Practical Tests 
-FOR- 
Contaminated Drinking-Water! 
drains, cemetaries, buired carcasses of ani- 
mals, etc. Water may also be contaminated 
by organic matter entering with surface 
water over the top of the well, or by tollow- 
ing the cemented wall down to the bottom of 
the well, and entering with the water-supply 
under the wall. It can readily be understood 
that by sinking a well in the ground, a cone 
of earth is drained by its surplus water, and 
that the area of this cone will depend upon 
the depth of the well and the porosity of the 
soil. In a stiff clay soil the area of the cone 
drained -would be much less than in a loose, 
porous, gravelly soil. Should you wish to 
illustrate this cone of drainage to your schol- 
ars. draw a large picture of a section 
of a wrcll, and shade up the supposed 
.cone of drainage, making the shading heav- 
ier near the well than at the outside edges. 
This picture. Fig. 1* will then represent a 
drainage of the well and the cone of soakage 
your bottles all labelled, and be sure and 
pick up the right solu- 
tion. Try all these 
tests by yourself, be- 
fore exhibiting them to 
the class, in order to fa- 
miliarize yourself with 
the effects, and to see 
that they work as yon 
expect them to. 
Heisch's Test. 
Twenty-four or forty 
eight hours before you 
exhibit these tests to 
the class, take a clean 
pint-bottle and nearly 
till it with water con 
laminated with urine. 
To this add a small quantity (% a teaspoon- 
ful to a pint of water) of pure cane sugar 
(rock candy) and allow it to stand tightly 
corked in the sunlight, and in a moderately 
warm temperature until you wish to exhibit 
it to your class. By that time, if the water 
is contaminated, there should be a white 
cloudy appearance in the water, and a "start 
of fungoid growth. Pure water should re- 
main perfectly sweet'and clear after this test. 
TEST FOR LIME. 
Lime may be detected by adding to "hard" 
waler a few drops of oxalate of ammonium, 
when a white precipitate of oxalate of lime 
will form. If oxalate of ammonia cannot be 
secured, take the bottle of lime water and by 
means of a glass lube blow several breaths 
through the lime water. The lime in the so- 
lution and the carbonic acid in the air ex- 
pired unite to form carbonate of lime which 
manifests itself by a white precipitate. 
TEST FOR CHLORINE 
Take a small sample of the urine contam- 
inated water in the test tube and add a few 
drops of nitrate of silver solution. If chlorine 
is present a white precipitate of chloride of 
silver is formed. "In an indirect manner the 
presence of chlorine, especially when excess- 
ive, is indicative of sewage or of urine." If 
much chlorine is present, and there is a privy 
in close proximity to the well from which the 
water comes, the water is to be suspected of 
harboring evil agents against our non-sus 
pecting household. 
TEST FOR AMMONIA. 
Ammonia is a product of the decomposi- 
tion of organic matter, and an excessive 
amount of it in well-water may indicate pol 
lution from decomposing organic matter or 
from a privy vault. Take a test tube nearly 
full of the urine contaminated water and add 
to it a small quantity of Nessler's solution*; 
a yellow color, or yellowish brown precipi- 
tate shows the presence of ammonia. 
PERMANGANATE OF POTASH TEST. 
Perhaps the easiest manner of testing for 
organic matter is to add a few drops of Po- 
tassium permanganate solution to a large 
test tube of water. If organic matter be 
present, the pinkish tinge given to the water 
by the solution will disappear, and the num- 
ber"of drops added to the water before the 
pinkish tinge becomes permanent after stand- 
ing ten minutes, is a rough indication of the 
amount of organic matter present. If no or- 
ganic matter is present the pinkish tinge will 
be permanent from the first drop of the solu- 
tion added. This test cannot be relied upon 
as a detective of danger, as any organic mat- 
ter such as fruit juice will, if present in wa- 
ter, cause the reaction, while there may be no 
danger present. As a reliable test it has long 
since been abandoned. As an experimental 
test it is useful. 
The author does not claim to have added 
any new knowledge on this subject; but this 
paper is presented as a brief summary of 
methods of testing water, iu the hope that 
they may become more popularized. He 
would aduise all especially interested in the 
subject, to procure a little treatise* from 
which he has freely drawn, and to the auth- 
or of which he hereby makes acknowledge- 
ments. 
BY JNO. K. ALLEN, OF LANSING, MICH. 
In water there is, perhaps, more opportunity 
for causes of sickness to enter our systems, 
than in any article of food or drink, because 
of the large quantities of water, taken into 
our stomachs unchanged by any preparation 
of cooking or other process which would 
tend to destroy the germs of disease which 
may be present in almost any drinking-water. 
It is because of this fact that it seems impor- 
tant that teachers should understand the sub- 
ject of water-contamination and its dangers, 
sufficiently to impart to their pupils a whole 
some fear of water, the purity of which is not 
known. The knowledge necessary to be 
gained is not difficult to acquire, and the in- 
struction which may be imparted to the 
scholar may be illustrated by experiments 
and tests, simple in character, but forcible in 
their teachings. It will be the object of this 
short paper, to treat in a general manner, of 
the contamination of drinking water, and 
the tests by which such contamination may 
be detected. 
THE REQUISITES OF GOOD WATER. 
