'62 2 



NATURE 



[April 30, 1806 



daily average of 888 millions of gallons, the average for the two 

 years being 974 millions of gallons ; and this number does not 

 include 120 millions of gallons daily abstracted by the five 

 London water companies who draw their supplies from the 

 Thames. Thus, in round numbers, we may say that, after the 

 present wants of London have been supplied from this river, 

 there is a daily average of nearly a thousand millions of gallons 

 to spare. Surely it is not too violent an assumption to make 

 that the enterprising engineers of this country can find the 

 means of abstracting and storing, for the necessary time, one- 

 fourth of this volume. 



As regards the quality of this stored water, all my examina- 

 tions of the effect of storage upon the chemical, and especially 

 upon the bacterial quality, point to the conclusion that it would 

 be excellent ; indeed, the bacterial improvement of river water 

 by storage, for even a few days, is beyond all expectation. Thus 

 the storage of the Thames water by the Chelsea Company for 

 only thirteen days reduces the number of microbes to one-fifth 

 the original amount, and the storage of the river Lea water for 

 fifteen days by the East London Company reduces the number, 

 on the average, from 13,693 to 2752 per c.c, or to one-fifth. 

 Indeed, quietness in a subsidence reservoir is, very curiously, far 

 more fatal to bacterial life than the most violent agitation in con- 

 tact with atmospheric air ; for the microbes which are sent into 

 the river above the Falls of Niagara by the city of Buffalo seem 

 to take little or no harm from that tremendous leap and turmoil 

 of waters ; whilst they subsequently, very soon, almost entirely 

 disappear in Lake Ontario. Thus it is not t<jo much to expect 

 that storage for, say, a couple of months, would reduce the 

 number of microbes in Thames flood water down to nearly the 

 minimum ever found in that river in dry weather ; whilst, by 

 avoiding the first rush of each flood, a good chemical quality would 

 also be secured. There is therefore, I think, a fair prospect that 

 the quantity of water derivable from the Thames at Hampton 

 could be increased from its present amount (120 millions of 

 gallons per diem) to 370 millions. 



Again, in the river Lea, although here the necessary data for 

 exact calculation are wanting, it may be assumed that the pre- 

 sent supply of fifty-four miUions of gallons could be increased 

 by the storage of flood water to 100 millions of gallons per day. 

 To these volumes must be added the amount of deep- well water 

 which is obtainable from those parts of the Thames basin which 

 lie below Teddington Lock ; and in the Lea basin below Lea 

 Bridge, and which was estimated by the last Royal Commission 

 at rather more than 67I millions of gallons. Thus we get the 

 grand total of 537I millions of gallons of excellent water obtain- 

 able within the Thames basin, the quality of which can be 

 gradually improved, if it be considered necessary, by pumping 

 from the water-bearing strata above Teddington and Lea Bridge 

 respectively ; instead of taking the total supply from the open 

 rivers above these points. Such a volume of water would 

 scarcely be required for the whole supply of the water area of 

 London at the end of fifty years from the present time, even 

 supposing the population to go on increasing at the same rate 

 as it did in the decade 1881-91, which is an assumption scarcely 

 likely to be verified. 



In conclusion, I have shown that the Thames basin can 

 furnish an ample supply for fifty or more years to come, whilst the 

 quality of the spring and deep-well water and the efficiently- 

 filtered river water would be unimpeachable. To secure these 

 benefits for the future, storage must be gradually provided for 

 11,500 millions of gallons of flood water, judiciously selected, 

 in the Thames Valley, and a proportionate volume in the basin 

 of the Lea ; whilst filtration must be carried to its utmost per- 

 fection by the use of finer sand than is at present employed, and 

 by the maintenance of a uniform rate during the twenty-four 

 hours. 



The lecturer concluded as follows. There nothing heroic in 

 laying pipes along the banks of the Thames, or even in making 

 reservoirs in the Thames basin. They do not appeal to the 

 imagination like that colossal work — the bringing of water to 

 Birmingham from the mountains of Wales ; and there is little in 

 such a scheme to recommend it to the mind of the enterprising 

 engineers of to-day. Nevertheless, by means of storage, by 

 utilising springs, by sinking deep wells, and by such compara- 

 tively simple means, we have, in my opinion, every reason to 

 congratulate ourselves that for half a century, at least, we have at 

 our doors, so to speak, an ample supply of water which, for 

 palatability, wholesomeness, and general excellence will not be 

 surpassed by any supply in the world. 



