1 84 BiJJoop of Landaff’s Obfervat'ms on 
iron yielded hepatic air, by folution in acids. This, I believe, 
is the main of what is known by chemifts on this fubjedt ; 
what I have to fuggeft, relative to the Harrogate waters in 
particular, may perhaps be of ufe to future inquirers. 
I have been told, that 011 breaking into an old coal- work, in 
which a confiderable quantity of wood had been left rotting 
for a long time, there iflued out a great quantity of water 
fmelling like Harrogate water, and leaving, as that water does, 
a white fcum on the earth over which it pafled. On opening 
a well of common water, in which there was found a log of 
rotten wood, an obfervant phyfician aflured me, that he had 
perceived a ftrong and diftindt fmell of Harrogate water. Dr. 
Darwin, in his ingenious Account of an artificial Spring of 
Water, publiffied in the firfl: part of the LXXVth volume of 
the Philofophical Tranfadtions, mentions his having perceived 
a flight fulphureous fmell and tafte in the water of a well 
which had been funk in a black, loofe, moifl: earth, which ap- 
peared to have been very lately a morafs, but which is now 
covered with houfes built upon piles. In the bog or morafs 
above-mentioned there is great plenty of fulphureous water, 
which feems to fpring from the earth of the rotten wood of 
which that bog confifts. Thefe fadts are not fufficient to make 
us certain, that rotten wood is efficacious in impregnating water 
with a fulphureous fmell ; becaufe there are many bogs in 
every part of the world, in which no fulphureous water has 
ever been difcovered. Nor, on the other hand, are they to be 
rejedted as of no ufe in the inquiry ; becaufe wood, at a par- 
ticular period of its putrefadtion, or when fituated at a particu- 
lar depth, or when incumbent on a foil of a particular kind, 
may give an impregnation to water, which the fame wood, 
under different circumftances, would not give. 
The 
