178 SPRINGS, RIVERS, CANALS; LAKES, 



east by south of London. This place is remarkable for its chaly* 

 beate springs, which are four or five miles south of the town, but 

 in the same parish, and are resorted to by the nobility and gentry 

 in June, July, and August. They are situated for the most part 

 in the parish of Tollbridge, between two hills, named Mount Sion 

 and Mount Ephraim, both covered with good houses, and gardens 

 abounding in fruits. Tunbridge is likewise famous for its beauti- 

 ful turnery ware. 



This spring was first discovered in the year 1606, and brought 

 into general notice by Dudley Lord North, but no buildings were 

 erected until thirty years afterward. About a mile and a half from 

 the wells is an assemblage of stupendous rocks, from forty to se. 

 venty-five feet high, \vhich resemble the hulks of large men of war, 

 closely ranged. 



EPSOM, in Surrey, is a handsome, \vell-built town, about four- 

 teen milei from London. Its extent is about a mile and a half in a 

 semi-circle, from the church to the fine seat at Diirdaus. Its mi- 

 neral purgative waters, which issue from a rising ground neunr 

 Ashstcd than Epsom, were discovered in IfilS, and soon became 

 rery famous ; but though they have not lost their virtue, they are 

 /ar from being in the same repute as formerly ; however, the salt 

 made of them is valued all over Europe. A large quantity of 

 Magnesia is prepared from the earth and water in this neighbour- 

 hood. [Gough, Phil. Trans. Thomson.] 



4. Means of analysing Mineral or Medicinal Waters, and of 

 determining their Principles and Properties. 



The first knowledge of mineral waters, like every other branch 

 of knowledge we possess, was accidentally discovered. The good 

 effects they produced on such as Jiee them, have doubtless been the 

 cause of distinguishing them from common waters. The first phi- 

 losophers who considered their properties, attended only to their 

 sensible qualities, such as colour, weight, or lightness, smell, and 

 taste. Pliny, however, distinguished a great number of waters, 

 either by their physical properties or their uses ; but the inquiry 

 after methods of ascertaining, by chemical processes, the quantity 

 and quality of the principles held in solution by mineral waters, was 

 aot attempted till the seventeenth century. Boyle is one of the first 



