88 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
[August 3, 1872.. 
into the sources of our water supply ; and it is further¬ 
more a fact that one, at any rate, of the most noxious of 
these matters—the discharges of cholera—will pass 
through all filters. How then can Dr. Letheby, or any 
one else, prove to us that no such noxious matter is ever 
present in the water supplied to our houses ? As we 
understand it, Dr. Letheby's answer is twofold. Firstly, 
he tells us ho knows by his experience that all dan¬ 
gerous matter must have been destroyed by oxidation in 
water which has been exposed to the conditions of the 
London water-supply. This argument we may set aside 
as a bare opinion. It is obvious that no amount of mere 
experience can decide the question. Dr. Frankland and 
8ir Benjamin Brodie have come to a different conclusion, 
and they are surely as well entitled to have an opinion 
as Dr. Letheby. Secondly 7 , Dr. Letheby relies on his 
analysis of the water, which tells him that the quantity 
of organic matter in it is very small and not noxious. 
How far his analysis may be trusted for this all-impor¬ 
tant proof a single example will show. In the report 
which we have before quoted he says :—“ The proportion 
of organic matter in the water has been very small, for the 
quantity of oxygen required to act on every description 
of oxidizable matter has ranged from only O'Ol of a 
grain per gallon in the chalk water of the Kent Com¬ 
pany, to 0-102 of a grain in the Thames water supplied 
by the Grand Junction Company.” Now Dr. Frankland 
has found that water contaminated with one-five-hun¬ 
dredth of rice-water discharge—that is, water which 
contains in every gallon 140 grains of the evacuations 
of a cholera. patient—only requires, after filtration, 
0-03 of a grain of oxygen per gallon for its oxidation. 
In other words, such a deadly mixture as this would 
exhibit under this test less than one third of the pollu¬ 
tion of the Grand Junction water! 
HEAT AND THIRST, AND SOME OF THEIR 
POPULAR ANTIDOTES. 
By the Author of a « Report on Cheap Wines.” 
I think I may appeal to experience and the instinct 
of mankind, that something more than mere water i 
required to gratify the compound craving called thirst 
leic, or as it is more commonly called hike-warm watei 
supplies the place of fluid, and so far does good, but i 
is not a true quencher of thirst, whilst from its nemativ 
properties, being neither hot nor cold, and so incapabl 
?f excitll }S' the nerves of sensation, it has become ; 
b) v ord fore very thing nauseous, disgusting, and con 
temptible, both moral and physical. “Because tho 
art lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I shall spue the 
out ot my mouth, says the Apocalyptic writer. A luke 
warm ally is usually more disgusting than an open enemy 
Heat is by no means a bad antidote to thirst, if a liquii 
be Sipped which is hot enough to produce some pungen 
effect on the tongue This may be effected by te 
or co ee, the surface of which is often sipped at a tern 
perature of 130“ to 140°. _ Of course, if the aromatic am 
astringent and stimulating elements of tea or coffe 
are present, the nervous exhaustion, of which thirst is 
symptom, will be more effectually combated, but eve] 
hot water sipped is better than lukewarm. Thirty year 
ago. dyspeptic physicians used to order their patient 
to sip with their meals water as hot as they could bear il 
But the stimulant effect of cold is far more sough 
attci than that of heat, and is more appropriate. Le 
it be observed that it is much abused : that ice taken h 
excess enfeebles the stomach, and that some people ar 
as really intemperate in gulping down unmeasurei 
draughts of cold liquid, for the relief of an unpleasan 
sensation, as others are in the use of alcoholic drink. T 
drink to excess for mere pleasure is intemperate, be th 
beverage what it may. 
