“These gravel-beds are as porous as a sieve, and there is indisputable proof of the free communication of the water sheet and all the receptacles of impurity that the surface of the ground contains. The only relief is found in the fact that the water sheet is also in free communication with the rivers, rising and falling with them; but even this does not free the wells from the poisonous effects of the filth soakage from above. Geology turns over to sanitary science the conclusion, that the drift wells of central and south-western Ohio are, in all densely populated districts, small cities, towns, villages, and hamlets—even in those containing no more than a dozen houses—utterly unfit for human use.”
The above facts are applicable to all the drift formation, including that portion protected from immediate filth soakage of blue clay formation.
A recent examination of our sewerage system, by the U. S. Census Bureau, developed the fact that Cincinnati is polluting its subterraneous soil, to an alarming degree, by the vault system. That no city has so neglected the sanitary necessity of tapping the sewers for house drainage than Cincinnati; that this nature of carelessness was the cause of Memphis’ sad fate, which we have escaped because our soil is of sand and gravel, and susceptible of natural drainage. Yet through this same soil passes the water that is used by some 250 well-owners, still the use of this water is increasing.
London was originally supplied by shallow wells in gravel-beds of 10 to 20 feet in depth, and the direction of its growth was controlled by this water-bearing strata, until the establishment of the New River Water Company in 1600. The Public Health Act of 1872 gives the sanitary authorities power to close these wells.
ARTESIAN WELLS.
Beneath the Cincinnati group are the calciferous sand-rock and Potsdam sandstone, which are porous and water bearing, but they rise to the surface nowhere in our State. They have been reached, however, at this point in several of the deep well-borings, and flowing water of sulpho-saline nature was found, at the following locations:
| NAME OF OWNER. | LOCATION. | DEPTH IN FEET. | SIZE OF BORE IN INCHES. | PRESSURE IN LBS. | TEMPER- ATURE. | CAPACITY PER HOUR IN GALLONS. |
| Rabe’s Distillery | Cumminsville. | 1,400 | 4½ | 35 | — | 6,000 |
| Millcreek “ | West of Millcreek. | 1,440 | 4½ | 45 | — | 16,000 |
| Cincinnati Gas Co | West Front Street. | 1,360 | 4½ | 41 | 60 | 8,300 |
| “ “ | “ “ “ | 1,360 | 4½ | 40 | 60 | 8,300 |
| “ “ | Eastern Avenue. | 1,475 | 6 | 52 | 61 | 30,000 |
| Moerlein’s Brewery | North Elm Street. | 2,408 | 4 | — | 62 | 24,000 |
| Keck’s Fertilizing Works | Cumminsville. | 1,380 | — | — | 60 | — |
Through the kindness of Gen. A. Hickenlooper, President of the Cincinnati Gas Company, the following complete account of the borings at their works on Front Street is given, which will also serve for a description of the above artesian wells.
The depth and classification of strata are: