Part 5 (2/2)
”The owners.h.i.+p of these springs is vested in a body of trustees, appointed originally by the Legislature of Virginia, and the improvements are made and kept up by means of the revenue derived from the annual visiters. The charges for the use of the baths are as follows:--Single bath, 25 cents; season ticket, $2 50. Children and servants half the above rates. Life ticket, $15 00. A season ticket ent.i.tles the purchaser to the use of the bath during the whole bathing season. A life ticket ent.i.tles the purchaser and his immediate family to the use of the bath during the life of such purchaser, with the additional fee of 50 cents per annum from each individual to the bath-keeper. Arrangements are making for extending and improving the bathing accommodation, so as to give the public the full benefit of a restorative and luxury so copiously supplied by nature. It has been estimated that these springs furnish water at the rate of 800 or 1000 gallons per minute.
”Bath is the county town of Morgan, has a daily mail, and contains about 250 inhabitants. The scenery in the neighbourhood is wild and picturesque, and the view from Capon Mountain, showing the junction of the Capon and Potomac Rivers, is quite celebrated. There are also, in the immediate vicinity, a number of fine sulphur and chalybeate springs.
”Although these waters possess considerable medicinal virtue when taken internally, yet it is to their external use that they chiefly owe their celebrity; their delightful medium temperature, in connexion with other properties, adapting them to a wide range of diseases, and giving them a decided advantage over most other waters known in this country. They have never been accurately a.n.a.lyzed, but the presence of purgative and diuretic salts has been ascertained, though the impregnation is not strong, and the amount uncertain.
”This water is tasteless, insipid from its warmth, and is so light in its character, that very large quant.i.ties may be taken into the stomach without producing oppression or uneasiness. Persons generally become fond of it after a time, and when cooled it is a delightful beverage.
It is beneficial in a cla.s.s of chronic and subacute disorders, such as derangements of the stomach, with impaired appet.i.te and feeble digestion, and chronic diseases of the abdominal viscera not connected with a high degree of organic disease. Their salutary effects in these cases would seem to depend upon the exceedingly light character of the waters, aided by their gentle alkaline properties, neutralizing acidity, and then invigorating and soothing the viscera.
”In the early stages of calculous diseases, attended with irritable bladder, their free use internally and externally is frequently of great benefit.
”Externally used, these waters are beneficial in the whole cla.s.s of nervous disorders, especially in those irregular anomalous diseases more frequently met with in females when not connected with a full habit or _extreme debility_. They are useful in all uterine diseases when active inflammation is not present. In cases of relaxed habit and debility, when sufficient power of reaction exists in the system, their tonic and bracing properties are very decided. Persons suffering from a residence in warm, low, and damp climates, and subject to nervous affections, will generally find them a complete restorative. They are very useful in chronic diseases of the mucous membrane, such as leucorrhoea, gonorrhoea, &c., and certain forms of bronchial disease arising from a relaxed condition of the membrane; also in local paralytic affections unconnected with congestion of the brain.
”In chronic rheumatism these baths have been p.r.o.nounced a specific. Of their mode of action little is known with certainty, but the results are undeniable and admirable. The most obstinate, complicated, and troublesome cases invariably yield to a patient and judicious use of the remedy. The milder cases generally yield in ten days or two weeks, those of longer standing require a longer time for their eradication.
”It is to be regretted that the results of a careful a.n.a.lysis, and a more extended medical notice, cannot now be given to the public; but probably practical experience is after all the best test to which a mineral water can be subjected, and this test Berkeley has stood for more than eighty years with increasing reputation.
”Strother's is the princ.i.p.al hotel in the place. It adjoins the grove, and will accommodate comfortably about 400 persons. It is built of wood, on three sides of a quadrangle, 168 feet front by 197. The front building is four stories high, has a portico 130 feet long by 16 wide; a dining and ball-room 106 feet by 30, three large public parlours, and a bar-room. The wings are respectively two and three stories high. A bas.e.m.e.nt of stone, fire proof, roomy, and well ventilated, contains the kitchen department and wine cellar. The court yard, about 100 feet square, is tastefully ornamented with trees, flowers, and shrubbery.
