Analysis of the Pittsburgh Mineral Spring. 1 25 



ated. If you think the subject of any interest to the public, 

 or that such an inquiry is within the limits of those branches 

 of science, to which your useful Journal is appropriated, 

 this communication is perfectly at your service. 

 I am sir, very respectfully yours, 



W. Meade. 



The Pittsburgh Mineral Spring is pleasantly situated on 

 the farm of John S. Scully, Esq. in St. Clair township, Al- 

 leghany county, four miles south west of the city of Pitts- 

 burgh, and two miles south of the Ohio river. It issues 

 from the fissures of a rock, on the side of a small hill, and 

 discharges about a gallon of water per minute, which is con- 

 veyed through a tunnel into a reservoir, from which it is 

 pumped to supply the bath house. The water in the spring, 

 when undisturbed for a few hours, is covered with a thin 

 white pellicle, which after some time assumes an iridescent 

 appearance. It then falls to the bottom, and is renewed, if 

 the water be not disturbed, as may be more particularly ob- 

 served every morning. 



When the water is first taken from the spring, its appear- 

 ance in a glass is perfectly clear ; its taste is lively and rather 

 pungent, with a peculiar ferruginous flavour, and an odour 

 which has some resemblance to the scouring of a gun bar- 

 rel, and which is easily recognized as arising from an impreg- 

 nation of sulphuretted hydrogen gas. 



If the water is allowed to remain for some hours in a 

 glass, it loses, in some degree, its transparency, as well as its 

 lively and pungent taste ; numerous air bubbles are extracted 

 from it, and a light deposit takes place on the inside of the 

 glass, which renders it pellucid. Vessels which are constant- 

 ly used become lined with an ochry incrustation which is 

 with difficulty removed, and the bottom and sides of the 

 well, as well as those substances over which the water flows, 

 contain a sediment of the same nature. 



The temperature of the spring is nearly the same at all 

 seasons of the year. In the month of August, when the 

 atmosphere was as high as 85 of Fahrenheit, the tempera- 

 ture of the water was only 54. 



The specific gravity of the water differs little from the 

 purest water. When compared with distilled water it is as 

 1002 to 1000. 



Having made these preliminary remarks on the external 



