Thales, who borrowed from Egypt the elements of philosophy, which he afterwards spread in Greece, taught that water is the vivifying principle of all things; that nature is thereby made fruitful; that without it the earth, arid and laid waste, would be a frightful desert, where every effort of man to support his existence must fail.[XXV_1]

These ideas, for a long time adopted by Pagan theology, peopled fountains, rivers, and seas, with divinities, and often confounded in the same worship those gods, sons of gratitude, with the limpid waters consecrated to them.

The Persians carried their veneration for this element so far, that they dared not wash their hands, and would have preferred being consumed to the very bone rather than dip themselves in a river.[XXV_2]

The Cappadocians were proud of treading in the same path.[XXV_3]

The Egyptians offered prayers and homage to water.[XXV_4] The Nile, in particular, received their adorations under the name of Ypeus, or Siris, and they offered to it—as a sacrifice—barley, wheat, sugar, and fruit.[XXV_5]

The Scythians honoured the Danube on account of its vast extent; the Thessalians prostrated themselves before the majestic shores of the Peneus; the ancient combat of Achelous with Hercules made it sacred to the Ætolians; by a special law, the LacedÆmonians were compelled to implore the Eurotas; and a religious precept forced the Athenians to incense in honour of the Ilissus.[XXV_6]

The Greeks and Romans did not fail to follow such good examples. The fountains and rivers had their altars. The Rhine was called a god; and when Æneas arrived in Italy, he prayed it might be favourable to him.[XXV_7]

However strange such superstition may appear, it is, nevertheless, conceivable that Paganism, struck with wonder at the flux and reflux of the sea, and at the phenomena presented by several celebrated springs, and seduced by the charming fictions of doubtful poesy, should have deified an element both beneficial and terrible, since it could not cry out with the prophet king: “The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea than the mighty waves of the sea.”[XXV_8]

Thence came the innumerable number of tutelary gods to which the Ocean alone gave an asylum. By Thetis it became the father of the seventy-two Oceanides, and the fifty Nereides called it their grandfather. Hesiod numbered three thousand nymphs, and he probably forgot a few of them. We say nothing of the Naiades, the NapÆÆ, the Limnades, and so many others whom fable was pleased to recognise, and whom it described as joyfully disporting in the water.

Greece exhausted the treasures of its poetical imagination to embellish her fountains, beloved retreats of the timid Naiades. Several were remarkable for the beauty of their architecture and the extreme delicacy of their execution.

Megara, in Achaia, possessed one celebrated for its magnificence. That of Pirene, at Corinth, was surrounded with white marble, in which were placed grottoes which unceasingly supplied a vast and superb basin. Another fountain of Corinth, named Lerna, offered to loungers an elegant portico, under which some very commodious seats allowed them to enjoy, during summer, the freshness which the water communicated to the atmosphere.

In the sacred wood of Æsculapius, at Epidaurus, a splendid fountain was seen whose marvellous beauty attracted all eyes.[XXV_9] Lastly, those of Messina, known under the names of Arsinoe and of Clepsydra, yielded nothing in richness of material and finish of details to the most renowned monuments of Greece.

The Athenians named four officers to keep watch and ward over the water.[XXV_10] The other Greek towns followed the example. These officers had to keep the fountains in order and clean the reservoirs,[XXV_11] so that the water might be preserved pure and limpid.

