?6 HOME LIFE IN FLORIDA. 



all the impurities of the water to the bottom. For every 

 gallon of water that it is desired to purify, add a teaspoon- 

 ful of the filtering fluid, and stir it until every particle of 

 the auimalculse is precipitated. This usually takes five 

 minutes. Then run your gallon of water thus treated 

 through the filter, and you will have your water free from 

 all impurities." 



To make a filter with a wine barrel, procure a piece of 

 fine brass wire cloth of a size suflficient to make a partition 

 across the barrel. Support this wire cloth with a coarser 

 wire cloth under it, and also a light frame of oak, to keep 

 the Avire cloth from sagging. Fill in upon the wire cloth 

 about three inches in depth of clear, sharp sand; then 

 two inches of charcoal broken finely, but no dust ; then 

 on the charcoal four inches of clear, sharp sand. Fill up 

 the barrel with water, and draw from the bottom. 



Sometimes, after heavy rains, the well-water is found to 

 have sediment in it ; in such cases drop into it powdered 

 alum, in the proportion of one tablespoonful to a hogs- 

 head of water. 



Or, if alum is not at hand, borax will do, two ounces to 

 about twenty barrels of water. 



In either case stir the water for a few moments, and the 

 impurities will in a few hours settle to the bottom, but 

 more entirely so with the alum than with the borax. 

 Neither afiects the taste of the water. 



We have been thus minute in dealing with this subject, 

 not because the settler is at all likely to have any trouble in 

 procuring pure water, for, as we have said, this is only so in 

 Florida in exceptional localities, but rather on the principle^ 

 that " an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." 



The sugar test will quickly settle the matter of pure or 

 impure water ; not one in one hundred will find it the 

 latter. 



