=Water in the Human Body.=--Taken as a whole, the human body consists
of about seventy-one parts of water in the hundred. When we consider
how large a quantity of water is given off daily, not only through
the kidneys and intestines, but through perspiration, sensible and
insensible, and through the vapor breathed out from the lungs, it
becomes clear that the food must contain a large proportion of water to
supply the daily loss.
The proportions of water are not always quite the same, nor does the
identical water present in any part of the body at any given moment
remain there. There is a constant movement, a continual renewal going
on in the body, and water helps to accomplish this renewal. By means
of the watery substances, the saliva, the bile, and other juices of
the stomach and intestines, the solid nutritive parts of the food are
dissolved, and pass into the blood to renew the waste, and to keep up
that continual current called life. Water is also useful in carrying
off the worn out and useless materials which pass out through the
fluid excretions and through the vapors from the lungs and skin.
=Water in Food.=--The amount of water contained in many articles
of food that appear quite solid is generally surprising to those
unacquainted with the chemistry of foods. In one hundred pounds by
weight, fresh oatmeal contains 5 pounds of water. Corn and barley meal,
wheat flour, peas, and beans contain 14 pounds; rice 15; bread 40;
potatoes 75; grapes 80; parsnips 81; beets 82; apples 83; carrots and
cabbages 89; onions 91; lettuce 96.
Of the animal foods, butter contains 10 pounds of water in one hundred;
bacon 22; cheese 34; eggs 72; lean meat 73; fish 74; milk 86. By
cooking, most foods lose a part of their natural moisture. The eatable
part of a mutton chop contains 70 per cent of water before cooking, and
54 per cent after.
=Daily Requirement.=--Scientific sanitarians have estimated the
daily requirement of water for a person at from twelve to sixteen
gallons. The British War Department aims to provide each soldier with
fifteen gallons daily. In cities the daily allowance per capita is
fifty gallons and upwards, which provides for animals, manufacturing
purposes, fires, sewerage, etc., as well as for drinking, cooking,
bathing, and other wants of man.
=Sources of Supply.=--The importance of an abundant supply of pure
water is becoming more and more apparent each year. The numerous and
serious epidemics throughout the country whose sources have been traced
to the use of impure water leave no room for question on this point.
Most cities draw their supplies from rivers and lakes. If these sources
are kept free from sewage and the waste of manufacturing establishments
the water is likely to be pure and wholesome. Subsiding reservoirs
and filtration beds are needed to take out the mud occasioned by
rains, and to catch up whatever floating matter may be carried into
the basins. Muddiness is not always an indication of unwholesomeness,
nor is clearness a proof of purity. Germs of disease have been found
in the clearest water. Whenever there is the least suspicion of
unwholesomeness, all water used for cooking and drinking should be
boiled. It is not safe to trust to the theory, held by some, that a
running stream, even if polluted, will in flowing a distance of twelve
or fifteen miles purify itself.
Wells, which are the chief source of supply in the country, should
be kept away from barnyards, stables, cesspools, and the waste waters
from dairy and kitchen, to preserve them from pollution. Many cases of
typhoid fever and other serious diseases have been directly traced to
a violation of this rule. The ground surrounding the well should be
raised so as to throw all surface water twelve or fifteen feet away
from the well. See also what is said on this subject in the chapter on
Dwellings.
Springs usually furnish the purest and best water. Coming from a
considerable depth, spring-water loses, in its passage through the
earth, most if not all its organic matter, and rises to the surface
clear, cool, pure, and sparkling. The spring should be walled and
covered, and otherwise protected from surface drainage.
=Cisterns.=--Rain-water collected in the country, and under favorable
conditions, is comparatively pure and wholesome. In the cities, it
contains such a large amount of organic matter and other impurities,
washed out of the air and off the roofs by the rain and snow, that it
is generally unfit for drinking without being filtered. On account
of its softness, rain-water is very desirable for washing and other
domestic purposes, but owing to the absence of mineral constituents
it is flat and insipid to the taste. In New Orleans and other southern
cities, where cisterns are largely used, the water is rendered cool and
palatable by the use of large quantities of artificial ice.
