EKIN ON THE ORIGIN OF NITRATES i ' 1 VII.-Ou the O,?giiz of Ai'trates in Potable TVizfers. By CIIARLES EPIS Batli. 64 The yellow colour renders the examination of its optical properties difficult but as far as has been hitherto tried it is inactive. I hare not been able to recognize fluorescence in its solutions. Its taste is a pcculiar bitter very much less both in intensity and permanence tlinii that of the other cinchona alkaloids. I have not been able to find out whether this alkaloid is contained in all the species of cinchona or if not to which it belongs for the diffi- culty of tlie crystallisation of the impure salts makes it a matter of uncertainty to obtain it. My unclc Mi-. J. E. Howard when investigating the leaves of the Ciiicliom Siccci~nLhmc from India found minute quantities of an alka- loid soluble in ether froni which an alcoholic solution of oxalic acid precipitated i t in a crj-stalline form ; bat the small quantities a t liis disposal prerented his examining it further than to show its analogy 7Vith quinine ; his present conviction is that this substance is identical with the alkaloid I hare been describing and though the eviclencc is not yet sufficient to cnable us to speak with certainty it teiids strongly to prove it.It seemed so desirable t o settle this point and to tlirom some light if possible on the order of formation and possibly on the fnr more important and far more difficult question of the mode of forniation of the alkaloids of the descending sap that he has written to Mr.Broughton and we hope shortly to receive a quantity of the leaves sufficient to enable us to investigate it. I DAVE frequently been a t a loss to account for the presence of con- sidcrable quantities of nitric acid in potable waters where contamina- tion by sewage or manured land was out of the question. To give but ono instance tlicre is a hill near Bath capped by the Great Oolite which has not a siiigle house upon it no drainage near it and on n-hose scanty herbage browse oiily a few sheep and yet the springs rising a t tlie junction of tlie Oolite with the Fuller's earth contain as much as . r j j grains of nitric acid per gallon. Here then after making all due allom- ance for the combinecl nitrogen contained in rain water which according to tlie observations of Lawes Gilbcrt and Way amounts to .?+k parts nitrogen in l,OOO,OUO tliere still remains the large proportion of eight to one to be accounted for.And this proportion will be still further increased if we consider that much of the nitric acid and ammonia IN POTABLE WATERS. 65 present in rain mater must be absorbed by vegetation in its passage through the soil. It has of course long been known that water from artesian wells in the chalk contains nitrates which cannot possibly bc refcrred to sen-ago or other impurity but I am not aware that it has becn suspcctcd that other strata might also contain nitrates. It was to ascertain this in the absence so far as I know of any publishcd expcrimcnt bcaring on the subject that the following experiments mere macle and t o ascer- tain if possible the origin of these nitrates which according to Dr.Paul in his comprehensive article on Water Analysis in m a t t s ’ s Dictionary of Chcmistry has not yet been done. The rocks and fossils mentioned below wcrc all most carefully col- lected by myself from situations There any accidental containine tion seemed impossible none of them having been exposed to tlie mcatlier or to percolating impurity. The method I pnrsued was to p o w h the fossils rougllly a i d macerate themfor a few days in perfectly pure clistillcd water; to pour off thc clear supernatant liquid ; add an eclnal rlumtity of solution of pure sodiiun hydrate (1 to 10) ; transfer to a retort; clissolvc in tlic liquid a piece of thin sheet aluinininm ; collect the ammonia by distilla- tion; ancl estimate it by Ncssler’s test.The utmost care was used to insure the purity of tlie mater ancl solu- tion of sodium hydmte and perfectly negztive rcsults werc obtained i n each case by blank experiments. Procecding in this ay I found that grey chalk marl contained 1.1 part of combined nitrogen in 1,000,000 parts ; Bath oolite 1.3 parts ; fossils from the Green-sand 2.23 parts ; fossils from tlic Lias 3.6 parts ; another sample of fossils from the Lias Ji parts ; fossils from tlic Fuller’s earth newly 3 parts j a seinplc of Inferior Oolite rock i . 6 parts ; and another sample of the same 6 9 parts. The samples of Iiifcrior Oolitc rock were entirely made up of fossils and although I hail erery rcason t o trust the results given by my first experiment yet thc quantity of nitrogen present mas so high that J obtained the second snmplc fiom :L different locality but it gave almost the same results.Tlic high figure of combined nitrogen given by tho Inferior Oolite canscd me t o look a t my note-book ancl I found that almost without exception the springs in this neighbourhood mliich I hare examined and wliicli had pcrco- latcd through the Inferior Oolite rising a t its junction with thc Lias contained a larger quantity of nitric acid varying from 14 p a i n to 2 grains per gallon than the springs rising a t the junction of‘ tlic Cheat Oolite with the Fuller’s earth and this I attribute to thc onc stratuni being so much m7re fossiliferous than the other.It is still the practice of many of our first analysts to look with great suspicion upon maters containing any appreciable amount of nitric acid FRANKLAND ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF FUNGI VIII.-OIP tlLe Development of FumgSi in Potable Water. By E. PRANKLAND Ph.D. D.C.L. P.R.S. 66 bat that this nitric acid is not necessarily due to tlie oxidation of excretal matter I think the foregoing experiments sufficiently prove and I ven- ture to think in consequence that the “ previous sewage contamination theory” ought to be considerably modified. IN June 1870 Mr. ITeiscli communicated to the Chemical Society the results of some rery interesting obserrations on the derelopment of cellular and fungoid growths in various waters to which a small quantity of crybtalliiie s u p - liad been added.Having observed this phenomcnon in water to wliich sewage was strongly suspected to have gained access lie procured water from various sewers and after allom- ing the suspended ma,tters to settle six drops of each sample of clarified liquid were mixed with 10,000 grains of West Middlesex and New Rivcr water and to G oz. of each sample thus polluted 10 grains of pure sugar were added n like quantity being mixed with cj oz. of the watcr without tlic sewage. All the samples were placed in stoppered bottles in a window where plenty of liglit could reach tliem. It was founcl tliat the watcr and sugw reinained clear and sweet as did also lhe water and sewage vithout sugar ; but the mixtures of water sewngc and sugar became turbid and on being submitted to microscopic examination were found to contain small spherical cells nith in most cases a very briglit nucleus.After the lapse of some days these cells gradually grouped themselves together in bunches something like grapes ; t,liey next spread out into strings with a wall surrounding and connecting the cells ; the original cell-walls then seemed to break and leave apparently tubular sort of threads branched together. A h . Heisch then describes a number of other experiments which taken together with tlic foregoing led him to tlie conclusion that the cells of these germs whcn thus dex eloped are distinct evidence of sewage contami- nation and that the germs producing tliese cells are not removed by filtration through the finest Swedish paper neither are they destroyed by boiling for half-an- hour. These remarkable results excited in myself and doubtless in other cheinists occupied in the inrestigntion of potable waters the liveliest intercst. h i comeetion with the most generally accepted hypothesis of the cause of the spread of epidemic disease tlirough the agency of water there was liere discovered a much nearer approach to the supposed iiiorbific matter in such water than had before been attained. Another parallel mas apparently opened from which one of the strongholds of