MINERAL WATERS AND MEDICINAL SPRINGS OF ESSEX. 237
A sample obtained on the 10th September 1907 yielded the
following results :—
This water is unusual in character, as the magnesium salt
present is the chloride and not the sulphate, as is generally the
case. The water appears to be derived from beds like those at
Hornchurch ("Havering Well"), but this contains a larger
proportion of magnesium. It cannot be regarded as of any value
medicinally. It is obviously affected by manured soil in its
immediate vicinity, as it contains a fairly-large quantity of
nitrates, derived from the oxidation of manurial matter.
Mr. Dalton thinks that this water must come from "the
Thames Gravel at its junction with the London Clay."
(21).—The South Bemfleet Spring.—For our knowledge of this
spring, we are indebted to Dr. Henry Laver, F.S.A., of
Colchester, who writes us :—
" I remember this spring very well in my school-boy days, over
fifty years ago. It was at the base of a small cliff of London
Clay, on a farm held by two brothers named Woodward. The
spot was in a line from the Castle at Hadleigh to Bemfleet, just
at or below the edge of the valley. To get to it you went down
a lane leading from about the middle of the Common, as it then
existed. Possibly, it was in Hadleigh parish. The cliff of
London Clay was constantly slipping, as it is doing all along the
steep slope on the North bank of the Thames all the way from
Southend to Bemfleet and elsewhere round our Essex Coast.
Probably, therefore, anyone who visited the locality now, in
search of the well, would be unable to find it, owing to the
changes which have taken place.
" The well itself was very small—merely a 'drizzle.' I
remember well the flavour of its water, which was strongly
impregnated with what I know now to be sulphate of soda