1866.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 223 



and unusual organic impurity in the water of the river itself. The 

 products of foecal decomposition were known to be there in vast 

 quantities, because the fcecal matter was systematically and daily 

 deposited there, so as, if possible, to poison the stream. 



Why this should be carried out above the town instead of below it 

 was, Dr. Smith observed, a puzzle to him. He thought it a very 

 unjustifiable Municipal arrangement and highly objectionable. 



Mr. Waldie had also described " crops and forests of vegetable 

 matter" in some of his specimens. Were not these enough in them- 

 selves to account for a vast and unusual amount of organic adulteration ? 

 Dr. Smith thought this must be so, quite independent of similar 

 impurities derivable from sources of animal decay. 



Dr. S. said he could not help observing that Mr. Waldie himself 

 had expressed very considerable uncertainty as to the value of his own 

 results, and even as to the processes adopted, by which he had arrived 

 at them. 



This, Dr. S. was prepared to allow, was evidence of great candour 

 on Mr. Waldie's part, who indeed, it must be allowed, had judged 

 his own experiments very critically and severely. All this, however, 

 was not capable of affecting the Tables now about to be published by 

 the author of the present paper, and the relation of these to the 

 remarkably different figures found in Dr. Macnamara's Report of the 

 same analyses, conducted at the instance of the Calcutta Municipality. 



Dr. Smith said he was not himself prepared to disprove that tank- 

 water was less pure than Hooghly water ; this was not the point he 

 cared to discuss. On the other hand, he was quite ready to allow 

 that water drawn from Pultah Grhat ought to be and is purer than 

 that obtained under like circumstances at Cossipore, which is a good 

 many miles lower down the river. But if he did not greatly mistake 

 Mr. Waldie's meaning, the Society was now asked to accept these two 

 broad facts : — 



1st. That the water of the Hooghly is not so impure as it is usually 

 believed to be, and as has been stated by Dr. Macnamara. 



2nd. That it is fit for town consumption at all seasons of the 

 year without greater danger than attaches to the impurities of the 

 Thames, for example. 



Dr. S. believed the Hooghly to be a most unusually foul and tainted 



