Seltzer water

“ Hollis admitted that he had not seen the river within that time. Norton laughed shortly.
“She’s dry in spots now,” he informed Hollis. “There ain’t any water at all in the shallows. It’s tricklin’ through in some places, but mostly there’s nothin’ but water holes an’ dried, baked mud. In two days more, if it don’t rain, there won’t be water enough for our own stock. Then what?”
“There will be water for every steer on the range as long as it lasts,” declared Hollis grimly. “After that we’ll all take our medicine together.” ”

“ And when Parsons and the driver were carrying the baggage in she was outside the house, standing at the edge of a butte whose precipitous walls descended sharply to the floor of the irrigation basin, two or three hundred feet below. She could no longer see the cultivated level, with its irrigation ditches, but she could see the big dam, a mile or so up the valley toward Dawes, with the water creeping over it, and the big valley itself, slumbering in the pure, white light of the morning. ”

“ The most celebrated muriated saline springs in the United States are those of Saratoga (49° to 51° F.) , Congress water having about the strength of Kissingen Rakoczy, but a milder taste, while the Hathorn spring contains more chloride of sodium. Some of the springs are chalybeate, others sulphurous or iodinous, and all are highly charged with carbonic acid gas. The Saratoga Seltzer resembles the celebrated Seltzer (properly Selters) in Germany; and the Geyser, bored in 1870, is so highly charged with carbonic acid gas that it foams like soda water when drawn from a faucet. ”

“ The tube extends down thirty-four feet to the surface of the foundation rock. The crevice in the rock through which the water issues is about twelve inches by five. The column of water above the rock is thirty-seven feet high. The flow of gas is abundant and constant, but every few minutes, as the watchful visitor will observe, there is a momentary ebullition of an extraordinary quantity which causes the water in the tube to boil over the rim. When the sunshine falls upon the fountain it presents a beautiful appearance.
This is a genuine Seltzer spring. ”

“ He turned to the desk, ignoring Dunlavey. Sitting there, his senses alert, he heard the door slam. From beyond it came a curse. Silence again reigned in the office; Hollis was alone with the dust and the heat–and some very original thoughts.
107CHAPTER VII
THE “KICKER” BECOMES AN INSTITUTION
It was mid-July–and hot. The sun shone continually; the nights were uncomfortable, stifling. The dust was everywhere and grew deeper and lighter as the days passed. Water grew scarce; cattle suffered, lowing throughout the night, during the day searching the bogs and water holes for drops of moisture. ”

“ The sun climbed to the zenith. It grew intensely hot in the chamber. Twice during the afternoon the Judge asked for water, and each time he received the answer he had received before. He did not ask for food, for he felt it would not be given him. At sundown his captor entered the chamber and gave him a meager draught from the canteen. Then he withdrew and stood on the ledge in front of the door, looking out into the darkening plains, and watching him, a conviction of the futility of resisting him seized the Judge. ”

“ He rode to Lazette and talked with a banker there. The latter was interested, but unwilling to lend.
"The Okar Basin," he said. "Yes, I've heard about it. Great prospects there. But I've been told that Silverthorn and Maison are going to put it through, and until I hear from them, I shouldn't like to interfere."
"That gang won't touch the Double A water!" declared Sanderson. "I'll see the basin scorched to a cinder before I'll let them in on the deal!"
The banker smiled. "You are entitled to the water, of course; and I admire your grit. But those men are powerful. ”

“ Lemuel Train did not forget to curse Dunlavey.
“We ain’t likely to forget how he stood on the water proposition,” he said.
After Train had departed Norton stood looking after him. Then he turned and looked at Hollis, his eyes narrowing quizzically. “You’ve got in right with that crowd,” he said. “Durned if I don’t believe you knowed all the time that it was goin’ to rain before Dunlavey’s tenth day was over!”
Hollis smiled oddly. “Perhaps,” he returned; “there is no law, moral or otherwise, to prevent a man from looking a little ahead.” ”

