18 
were proved to be about 1200 feet in thickness. Rock salt 
and not fresh water has generally been found in them. If 
the sandstone beds of the waterstones or the soft red sand- 
stone of the bunter, both of them water bearing strata, were 
reached, he doubted about the water being fresh if found at 
all. 
Mr. W. W. Platt, of the firm of Mather and Platt, said 
he was of opinion that the occurrence of salt in the marls 
was no reason why there should not be fresh water below in 
beds of sandstone, and if he were the parties engaged in the 
undertaking he should not hesitate in proceeding further, 
and he thought with a fair chance of success, for a good 
supply of fresh water. 
“On the Manufacture of Sulphide of Ammonium, 95 by 
Peter Spence, F.S.A., F.O.S. 
Hydro-sulphuret of ammonia, or sulphide of ammonium, 
is at present chiefly used in the laboratory, where it is a very 
useful reagent in metallic and other analyses, and it has 
often been thought it might be more extensively used if it 
could be made cheaply and of good quality. At present it is 
made by directly charging liquor ammonia with sulphuretted 
hydrogen gas, but this is a very expensive mode, and, from the 
fact that most of it thus obtained is not fully charged, it would 
seem not to be an easy mode of making it. Having occasion 
some time ago to require it largely in the manufacture of 
sulpho-cyanide of ammonium, I invented for myself a mode 
of making it very economically and fully charged with 
sulphur. 
In communicating this plan to the Society I do it in the 
hope that it may be useful in the laboratories of those who 
produce some of their own reagents. The Society must not, 
however, give me too much credit for generosity, for, had I 
found a market for the article making it worth my while to 
make it largely, I should have held it secured by patent. 
