connected with Health and the Arts. 319 



as has been above explained. On all these grounds, whilst 

 the author admits that the Rhone water is. at Lyons, a very 

 potable water, — especially when it has undergone the process of 

 purification, — yet he must assign a decided preference, for all 

 domestic purposes, to the springs on the margin of the Saone. 

 The important subject of the application of water to various 

 arts, and more especially to the dyeing of silks, the chief of 

 the manufactures at Lyons, leads to a number of not less cu- 

 rious remarks. M. Dupasquier publishes a letter, signed by 

 seventy-five of the dyers of Lyons, who have all remarked that 

 there is a marked superiority in good spring-water over the 

 Rhone water in the dyeing of silk. The calico-printers, also, 

 whose establishments are in the vicinity of copious streams, 

 have stated that their dye-stuffs were not only more beautiful, 

 but went much farther than they did on the banks of the Rhone, 

 where they had formerly been situated. They also remark that, 

 in their new circumstances, bleaching is improved, and that the 

 steadiness of temperature is much more favourable to dyeing 

 and the printing of goods, than the variety of execution which 

 attended upon the changes of the river- water when frozen in 

 winter and parboiled in summer. This last advantage is so 

 great, that some of the calico-printers on the banks of the 

 Rhone carry, in summer, the valuable goods they have to dye 

 to a distance of about two leagues, that the operation may be 

 carried on with spring-water, whose temperature and clearness 

 are not liable to change. We may add, that the presence of 

 calcareous salts in the water employed for the dyeing of silk is 

 so indispensable, — and especially for the preservation of va- 

 rious shades of white, that the eminent dyers of Saint Etienne, 

 who, on their premises, can command only the very pure wa- 

 ters of Furens, send to Lyons, a distance of fifteen leagues, to 

 the establishments close to the calcareous springs, all the silks 

 which are intended for white fabrics ; and for this kind of work 

 these establishments have a kind of monopoly. 



Wholly independent of these facts founded upon the prac- 

 tice and observation of the manufacturers, M. Dupasquier has 

 made, both personally and in the presence of many practical 

 and expert dyers, comparative experiments upon the colouring 

 and dyeing properties of decoctions of various dye-stuffs, ia 



