MIDLAND SPAS.

CHAPTER I.

NEW BRIGHTON-WATERLOO-LIVERPOOL AND MANCHESTER -ROAD TO BUXTON.

SEA-BATHING-Chemical Agents in Sea-water-Bromine and IodineOpinions of their Efficacy-Other Ingredients of Sea-water-WOLLASTON'S Discovery-Sea-water is a True Mineral Water-HUFELAND'S View of the Power and Composition of Sea-water-Effect of Sea-bathing on the Constitution-Absorption of some of its Active Principles into the System-Counter-irritation and Modification SEA-BATHS a Powerful Remedy in the Hands of a Skilful Physician-English not a Bathing Nation-NEW BRIGHTON-A Town among Sand-hills-Villas and Hotels-Profitable Speculation-CROSBY WATERLOO-Marine Crescent - The Hotel- MANCHESTER - New Building-mania — Improvements-The Philosopher DALTON-Interview-CHANTRY and his Statues-A COTTON-MILL-Prodigies-The Factory QuestionWhat I saw-LORD ASHLEY-The Locomotive Engine ManufactoryReflections-ROAD to Buxton.

DR. FORMBY, a respectable physician of Liverpool, whom I accidentally met in the promenade-room at Harrogate, assured me that as many visiters now proceed to Liverpool for the benefit of sea-bathing, as are known to

attend Harrogate for the purpose of drinking those mineral waters, or bathing in them.

That people should select a place which in reality does not enjoy the advantage of genuine sea-water, with an intention of taking sea-baths, somewhat puzzled me, until the learned Doctor explained to me that of late years a new sea-bathing place had been created, exclusively for the accommodation of the wealthier classes in and about Liverpool, who, having now nearly deserted the once fashionable Park Gate, on the Cheshire coast, gladly availed themselves of the new establishment to which the emphatic title of New Brighton had been given.

On a second visit, therefore, to Liverpool, the summer before last, my principal care was to make inquiries respecting this newly-risen Brighton of the north, and to proceed thither, if necessary, in order to ascertain its condition, and form an idea of an establishment which seemed to have commanded the attention of a medical practitioner by whom sea-bathing was evidently placed upon a par with mineral-water drinking.

Now, few persons are more ready than I am to admit the advantage to be derived from sea-bathing; nay, I am prepared to contend that much more might be effected in the way of curing disease by means of the application of seawater to the skin-and I will go further, and add, also, by means of a suitable internal use of sea-water-than has hitherto been accomplished. Long experience on this head,—my occasional residence on, and visits to the sea-coast in years gone by, and my former services in the navy, when I had ample opportunities of watching the effect of sea-bathing on different classes of persons in this as well as in a tropical climate, have satisfied me of the immense benefit that may and might still more effectually be derived from the timely and judicious employment of sea-bathing. But I am not disposed, from any thing I have heard or seen, to go the length of admit

ting that sea-bathing is better than bathing in a mineral spring, or drinking of its waters.

This subject being quite akin to that which forms the principal topic of my present volumes, and being, moreover, one of great importance in a medical point of view, I may be permitted to dwell briefly upon its bearings and applications. After which, I will proceed to the description of New Brighton, and any other sea-bathing place which the Liverpoolians may have provided for their own particular use. It is not, however, a professed treatise on sea-bathing that the reader must expect in this place, but only a few practical hints derived from personal experience, to the exclusion of every species of theory or opinions peculiar to other people.

Two very important agents, endowed with peculiar virtues in reference to the human constitution, have of late years been much commended and employed in the practice of medicine. I allude to iodine and bromine, both of which have been detected by recent analyses in sea-water. The presence of the former, indeed, has been doubted by two high authorities,-SARPHATE, of Leyden, who found no such substance in the sea-water near the Dutch coast, and Professor DAUBENY, of Oxford, who could not detect iodine in the residuum of sea-water taken up near Cowes. But an analytical chemist of equal weight, Mr. Schweitzer, of the German Spa at Brighton, has shown, in a very recent analysis of sea-water taken near that place, that iodine is present in it, although in so minute a proportion that 174 pounds of the water contain hardly one grain of that substance.

With regard to the other active agent alluded to, bromine, its presence in sea-water is admitted on all hands, and, indeed, may be said to constitute an essential ingredient of every brine spring, as I have shown both in my former work on the "Spas of Germany," and in the analytical table connected with the present volumes.

Independent of these, there are other very active ingre