“ Lawler enlightened the men at the camp fire that night.
"The railroad runs almost straight from Willets," he said. "There's a tunnel through one of the mountains, and other tunnels east of it. And there's a mountain gorge with plenty of water in it, where the railroad runs on a shelving level blasted out of the wall. The mountains form a barrier that keeps Willets and the Wolf River section blocked in that direction. It's the same south of here, the only difference being that in the south there is no railroad until you strike the Southern Pacific. And that's a long distance to drive cattle." ”

“ He is trying to make a boom town of Okar. He has bought a great deal of land in the basin."
"You know what he wants the land for?" Sanderson smiled at her.
"For speculation purposes, I suppose. If he could get water——"
"You've figured it out," said Sanderson. "But he won't get water. The water belongs to the Double A—to me an' to you. An' we're goin' to sell it ourselves."
"You mean—" began Mary.
"That we're going to build an irrigation dam—with all the fixin's. You and me."
The girl sat erect, her eyes luminous and eager. "Do you think we can do it?" she whispered. ”

“ Sanderson left Lazette in disgust. It was not until after he had tried in Dry Bottom and Las Vegas that he realized how subtle and far-reaching was the power and influence of the financial rulers of Okar.
"We should like to let you have the money," the Las Vegas banker told him. "But, unfortunately, a loan to you would conflict with our interests in Okar. We know the big men in Okar have been considering the water question in the basin, and we should not like to antagonize them." ”

“ He entered the Kicker office to greet Hollis, his face wreathed in smiles.
“You’ve got ’em all stirred up, my boy!” he declared, placing his hand on Hollis’s shoulder with a resounding “smack”; “they’re goin’ to enforce the little law we’ve got and they’ve passed some new ones. Here’s a few! First and foremost, cattle stealing is to be considered felony! Penalty, from one to twenty years! Next–free water! Being as the rivers in this Territory ain’t never been sold with what land the government sharks has disposed of, any cattleman’s got the right to water wherever he wants to. ”

“ The men sat silent; the spokesman was without words.
“How many men can the six of you muster–in case Dunlavey should try to carry out his decision to drive your cattle from the Rabbit-Ear–or shoot them?”
“Eighteen, I reckon,” returned Train, looking at the others, who nodded affirmatively to his question.
Hollis turned to Norton. “How many men does Dunlavey employ?” he questioned.
“Thirty,” snapped Norton. “But in case he needed them he c’n get a hundred.”
“Big odds,” smiled Hollis. “Why should I volunteer to help you fight Dunlavey? My cattle are certain of getting enough water. ”

“ These underground streams of brine all gravitate towards the pumps, widening and deepening as the continually renewed water takes up its supply of salt. Where the earths overlying these brine “runs” are not too tenacious, they soon follow the hollow or trough formed on the surface of the salt bed, and a corresponding hollow or trough is formed on the surface of the ground. Where the hollow forms at an early stage, it rarely attains any considerable depth, for the sinking earths impede the course of the flowing brine stream and cause the fluid to spread and be diffused over a wider area. ”

“ But when the saturated brine is pumped up and its place is taken with a new supply of water which collects its tribute from the salt strata, and that water, in its turn, is raised, to be replaced by more, and when it is known that each 100 tons of water that traverses the salt-bed to the pumps carries away with it 25 tons of solid earth, the work of destruction that is continually going on is explained. ”

“ In Italy most of the salt is made by solar evaporation. The salt grounds, which occupy extensive areas, are14 furnished with reservoirs for the preparation of the sea-water by saturation and for the deposit of salt. The former are known as condensers and the latter as crystallizing beds, and in both the work is carried on by solar evaporation only. Every salt-ground, or salt-garden, as it is called, has a feeding channel for the inflow of sea-water, a drainage channel, and a network of internal channels at low and high levels, as are required for immission or drainage purposes. ”

