Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1879-07-09
VOL. XXXVI.
The Benefits of Pure Water.

The following is an extract from an in
teresting paper which was read before the
Franklin county farmers club recently by
Geo. II. Wood:
Mr.. Wood says: The quality of water
we use for domestic purposes, drinking
and cooking. is matter of vital import
ance. The heal h of almost every com
munity is almost in exact proportion 10
the purity of the water which the people
are accustomed to use. Good, wholesome
water is beyond all price; foul water is an
unmitigated curse; it is loaded with dis
ease and death and will sooner or later
prove II terrible scourge to all who use it.
The many questions relating 10 the pol
luton of English rivers were eXhaustively
considered by commission established
by act of parliament. These commission
ers classify drinking water rs follows:
Whole>ome-1, Spring waier;2 2. Deep
well water; 3. Upland surface water.
Suspicious-4. Stored rain water; 5.
Surface water from cultivated land.
Dangerously. River water to which
sewerage gets access; z. Shallow well
waller.
The above classification was established
by the commission after an examination OF
over 1000 samples of water claimed TO be
arinkabe. The high character of the
commissioners and their exhaustive labor
should entille their conclusions to great
weight The point settled by the English
commissioners should be fixed IN the pub
lie mind, and | do not see how | could
confer any more practical benefit upon the
members Of this club than by making a
concise statement of The points settled by
this high authority:
1st. Where a river or stream OF water
has been polluted by sewerage. in any
part of lis course, 1t is polluted from that
point down to its mouth. No river in the
United Kingdom is long enongh TO destroy
the effect of sewerage when once receiv, d.
I'd. There is no known process, natural
or artificial, to remove the sewerage con.
tamination from water except by long
boiling or diStilation, and, therefore. such
water shonld never be used for domestic
purposes.
Sd. No fltering of any kind or descrip-
ton whatever Can remove the minute
germs of disease which exist in dilute
sewerage water-not even filtration
through solid stratum of chalk.
4lh. Poisoned water is poisoned still.
however much diluted-even when chem
ical analysis can not detect the slightest
contamination. Hence cheminal analysis
is of no account except in cases of gross
or sensible pol!ution. in which case it is
scarcely needed. The intinitesimal pois-
oning of water can only be determined by
the increasing death rate among those
who use it.
5th. Any organic matter will poison
water and cannot be removed except by
boiling or distilation.
9th. The most dangerous organic sub
stance is human eXcremental matter, and
especially so when from cholera and fever
patients.
7lh. Shallow we'll water is the most
dangerous of all waters. Of four hum
dred and twelve shallow wells examined
by the royal commissioners, they pro-
nounce them all, with few exceptions, en-
trelv unfit for human consumption. With
regard to fillering or disinfecting such
water, they mournfully add that disinfect-
ants do not disinftct and filter beds do not
filter. Both attempts have been costly
failures.