26 
DE RANGE : UNDERGROUND WATERS IN LINCOLNSHIRE. 
Analysis given in grains per gallon : — 
Total solid residue 
... 18-48 
Oxidizable Organic matter 
•02 
Chlorine 
•90 
Equal to Chloride of Sodium 
1-48 
Nitric Acid as Nitrates 
... 385 
Free Ammonia 
•0005 
Albumenized Ammonia 
001 
Hardness — Clarke's scale 
14 
" Water was bright, clear, and free from colour and deposit . . 
' ' ' It is a beautifully pure supply for drinking purposes : it not 
being excessively hard makes it also serviceable for general domestic 
purposes." 
The excellent character of the water derived from the New Red 
Sandstone, and its power of naturally filtering and purifying waters 
passing through its pores, was acknowledged by the Rivers Pollution 
Commission, and from this formation are derived at Liverpool six- 
and-a-half million gallons a day, and the whole of the supplies of 
Birmingham, Birkenhead, Southport, Wallasey, Crewe, Staffordshire 
Potteries, South Staffordshire Waterworks, Nottingham, Coventry, 
and Leamington, as well as a large number of smaller towns. The 
outcrop of these rocks lies sixteen miles westward of Lincoln, where 
they occupy a very large area between Worksop and East Retford, of 
dry sandy ground, absorbing a large proportion of the annual rain- 
fall, which water is practically untouched. The eastward dip of the 
New Red Sandstone carries down that formation, and with it the 
underground stores of water contained in it below the Lias and 
Oolites of the Grantham, Lincoln, and Gainsborough districts, 
through which they have been touched at several points, and in 
some cases penetrated. 
The Keuper Marls contain sandy beds, which at several localities 
have given local supplies, but they cannot be depended on for large 
public water supplies. 
The Marlstone Rock Bed, lying between the Lower and Upper 
Lias Clays, is often of great value as a source of springs, but in the 
Lincoln district this is not the case. 
