and which contributes to their agreeable taste, is the carbonic acid
gas with which the water is so freely charged. This free carbonic acid
gas is probably formed by the decomposition of the carbonates which
compose the rock. The water, impregnated with it, becomes a powerful
solvent, and, passing through different strata, absorbs the various
mineral substances which compose its solid constituents.




General Properties.


Writers upon mineral springs generally divide them into the following
classes: Carbonated or acidulous, saline, chalybeate or iron,
alkaline, sulphur or hepatic, bitter and thermal springs.

The Saratoga waters embrace nearly all of these except the last two;
some of the springs being saline, some chalybeate, some sulphur, and
nearly all carbonated; and in the list may be found cathartic,
alterative, diuretic and tonic waters of varied shade and differing
strength. The cathartic waters are the most numerous and the most
extensively used. The curative agents prepared in the vast and
mysterious laboratories of Nature are very complex in constitution and
different in temperature, and on that account do not, like iron,
opium, quinia, etc., exhibit single effects; they exercise rather,
with rare exceptions, combined effects, and these are again modified
by various modes of employment and the time and circumstances of their
use.