PUBLIC WATER SUPPLIES == HISTORICAL. 



By John A. Stiles, B. A. Sc. 

 University of New Brunswick. 



The fii'st nietliod of obtaining a public water-supply was, with- 

 out doubt, by the sinking of wells. The deepest of these were in 

 China, depths as great as 1500 ft. being recorded We read of 

 wells in Greece, Assyria, Persia and India. The idea of saving 

 the water took shape in the digging of reservoirs. Jerusalem had 

 underground cisterns built near the city and the water from these 

 ran by gravity tlirough masonry conduits. Later, Egypt began 

 the building of immense reservoirs for the storage of water for 

 irrigation purposes. Assyria followed this example, and when 

 the English occupied India they discovered no less than 50,000 

 reservoirs which had been built for irrigation purposes. The 

 magnitude of tlie latter undertaking seems astounding when we 

 read that it involved the building of no less than 30,000 miles of 

 earthen embankments. 



Pi-evious to '612 B C. Rome obtained her water siii)ply from the 

 Tiber, bat it finally became so polluted that some other method 

 had to be adopted. This led to the building of the famous 

 aquedacts. Rcjuie was to receive by these aqueducts over four 

 lumdred million gallons a day, but the conduits leaked and a care- 

 ful study reveals the fact that not over 50 million gallons per day 

 ever actually reacihed the city. 



When Rome fell, the aqueducts were destroyed, and it is said 

 that, although the popes made an effort to keep up the suppl.y, 

 th'-re were many cities which even forgot for what purpose the 

 ag[a9d.i'Jts hid baan bLiilt. Tlie tumble r.ivages of ijestileuce in 

 the Middle Ages were doubtless due to the drinking of grossly 

 polluted water. 



During the ninth century a few aqueducts were built by the 

 Moors in Spain, but very little activity along similar lines is 

 recorded until hundreds of years later. 



Paris was drinking water out of the Seine until 1183, when the 

 first aqueduct was constructed. As late as 1550 the amount per 

 cax)ita per day did not exceed one quart. 