“ SALT. Geological Position of Rock Salt—Mines of Northwich—Their immense Excavations—Droitwich and Stoke—Wieliczka—Berchtesgaden and Reichenhall—Admirable Machinery—Stassfurt—Processes employed in the Manufacture of Salt—Origin of Rock-salt Deposits.
Common salt is so necessary to man, and of such vast importance to the manufacturer and agriculturist, that the processes by which it is obtained are justly reckoned among the chief branches of industry.
In many of the warmer countries of the globe it is procured simply by the evaporation of sea-water in shallow lagoons ”

“ Let it be clearly understood that all commercial salt is produced either from the sea or from rock-salt. Sea-water is evaporated to precipitate its salt either by the heat of the sun or by artificial heat. Rock-salt is mined and refined for market purposes, and it is resolved into brine from which the salt is extracted by solar heat or the process of boiling, but whether the salines are obtained from salt lakes or from natural brine springs, or are prepared by flooding salt deposits with water and pumping it out in the form of fully saturated brine, rock-salt is the foundation for them all. ”

“ Particles of chloride of sodium in volcanic ejections were no explanation of the formation of huge deposits of rock-salt, and since it was realized that salt in large quantity can only be obtained from salt water, and that it cannot be got naturally from the sea, it became evident that what man does in isolating tracts of sea-water to produce salt by solar evaporation, must have been practised by nature on an extensive scale in all ages. ”

“ The large grained, flaky salt was made with an evaporation conducted at the heat of 130 or 140 degrees, and the pan was filled once in every forty-eight hours; while in the case of fishery salt, the brine was brought to a heat of from 100 to 110 degrees of Fahrenheit, and five or six days were required to evaporate the water of solution. In the course of these several processes, various additions were often made to the brine, with the view of promoting the separation of any earthy mixture, or the more ready crystallization of the salt. ”

“ This conclusion on the subject, which is now generally accepted, is based on the theory that the Cheshire salt lake was situated in a desert, or more probably a salty steppe , such as are found in the region of the Caspian Sea, and that the climate was divided into wet and dry seasons. The presence of rock-salt supports these ideas, because the marls could only be formed in periods of heavy rainfall, and the salt could only crystallize out in dry, water-evaporating periods. ”

“ Instead of the nice saline draught which our Sedlitz powder makes, of tartrate of soda and potash, rendered even effervescent by the succeeding additions of carbonated soda and tartaric acid, the bitterwasser of Saidschitz consists of a strong solution of Epsom and Glauber’s salts; and I need not say that the term “bitterwasser” is most appropriately applied. There are twenty-two wells at Saidschitz, all capable of furnishing a large quantity of water, though few only are in actual use. ”

“ There are other salt deposits in the neighborhood, and it is believed that the Dead Sea derives its saltness from the dissolving of these deposits, and also from the substances brought down by the River Jordan."
"Every lake without any outlet is salt, is it not?" Fred asked.
"Certainly," replied the Doctor; "it is a rule of nature that has no exception. All water from springs, brooks, and rivers contains salt gathered from the earth, and sometimes the quantity is considerable. It is the slight amount of salt that makes water palatable ”

“ In order to accelerate the condensation of the brine, the salt-maker adds and mixes into it bullock’s blood, or calf’s blood, or buck’s blood, which dissolves and is distributed into all the corners of the caldron. When the boiling water seems to be mixed with scum, it is skimmed with a ladle, and from the firing of the furnace to the skimming of the boiling scum is the work of half an hour. ”

“ The facts that the chief accompaniment of every known deposit of rock-salt is clay, and that clay is deposited in water, formed the basis of the erroneous theory that because salt is a deposit out of water, and sea-water contains salt, all salt beds must have been deposited in the sea. But salt does not mix mechanically with water and has not been deposited like sedimentary rocks; it forms a solution, and not until the solution becomes super-saturated does it crystallize out. Now sea-water rarely contains more than 31⁄2 per cent. ”