, one of the Polish
mines having been worked since 1851. These Pol,
ish salt mines have heard the groan of many a
poor captive, and have seen the last agonies Of
many a brave man, for until lately, they we're
worked entirely BY the state prisoners Of Austria,
Russia or Poland, whichever happened to be in
power at the time and once the offender, or fan
cied hin ierance to some other persons advance,
ment, was let down into this subterranean prison,
he never saw the light of day again. So salt has
its history as well as science. Other large depos-
its are found in Cheshire, England, where the wa.
ter is forced down by pipes into the salt, and is
again pumped up DIS brine, which is evaporated
and the salt obtained. To such an extent has this
been carried on that one town in the "salt coun.
try" as it is called, has scarcely an upright house
in it, oil 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 Sal.
mon mountains, in Oregon, are capable of afford
! ing large quantities Of the same material. The
7 brine springs Of Salina and Syracuse are we'll
known, and from about forty gallons of their brine,
: one bushel of sat is obtained. There are also ex
e tensive salt springs in Ohio. The brine is pumped
! up from wells made in the rock, and into which i.
flows and runs into boilers. These boilers are large
o iron kettles set in brick work, and when fires are
p lighted under them, the brine is quickly evapora
ted. The moment tho brine begins to boil, it be
comes turbid, from the compounds Of lime that il
contains, and which are soluble in cold, but not ho
water these first sediments are taken out with la
n dies called ''bitten ladies'" and the salt being
next deposited from the brine is carried away tc
m drain and dry. The remaining liquid contains q
% great quantity of magnesia in various forms, and
,e gives 1t the name of "bittern" from the taste pecu
30 liar to magnesia in every form.
n "But how did this salt come into the rock p il
l the natural query, and the wonder seems greater
ID when we recollect that salt beds are found in near
l ly every one of the strata composing the earth!
en- crust. This fact proves another, that as the ma
'e' ority of these salt beds have come from lakes lief
Cd in the hollow of the rocks by the recedence Of thu
ks sea, the sea has through all the geologic ages beer
IL as salt as it is to-day. Let us take the Great Sal
nd Lake as an illustration, it being the largest sal
OF lake in the world, but by no means the only one
as such inland masses Of saline water are fount
n over the whole earth, but as ours is the greatest il
'r' extent, it will form the best example. 1t is situa
IN ted at an elevation of 4, 200 feet above the sea. on tn,
re, Rocky Mountains, and has an area of 2 600 squar,
nd miles yet, high as it is, "once upon a time," a
- the story books of our juvenility used to say, it wa
ty part of the sea, which retired, by the upheaval o
l the rocks, and that great basin took its salt waite
'as up with it. Should this in time evaporate, and it
salt become covered with mud and sand, and tn
*. land again become depressed then, at some distan
ere future age, the people would be wondering no,
nd the salt got there, little thinking tia. the Mormon
lis had ever built a city on its shores when it was
ny. great salt lake. There are also, however, salt rock
nd taking their place in regular geologic series wit
i've other rocks, interspersed between red san6ston,
ur. magnetism and carboniferous strata these we ca
q | only account for, as we do for other strati6e
my rocks, viz, they were deposited from their solutio
in in water or carried mechanically to the spot wheI
oy- now found by that ever mobile liquid. We fear v
ste shall be accused of an attempt to put our reade
in pickle, SO will stay our pen, hoping tn,
ife. will remember these bits of information when ne
at they say, "The salt, if you please"