230 



The Country House 



best to have it analysed by a chemist who is familiar with such work. W 7 ater has 

 been taken from some of the juniper swamps of Virginia which, while decidedly 

 doubtful as to looks and taste, proved to be perfectly healthy and harmless, while 

 numerous examples of clear, cool, sparkling water contained poisonous qualities 

 of the most dangerous sort. 



As far as tangible impurities are concerned (and by this we mean those that 

 are unsightly rather than dangerous), they can be eliminated by the use of charcoal 

 or iron-stone filters. These filters should be cleansed frequently. Although slightly 

 impure water may be filtered, it is not best to trifle too much with it. Your chemist 

 will at once tell you what you have to deal with, and a source of excessive impurity 

 should be abandoned. It is more with the knowledge that contamination may 

 occur after the supply system has been working perfectly for a considerable time 

 that we speak of the filter at all. Purification by any other method than filters 



should be done by one understanding 



%^;:*;;/ ..,, A . chemistry. This being the case, its claim 



<^kjd^ 5^**-^ on one's attention is brief. 



The well is a shaft by which water- 

 bearing strata are reached. Wells are 

 of three kinds; viz., dug, bored or artes- 

 ian, and the driven or drive well. The 

 ordinary well of the country farmhouse 

 is located midway between the kiulun 

 sink and the pigpen, with a preference 

 one way or the other as the case may 

 be. From one or both of these sources 

 of filth the well receives more or less 

 contagious matter until something hap- 

 pens. The remainder of the family are 

 consoled with the assurance that it is 

 the will of the Lord. Later the " Lord " 

 claims more victims, and all is still. 

 Religion is a beautiful thing. It seems, 

 however, decidedly out of place and a 

 shirking of responsibility to lay the 

 deadly workings of a filthy well to the 

 Almighty. Of course it is far easier to 



HMBHflMMMMIHHHHI assume that it is His wisdom than to 

 of the rustic well house at Newburgh, N. Y. take the trouble to ascertain that it is 



one's own consummate stupidity. There 



are those who a\vake to the truth after the evil is done, but how much better 

 would it have been to have taken proper precaution and averted it in the beginning. 

 The fact that the well is separated from the sink drain and the barn by a 

 considerable distance means nothing more than that the evil may be merely delayed. 

 There are cases, it is true, where wells under such conditions have remained pure 

 for years, and are, for that matter, still pure, but that is not the fault of the builder; 

 it is just pure unadulterated luck nothing more. 