Godd water should be:- 
1. Transparent to white light, and of good 
color. This may be easily tested by filling a 
long test-tube with the water and looking 
down upon it. If the water has a bluish 
tint, and you can see the bottom of the tube 
distinctly, it is one evidence of purity. A 
green tinge may indicate vegetable impurity 
and a brown tinge may indicate animal con- 
tamination. 
2. Il should be tasteless. The bad taste 
which some waters have is not always an ev 
idence of their impurity, because many min- 
eral waters have a disagreeable taste while 
their health-giving properties are much 
praised. Taste in w ater may come from sa- 
line or mineral substances contained in it, 
or may depend on the character of the soil 
through which the water comes, or may 
arise from contamination. 
3. It should be without smell. This may be 
tested easily by filling a clean bottle one-half 
full of water, and shaking it violently for a 
few seconds. A strong whiff from the bottle 
will decide whether it possesses odor or not. 
4. It should have no particles suspended in 
it, nor should a deposit form after standing. 
5. Air should have free access to it, and it 
should be cool for drinking purposes. 
If water does not possess these virtues, it 
should be discarded for drinking purposes, 
and the cause of the defect found and reme- 
died if possible. 
HOW WATER MAY BE CONTAMINATED. 
Water in wells and cisters may be contam- 
inated by infiltration of organic matter 
through the soil surrounding the well or cis- 
tern, from privy vaults, cess pools, choked 
Fig. 2, Cone of Soakage, (After Kedzie.) 
from the cess-pool overlap each other, and 
the soakage from the 
the cess-pool or privy 
vault drains into the 
well, sickness may be 
expected in the family 
using the water. Too 
much stress connot be 
laid upon the danger 
Of using privy vaults 
tnd cess-pools, and if 
ihey are used it is»im- 
poriant that they be 
as far from the water 
supply as possible. 
mow CONTAMINATION 
4 MAY KK DETECTED. 
The most certain 
manner of detecting 
contamination, is to hate an analysis made by 
a competent chemist. This is rather expen- 
sive, and your drinking water may be easily 
tested by any of the following tests, and 
then if the tests show organic matter to be 
present, it will pay you to have the analysis 
made, to learn the source of the impurity if 
possible, and remove it: 
In performing the following tests before a 
class, it will be very desirable to have a bot- 
tle of water of known parity (distilled water), 
a bottle of water known to be contaminated, 
and several bottles of water from wells in the 
neighborhood, of which it may be desirable 
to illustrate to the scholars. Distilled water 
may be made, or purchased of a druggist. 
You may contaminate water by allowing it 
to pass through a filter full of earth which 
has been saturated with urine. Besides these 
articles you should have a bottle of lime 
water, a small quantity of nitrate of silver 
solution* a bottle of permanganate of pot- 
ashf solution, a small quantity of oxalate of 
ammonia, and a bottle of Nessler's solution. 
You. should have several large glass test 
tubes, and several drooping lubes. Have 
♦Water. Analysis: A Handbook for Water Brink- 
ers; by G. L. Austin, M. D. Boston: Lee & Shep- 
ard. 50e. 
Fig. 1, Cone of Drainage, (After Kedzie.) 
cone of drainage with the apex of the cone | 
extending down into the earth and the base ] 
of the cone at the earth's surface. It will 
then be readily understood how contamina- 
tion of the water in a well may take piace if 
any decomposing animal' or vegetable mat- 
ter is allowed to come in contact with the 
water in this cone of drainage. The soakings 
from such decomposing matter must of ne- i 
cessity be carried into the well, to be drawn ! 
up and offered to our friends and used by j 
our families, a veritable sparkling drink of 
Death. 
Opposite in character to the cone of drain- 
age is the cone of soakage. If we pour water 
into a hole in the ground, it soaks away and 
the area over which the water is distributed is 
greater than the area of the hole into which 
it is poured. The same rule will apply to the 
cone of soakage as was mentioned in regard 
to the cone of drainage, that the size of the 
area will depend upon the porosity of the 
soil. A privy-vault, full of reeking filth, sur- 
face water, urine, etc., will, by its soakage, 
contaminate a large area of ground. The 
cone of soakage may be easily illustrated to 
the class by making a large drawing of a 
cess pool and shading down the supposed 
cone of soakage, Fig. 2. When the cone of 
*"Nessler's solution maybe made by heating and 
stirring 35 grammes of iodide of potassium and 13 
grammes of corrosive sublimate, in about 800 cubic 
centimetres of distilled water. Add gradually a 
cold aqueous saturated solution of corrosive subli- 
mate, until the red color produced just begins to 
be permanent. Add 160 grammes of solid caustic 
potash to the mixture, which is then to be diluted 
with sufficient water to bring the whole to a litre. 
To render the test sensitive, add a little more cold 
saturated solution of corrosive sublimate, and al- 
low it to settle." 
*The formula for standard Nitrate of Silver so- 
lution is as follows: Dissolve 4.79 grammes of crys- 
talized nitrate of silver in one litre of distilled wa- 
ter. One cubic centimeter is then capable of pre- 
cipitating exactly one milligramme of chlorine. 
+The formula for standard Permanganate of Pot- 
ash is as follows; Dissolve .395 gramme of potash 
in one litre of distilled water. 
*We are enabled to illustrate this article through 
the kindness of The Sanitary Heview, Chicago.- 
[Ed.