Organic Impurities in Water. -- a small quantity of organic matter of vegetable origin, that is to say, an amount not exceeding three grains to the gallon, is not generally found to be injurious, but even very minute quantities of organic material of animal origin, especially if this material is composed of the waste matters, such as urine or excrement, for man or animals, is the great cause of unwholesome nests of water. Probably one fourth of the sickness and death in civilized communities arises directly or indirectly from this one cause, and, unfortunately, even when we are fully forewarned of this imminent danger to health, it is exceedingly difficult and most thickly populated places to secure a source of water supply with which sewage has not been mingled.

 

It is little wonder, that 100 years ago and even further back, people developed a taste for wine and other forms of alcohol, which essentially had to be distilled. This was one way to actually purify water or something drinkable, and help people avoid some of the issues that were probably readily found in the water supply of many urban areas.  If you were to travel back in time, and you were looking for a small business opportunity to earn a good living in the past, setting up some sort of water purification system, could definitely help a person earn a good living and possibly change the course of history not to mention decreasing the deaths of many children in newborns. In fact the war old would probably be more populous today, if it had not been for this issue.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Size, Shape and Location of the Heart
  
  

  Size, Shape and Location of the Heart.  –In this beautiful anatomical chart we obtain an accurate idea of the relative size, shape and position of that wonderful engine, the heart, his tireless efforts to keep the wheels of life and motion are truly surprising, and fill us with amazement at the prodigious work at daily performs.  The heart is in your regular, pear-shaped hollow, muscular organ, placed obliquely in the lower in front part of the chest, between the two lungs and inclining to the left of the centre. the bases directed toward the spine and corresponds with the fourth and fifth dorsal spine bone, while the apex points between the cartilages of the fifth and sixth ribs on the left side.  In this illustration the pericardium, or loose sac in which the heart is enclosed, is removed and we see the coronary artery with its branches distributed over the outer surface of the complex and restless organ.

  This section wasn’t written to poorly, or maybe a better way to say this is that it seems to stood the test of time fairly well.  Second sentence got a little bit wordy and again I would suspect a paid by the word contract, but in general this was fairly descriptive and fairly on point.  You might notice the spelling of the word centre spelled with an ‘re’ as opposed to an ‘er’

  I suspect that may be one of those variations in spelling that have occurred over the centuries. Otherwise it was fairly tame.  The chart that they’re referring to his Chart 2 by the way.

• Chart 1
  
  

  Here are several images captured with a digital camera covering Chart 1.

  
  
  
  
  

• Quantity of Water Needed
  
  

  Quantity of Water Needed.-the quantity of water needed by man and animals must therefore be very carefully calculated. Repeated experiments upon a very extended scale in England have shown that a healthy man requires daily as drink from 2 to 4 pints of water, this amount being in addition to that which is swallowed as moisture and food. The amount required for cooking is estimated at from having gallantly gallon or more. To this quantity, Dr. Parkes considers should be added for daily ablution, including a sponge bath, 5 gallons; daily share of kitchen and other utensils, and house washing, 3 gallons; and share of clothes washing, another 3 gallons; making up a total of a little over 12 gallons for each individual daily. In the poorer districts of the city of London, the amount used is stated to be only about 5 gallons daily. A shower-bath will require about 4 gallons extra, and a plunge-bath from 40 to 60 gallons. Where water-closets are used in additional quantity of from 4 to 6 gallons daily for each person must be provided.

  In general this is actually one of the more interesting paragraphs that I found in this book. It describes several things that I believe could be rather unique. First it discusses the quantity of water needed for human consumption. It describes experiments done in England and considering that this book was published sometime around the turn-of-the-century around 1916 by my estimates, this would seem to indicate a human water consumption estimates of 2 to 4 pints presented 20 years before the FDA guidelines written by a bureaucrat that suggested that people should drink 8 cups of water a day.

  Furthermore I find this one interesting from the perspective that it discusses how much water people may have used around the turn-of-the-century. I live in the Southeast of the United States and today we are in a drought.. Water consumption is definitely an important issue for the Southeast United States and many other areas of the world. And therefore when I listen to and read some of the items here that describe how much water should be used or could be used, it seems strikingly different than what we might use today, especially as we have many more appliances that use water, and many newer appliances that are designed to be energy-efficient.  Very very interesting section, some of those water estimates seemed very high by todays standards and some seemed relatively low, at dollhouses levels.