THE SHALLOW AND DEEP WELL WATERS OF ESSEX.
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something was done at the well itself (I do not know what), and at
my next visit the water taken gave no indication of impurity.
Recently, however, I was told that the water was again very hard,
and, upon examining a sample, I found it as bad as at first.
Before considering the variations in character of the deep well
waters throughout the county, it may be instructive to consider to
what extent such waters may differ in composition over a much
more limited area. As I recently examined the waters from all
the wells in the parish of Latchingdon, we will take this area as
an example. The analyses of fourteen waters are embodied in
Table VII. These waters varied in total solids from 85 to 582
grains per gallon : the hardness from 3o to far over 100°. In fact
the hardness of the water from Hitch's well is so excessive as not to
be capable of estimation by the ordinary process. The alkalinity,
due to the presence of carbonates, varied from 17 to 34-5° per
gallon; the chlorine from 14-8 to 71 grains per gallon. All these
wells are said to be about 300 feet deep, save the one at Tyle Hall,
the surface elevation there being much higher than in the other
portions of the parish where the deep wells are found. In all cases
the water is said to come from the Tertiary sands: yet some con-
tain, as we have seen, only 3 to 4 grains of lime salts per gallon,
and no magnesia salts; whilst others (Snoreham Hall, Bullock's, and
Hitch's) contain so much sulphate and chloride of magnesium as to
unfit them for any domestic purpose. I know of no other district,
however, in which the variation in character is so marked as around
Latchingdon. Many of the wells bored here have been closed
because the water was unusable ; and anyone wishing to sink a well
must take the risk as to what the character of the water will be. Up
to the present time I have only met with these magnesia waters in
the district between Foulness Island and Latchingdon. What is the
origin of these magnesian salts, or of the water containing it ? It
resembles closely the water referred to as contained in small beds of
sand in the upper portion of the London Clay. Do such beds also
occur at various depths or beneath the clay ? The water from
Hitch's well, for a great many years, was as soft and good as any
deep well water in the parish. The supply, however, began to fail,
owing, it is said, to the sinking of a similar well on Bridgemarsh
Island, and the owner decided to have the tube "shelled" and the
well bored a few feet deeper. This was done ; but it was then
discovered that the water was totally altered in character, and it has
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