The discovery in sea-water of iodine and bromine, two principles which, although in minute proportions, are said to be generally diffused throughout the present ocean, naturally suggested the inquiry, as to whether these same ingredients might not be found to exist in springs occurring in inland situations when containing a similar saline impregnation. This accordingly has been already determined by Stromeyer, Liebig, and others, to be the case in many of the brine-springs of Germany, France, and Italy; but at the time my attention was first directed to the subject, I was unacquainted with any trials of the kind having been instituted with reference to those of this country, except by Professor Turner of the London University, regarding the presence of iodine in the mineral waters of Scotland; in only one of which, that of Bonnington near Leith, he appears to have detected it. I was therefore induced in the course of last spring and summer to undertake a pretty extensive survey of such English springs as are known to contain a considerable proportion of common salt; and having succeeded in detecting in several of them traces of one or both the substances alluded to, I inserted a brief account of the results obtained, in the Philosophical Magazine and Annals of Philosophy for September last. An article that has appeared in a subsequent number of the same periodical work has, however, been the means of drawing my attention to a little work by Mr. Murray, entitled “Experiments on Chemical Philosophy,” which had not before fallen in my way; and from this it is clear, that the detection of iodine in the Gloucester Spa water had been made by that gentleman some time before I had engaged in the inquiry. I am unable, however, to discover in his publication, although it bears so late a date as 1828, any thing that can substantiate the assertion which its author has made in the number of the Philosophical Magazine and Annals referred to, as to his having anticipated me in the discovery of iodine in the springs at Cheltenham*, or in that of bromine in those of Ingestrie. I consider myself, therefore, still warranted in claiming as my own the first public announcement of the existence of bromine in our English springs; but I am far from attaching importance to a discovery which had been previously made in so many similar situations abroad, and would wish it to be understood, that my only pretence for offering to the Royal Society the present communication, is the circumstance of my having examined on the spot most of the mineral springs hereafter enumerated, and having undertaken, wherever it appeared practicable, to obtain an approximation at least to the proportion which these principles bore to the other ingredients present, and to estimate their comparative frequency and abundance in the several rock-formations.
M. M. Mironov. - Warm and hot baths during menstruation. - (Weekly, 1895, No. 22).