The Romans at first contented themselves with water from the Tiber. King Ancus Martius[XXV_12] was the first[XXV_13] to build aqueducts, destined to convey the water of the fountain of Piconia from Tibur to Rome, a distance of about thirty-three thousand paces. Some have honoured the censor, Appius Claudius, for this magnificent undertaking,[XXV_14] to whom is certainly due the celebrated Appian Way.[XXV_15] These gigantic works greatly multiplied in time. Under the reign of Nero, Rome had nine principal aqueducts[XXV_16] constructed, the pipes of which were of bricks, baked tiles, stone, lead, or wood.[XXV_17]

According to the calculation of Vigenerus,[XXV_18] 500,000 hogsheads of water were conveyed into Rome every twenty-four hours, by 10,850 small channels, the internal circumference of which was one inch. The water was received in large closed basins, above which were raised splendid monuments. These basins—or chÂteaux d’eau—castella Aquarum—supplied other subterraneous conduits connected with the various quarters of the town,[XXV_19] which conveyed water to small reservoirs—fontes—furnished with taps, for the exclusive use of certain streets.[XXV_20] The water which was not drinkable ran out by means of large pipes into extensive inclosures, where it served to water cattle. At these places the people washed their linen, and here, too, they had a ready resource in case of fire.[XXV_21]

Augustus created water commissaries, who took care that all water coming into Rome by the aqueducts was fairly distributed in every public place, and to those of the inhabitants who had obtained the privilege of having it enter their houses.[XXV_22]

But the “ingenious thirst”[XXV_23] of the conquerors of the world could not content itself with a delicious water which nature furnished free of expense. Was it not too much for human endurance, that not only the air and the sun could not be offered to the highest bidder,[XXV_24] but that the same spring was to quench the thirst of obscure plebeians on equal terms with the rich patrician?

Intemperance and luxury very soon contrived to find excellent means of remedying a state of things so intolerable. The custom of preserving snow in cellars, to obtain cool beverages, is very old. Aristotle pointed out the method of boiling water, and putting the vessel afterwards in snow, in order to obtain ice. Rome had recourse to this expedient, which was afterwards replaced with advantage, under Nero, by constructing ice houses for the use of opulent epicureans.[XXV_25]

This even was not enough for voluptuous Romans, slaves to their strange caprices; their beverages did not appear to them as yet sufficiently cool,[XXV_26] and the summit of the Alps was put under contribution to furnish ice for the fashionable tables of the imperial city.[XXV_27]

The Romans were also frequently supplied with snow water,[XXV_28] clarified by being passed through the colum nivarium, or snow cullender,[XXV_29] a charming little utensil of silver, pierced with a great number of holes, through which the iced beverage passed into a recipient beneath. This drink was sometimes mortal, but always exquisite.[XXV_30] From this vessel, it was poured into an ampula, or a sort of crystal bottle of rotund form, which was often enormously dear on account of the elaborate chasing with which it was embellished.[XXV_31] This water bottle, with its long and narrow neck, was the principal ornament of the sideboards and tables, when it bore the name of some skilful artist from Campania or the Island of Samos.[XXV_32] [O]

Iced beverage lost all its charm at the end of the fine season, and hot water took its place during winter.[XXV_33] The same custom existed in Greece in the best classes of society.[XXV_34] At Rome, it was much more general, for there were a great number of taverns, where the middle classes and citizens of the lowest order gorged themselves copiously with pork and warm water. The Emperor Claudius caused them to be closed, and severely punished the proprietors of those houses who opposed his ordinance.[XXV_35]

At the commencement of the repast, a copper vessel was placed on the table purposely to boil water. It was much like a French bouilloire (which nearly resembles a tankard), and contained a cylinder of about four inches in diameter, covered with a moving lid, and pierced with holes for the ashes to pass through. They fell into the lower part of the cylinder. The space around was filled with water by means of a small funnel soldered to the boiler. The taps of these vases were always slightly above the bottom, so that the sediment of the water should not pass into the cups.[XXV_36]

Ancient medicine attributed to water a singular curative virtue, which it has also been supposed to possess in our days. This system, so much talked about now by some persons, is, therefore, not new. Hippocrates carefully distinguished the difference between good and bad water.[XXV_37] The best, according to him, ought to be clear, light, inodorous, without any flavour, and drawn from springs exposed to the east.[XXV_38] He interdicts all those which proceed from melted snow.[XXV_39]

