WOODEN WATER-PIPES AT CLERKENWELL, LONDON. 273 



converted into the Parcels Post Office, but some portions of the Prison walls still 

 remain. 



The Bag^nii^fre Wells Road, now Kint^'s Cross Road, is seen crossing tlie 

 picture from left to right in the mid-distance, marked by the line of fence. 

 Directly in the foreground is the Fleet Ditch, spanned with an arch to carry the 

 mains formed of four lines of wooden pipes. 



The second view is from nearly the same point, about the present Calthorpe 

 Street, not far from Rowton Mansions, the spectator looking towards King's 

 Cross. 



Conspicuous in the distance to the right are the Tile Kilns ; these remained 

 until comparatively recent times. The trees adjoining are those of the gardens of 

 Bagnigge Wells, at this period a flourishing pleasure garden, and through which 

 wandered the stream of the Fleet. 



Between the Tile Kilns and the gardens ran the Bagnigge Wells Road, and 

 immediately in front of the Tile Kilns is the Bun House. The bridge in the 

 foreground appears to be the same as tiiat shown in the former view. 



These drawings were made for Sir John Soane, not on 

 account of their topographical interest, but for the special 

 purpose of showing the defective system of the New River 

 mains by the employment of these wooden pipes, the Company 

 having incurred the displeasure of the eminent architect. 



The question therefore arises, were these mains uncovered as 

 they are here represented, or are we to consider the drawings in 

 this respect diagrammatic ? 



It appears, on the face of it, improbable that pipes of this 

 description would simply have lain on the surface, unprotected 

 from the weather and from the attentions of mischievously- 

 inclined people. 



With all their shortcomings as regards perspective, these 

 drawings show, on comparison with old engravings, such 

 accuracy of detail that one is disinclined to suppose that they 

 are not wholly realistic. 



Britton, describing these fields as he remembered them about 

 the same period, says^ : — 



" Spa Fields from the south end of Rosoman Street to Pentonville, and from 

 St. John's Street Road to Bagnigge Wells Road, were really fields devoted to 

 the pasturage of cows and to a forest of elm trees, not standing and adorned 

 with foliage in the summer, but lying on the ground to the southward of the 

 New River Head, being destined to convey water in their hollow trunks to the 

 ncrthern and western parts of London in combination with similar pipes laid 

 under the roadways of the street." 



From this it would appear that the pipes were actually 

 exposed, though the writer may have been speaking from his 



2 Britton's Auto-Biography, 1850, p. 62. 