NO. 1383, VOL. 53] 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Cambridge. — The Conference on Secondary Education, held 

 in the Senate House on April 21 and 22, was largely attended 

 by representatives of all the various educational authorities. 

 The discussions were in some cases animated, and turned largely 

 on the provisions of the new Education Bill ; but the resolutions 

 prepared, in support of the Report of the Royal Commission on 

 Secondary Education, were in every instance passed by large 

 majorities. 



Dr. A. A. Kanthack, of St. John's College, has been appointed 

 Deputy- Professor of Pathology for the present Term, in place of 

 Prof. Roy, who is unable to lecture. 



Dr. H. Frank Heath, Fellow of University College, 

 London, has been elected Assistant Registrar in the University 

 of London, in the place of Mr. Dickens, who has succeeded 

 Mr. Milman as Registrar. 



A SPECIAL meeting of the Board of Governors of the York- 

 shire College was held on Wednesday, April 23, in the 

 Philosophical Hall, Leeds. The business before the meeting 

 was to obtain the assent of the Governors to the borrowing by 

 the Council of the College of ^30,000 at 3 per cent, per annum 

 on a mortgage of the real estate of the college situate in College 

 Road (except such portion as is held in trust for the Cloth- 

 workers' Company), and of the new Medical School in Leeds. 

 The motion was ultimately agreed to. 



The annual report of the Whitworth Trustees has just been 

 published, in which it is stated that a sum of ^10,000, a portion 

 of the surplus from the 1887 Exhibition, has been handed over 

 to the Technical Instruction Committee of the Manchester 

 Corporation for the purpose of erecting an additional wing to 

 the School of Art in Cavendish Square of that city. We 

 thought that satisfactory arrangements had been made for the 

 accommodation of this art school in the new technical school 

 which is being built at an estimated cost of ^200,000. 



The following are among recent appointments : — Dr. A. 

 Fleischmann to be extraordinary professor of anatomy and 

 zoology in Erlangen University, and director of the Zoologischen 

 Universitats, Anstalt ; Dr. Pockels, privat docetit in physics at 

 Dresden Technical High School, to be professor ; Dr. Oertel to 

 be observer at the Koniglichen Sternwarte in Munich, and Dr. 

 Julius Bauschinger, of the same observatory, to be full professor 

 of astronomy in the University of Berlin ; Dr. H. W. Bakhuis 

 Rosebom to be professor of chemistry at the University of 

 Amsterdam, and Dr. A. Bistrzycki to be professor of analytical 

 and technical chemistry in the University of Freiburg. 



The Paris correspondent of the Times states that the General 

 Council of the Paris Faculties has decided to send several dele- 

 gates to the meeting of the Franco-Scottish Society to be held 

 in Edinburgh in 1897. It has also decided to be represented at 

 the jubilee of Lord Kelvin's connection with the University of 

 Glasgow in June next. A similar decision was taken in reference 

 to the Princeton College celebration/^/«j. In this connection the 

 Council passed a resolution in favour of closer relationship 

 between French and foreign universities. It was declared that 

 France held too much aloof from these international festivals, 

 and did not sufficiently try to extend a knowledge of her scien- 

 tific activity. But, however this may be, it is certain that we 

 have yet to cultivate the hospitality always freely and lavishly 

 given when British men of science visit their French confreres. 



The Report of the Council of the City and Guilds of London 

 Institute upon the work of the Institute for the year 1895 has 

 come to hand. Reference is made in it to the assistance which 

 Prof. Huxley gave to the Committee appointed in 1877 to pre- 

 pare an educational scheme. It was fitting that some permanent 

 record of his connection with the Institute should be established, 

 and the Council have been gratified to receive from the 

 Fishmongers' Company an intimation that, in consideration of 

 the eminent and important services rendered by Prof. Huxley 

 to the cause of technical education, the Court of that Company 

 have determined to found a Scholarship of £60 a year to be 

 called the " Fishmongers' Company's Huxley Scholarship," to 

 be awarded to a scholar of the Technical College, Finsbury, to 

 enable him to proceed to the Central Technical College. In 

 recalling the work of their late Chairman and of Prof. Huxley 

 in the early years of the Institute, the Council are reminded of 

 the great extension which this movement has undergone during 



