“Look around on this world, it is sweet, it is fair, There is light in the sky, there is _life_ in its air, Sublimity breathes from the forms of its hills, And beauty winds on with its rivers and rills; The dew as with diamonds its mead hath bespread, From its groves are a thousand wild melodies sent; While flowers of each tint are by morning imparted, Oh! why is there woe in so lovely a world.” Rain water, when collected in the country, is doubtless the purest and best adapted for ordinary household purposes, but in London and large cities it contains many impurities; when collected in our tubs or cisterns, it is impregnated with all the dust, dirt, and smoke that hangs more or less like a funeral pall over smoky cities; the air contains more or less sulphurous acid, and the carbon that escapes from our chimneys and is deposited on the tops of our houses, hence the sooty taste that soft or rain water has. Well or spring water always partakes more or less of the character of the ground or the strata through which it passes, hence the explanation of the great differences which exist. Water that passes through chalk is characterised by its hardness, because it holds a large quantity of carbonate of lime in solution. Thus it is with chalybeate springs, which contain a large proportion of the salts of iron, and others, that contain sulphate of magnesia; these instances illustrate the fact that water is a great solvent, and partakes of the character of the materials through which it passes, and hence the differences which we find existing in the water we derive from wells. There are not many public pumps in my district, and fortunately they are not in the vicinity of churchyards, nor in communication with cesspools. There is not therefore much danger of wholesale poisoning by drinking water from these sources. The water, as supplied by the West London and Grand Junction Companies, is, I believe, of good quality; for from the samples I have examined, and the reports furnished by Dr. Whitmore, the water appears free from those organic impurities which are indications of danger, and are specially to be guarded against in times when cholera threatens us. The water, which in not a few of the houses in my district, is supplied by the water companies pure, is rendered impure in the tubs and cisterns in which it is stored. Water not only has the property of becoming impregnated with mineral substances, but also the property of absorbing gases. It is strange, but nevertheless true, that the worst place possible for tubs, cisterns, and water reservoirs, is selected, viz., next to or over water closets, or over dust bins; this obtains almost universally in my district. The consequence is, in the one case feculent exhalations arise, and are absorbed by the water; and in the other, exhalations from the decomposed and decomposing vegetable and animal refuse; further, the tubs and cisterns in many cases