Next to cold, carbonic acid is the most popular stimu 
lantand the most beneficial. It may be had in natura 
waters, as the Nassau, Seltzer, and Apollinaris, or ii 
waters aerated under pressure, or in liquids in which it 
is evolved by fermentation. Of the aerated waters in 
popular use, some arc very' vapid ; the gas escapes at 
once on exposure, and the result is hardly' more satisfac¬ 
tory than that of pure water. There is an immense- 
difference to the connoisseur between such waters as those 
of Ellis of Ruthin and those which may be got over a 
confectioner’s counter. Perhaps for a mere summer 
draught it does not much matter ; but in the treatment 
of disease the “seltzer-” or “soda-” water prescribed 
should bo from a good maker, who is careful in the 
choice of his raw material—the water—and has a first- 
rate plant for aerating it. 
The .next and most obvious method of any for evolving 
carbonic acid is by r fermentation; and this method of 
preparing a popular drink that shall be cold, aerated, 
sub.acid and stimulant, deserves not the contempt with, 
which some may' be inclined to regard it as beneath tho 
notice of political philosophers. Given heat and thirst, 
and a natural tendency to allay their effects, it is to the' 
public interest that drinks shall be readily accessible- 
which are better than water, more refreshing, more 
quenching to the thirst, containing some alcohol, and. 
y r et not enough to do mischief. Such a drink is. 
that beer which ought to be brewed in every household, 
from white sugar, a small quantity' of cream of tai’tar, a 
little lemon-juice and peel for flavour, and a liberal al¬ 
lowance of infusion of ginger. Such real fermented ginger- 
beer is very- different from a mere ginger-drink aerated by 
forcing carbonic acid into it. Sugar, which ferments- 
with y'east, yields carbonic acid in abundance, but alco¬ 
hol even more abundantly; this may be easily 7 produced 
from ginger-beer by 7 distillation, and ginger-beer is 
as strong as any 7 other cheap “ small ” beer. The car¬ 
bonic acid is better combined, and more telling to the 
palate. Then there is the ginger, a good stimulant, 
which substitutes a grateful warmth on the soft palate 
for the flabby 7 nauscousness of atonic thirst, and which 
corrects the faults of a cold acid drink. I am perfectly 
certain that this drink, well prepared and cheap, would 
be a serious antidote to the public-house bar in summer.. 
Some yearn ago I was Medical Officer of Health of 
the district, ynd tried hard to get at the secrets of the 
“poor mans home”—how they live; what they do- 
with their money'; whether the obtrusive almsgiving 
which is practised does good or harm. Now, the time 
to see the London working classes at home, and as they 7 
are, is on a Sunday morning, when all the respectable 
people are at church; and many a Sunday morning 
from 11 to. 12 30 did I spend in these explorations. One 
such morning I spent chatting with the keeper of a little • 
“general” shop at the back of Grosvcnor Square, and 
was both amused and instructed by 7 the run of custom 
that was going on all the while—more especially 7 at the 
number of women, of the class of mechanics’ wives, who- 
came in for ginger-beer.. “ You see, sir,” said the mistress, 
of the shop, “that whilst the public-houses is closed, 
ginger-beer is the only thing they can drink of a morn-- 
ing, and we sell a good deal every Sunday 7 .” It wore to- 
be^ wished, that they took nothing worse at other times. 
There is a modification of ginger-beer called pepper - 
punch , the receipt for which I learned from a West 
Indian.family 7 , (West Indians, by the bye, are famous, 
for their knowledge of gastronomy), and which I have- 
at times found very serviceable in treating persons fond 
of.taking “too much,” with atonic stomachs, nausea, 
thirst, and the like. It is made as ginger-beer, but 
heightened in piquancy and endowed with a most 
agreeable flavour by 7 adding some of the green pods of 
the capsicum. The West Indian receipt, I am sorry to- 
say', orders the addition of about a teaspoonful of rum 
to each half-pint bottle. This gives it a finish which 
few ladies can resist; but, although I urge the use of 
stimulants and of wine in moderation for the more 
effectual quenching of thirst, y'et I am afraid we must, 
draw a line at pepper punch, and leave out the rum. 
