The nitrates with which these waters are charged generally proceed from the decomposition of animal matter, such as the corpses interred in London churchyards; hence the popularity of some pumps near churchyards; and to such an extent are some of these waters charged with this ingredient, that J. B. C. Aldis, M.D., declares the water of a surface-well (though cool and sparkling to the taste) twice exploded during the process of incineration when he was analysing it! Under these peculiar circumstances it does seem strange that in London the weary, the thirsty, and the poor have thus practically been driven to the public house, and that they should have been left without an alternative. A man toiling all day, bearing, it may be, heavy burdens in the summer sun, miles it may be from his home, parched with thirst, practically to quench that thirst has been compelled to resort to the beer-shop or the gin-palace. And what has been the consequence, that the man has been led to drink more than was good for him—that he has got into bad company—that he has wasted his time and his money, injured his health, and possibly been led into the commission of vice and crime. Every day the evil has been demonstrated in the most striking, in the most alarming, and in the most abundant manner. A benevolent gentleman at Liverpool was the first to see the evil, and to devise a remedy. He erected fountains, elegant and attractive in character, furnished with pure water, and in one day of about thirteen hours twenty-four thousand seven hundred and two persons drank at the thirteen fountains in that town. Of that twenty-four thousand seven hundred and two persons, many would otherwise have resorted to public-houses or gin-palaces to quench their thirst. In smaller places, where results are easier to ascertain, it has been found that in reality the fountains do keep people from frequenting beer-shops, and, therefore, do keep them sober. A gentleman who largely employs workmen in ironworks in the town of Wednesbury, having recently erected fountains for his workpeople, says that his manager has since observed an improvement in their habits and regularity of attendance, attributable to their discarded use of beer, in consequence of the facility of obtaining pure water which the fountains afford. The publicans in London understand this, as it appears from the report of the committee of the Free Drinking Association, held at Willis’s Rooms last week, when the drinking cups have been missing they have invariably been found at some neighbouring public-house. The movement, as we have intimated, commenced at Liverpool; it was not long before it reached London. According to Mr. Wakefield, the honorary secretary of the Association, there was a greater need for this movement in London than elsewhere, owing to the fact that the greater radiation of heat from a larger surface of buildings, less shade, more smoke and dust,