367 



ber. The evaporating pans are fitted with wooden covers, and the 

 vapour escaping from them is conducted through pipes passing 

 through the cisterns before spoken of, and by its condensation fur- 

 nishes a large quantity of perfectly soft water. The excess of the 

 gas is used as fuel under the boiler of a steam engine employed in 

 boring another well, and for the purposes of lighting up the establish- 

 ment at night. 



In the works from which the description was taken, 450 bushels of 

 good merchantable salt are made daily, and can be sold at 18 cents 

 per bushel. It is not every brine-well, however, which furnishes the 

 gas ; nor is the supply unlimited, since the first gas-well has en- 

 tirely given out. The temperature of the water from all these wells 

 is the same as that of the coldest spring water, which contrasts singu- 

 larly with the phenomena found in corresponding borings in Europe, 

 such as the well at Grenelle, the temperature of whose water is 85°, 

 and the observed increment below the point of constant temperature, 

 1° for every 50 feet. 



Mr. Allen attributes the rise of the water to the hydrostatic pressure 

 in subterranean currents extending from the tops of the surrounding 

 mountains ; the gas he supposes to be developed during the conversion 

 of the bituminous coal (with which the region abounds) into coke, gra- 

 phite and anthracite; the coldness of the water he attributes to the 

 solution of the salt. The borings are through soft, crumbling sand- 

 stone, into which the drills penetrate easily and perforate a channel 

 like a tube of stone. They are usually 2| or 3 inches diameter, and 

 to prevent the infiltration of the upper weaker brine, are lined with a 

 copper tube of about 2 inches diameter, made continuous by being 

 tightly united by screw-joints of cast brass, and with a strip of leather 

 around the lower end to make the tube fit tight to the bore of the drill 

 hole. The contract price for boring to the depth of 1000 feet, is 

 $2.50 per foot, the necessary steam-power being furnished, and six 

 months allowed to execute the work. 



The drilling apparatus consists of " auger-rods," as they are termed, 

 made of round pieces of oak of about 2 inches diameter, and often 

 20 feet long, the sections being united by iron screw-joints. The 

 bottom sections of the auger-rods are made of iron, terminated with 

 a steel drill, this heavy metal being used to cause the descent of the 

 wooden rods in the water that usually fills the drill-hole. The lower 

 iron rods are for this reason called by the workmen "sinkers." 



The lowest steel-pointed section of the auger-rod is formed with an 

 open slit at the end of its junction with the section next above it, in- 



