259 Supply of Water to the Metropolis. 



have annexed in a note,* and upon which the directors have 

 published a series of ** remarks," some of which are much to 

 the point. 



In the first place, the said directors have been held out to 

 their customers as a most obdurate and inflexible body of gen- 

 tlemen, quite inaccessible to all remonstrance, and deaf to the 

 reiterated complaints of their customers ; but here we find, that 

 immediately upon a notice being given in the House of Com- 



* " Resolved : 



" 1st. That a constant supply of pure and wholesome water is essen- 

 tial to the health and comfort of the inhabitants of this great and thickly- 

 peopled metropolis. 



" 2d. That the principle of tlie Acts of Parliament, under which the 

 several companies supplying the metropolis with water were instituted, 

 was to encourage competition ; seeing that it is only from competition, 

 that a perfect security can be had for a good, a cheap, and a plentiful 

 supply. 



*' 3d. That, nevertheless, by an arrangement entered into, about the 

 year 1817, between the several companies supplying the metropolis with 

 water, all competition was put an end to, and a monopoly of this neces- 

 sary of life virtually established. 



*' 4th. That the water taken up from the river Thames, at Chelsea, 

 for the use oi' the inhabitants of the western portion of the metropolis, 

 being charged with the contents of the great common sewers, the drain- 

 ings from dung-hills and lay-stalls, the refuse of hospitals, slaughter- 

 houses, colour, lead, and soap works, drug-mills and manufactories, 

 and with all sorts of decomposed animal and vegetable substances, ren- 

 dering the said water offensive, and destructive to health, ought no 

 longer to be taken up by any of the Water Companies from so foul a 

 source. 



" 5th. That the Grand Junction Water- Works Company, having en- 

 gaged to supply their customers with water of the purest and most 

 wholesome quality, to be drawn from the rivers Colne and Brent, and 

 from an immense reservoir of nearly one hundred acres, fed by the 

 streams of the Vale of Ruislip, have, nevertheless, since the month of 

 September 1820, drawn their supply from the Thames, at the foot of 

 Chelsea Hospital, and nearly adjoining to the mouth of the Great Rane- 

 lagh Common Sewer. 



*• 6th. That the water supplied by the Grand Junction Company, to 

 more than seven thousand families, has been pronounced, by profes- 

 sional men of the first eminence, to be a filthy fluid, loaded with decayed 

 vegetable matter and other substances equally deleterious to health, and 

 unfit for domestic purposes. 



•* 7th. That the Grand Junction Company, having promised to supply 

 their customers with water, at a comparatively small charge, have, 

 nevertheless, exacted an increased rate, equivalent, in no case, to less 

 than fifty per cent., and extending, in most instances, to ninety and a 

 hundred per cent. ; and that th^ obtained, in May last, the sanction of 

 the legislature to a new table of rates, by which an addition of fifty per 

 cent, may be levied on their customers. 



