Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-08-20
ESTABLISHED 1850.
Mr.. Forts ArtesIan Well.

The successful completion OF Mr..
Forts artesian well has given that gen
tleman a well deserved reputation for
enterprise and public spiritedness. He
certainly deserves all the praise his sue
cessful enterprise has won for him. for
he risked his money on an undertaking
that was generally considered impracti.
cable, and by demonstrating that these
ever.fowing wells of pure water are
easily and cheaply in the reach of corpo-
ratiOns, and even individuals, he has
conferred upon our county boon that
can scarcely be overestimated. When
these wells shall have taken the place of
the old-fashioned bucket and chain on
every plantation in the county, as doubt
less they will ia time, we will see better
cared for stock and cleanlier quarters.
And as it is impossible to foul one Of
them by drainage or surface filth, we
may hope also that they will prove valu-
able factors in promoting the health of
the places on which they are located.
But here let me correct an error that
Mr.. Fort seems to have fallen into, in
common with people generally through
out the country, especially those living
in the up-country. He joins in the COM
mon assumption that lime water as such
is unhealthy, and that its use is a specific
cause, if not the only cause. of chills or
of malarial fever in all of its forms, and
he felicitates himself on the fact that by
piercing through the lime rock from
which the lime water is obtained, and
gong peyonu II, ne OBTAINS water tnat Is
pure-pure, that is, in the sense that it is
free from fever-giving qualities.
This assumption of the unhealthiness
of lime water, that Mr.. Fort seems so
unhesitatingly to share, is beyond all
doubt erroneous. There is nothing in
lime water, 1t7lcOntdm5ndted aoih surface
drainage or horse lot seepdge, that is capa-
ble of producing sickness of any kind
nor do know of any disease where its
free use is contra indicated. On the
contrary, | know from actual Ohserva-
tion THAT it is powerfully curative in
many forms of dyspepsia. as is attested
by the infrequency of this disease in
lime-water countries, as compared with
freestone water sections. 1t is also be
lieved-at least | have heard the idea
advanced by that eminent physician. Dr.
Campbell, of Augusta-that there is an
evident connection between the use of
lime water and the marked absence Of
stone in the bladder in limestone re-
gions.
AS regards pure lime water beng the
cause of malarial fever, the idea is pre-
posterOus. The town of Winchester,
Va, is supplied with water more strong
ly impregnated with lime than in any
well in Dougherty county, and the
whole valley of Virginia is supplied with
water from bold limestone springs, as
any of Lees old soldiers very well know,
and yet chills and fever, or of any form
whatever OF malarial fever, is unknown
in that region. The same is true of
portions of Kentucky and Tennessee,
where limestone abOunds, the water
being hard from lime impregnation, but
unattended with chills.
know it is said that the cause of the
difference lies in the difference of the
character of the lime rock-that in the
valley there is blue limestone, while
with us it is rotten and that this rotten
lime causes chills. | have never yet
found man who could give me def
milton of rotten limestone, because there
is no such thing. One cannot speak of
an inorganic substance as being rotten,
for the term carries with it the idea of
putrescence,- that is, Of inorganic matter
undergoing Preventative decay. GeolO-
gists, however, do recognize a difference
IN the character of the two formations
a difference due to the much greater age
of the one, compared with the other, and
change in the texture, caused, doubt
less, by pressure and heat. But certain
ly there is no such difference in them as
would imply that the one has delsterious
qualities, which, being dissolved in the
streams of water running through it,
would generate chills in a person drink
ing it.
And yet l am not to be understood as
saying that our common plantation wells
are not productive of sickness, and that
therefore Mr.. Forts artesian we'll will
not tend to lessen the sickness and NOR
tality of his plantation. | am convinced
that the ordinary plantation well is, in a
large measure, responsible for the sick
ness on the plantation. Not because the
water is lime water (for as a matter of
fact very few of them are strongly i'm
pregnated with lime, the well not being
dug deep enough to reach the lime water
streams that flow through the rock), but
because, as they are usually constructed,
they are nothing but receptacles for sur
face filth or the seepage from horse lots.
1t is then the organic matter that gets
into these wells from the surface that
makes them unhealthy, and not the lime
water, that is pure and healthful.