Читать книгу A Book of the United States - Various - Страница 15

Table of Contents

The mineral springs in the state of New York, in excellence and variety, are unsurpassed in any part of the world. The most famous are called by the general name of the Saratoga and Ballston Springs, and are embraced in an extent of about twelve miles in the county of Saratoga. The first spring discovered in the neighborhood of Ballston stands on a flat. It formerly flowed out of a common barrel, sunk around it, without any other protection from the invasion of cattle, who often slacked their thirst in its fountain. Afterwards the liberality of the citizens was displayed in a marble curb and flagging, and a handsome iron railing. The curb and flagging were finally removed, leaving the railing, which still serves the purposes of ornament and protection. The spring flows now, probably from the place where it originally issued, some feet below the surrounding surface, which has been elevated by additions of earth, for the purpose of improving the road in which it stands.

Near this spring, in boring about six or eight years ago, an excellent mineral fountain was discovered at a considerable depth beneath the surface. Its qualities are said to be superior to those of the spring already mentioned, and, by many, its waters are preferred to any other in the village.

The United States’ Spring is situated at the east end of the village. Near this fountain, a large and commodious bathing-house has been erected, to which, not only the waters of this, but of a number of other adjacent springs, are tributary, for the purpose of bathing. Between the springs already mentioned, there was discovered in the summer of 1817, a mineral spring, called the Washington Fountain. This latter spring rose on the margin of the creek in front of the factory building; it flowed through a curb twenty-eight feet in length, sunk to the depth of twenty-three feet, and was liberated at the top in the form of a beautiful jet d’eau; but the spring disappeared in 1821. Numerous attempts have since been made to recover it, but they have proved fruitless. The principal ingredients of these waters consist of muriate of soda, carbonate of soda, carbonate of lime, carbonate of magnesia, and carbonate of iron; all of which, in a greater or less degree, enter into the composition of the waters, both here and at Saratoga.

The justly celebrated springs of Saratoga are about six miles north-east of Ballston Spa. They are situated on the border of a valley, which bounds the village on the east, and form the continuation of a series of springs which first appear in Ballston about twelve miles to the south, and extend easterly in a semicircular line to the Quaker village. In the immediate neighborhood are about a dozen springs, the most celebrated of which are the Congress, the High Rock, the Flat Rock, the Hamilton, the Washington, the Columbian and the President. A cluster, known by the name of the Ten Springs, is found at the distance of a mile to the eastward.

The Congress Spring is situated at the south end of the village. It was first discovered about thirty years since, issuing from a crevice in the rock, a few feet from its present location. Here it flowed for a number of years, until an attempt to improve the surface around it produced an accidental obstruction of its waters, which afterwards made their appearance at the place where they now flow. It is inclosed by a tube sunk into the earth to the distance of twelve or fourteen feet, which secures it from the water of the stream, adjoining to which it is situated. Besides a handsome inclosure and platform for promenading, the proprietor has thrown an awning over the spring for the convenience of visitors.

The High Rock is situated on the west side of the valley, skirting the east side of the village, about half a mile north of the Congress. The rock inclosing this spring is in the shape of a cone, nine feet in diameter at its base, and five feet in height. It seems to have been formed by a concretion of particles thrown up by the water, which formerly flowed over its summit, through an aperture of about twelve inches in diameter, regularly diverging from the top of the cone to its base. This spring was visited in the year 1767 by Sir William Johnson, but was known long before by the Indians, who were first led to it, either by accident or by the frequent footsteps of beasts, attracted thither by the saline properties of the water. A building was erected near the spot previous to the revolutionary war, afterwards abandoned, and again resumed; since which, the usefulness of the water has, from time to time, occasioned frequent settlements within its vicinity. The water now rises within two feet of the summit, and a common notion prevails that it has found a passage through a fissure of the rock, occasioned by the fall of a tree; since which event, it has ceased to flow over its brink.

Between the Red spring in the upper village, and the Washington in the south part of the lower village, are situated most of the other mineral springs in which this place abounds. At three of the principal springs, the Hamilton, Monroe and Washington, large and convenient bathing-houses have been erected, which are the constant resort for pleasure as well as health, during the warm season.

The mineral waters, both at Ballston and Saratoga, are supposed to be the product of the same great laboratory, and they all possess nearly the same properties, varying only as to the quantity of the different articles held in solution. They are denominated acidulous saline and acidulous chalybeate. Of the former, are the Congress, (which holds the first rank,) the Hamilton, High Rock, and President, at Saratoga; and of the latter, are the Columbian, Flat Rock, and Washington, at Saratoga, and the Old Spring and United States, at Ballston. The waters contain muriate of soda, hydriodate of soda, carbonate of soda, carbonate of lime, carbonate of magnesia, oxide of iron, and some of them a minute quantity of silica alumina. Large quantities of carbonic acid gas are also contained in the waters, giving to them a sparkling and lively appearance. The Congress, in particular, the moment it is dipped, contains nearly one half more than its bulk of gas; a quantity unprecedented in any natural waters elsewhere discovered.

Doctor Steel, in his geological report of the county of Saratoga, published a few years since, remarks, that ‘the temperature of the water in all these wells is about the same, ranging from forty-eight to fifty-two degrees on Fahrenheit’s scale; and they suffer no sensible alteration from any variation in the temperature of the atmosphere; neither do the variations of the seasons appear to have much effect on the quantity of water produced.

‘The waters are remarkably limpid, and when first dipped sparkle with all the life of good champaigne. The saline waters bear bottling very well, particularly the Congress, immense quantities of which are put up in this way and transported to various parts of the world; not, however, without a considerable loss of its gaseous property, which renders its taste much more insipid than when drank at the well. The chalybeate water is likewise put up in bottles for transportation, but a very trifling loss of its gas produces an immediate precipitation of its iron; and hence this water when it has been bottled for some time, frequently becomes turbid, and finally loses every trace of iron; this substance fixing itself to the walls of the bottle.

‘The most prominent and perceptible effects of these waters, when taken into the stomach, are cathartic, diuretic, and tonic. They are much used in a great variety of complaints; but the diseases in which they are most efficacious, are, jaundice and bilious affections generally, dyspepsia, habitual costiveness, hypochondriacal complaints, depraved appetite, calculous and nephritic complaints, phagedenic or ill-conditioned ulcers, cutaneous eruptions, chronic rheumatism, some species or states of gout, some species of dropsy, scrofula, paralysis, scorbutic affections and old scorbutic ulcers, amenorrhea, dysmenorrhea, and chlorosis. In phthisis, and indeed all other pulmonary affections arising from primary diseases of the lungs, the waters are manifestly injurious, and evidently tend to increase the violence of the disease.

‘Much interest has been excited on the subject of the source of these singular waters; but no researches have as yet unfolded the mystery. The large proportion of common salt found among their constituent properties, may be accounted for without much difficulty; all the salt springs of Europe, as well as those of America, being found in geological situations exactly corresponding to these. But the production of the unexampled quantity of carbonic acid gas, the medium through which the other articles are held in solution, is yet, and probably will remain, a subject of mere speculation. The low and regular temperature of the water seems to forbid the idea, that it is the effect of subterranean heat, as many have supposed, and the total absence of any mineral acid, excepting the muriatic, which is combined with soda, does away the possibility of its being the effect of any combination of that kind. Its production is therefore truly unaccountable.’23

At Albany, in the summer of 1826, in boring for pure water for a brewery, a mineral spring was accidentally opened. The sensible qualities of this water have a great resemblance to those of the Congress Spring at Saratoga, but those who are acquainted with it, think it by no means so stimulating. Its temperature is uniformly from fifty-one to fifty-two degrees of Fahrenheit, at all seasons of the year; its specific gravity, when taken with great care, and after repeated trials, was found to be as one thousand and ten to one thousand. The taste of the water is purely saline, somewhat pungent, and not at all disagreeable; it has no sensible chalybeate taste, and no perceptible smell, which could lead to the suspicion of its holding sulphuretted hydrogen gas in solution.

New Lebanon Spring is situated in Columbia county, New-York about twenty-four miles south-east of Albany. It is a very remarkable fountain, issuing from a high hill. The water boils up in a space of ten feet wide by three and a half deep, and is so perfectly clear that the smallest objects may be seen at the bottom of the spring. Much gas issues from the pebbles and sand, and keeps the water in constant and pleasing agitation. The fountain is very copious, and more than eighteen barrels of water are discharged in a minute. This supply is not only sufficient to furnish the baths abundantly, but turns the wheels of several mills. The quantity of water does not perceptibly vary at any season; its temperature is uniformly seventy-three degrees of Fahrenheit. The water is without taste or odor, is very soft, is used for all culinary and domestic purposes, and differs but little from pure mountain water, except in its remarkable temperature. It is found very useful in salt rheums, and other cutaneous affections; it augments the appetite, and sometimes acts as a cathartic. For those who wish to enjoy fine rural scenery, bold, picturesque, and beautiful, and such advantages to health as this copious fountain presents, nothing can be better in its kind than New Lebanon.

The Bedford Springs rise near a romantic and frequented village of that name, situated among the mountains in the southern part of Pennsylvania. They rise from a limestone rock at the base of a hill. The water is pleasant and cold, and without any perceptible odor; the iron, lime, and magnesia, with which it is impregnated, render it useful in chronic and cutaneous disorders. Mineral springs abound among the mountains in the central parts of Virginia. The Yellow Springs, near the falls of the Little Miami, in Ohio, are esteemed for their medicinal properties; the water is a strong chalybeate. The country about them possesses much attraction in point of scenery, and is unusually salubrious.

Florida is remarkable for the large number of its springs; a substratum of soft and cavernous stone appearing to extend over the whole country, admitting the courses of subterraneous brooks, which burst out at frequent intervals in the form of springs. The most remarkable of these is the fountain of Walkulla river, twelve miles from Tallahassee. It is so large as to be navigable by boats directly below its sources. About a mile from its head-waters the channel becomes choked with weeds, but suddenly breaks on our view in the shape of a circular lake, that has been sounded with a line of two hundred and fifty fathoms. It is clear as crystal, and has the cerulean tinge which mark the waters of the gulf. This hue is attributed to the presence of the sulphuret of lime.

‘To a person placed in a skiff,’ says Mr. Flint, ‘in the centre of this splendid fountain basin, the appearance of the mild azure vault above, and the transparent depth below, on which the floating clouds and the blue concave above are painted, and repeated with an indescribable softness, create a kind of pleasing dizziness, and a novel train of sensations, among which the most distinguishable is a feeling, as if suspended between two firmaments. The impression only ceases, when the boat approaches the edge of the basin near enough to enable you to perceive the outlines of the neighboring trees pictured on the margin of the basin. It has been asserted, that limestone water, in its utmost purity, has less refractive powers for light, than freestone water. The water of this vast spring, even in this sultry climate, has a coldness almost like ice-water. The water, probably from the pressure of the sulphuret of lime, is slightly nauseous to the taste. Beautiful hammock lands rise from the northern acclivity of this basin. It was the site of the English factory in former days. Here resided the famous Ambrister. The force, which throws up this vast mass of waters from its subterranean fountains, may be imagined, when we see this pellucid water swelling up from the depths, as though it were a cauldron of boiling water. It is twelve miles from St. Marks, and twenty from the ocean.’