BAILEY. | Mineral Waters. 31 
“Tt is generally known that a strong dose of sea water acts 
as an emetic; in larger proportions it is a purgative and diu- 
retic. Dioscroides advised diluting it with honey, which might 
perhaps produce an effective medicine, but certainly not a 
savory one. At the beginning of this century it was diluted 
with wine, but such a mixture would hardly be better than the 
previous one. It was prescribed in Spain against yellow fever, 
and in England against worms; in the former case as anemetic, 
and in the second case milk was added to it, so that the child 
could drink it without aversion.”’ 
On concentrating, sea water deposits calcium carbonate, cal- 
cium sulfate, sodium chlorid, then the magnesium salts, while 
bromin and iodin compounds accumulate in the mother-liquors 
and can be finally obtained from this source. It is a well- 
known fact that brine springs, especially some found in Ohio 
and West Virginia, contain sufficient quantity of bromin so that 
the mother-liquor, after the separation of salt, is used for 
the manufacture of bromin. l[odin was discovered in 1812 by 
Courtois in sea water. Moloquette discovered copper, lead, 
sulfur and iron in seaweed, and they were afterwards found in 
sea water. Some compounds of iodin and bromin, especially 
the former, seem to be concentrated in animal tissue, as in the 
familiar case of iodin in cod-liver oil. M. Dieulafait showed 
that the Dead Sea was not originally a part of the Red Sea, as 
he found neither iodin, lithium nor sulfur in the Dead Sea and 
found them inthe Arabian gulf. 
WHAT IS A MINERAL WATER ? 
‘‘By their very characteristics,’’" says Mr. Kellar, ‘‘mineral 
waters yield to a rigorous method of classification with great 
difficulty. These are complex compounds, or rather mixtures of 
variable composition. These contain very many substances in 
solution in greater or less proportion of all the soluble elements 
of the regions through which they circulate or which they trav- 
_ erse before gushing from the surface of the soil. The multitude 
of these elements, the chemical analysis of which has not al- 
11. A Sketch of the Natural History of Mineral Waters, Frederick Maurin, Sanitarian, vol. 
33, pp. 203-209. 
