Jahrgang 
14 (1800)
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173
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ON AMERICAN SPRINGS.: (Concluded from page 19-) For the Cómmercial and Agricultural Magazine.

HE extraordinary kinds of ſprings in America, ſo far as they

occur to my remembrance, are(prings which ebb and flow freſh water in the interior of the country s ſprings producing common falt in the interior parts of thecountry; ſulphur ſprings, bituminous ſprings, alum ſprings, and medicinal ſprings, which have been analyzed by profeflional men, and are ſaid to poſſeſs ave properties ſimilar to thoſe of Spa, and other mineral waters of Europe.

Of the ebbing ſprings, there is one upon the weſtern ſide of the north: Fork of Holton river in the tate of Tenneſſee, juſt below the waggon ford at Ro(ss iron works, wbich may be con= ſidered as a ſpecimen correſponding with all the reſt of this kind, and reſembling one at Giggleswick in Y orkſhire, ſo far as its being ſituated beneath a high bank of lime ſtone country, and in the nature of its AuAuations. Mr. Ferguſon, in his Lectures under the bead of iatermitting, or reciprocating ſprings, page 117, plate xi. and figure 2. has ſpared me the trouble of accounting for this phenomenon.

Thefalines, or falt in ſprings in America, froin which falt is made for common houſhold purpoſes, have litile if any reſem- blance to che ſalines of Avaujuez.

Theſe are moſtly found in places termed falt licks*, andthe waterrom which the falt is made by boiling, is chiefly procured by digging wells in ſuch places. There ſcems, I think, to be little doubt, that theſe kinds of ſalines are exudations from a ſolid body of rock ſalt underneath; which impregnates the water in its paſiage through the ſeveral ſubterraneous ducts which lead to the orifice, through which it diſcharges towards the open air. But this ſeems not to be the caſe with the ſalines of Spain, which bear the features of a general impregnation through porus hills of nitrous and ſaline particles, which have a natural tendency to chryſtallization.

The ſpecies, which are uſually denominated ſalt ſprings,"and ſalt licks in America, are numerous; in ſo much, that nature may be ſaid to. have been peculiarly bounteous in this reſpect, to the interior countries of this favored continent, in every place which

is remote from the ſca. They abound in many places near the lakes of Canada; in many places upon the waters of the Ohio

* Salt licks are moiſt and ſpringy places; generally in a clay wil near a creek or river, which are ſo rongly impregnated with ſal or ſaline particles, that the wild beaſts and neat cattle convene thither in herde, o fic and eat the ſaline earth,: