TREATISE BY HERR WEX. 195 



were formerly so abundantly provided with water from the aqueducts 

 by which they were supplied that they could play almost the whole 

 day long ; whereas now, from the great diminution which has taken 

 place in the water coming to them, this must be allowed to accumu- 

 late for about twenty-three hours to allow the fountains and other 

 water-works to play a single hour. 



" So also with the numerous fountains and artificial cascades in 

 the Belvidere-Schwarzenberg and Lichtenstein-Gardens at Vienna, and 

 those in the palace garden at Schtinbrunn, which were abundantly fed 

 by spring-water led to them, they stand now almost quite dry, as a 

 saddening monument of the dried up springs. 



"The City of Vienna has, besides, about 10,000 sunk wells, and in 

 addition to these nineteen different aqueducts, with which the springs 

 and drainage waters in the environs of Vienna are intercepted, col- 

 lected, and brought into the city. After the water in the sunk wells 

 had not only diminished, but, in consequence of the filtration from 

 the canals, had become deteriorated — and also the quantity of water 

 brought in at one time by the aqueducts had become very much 

 reduced; there was constructed, in the year 1836, the Emperor 

 Ferdinand's aqueduct, by means of which were brought into the 

 City of Vienna, from the Vienna Donaucanale, near Nussdorf, by long 

 and deep suction pipes, an aggregate of about 100,000 einiers of water 

 daily ; and now, after this aqueduct also, through a lowering in the 

 water-level in the Vienna Donaucanale, and partly through the 

 coincidence with this of a sliming up of the suction pipes, has be- 

 come insufficient and precarious, the commune of Vienna, after year- 

 long negociations, has seen itself under the necessity to seek to 

 obtain the two million eimers per day, required by the city for 

 drinking and necessary uses, from the high springs of the Schneeberg 

 (Kaiserbrunnen and Stixensteinerquelle), by means of a canal 

 about twelve German miles long,* which aqueduct will absorb a 

 capital of about sixteen miUion of Guldens [or ^1,600,000 

 sterling]," 



Herr Wex goes on to say : — " I consider that I have satisfactorily 

 proved, by the foregoing observations, deductions, and examples, that 

 in recent times the supply of water in subterranean reservoirs, and in 

 the water-bearing strata of the earth, is being diminished ; further, 

 that many of the drains and springs of to-day have become some 

 quite dry, and others yield a comparatively small supply of water ; 



* A Germaa mile is equal to about 4^ £nglisb miles. 



