PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 153 



the Severn is greater than that in the Thames on an 

 average, and the minimum flow of the Severn above the 

 Avon at Tewkesbury is fully equal to the minimum of 

 the Thames at Teddington. 



The Quality of Water the Severn is Readily 

 Capable of Yielding 



The Severn an Excellent and Inexhaustible 

 Supply for Drinking and All-Round Purposes 



There can therefore be no possible difficulty in pro- 

 ducing as good a water from the Severn as from the 

 Thames. The only argument that can be adduced as 

 against the use of river water is the possibility of the 

 germs of typhoid fever being spread in the supply, but 

 supposing that the water at the intake ever contained 

 such germs, by a careful treatment by subsidence and 

 slow filtration it is perfectly easy to get rid of them, and 

 considering that absolutely pure but unfiltered waters 

 have been the cause of typhoid epidemics it would seem 

 most safe to use a freshly purified water. It is better 

 sometimes to trust rather to art than to nature. The 

 experience of London and the many other places for so 

 many years proves beyond doubt the safety of purified river 

 water for drinking and the safety is now further assured by 

 the fresh knowledge we have gained. The highly sensational 

 cry " Is sewage fit to drink " as applying to river water 

 such as that of the Severn is meaningless. The water of 

 the Severn is not sewage, but a good natural water of 

 unusual purity. It is no more sewage than the springs 

 of the Cotswolds are sewage, because the surfaces of the 

 fields upon which that same spring water fell were subject 

 to innumerable pollutions and even covered with the 

 manure of animals and men. As that water is purified 

 by a natural purification so the Severn water can be 

 purified with quite as great a certainty and to quite as great 



