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not determine its value for drinking purposes. Water, however, 
for the supply of a town should be as soft as possible, care being 
taken that the supply pipes are not made of lead—soft water 
having a solvent action on that metal. The arguments of certain 
medical authorities as to the necessity of hard water—since by 
using soft water we should loose the salts of lime which go so 
largely to the production of bone—require only to be considered 
to be neglected ; for it is certain that we have in our ordinary 
articles of food a sufficiency of the lime salts in a form well 
adapted for assimilation. 
The substances which are especially injurious in water are 
those of an organic nature; but organic matter varies very much 
in character, and it is therefore necessary to make distinctions. 
Some kinds of organic matter are perfectly innocuous, while others 
are poisonous. The questions of the classification of organic 
matters found in water, the relation of different forms to disease, 
and the accurate determination of the quantity, are therefore very 
important, for they provide the chief data by which we may 
conclude as to the suitability of water for drinking purposes. 
If the organic matter is of animal origin, by the use of that 
water we should incur great risk; but if it is due to peat or other 
vegetable substance of the same nature, we have not much to fear, 
because a little peat in water is perfectly innocuous. Let us clearly 
understand that the za¢ure of the organic matter must be considered 
before we can say that it is injurious. In this district much 
discussion has arisen as to the various supplies of water which 
may be obtained for different townships, and the question of 
quality has been several times raised, owing to the presence of a 
little peat in some of the samples sent me for analysis. It may there- 
fore be interesting here to state that the results of investigations have 
repeatedly shown that peat is not injurious, while, on the other hand, it 
is an antiseptic, and prevents the production of animalculz. Some 
time ago I read of an instance of the body of a man being found 
in a perfect state of preservation in a wild moor in Scotland, buried 
in peat, and from his dress and other circumstances afterwards 
discovered, it was believed that he had been buried there thirty or 
forty years. 
