42 TRANSACTIONS OF THE [NOV. 29, 



avenues, also quartzite containing a large proportion of dissemi- 

 nated tourmaline. 



Mr, L. E. Chittenden stated that he had found proof in old 

 records that the Natchez Indians smelted the gold of Georgia. 



Mr. p. H. Dudley showed a fine instantaneous photograph 

 of a railway train moving at the rate of forty-eight miles an 

 hour. 



Proe. Albert K. Leeds read a paper on 



the AMERICAN SYSTEM OF PURIFICATION OF THE WATER 



SUPPLIES OF CITIES. 



Acting under instructions from the Aqueduct Boards of New- 

 ark and Jersey City, I spent the past summer in examining the 

 water supplies of the large cities in England and Scotland. 

 Many of these cities have already passed through crises in the 

 history of their water supplies, similar to those at present agi- 

 tating American communities. It is of systems of purification 

 which they have adopted, and of a quite different American 

 system designed to meet the different requirements of climate, 

 character of water supplies, labor and capital in our own country, 

 that I propose to speak this evening. 



Our modern manufacturing towns increase in population 

 with such rapidity that they soon find their local sources of 

 water supply insufficient in quantity, and dangerous to health 

 from pollution by sewage and factory' waste. Then follows a 

 more or less prolonged period of bitter controversy. It matters 

 not how plain the fact of gross pollution may be, the fact is 

 denied. In case the chemical testimony agrees with that of the 

 senses, and water which is dirty, foul-smelling, and bad-tasting 

 is found by the chemist to be impure, his honesty and ability 

 are assailed. Either his results are declared false, or it is as- 

 serted that they mean just the reverse of what he himself says. 

 Other experts are employed, and the local water supply, thougli 

 it may contain the sewage of ten or a hundred thousand people, 

 like that of Albany, Newark, Jersey City, and Philadelphia, 

 is joyfully discovered to be extremely ivholesome, and second in 

 purity to none in the country. But at last, after years of denial, 

 during which the public health has severely suffered, the fact of 

 pollution is admitted, and the community resorts to one or more 

 of the three following remedies: 



1st. It abandons local for remote sources, such as springs, 

 lakes, rivers, or areas of upland drainage. 



2d. It sinks artesian wells, or deep wells, or subterranean gal- 

 leries. 



