DEATH IN THE WATER-CUP

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 337, 23 May 1885, Page 3

DEATH IN THE WATER-CUP

Cold* water is, doubtless, a very good sort of thing in. its way, .provided it is pure; unfortunately this is not always the case. Frequently it is as badly adulterated and quite as poisonous an article as the vilest beer or whiskey retailed over the counter of a bush grog-shanty or a low city "pub." Here is a caso in point : From an official report j ust furnished to the Taiori (Ofcago) County Council I find that the Kaikorai water, which is consumed by thousands of persons in and about Dunedin, is "fortified " with the following inviting liquids and solids, the bare enumeration of which is enoujjji to make the reader "swear off" drinking (water) for the term of his natural life: — Offal from a sausage-skin factory; blood from slaughter yard ; refuse from soap works ; ditto from iYllmongery ; blood and offal from another slaughter-yard ; liquid abominations from oil and bone works ; waste dye .products fro in Boslyn woollen mills and wash from pits of fellmongery; blood from another slaughteryard ; wool- washings ; chemical waste from N.Z. Drug Compauy's works ; waste liquor from tanuery, &c, &c. No wonder this water has a "body"; the wonder is it is not all body... Here in Auckland, happily, we are blessed with good water — at least the " city water" derived from the Western Springs is excellent. But there are other New Zealand towns I wot of that aro not so fortunate in. this respect. Let our Blue Ribbon friends remember that all " cold water" is not what they so fondly imagine it to be, and that death may lurk in the water as well as in the wine-cup.