7. "Success in bringing the influence of art to bear on the masses of the population in large towns, or on any set of people who have to earn their bread and have not time to acquire an unhealthy appetite for nonsense verses or nonsense pictures, will certainly only be attained by persons who know that art is important just in proportion to the importance of that which it clothes, and who themselves feel that rightness of appearance of the bodies, and the houses, and the actions, in short of the whole life, of the population of those large towns which are now, or threaten soon to be, 'England,' is of far greater importance than rightness of appearance in all that which is usually called 'art,' and who feel, to speak of only the fine arts, that rightness of appearance in pictures of noble action and passion, and of beautiful scenery, love of which is almost a necessary of mental health, is of far greater importance than art can be in things which cannot deeply affect human thought and feeling."—Ed.
NOTES ON NATURAL SCIENCE.
THE COLOR OF THE RHINE. 1834.
THE STRATA OF MONT BLANC. 1834.
THE INDURATION OF SANDSTONE. 1836.
THE TEMPERATURE OF SPRING AND RIVER WATER. 1836.
METEOROLOGY. 1839.
TREE TWIGS. 1861.
STRATIFIED ALPS OF SAVOY. 1863.
INQUIRIES ON THE CAUSES OF THE COLOR OF THE WATER OF THE RHINE.[24]
269. I do not think the causes of the color of transparent water have been sufficiently ascertained. I do not mean that effect of color which is simply optical, as the color of the sea, which is regulated by the sky above or the state of the atmosphere, but I mean the settled color of transparent water, which has, when analyzed, been found pure. Now, copper will tinge water green, and that very strongly; but water thus impregnated will not be transparent, and will deposit the copper it holds in solution upon any piece of iron which may be thrown into it. There is a lake in a defile on the northwest flank of Snowdon, which is supplied by a stream which previously passes over several veins of copper; this lake is, of course, of a bright verdigris green, but it is not transparent. Now the coloring effect, of which I speak, is well seen in the water of the Rhone and Rhine. The former of these rivers, when it enters the Lake of Geneva, after having received the torrents descending from the mountains of the Valais, is fouled with mud, or white with the calcareous matter which it holds in solution. Having deposited this in the Lake Leman[25] (thereby gradually forming an immense delta), it issues from the lake perfectly pure, and flows through the streets of Geneva so transparent, that the bottom can be seen twenty feet below the surface, jet so blue, that you might imagine it to be a solution of indigo. In like manner, the Rhine, after purifying itself in the Lake of Constance, flows forth, colored of a clear green, and this under all circumstances and in all weathers. It is sometimes said that this arises from the torrents which supply these rivers generally flowing from the glaciers, the green and blue color of which may have given rise to this opinion; but the color of the ice is purely optical, as the fragments detached from the mass appear white. Perhaps some correspondent can afford me information on the subject.