A Treatise on Adulterations of Food, and Culinary Poisons | Page 7

colour, and filled with sediment. A
fine of 30l. was ordered to be paid by the defendant.
[2] Of this root, several varieties are imported. The white sort, which
has no wrinkles, and no perceptible bitterness in taste, and which,
though taken in a large dose, has scarcely any effect at all, after being
pulverised by fraudulent druggists, and mixed with a portion of emetic
tartar, is sold, at a low price, for the powder of genuine ipecacuanha
root.
[3] Genuine ultramarine should become deprived of its colour when
thrown into concentrated nitric acid.

[4] Genuine carmine should be totally soluble in liquid ammonia.
[5] Genuine madder and carmine lakes should be totally soluble by
boiling in a concentrated solution of soda or potash.
[6] Genuine Antwerp blue should not become deprived of its colour
when thrown into liquid chlorine.
[7] Genuine chrome yellow should not effervesce with nitric acid.
[8] The best Indian ink breaks, splintery, with a smooth glossy fracture,
and feels soft, and not gritty, when rubbed against the teeth.
[9] Genuine white lead should be completely soluble in nitric acid, and
the solution should remain transparent when mingled with a solution of
sulphate of soda.
[10] Genuine vermilion should become totally volatilised on being
exposed to a red heat; and it should not impart a red colour to spirit of
wine, when digested with it.

REMARKS
ON THE
Effect of different Kinds of Waters
IN THEIR APPLICATION TO
DOMESTIC ECONOMY AND THE ARTS;
AND
METHODS OF ASCERTAINING THEIR PURITY.
It requires not much reflection to become convinced that the waters
which issue from the recesses of the earth, and form springs, wells,
rivers, or lakes, often materially differ from each other in their taste and

other obvious properties. There are few people who have not observed
a difference in the waters used for domestic purposes and in the arts;
and the distinctions of hard and soft water are familiar to every body.
Water perfectly pure is scarcely ever met with in nature.
It must also be obvious, that the health and comfort of families, and the
conveniences of domestic life, are materially affected by the supply of
good and wholesome water. Hence a knowledge of the quality and
salubrity of the different kinds of waters employed in the common
concerns of life, on account of the abundant daily use we make of them
in the preparation of food, is unquestionably an object of considerable
importance, and demands our attention.
The effects produced by the foreign matters which water may contain,
are more considerable, and of greater importance, than might at first be
imagined. It cannot be denied, that such waters as are hard, or loaded
with earthy matter, have a decided effect upon some important
functions of the human body. They increase the distressing symptoms
under which those persons labour who are afflicted with what is
commonly called gravel complaints; and many other ailments might be
named, that are always aggravated by the use of waters abounding in
saline and earthy substances.
The purity of the waters employed in some of the arts and manufactures,
is an object of not less consequence. In the process of brewing malt
liquors, soft water is preferable to hard. Every brewer knows that the
largest possible quantity of the extractive matter of the malt is obtained
in the least possible time, and at the smallest cost, by means of soft
water.
In the art of the dyer, hard water not only opposes the solution of
several dye stuffs, but it also alters the natural tints of some delicate
colours; whilst in others again it precipitates the earthy and saline
matters with which it is impregnated, into the delicate fibres of the stuff,
and thus impedes the softness and brilliancy of the dye.
The bleacher cannot use with advantage waters impregnated with

earthy salts; and a minute portion of iron imparts to the cloth a
yellowish hue.
To the manufacturer of painters' colours, water as pure as possible is
absolutely essential for the successful preparation of several delicate
pigments. Carmine, madder lake, ultramarine, and Indian yellow,
cannot be prepared without perfectly pure water.
For the steeping or raiting of flax, soft water is absolutely necessary; in
hard water the flax may be immersed for months, till its texture be
injured, and still the ligneous matter will not be decomposed, and the
fibres properly separated.
In the culinary art, the effects of water more or less pure are likewise
obvious. Good and pure water softens the fibres of animal and
vegetable matters more readily than such as is called hard. Every cook
knows that dry or ripe pease, and other farinaceous seeds, cannot
readily be boiled soft in hard water; because the farina of the seed is
not perfectly soluble in water loaded with