20 
Bulletin 72. 
as the soils in the vicinity of the other wells. The water soluble in 
this soil was less than in that about well A, but greater than in that 
about wells B and D for both the first and second two inches. The 
percentages of chlorin in the water soluble portions of the soils are 
not very different, but it is not probable that the salts present in the 
soils are the same. The whole of the chlorin may be present in the 
form of ordinary salt in one case and in the form of magnesic or 
some other chlorid in the other; this seems to be the actual case 
for we were unable to combine the results of the analyses of these 
different water soluble portions in the same manner. 
§ 61. It was hoped that the amount of the chlorin in the 
water and its variation from time to time might throw some light 
upon the movement of the alkali salts in the soil; but these seem 
so dependent upon local conditions and the character of the soil 
that no general deductions are justified. 
TOTAL SOLIDS. 
§ 62. The term total solids is here equivalent to alkali salts . 
in solution in the ground water, and these are not the same as those 
which form the alkali incrustations, nor are they equal to the water 
soluble portion of the soil. These are three different mixtures of 
salts. 
§ 63. It has been given as the result of three seasons’ obser¬ 
vation on this plot that the amount of the total solids varied in 
different portions, as shown by the fact that the wells differed from 
one another in this respect, and that there was no relation in the 
rate or extent of their variations. This is not the case with the 
composition of the solids held in solution, as shown by more than 
one hundred complete analyses of the waters of the different wells. 
§ 64. I wish to emphasize the statement that the well waters 
represent the composition of all the water flowing into the well, be¬ 
tween the surface of the water table and the bottom of the well, also 
possibly of water coming from the gravel below the well, for it is 
certain that however abnormally the salts may diffuse through the 
solution within the mass of the soil, they are entirely relieved from 
the influence of the soil particles in the free water accumulating in 
the wells. These well waters probably represent the average free 
solution in the soil for a depth represented by the height of the 
water plane above the bottom of the well, especially if there is no 
hydrostatic pressure forcing water upward out of a more porous 
stratum, as might have been the case in some of my wells where 
they entered the gravel. 
§ 65. I have two analyses which, taken with the conditions 
under which the samples were collected, will fully present this 
