1827.] Supply furnished to the Metropolis. 471 



in general is even more entirely unfounded. The rates charged are 

 certainly not so low as they were during the time of the ** competition" 

 when the companies were eating up their capitals in the hope to destroy 

 each other ; but the price, fairly taken, at which the inhabitants of Lon- 

 don get their water supplied, is low to a degree that seems astonishing. 



Jn fact a single glance only is necessary, at any of the remedies proposed 

 for this grievance of " extravagance," to set the question of " cheapness/' 

 as to the supply, entirely at rest. The last Number of the Quarterly 

 Journal of Science and Art, observing upon the ' filthy state of the water 

 usually supplied, at very extravagant rates, by the water companies," 

 suggests that, in " many cases, it answers to dig a well for the exclusive 

 supply of a large house with water ; and, if deep enough, the water will 

 be abundant, soft, and pellucid." The only drawback upon this exquisite 

 stratagem is observed to be " the labour of forcing the water, by a pump, 

 to the top of the house." (There would be some labour necessary, we 

 humbly apprehend, in raising it to the surface of the earth.) " This, how- 

 ever, is very easily done by a horse engine !!! " or there are people enough 

 about town glad to undertake it at a shilling a day." This shilling a day 

 which is over and above the expense of sinking a well, and keeping 

 machinery in order being the resource against the " extravagant charges" 

 of water companies, whose charges may be taken to average, one house 

 with another, at a shilling a week ; and who deliver this is about the rate 

 of the West Middlesex and East London Companies for that shilling a 

 week, into a house of the rent of 100 a year, every week, a supply of 

 water, exceeding in quantity 1,000 gallons. This scheme we are afraid 

 is scarcely as feasible as Mr. Mills's offer to bring the Thames water from 

 " above Teddington lock ;" but would not a far simpler than either be 

 that every individual for whose " personal consumption" the Thames water 

 (supplied from a proper point) did not appear sufficiently pure, should 

 provide his house with a common " filtering cistern," which costs thirty 

 shillings, and puts an end to all difficulty ? 



The fact is, that a great deal of the objection alleged against the exist- 

 ing system of water supply in London, is groundless ; that a great deal 

 more has been very much exaggerated ; and that, for any little which 

 remains, a " New Company" is not the proper cure. If competition is all 

 that is wanted that may be had, we venture to affirm, at once. If the 

 persons supplied by the Grand Junction Company find themselves 

 aggrieved, and want merely the assistance of another establishment they 

 or any reasonable number, say one-third of them have only to guaran- 

 tee their custom to the Chelsea Company, or the West Middlesex Com- 

 pany, for five years ; and either of those establishments, we venture to 

 prophesy, will break the " Holy Alliance," and " lay down pipes" 

 immediately. 



If any remedy beyond this is necessary, it must be found not in the esta- 

 blishment of more companies, but in the entrusting a power of control to the 

 legislature. Without any affront to the proposers of the new " Real Joint 

 Stock Company," which is to be " actuated by no other motive than an 

 earnest desire to contribute to the health and comfort of their fellow- 

 citizens," we must be excused if we decline believing that a new company 

 will exhibit more virtue than those which are already existing. The supply 

 of an article so vitally important as WATER to the metropolis, would justify 

 the assumption of a power of surveillance by the government ; and if any 



