An analysis of the Congress Spring : with practical remarks on its medical properties / by John H. Steel ; rev. and corr. by John L. Perry.

  • Steel, John H. (John Honeywood), 1780-1838.
Date:
1856
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An analysis of the Congress Spring : with practical remarks on its medical properties / by John H. Steel ; rev. and corr. by John L. Perry. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    This water has been repeatedly analyzed by a number of professed chemists; but the results of their examinations have been so discordant as to afford but little confidence in their correctness. These results, however, do not differ so much in the variety of the articles produced, as in the quan- tities of those acknowledged to be present. Much of this difference may be imputed to the various methods adopted to separate the constituent proper- ties, and to the different states in which these properties are produced ; some of them being in a state of crystallization containing a large portion of water, while the same article is obtained under another process in a perfectly dry state, producing an essential difference in the apparent quantity. But the greatest cause of the discordant results is the transportation of the water from the spring. It is usually bottled, perhaps imperfectly corked, transported to a considerable distance, and then suf- fered to stand in a quiescent state, subjected to a variety of temperature, until the convenience of the chemist affords an opportunity for its examination. In this way it must necessarily part with a large share of its carbonic acid, and the substances held in solution by it are of course precipitated. It is therefore abundantly evident, that in order to obtain any thing like an accurate knowledge of the properties and proportions of the various salts 2