122 



NATURE 



[May 30, 187& 



Of the more permeable rocks constituting the first list, 

 probably four-fifths of the area would yield unpolluted 

 water, and receive into its mass not less than six inches 

 of rainfall annually, or a quantity, if all yielded up to 

 wells, of no less than 240,000 gallons per day for each 

 square mile of area. 



Of the second list the rocks are for the most part 

 impermeable, and the most porous portion of the car- 

 boniferous generally return the water that has percolated 

 into the strata to the same river basin ; these rocks 

 receive the heaviest rainfall of England, seldom falling 

 below forty inches, and often rising to more than a 

 hundred, of which quantity not less than thirty inches 

 per annum may safely be calculated on, as the quantity 

 run off by streams. Assuming that the rainfall is only 

 available for water supply purposes, over one-tenth 

 of the area, or 2,153 square miles, and that one- 

 third of the supply is given back to the streams as 

 compensation to manufacturers, to preserve fish, and for 

 the purposes of inland navigation, the quantity remaining 

 off this selected tract would be more than sufficient for 

 the whole population of England, without recourse to the 

 subterranean supply, which Dr. Frankland more especially 

 recommends for domestic use ; so that there can be 

 no shadow of doubt that the quantity of water available 

 for supply to towns and rural populations, of a standard 

 of purity approved by Dr. Frankland, is far in excess of 

 the requirements of our population. 



The question of the amount of compensation water 

 which should be returned to streams which are im- 

 pounded for the purpose of water-supply is one of the 

 gravest national importance. In one case, the River 

 Roddlesworth, taken by the Liverpool Corporation 

 Waterworks, the Legislature permitted " the compensa- 

 tion water," ordered to be returned to the stream by the 

 Act of 1847, to be bought up, for the purpose of supplying 

 a new reservoir, and thus deprived the district drained 

 by the stream, in the words of Mr. Bateman, speaking 

 of a similar proposal,' " of all possible participation in 

 the extension of manufactures and in the commercial 

 prosperity of the surrounding district." Mr. Bateman 

 has strongly expressed similar views in his evidence 

 before the Duke of Richmond's Commission, and it is 

 with regret, we notice that though he proposes to take 

 eventually 50 million gallons per day from Thirlmere, he 

 only intends to return 5|' million gallons a day to St. 

 John's Beck. 



On the second head, the necessity of legislation to give 

 cheaper and more easily acquired water powers to sanitary 

 authorities, through the agency of provisional orders of 

 the Local Government Board — which do not now possess 

 compulsory powers to acquire water-rights, under the 

 Local Government Act of 1875. Mr. A. H. Brown, 

 M.P., read a paper describing the work done by 

 the Select Committee on the Public Health Amendment 

 Bill, of which he was chairman, and which has now been 

 read a third time in the House of Commons and passed. 

 The Bill introduces many sweeping changes, and not 

 only gives to the Local Government Board increased 

 powers, but empowers them " to confer the powers of 

 this Bill or any of them to urban authorities," and further 

 ordains that the Board shall hare power to permit Local 

 Boards to purchase water compulsorily, under provisional 

 orders, confirmed by Parliament, " such Provisional 

 Orders to put in force the Water Clauses Act, 1847." 



Should Mr. Brown' s Bill pass the Upper House but little 

 additional legislation would appear to be necessary, for the 

 labours of the various Royal Commissions, Parliamentary 

 Committees, and the British Association Committee of 

 Inquiry "into the Secondary rocks of England, as a 

 source of water supply," have amassed, as we have seen, 



^ "Borough of Liverpool New Water Supply Report," by Mr. John 

 Frederick Bateman, C.E., F.R.S. Liverpool, 1875. 



•The compensation of 13J million gallons, stated in several journals, and 

 lately quoted by us, is incorrect, the amount being only si- 



a large volume of information as to the rainfall, available 

 yield, and quality of the water suitable for domestic pur- 

 poses; and the new powers obtained by the Local Govern- 

 ment Board will enable them more quickly and cheaply to 

 give facilities for the construction of works for water 

 supply than heretofore. All that is still wanting, should 

 the Bill pass, is some further machinery for ascertaining 

 by Government inspection what rural districts and isolated 

 hamlets are not at present properly supplied, and how the 

 difficulty is to be solved. 



The Congress have met it by passing a resolution to 

 "urge upon Her Majesty's Government the importance 

 of taking steps, with the least possible delay, by means of 

 a small scientific commission to investigate and collect, 

 for the information of the public, the facts connected 

 with water supply, in the various districts throughout the 

 United' Kingdom, in order to facilitate the utihsation of 

 the national sources of water supply for the benefit of the 

 country as a whole, as suggested by H.R.H. the Prince of 

 Wales." 



The high value and important "character of the work 

 done by several bodies similarly constituted to the pro- 

 posed Water Commission is so well known, that it would 

 be needless to mention as examples the Charity, Civil 

 Service, and Ecclesiastical Commissioners, were it not 

 to point out that these gentlemen exercise functions of a 

 special character, which could not well be undertaken by 

 any other Government department ; while in the case 

 of the proposed Water Commission, this very important 

 raison d'etre appears to be absent, for special knowledge 

 and long experience appear to be already possessed by. 

 the staff of the Local Government Board, and by that of 

 the Geological Survey, which under the interchange 

 system of Government officers recommended by Dr. 

 Lyon Playfair's Commission could easily be directed to 

 assist them, especially as to a limited extent it already 

 does so, and has besides aided the Rivers Pollution Com- 

 mission in its labours.' 



The Congress has certainly been useful in showing 

 how impossible it is to separate water supply from 

 drainage, and the absolute necessity of there being a 

 central authority, with supreme power over water, whether 

 at the surface or underground, whether Jised for the 

 purpose of water supply, canalisation, supplying motive 

 power, or disposed of in the form of drainage and sewer- 

 age. As Dr. G. W. Child well remarked, "the bane of 

 all local government in England is the chaos of different 

 and often conflicting authorities, existing each for a 

 special purpose." How the formation of the proposed 

 permanent Water Commission will facilitate matters by 

 adding another to the long list of governing bodies it is 

 difficult to see. 



Facts are useful ; but we first want simplification and 

 unification of the law, and the carrying out its pro- 

 visions entrusted to one central authority, directed by a 

 Minister of Public Health, with power so to modify and 

 increase his department as to be able to collect informa- 

 tion at the same time that he administers the law, and 

 remove from us the possibility of the reproach that we 

 have carried on scientific investigations to complete our 

 knowledge of water supply, without applying, for the 

 use of our population and the prevention of disease, the 

 information we already possess. 



PHYSICAL SCIENCE FOR ARTISTS'" 

 IV. 

 AM afraid there is no use in shirking the notion that 

 my last paper may have seemed Avofully dull, fright- 

 fully technical, and terribly wide of the mark to some 

 artists who took it up, always supposing of course that 



« Annual Reports of the Science and Art Department. 

 ^ Cont.r.ued frcm p. 89. 



I 



