168 
ARSENIC IN DRINKING WATER. 
preparing to digest the food to be used by the crops the 
next season, though thay may be active to a cerain extent 
even now. 
ARSENIC IN DRINKING WATER. 
Ix a former number we adverted to the moot question of 
poisoning the water of the Thames by the agent resorted to 
for its purification—the sesquichloride of iron—which has 
awakened a notable controversy, now familiar to our readers. 
It would, however, appear from the following extract from 
the Chemical News, that water containing arsenic is not always 
and of necessity prejudicial to health, but oftentimes it is con¬ 
trariwise. It is, therefore, the quantity that kills. 
Note on the Arsenical Water of Whitbeck, Cumberland, by 
Arthur H. Church, F.C.S. 
The recent reliable accounts of arsenic-eating in Syria, 
the controversy as to the effect on the Thames water of arse- 
cj 
nical perchloride of iron, and the detection of arsenic in 
numerous mineral waters and deposits, invite special notice 
to the occurrence of this element. And now that the influ¬ 
ence on the animal economy of arsenic in minute but repeated 
doses is attracting so much attention, I think that the follow¬ 
ing account, incomplete as it at present is, of an arsenical 
drinking water will prove interesting. My attention was 
first directed to the subject by the Rev. Mr. Wilkin, of Booth, 
to whom, as well as to the Rev. Mr. Ormanby, of Whitbeck, 
and Dr. Fidler, of Whitehaven, I am indebted for much in¬ 
formation and assistance. 
From the northern and western sides of Black Combe, 
a mountain in the southern part of Cumberland, stiuated 
near the sea, numerous streams or becks originate; I believe 
that one onty of these exhibits any marked peculiarity. 
Whitbeck, such is the name of this stream, is fed by several 
small springs, and it was from the source of the most south¬ 
erly of these, where it rises from the ground, and at an eleva¬ 
tion of about 900 feet from the sea, that I obtained a spe¬ 
cimen of the water for examination. 
On the 29 th of June in the present year, the water, at the 
time of collection, had a temperature of 8° 5' C., the air being 
10° 6'. The reaction of the water as it issues from the earth 
was faintly but unmistakably alkaline; on testing the water 
after ebullition the effect was more decided. The water from 