=Ice.=--It was formerly supposed that in the process of freezing
all deleterious matter contained in the water was excluded. Several
outbreaks of disease in New England led to an investigation, which
showed that the ice used had been taken from ponds whose waters
contained large quantities of sewage and other impurities. A change
in the source of the ice supply resulted in an immediate check of the
disease. Recent research has shown that typhoid bacilli, after being
frozen in a block of ice for 103 days, may still be alive when released.
=Diseases Caused by Drinking Polluted Water.=--A polluted water supply
affects not one, but usually many persons, and notable epidemics have
resulted. In consequence, more diligent inquiry has been instituted
by Municipal, State, and National Boards of Health, and the evidence
adduced is of the most positive character. Typhoid fever, cholera,
dysentery, and diarrhœa have been clearly traced to the use of impure
drinking water, and other related diseases are suspected of having a
similar origin, although the evidence is not so conclusive.
=Appearance.=--A drinking water should be clear and bright. When
shaken in a glass or bottle, bubbles should rise quickly and break
immediately. If the bubbles move slowly, or seem to hang for some time
in the water, they are probably due to the presence of decaying organic
matter, and the water is of questionable purity. A slight cloudiness
in the appearance of the water, following a rain, may be due to the
presence of a small quantity of earthy matter, and not seriously affect
its wholesomeness, but if the discoloration looks like that occasioned
by a drop of milk the water should be avoided until carefully tested.
=Smell.=--A good water should have no smell. To this end, the cisterns
or other receptacles must be kept perfectly clean. The purest and best
waters will soon become foul if stored in unclean vessels.
=Taste.=--Water having a disagreeable taste is apt to be unwholesome.
In order that we may derive from it proper nourishment, water, like
other parts of our food, should be pleasant to the taste. And yet,
the taste is by no means a satisfactory test of purity. The purest of
all water is distilled water, which, by reason of the absence of all
mineral matter and air, has a flat and insipid taste. The cleanest
rain-water is also insipid. Boiled water is not much better, for while
the boiling process may have destroyed all poisonous or noxious germs,
and rendered the water absolutely wholesome, it also drove off the
natural gases which gave to the water a pleasant taste. Boiled water
may be re-aerated by pouring from an ordinary sprinkling can several
times.
=Hard Water.=--Hardness is a serious drawback, whether the water be
used for cooking, bathing, or for washing clothes. Food cooked by
boiling in hard water is, as a rule, not so well prepared. Greens
take on a gray color. Tea is never so good made from hard water. For
cleaning the skin, hard water is not nearly so efficient as soft.
Linens are never of a good color when washed in hard water.
Boiling hard water before using it improves it. A pinch or two of
carbonate of soda, or of borax, is helpful in washing. A little table
salt improves it for cooking most vegetables.
=Filtration.=--The following is a simple home-made filter. Take a
large flower-pot, and soak it thoroughly in clean water. Stop up the
hole in the bottom with a cork, in which insert a glass tube about
three or four inches long. The top of the cork and tube should be
nearly flat with the inside bottom of the pot. Put in a layer of sharp,
clean sand about two inches deep, then two inches of small gravel, and
three inches of well-burnt animal charcoal. On the top of this another
layer of sand, and then another layer of gravel. The gravel, sand, and
charcoal should be thoroughly washed before using. If the flow of water
is too rapid, it may be checked by laying several flat pieces of glass
upon the layers of sand. At reasonable intervals, the sand, gravel,
and charcoal must be taken out, washed thoroughly, heated in the oven,
and replaced in the pot, which must also be soaked in boiling water.
This filter will remove nearly or quite all of the inorganic matter
held in suspension in the water, but it is not to be depended upon to
remove dangerous microbes and other germs of disease. If the water be
thoroughly boiled for half an hour and cooled before being filtered,
all danger will be removed.
There are many inexpensive filters on the market. They all become
clogged, in a little while, and need to be cleaned or renewed. The
cleaning of the one described above is so simple that any housekeeper
could do it satisfactorily.