WATER SUPPLY FOR COUNTRY HOUSES. 



81 



small repairs or other stoppages will be necessary. For medium houses a water-tank in the roof will often 

 be quite sufficient and satisfactory. For larger establishments a more pretentious water-tower may be 

 erected into which the well pump discharges, and from which a supply is taken in pipes to the various 

 house and farm tanks lilted with ball-valve control. Where the water is hard, a softening plant may be 

 contained in the tower. Towers are sometimes placed at a considerable elevation on an adjoining 

 eminence, so as to afford ample pressure for fire purposes without the aid of any special tire pump. All 

 this is a question to be decided bv the expenditure it may be agreeable to incur or the degree of pride 

 felt in the water undertaking by the house-owner. Various circumstances enter into the determination 

 of the expenditure. It may be necessary to place a water-tower in an exposed situation, so that a well- 

 designed stone tower might be justified with an enclosed tank ; or the tower may be hidden in a wood, 

 when a very plain, simple affair nriy suffice. 



As regards the cost of boring wells, this may be set down at about fi per foot for diameters of 

 Gin. to S.Un. in London. This cost would include the lining tubes necessary. A well of looft. and .(.in. 

 to 5in. diameter would cost, including lining, perhaps js. to us. per foot. Above .(.ooft. the cost begins 

 to increase considerably. The cost of pumping will vary from [d. to id. per i.ooogal., according to quantity 

 pumped and height raised. It is obviously impossible to give exact figures to tit every case. Hut wells 

 have been bored and set to work with pumps that have recouped the outlay in saved water-rate in a year s 

 time ; and the writer once bored a well, about .&amp;gt;ooft. deep, near London which paid its cost in three months, 

 the water standing within suction reach of the pump. There is, of course, a great difference between 

 what can be effected at different places. At one place, for example, a single-driven - in. well, costing. 

 perhaps, 6, will give an ample supply for a large house. At New Lodge, Windsor, the writer engineered 

 a well bored into the lower greensand to a depth of i,2-|jft. A small supply of soft, pure water rose to 

 a height of nearly 8ft. above the surface, and was piped through glass-lined pipes to the first floor of the 

 house. The cost was, of course, great ; but there was no subsequent pumping cost for the main supply, 

 and the quality was 

 excellent. The- ex - 

 istence of this bored 

 w e 1 1 w ou 1 d n o 

 doubt add to the 

 value of the house 

 if ever sold, much 

 more than the cost 

 of the boring. A 

 safe bored tube well 

 will sell a house 

 which would now 

 be barely saleable 



with a contaminated or risky dug well. This point should always be taken into account when 

 considering rival schemes. There yet remains to be considered the impossible site for boring 

 of a house perhaps high on a hill, with a stream in the valley below. If there is even a low fall 

 possible by construction of a dam, a small water wheel may be used to pump up rough water, the better 

 supply being obtained from rainfall collected as described ; or the rough water may be forced up by a 

 hydraulic ram, when no dam is needed, the water being piped from a higher point of the stream to the ram 

 placed further down. A very low fall may thus serve to ram water up to a house at a considerable 

 elevation. But usually the stream will not be pure enough for potable purposes. 



Quality of Supply. The hardness or softness of a water supply is determined by the nature of the 

 surface from which the water is gathered or of the rocks into which a well is bored. From sand rocks 

 the water is soft ; from clays it is often found to be charged with soluble salts, such as sulphate of soda, 

 sulphate of magnesia and common salt ; from chalk or from other limestones or calcareous rocks generally 

 hard waters are obtained, the hardness being of that quality known as temporary, that is to say, it is 

 removable by boiling. Certain marls, such as the Keuper marls, contain gypsum and yield small supplies 

 of water, often of considerable hardness of the so-called permanent variety which is not removable by 

 ordinary boiling. Thus in Newark town hard water may be obtained from borings of moderate depth. 

 If soft water be demanded at Newark, it would be easy to obtain it at the expense of boring several hundred 

 feet so as to enter the new red sandstone which underlies the marls. In England especially the sequence 

 of the geological strata is generally such tha some water is usually to be obtained, either from the surface 

 stratum or that next below. Even in one of the worst parts of Essex water enough for a large house 

 has been obtained at less than Sooft. Artesian boring is now much less costly than it was twenty years 

 ago, and the hardest granite rock may be bored at the rate of several feet per day. Barl localities for 

 water are usually those, such as so much of the County of Essex, over which there is a thick layer of clay. 

 Essex is an area of London clay, and there is practically no water in London clay. It must be pierced 



1. Ai.i.rvn M. 



2. Bon.nKK CLAY. 



3. CHALK AND TLINT. 



HARD CHALK. 

 KM I) CHALK. 



I.OWKK (.KKENSAN P&amp;gt;. 



