Analyses of Books. 
[March, 
162 
“ was immediately delivered for consumption, and certainly was 
not exposed to those conditions which must be accepted as 
Sti {t t m!y P bfhe"f concerning the withdrawal of 
disease germs from water, doctors differ. Unless we are grea y 
“en'Prof . Frankland’ has asserted thaMva.er may be .freed 
filter. b ^3r! J abt^z'Hogg^orf the Contrary, has found such water 
Ple MentUrm:d=':fl”e'rryLtruaive statistics compiled hy 
Mr. Baldwin Latham, from which it appears that the : dea 
rate from diarrhoea in the districts suppled by the rhames 
water-companies is actually lower, though only to a slig 
Sent tha P n that prevailing in ‘he districts supplied rom the 
deep wells of the Kent Company. “Such a fart as this, 
remarks “ is simplv irresistible. c 
J Co y ncemtng the means of judging of the fitness or unfitness of 
a water for drinking purposes some difference of op, mon p evad. 
The author relies, it seems, on chemical analysis. He \\i tes . 
T By the logical use of the results obtained from the anal >:® is 
waters, combined with a knowledge of their history . ^ « got 
difficult for chemists to form a sound judgment as ,, 
they are or are not fit for drinking purposes, notwithstanding a 1 
that has been said to the contrary by engineers and bmlog^^. 
If chemists cannot pronounce positively concer n b Ascertain 
or absence of disease-germs m water they -can at least a 
from its composition and history whether 1 Hi region and 
them or not. Engineers can do nothing in this diredlior 1, and 
biologists cannot provide a better test of the punty o 'va 1 
We submit that the history of a water is as open to the 
engineer or the biologist as to the chemist. Chemical analysis 
may by dirert or indirert methods, ascertain what proportion 0 
carbon and of nitrogen in organic compounds » pre»P Bu 
unable to say whether such nitrogen and carbon have been 
derived from ‘he y bodies of disease-microbia or from lifeless 
is tr wssss - ;“™ - 
fa Tte 0 f2cicltpr n ocTe^f e oi the Metropolitan Board of Works 
at Barking and Crossness receive the estimate which they jus > 
m We regret that, from want of space, we cannot at picseiu 
enter upon a discussion of the author's views on the ■ propel ■ " 
of disease, the more as he does not implicitly accept the pie. 
vailing germ-theory. 
