The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1877-05-04

lime in it is best. For drinking, some
lime Is useful for making bone. The
impurities that make water injurious to
health, as drink, are organic matters,
and have their most abundant supply
from barnyards, domestic privies and
cemeteries, where the decay of animal
and vegetable substances Is constantly
going on.
Most farmers have one or more wells
from which they use water for domestic
purposes. The kind of soil into which
these wells are sunk is matter of i'm
portancc. Suppose it to be bed of
soft limestone gravel, the well will have
water So hard that it becomes milky
when boiled, and leaves sediment
that will incrust the inside of the boiler.
The boiling improves the water by
prccipitating the too great supply of
lime, unless the lime "be in the state of
gypsum, when, if little soda be added
during the boiling, it will separate off
the gypsum also."-C Johnston. Peo-
pie not accustomed to drinking hard
water should use water from such wells
with great care until they become ac-
customed to them.
This excess of lime is of comparative
ly small importance the drainage from
the surface and subsoil may give impur-
tiles much more Objectionable than a
great excess of lime. Where is the
house privy? Is it on higher land than
the well? Is the soil open and of easy
drainage, giving free passage to water?
How far off is the privy? These are
important questions, and may be asked
i'll regard to the location of the barnyard.
If the soil is not gravcl-if il is strait
fled clay and quite impervious to water
passing up or down. the spaces between
the layers may be fine lines of sand that
will carry water horizontally in the di-
rection of the dip, or if there be no dip,
then the water will extend from the
privy in every direction until an outlet
is found. The well being deeper than
the privy vault, will be that outlet, and
in time free channels will be formed
from the privy to the well, unless the
soil be very tenacious, and the distance
be very considerable. But, it may be
asked, will not the earth between the
privy and the well filter and purify the
water? answer by quoting Professor
Kedzie, from paper just published in
the report of the board of health of the
state of Michigan, he being a member
of that board:
"Pure silicious sand acts simply as a
mechanical filter to remove suspended
impurities. 1t has no chemical action
on any of the impurities held in solu-
ton, has no absorbent action over them,
and has of itself no oxidizing agency.
The only direct office OF
sand is to act as a mechanical filter.
From the finer division of its particles,
clay is much more perfect mechanical
filter than sand. But il has more than
mechanical action"
The learned doctor states the effects
produced by oxide of iron, humus and
lime ard magnesia, that are often found
in soils, in purifying for short time
the water that passes through them,
and says:
"We thus see that the soil, which is
made up of these various constituents,
is both a mechanical and chemical
filter-a filter on a vast scale. but of
limited powers. When limited guam
tity of soil is treated with sewage, the
pores Of the soil soon become INSTRUCTED,
preventing the passage of the water;
its power to fix and remove organic
matter in solution is soon exhausted, and
we then have soil saturation. Unfor-
tunately the chemical powers of such a
soil may be exhausted long before there
is mechanical obstruction to the pas
sage of the water, and the cfIluent wa
ter may be
Sparkling and bright in it. liquid light
and yet be vehicle of death. To re-
gard clear water as pure water, Is a
common and mischievous error. Clear
and clean are not always Synonymous"