Besides the ordinary single and double chambers, this house contains about thirty suites of apartments, of two, three, and four chambers, for the accommodation of families. The main building, with several out-houses, contains 200 lodging rooms, all neat, well ventilated, and conveniently arranged. In conducting this establishment essential comfort is generally preferred to external appearance, although the latter is by no means neglected. The furniture is neat, new, and simple, while the beds and bedding are costly and of the finest quality. The mattresses are of curled hair, and made by the best upholsterers of Baltimore, the table is admirably served, and the ice-houses capacious and unfailing.
”Attached to the hotel, are a fine band of music, billiard tables, pistol gallery, and ten-pin alleys. Riding horses, buggies, and carriages, are furnished for pleasure excursions.
”O'Ferrall's hotel is conveniently situated, well kept, and will accommodate about 100 persons. Other accommodation for 150 persons may be found in the place.”
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF BERKELEY SPRINGS.
”These springs were resorted to by invalids at a very early period, and had great celebrity throughout the colonies. Hundreds annually flocked thither from all quarters, and traditional accounts of the accommodations and amus.e.m.e.nts of these primitive times are calculated to excite both the mirth and envy of the present age. Rude log huts, board and canva.s.s tents, and even covered wagons, served as lodging-rooms, while every family brought its own substantial provision of flour, meal, and bacon, trusting for lighter articles of diet to the good will of the 'Hill Folk,' or the success of their own foragers.
”A large hollow scooped in the sand, surrounded by a screen of pine boards, was the only bathing-house, and this was used alternately by ladies and gentlemen. The time set apart for the ladies was announced by a blast on a long tin horn, at which signal all of the opposite s.e.x retired to a prescribed distance from the rustic bath-house, and woe to any unlucky wight who might afterward be found within the magic circle.
The whole scene is said to have resembled a camp-meeting in appearance, but only in appearance. Here day and night pa.s.sed in a round of eating, drinking, bathing, fiddling, dancing, and revelling; gaming was carried to great excess, and horse-racing was a daily amus.e.m.e.nt.
”Dated October, 1776, in the first year of the commonwealth, we find the following in the statute-book of Virginia.
”'_An Act for establis.h.i.+ng a Town at the Warm Springs, in the County of Berkeley._
”'Whereas, it hath been represented to the General a.s.sembly, that the laying off fifty acres of land in lots and streets, for a town at the Warm Springs, in the County of Berkeley, will be of great utility, by encouraging the purchasers thereof to build convenient houses for accommodating numbers of infirm, who frequent those springs yearly for the recovery of their health.
”'Be it therefore enacted by the General a.s.sembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia, that fifty acres of land adjoining the said springs, being part of a larger tract of land the property of the Right Honourable Thomas, Lord Fairfax, or other person or persons holding the same by a grant or conveyance from him, be and the same is hereby invested in Bryan Fairfax, Thomas Bryan Martin, Warner Was.h.i.+ngton, Rev. Charles M. Thurston, Robert Rutherford, Thomas Rutherford, Alexander White, Philip Pendleton, Samuel Was.h.i.+ngton, William Elbzey, Van Swearengen, Thomas. .h.i.te, James Edmondson, James Nourse, gentlemen trustees, to be by them, or any seven of them, laid out into lots of quarter of an acre each, with convenient streets, which shall be, and the same is, hereby established a town by the name of Bath,' &c., &c., &c.--(See Herring's Statutes at Large.)
”The town was consequently laid off, and a sale of lots made in August, 1777. Among the purchasers were Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, Horatio Gates, Gen. George Was.h.i.+ngton, and many others of note and distinction.
”In the schedule to Gen. Was.h.i.+ngton's will we find this clause,--
”'_Bath, or Warm Springs._
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