Asclepiades made his patients drink plentifully of water, and frequently ordered them cold baths.[XXV_40]

The physician, Musa, prescribed to Augustus the same regimen, and the Emperor found himself much benefited by it.[XXV_41]

Under the reign of Nero, Charmis acquired a great vogue by extolling cold baths,[XXV_42] even in the depth of winter. This dexterous native of Marseilles knew so well how to persuade people, that he could hardly attend to his immense connection; and as he sometimes required as much as £800 from his patients,[XXV_43] he soon became as celebrated for his riches as for his pretended medical genius. Who will say, after this, that the water-cure system is good for nothing?

“In Egypt, rich people have the water brought to them from the Nile in leather pouches. Large and porous earthen pots of an oval shape, kept up by supporters, are filled with it. The water at the end of a few hours has deposited the slime it contained. It is afterwards distributed in small vases of terra cotta, called bardaks, of the size of our water-jugs. These vases are taken in the most showy part of the habitation. In a short time the clay of the bardaks is impregnated; their surface is covered with water, which, after borrowing from the liquid within the caloric it requires for evaporation, reduces this to a temperature of six or seven degrees under that which it had before.”—Parmentier.

More than five centuries ago the Sieur de Joinville described the same process. “The water of the Nile,” he said, “is of such a nature, that when we hung it in white earthen pots, made in the country, to the rigging of our ships, the water became in the heat of the day as cold as spring-water.”[XXV_44]

Sea-water is not potable, but it has long since been remarked that the vapours which rise from the sea are soft, and it was thence concluded that, by collecting and condensing them, it would be possible to obtain a potable liquid fit for domestic purposes. This phenomenon was known in the time of Pliny, who informs us that, “fleece spread about the ship, after having received the exhalations from the sea, becomes damp, and that fresh water may be extracted from it.”[XXV_45]

About the middle of the last century means were found to remove

the saline substances from sea-water. Boyle, Leibnitz, the Count of Marsigli—all had made a great number of fruitless experiments. Mr. Poissonnier invented a very simple distillating machine, with which, and an absorbing powder, he succeeded in depriving sea-water of its insufferable bitterness, and rendering it perfectly salubrious. About 1784, a successful experiment was made at York with a machine which produced the same result.

Some travellers have related, that, at the Iron Island, the only soft water was that which was collected from a large tree, in the centre of the island, and which was incessantly covered with clouds. The water ran continually from the leaves, and fell into two large cisterns, constructed at the foot of the tree, which, according to Jackson, furnished enough for 8,000 souls, and 100,000 cattle. “Let us see,” says Bory de Saint-Vincent, “what amount of credit is due to the marvellous tree of the Iron Island.” Abreu Galindo, in his manuscript treatise on the Canary Islands, preserved in the archives of the country, says that he wished to see with his own eyes what the tree was. He embarked, arrived, took a guide to conduct him to a place called Tigulahe, which is separated from the sea by a valley, and there, at the extreme boundary, under a large cliff, was the holy tree, which in the country is called GaroË. Its trunk is twelve spans in circumference, four feet in diameter, and nearly forty feet in height. The branches are wide apart and tufted; its fruit resembles an acorn, and the kernel is, in colour and taste, like the little aromatic almonds which pine nuts contain. It never loses its leaves, that is to say, the old ones do not fall until the young ones are formed. On the north side, are two large stone pillars, of twenty square feet, hollowed out to a depth of twenty spans. These pillars are so placed that the water falls into one, and is preserved in the other. Vapours and mists rise almost every day from the sea, particularly in the morning, and at no great distance in the offing; these vapours are carried by the east wind against the cliffs, which block their passage, so that they cover the tree, become condensed on its smooth leaves, and run off drop by drop. The more the east wind reigns, the more abundant is the supply of water. It is distributed by a man who guards the tree. A whirlwind tore up the GaroË in 1625.[XXV_46]