THE ALUMNI JOURNAL 47 



Hippocrates was very sceptical on the use of mineral waters. He accused 

 of ignorance persons who asserted that saline waters excite the action of the 

 bowels and readily pass off with the faeces, because as he claimed they have 

 just the contrary effect. Waters that issue from rocks were considered as 

 indigestible, and thermal springs to heat the system and to dry up the juices, 

 as amongst unwholesome ingredients they contain copper, silver and gold. 

 Galenus held the same views as Hippocrates, but his disciple Caelius Aurelianus 

 who lived at the end of the second century already prescribed the alkaline 

 saline waters of Ischia for stone in the bladder. Paracelsus called the gases 

 ascending from springs "wild spirits," and remarked in his work, "De Aquis 

 IVlincralibus." 1562, that they were caused by the burning of certain minerals; 

 and Hufeland and others who called it volcanic heat, believed it to be entirely 

 distinct from ordinary caloris, and possessed of specific curative effects not 

 shared by ordinary water of the same temperature. Great stress was also laid 

 upon the electricity of thermals, tho a delicate multiplier was necessary to 

 prove its presence. The nature of the water itself was doubted on account of 

 the variations which were observed to exist in the boiling point of different 

 springs, which, however, can be readily explained by the varying quantity 

 of salines kept in solution, and by the difference of elevation. Thus Gastein 

 water boiling at 2073/'° at an elevation of 3,000 feet above the level of the sea, 

 was actually taken down by Von Graefe to the plains of Albano, in Lombardy, 

 i;i order to prove that it would boil there at 212°. Baumgartner and Gessler 

 even went so far as to claim for Gastein water a chemical composition entirely 

 different from ordinary water. According to these savants, it contains one part 

 of oxygen to three parts of hydrogen; and a law was enacted in the Duchy of 

 Salzburg, in 1797. not yet repealed, threatening with the penalty of one guilder 

 all persons who should have the temerity of calling Spa water. 



Real progress in the knowledge of the composition of mineral springs was 

 only made by the discovery of the alkalies and fi.xed air In- Van Helmont in 

 1648. The demons of the ancients and the wild spirits of Paracelsus were then 

 found to be our familiar carbonic acid gas. The great philosopher Arago proved 

 the temperature of the springs to correspond with the depth from which they 

 ascend; and Bergmann, Berzelius, Bischof and Struve showed their composition 

 to depend upon the amount of carbonic acid and other gases which are dis- 

 solved in them, and upon the nature of the rocks and strata which they per- 

 meate. This same thing Pliny told to us 2,000 years ago. Struve proved this 

 by direct experiment. By powdering the clinkstone of Bilin and subjecting it to 

 the action of carbonic acid water under a small hydrostatic pressure, he suc- 

 ceeded in producing an artificial water which was identical in composition with 

 the natural spring of Bilin. Having himself been cured by the use of a gas 

 spring, or rather by the escaping gases, he devoted his life to the investigation 

 aiTd reproduction of mineral waters, and must be called the father of artificial 

 spring waters. His artificial Carlsbad water, which he sent to Faraday, and his 

 artificial Friedrichs-hall bitter water, which he sent to Liebig for examination, 

 were pronounced by these distinguished philosophers to be identical in chemical 

 composition and physiological action with the natural springs they represented. 



Dr. Hallock gives Dr. Carl H. Schultz the credit of being the originator, in 

 this country, of scientifically produced mineral waters. In 1862 he undertook 

 the reproduction of mineral spring waters by using as a basis for his mixtures 

 standard solutions of each ingredient, and in this way he was able to produce 

 waters of uniform composition. Many manufacturers even at the present time 

 use as their unit of measure in mixing their waters an ordinary shovel, which 

 is not destined to produce results of any great accuracy. 



The various conditions, beliefs and properties of the waters and modes of 

 production were well illustrated by the lecturer. — H. J. G. 



