1850.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



97 



constructed. If we be in error, we shall be glad to be set rifflit; 

 and shall be rejoiced to be become acquainted with the niiuutijp of 

 BO important and so gratifying- a fact, that a rotatoi-y fly-wheel 

 engine, for land purposes, can be made to do with tliree pounds of 

 coal per each horse power per hour. 



We still doubt the fact: if we be in error, we respectfully invite 

 the Messrs. Joyce to verify the statement, by making known to tlie 

 public, tlirough our Journal, the following particulars to guide 

 them : — 



Diameter of each steam-cylinder, and length of stroke? 



At what pressure the steam was worked in the small cylinder.'' 



The number of strokes made per minute.'' 



The diameter and weight of the mill-stones; and the number of 

 revolutions made by them per minute? 



The quantity of wheat ground per hour, when the bolting and 

 dressing machines were at work as well? 



The nominal power of the engines? 



And the quantity of coal consumed? 



yVe shall be glad also to learn, whether the consumption of coal 

 per each horse power, per hour, were estimated on the full indicated 

 power— inclusive of friction, the power consumed by the pumps, 

 &c. ; or whetlier it were given to the world on tlie nominal horse 

 power, as it ought to have been? If on the former, its tendency is, 

 most unquestionably, to convey an erroneous impression. 



Vi' e shall be glad to hear from the Messrs. Joyce on this subject. 



THE HEALTH QUESTION— WATER SUPPLY ADiMI- 

 NISTRATION. 



Although there have been successive agitations for better water, 

 each of wliich has died away, yet the time now comes when the 

 public is in earnest, and B<imetbing will be done, so tlint the ques- 

 tion only remains how. Undoubtedly it is of much importance, 

 that the best spring should be gone to; but it is of much more 

 moment, that the best mode of management should be resorted to. 

 ^Vhen we say " the best," we do not mean the best theoretically, 

 but that wliich will work most energetically, and in which the public 

 will have most confidence. This, too, is a matter whicli as much 

 interests our readers as the levels and pressures incident to the 

 water supply. Indeed, what can interest them more than to know 

 who are to be their employers? Further, it must not be lost sight 

 of, that the great progress in the water movement, as in the drain- 

 age and other improvements for health, is owing to the engineers. 

 Engineers have shown, that water can be cheaply raised, efficiently 

 filtered, and sent into the houses as a constant supply, just in the 

 same way that by improvements in the form and construction of 

 sewers, they jiaved the way for the extension of the sewage system. 

 Mr. Chadwick has done much; medical men have done much; but 

 the share of the engineers, although little noticed by the public, 

 find purjiosely kept out of sight by the government, is none the 

 less worthy of regard. As is too common, those who halloo the 

 loudest are those most looked to; and those who do the work, for- 

 gotten. It is much harder to lay down a good and cheap sewer 

 than to make an outcry about want of drainage; and yet he who 

 does t!ie work gets the least reward. 



This unsatisfactory state of affairs is, to a great degree, dependent 

 ou the system of management now adopted, and for this reason in 

 particular we now take up the pen, in the hope of gaining the 

 co-opei'ation of our readers. Hitherto the system has been bad ; 

 but care must be taken, that in making alterations, one bad system 

 is not substituted for another; or, indeed, a worse system for what 

 is now bad enough. The water companies have failed to work well, — 

 the Sewers Commission is unsettled, — the Health Commission is 

 only in a provisional state,— the management of streets, paving, 

 and lighting is disorganised. 



^\'e know there is one favourite panacea in Downing-street 

 government management; and there is a strong push made to 

 bring it to bear on the water supply, but with no sufficient reason. 

 If there were formerly people weak enough to believe that govern- 

 ment management is perfection, that belief is now ishaken. Every 

 paper that comes out, gives the fullest and strongest proofs of 

 government mismanagement; and the last year's exposures have 

 been awful. M'e knew before how bad are the Post Office, the 

 Government Life Annuity arrangements, the Colonial Office, our 

 Foreign relations, the Exchequer Bill Office, the Victualling De- 

 partment, the Board of Works, and the Railway Commission ; but 

 we are now enlightened as to the management of the dock yards 



and steam navy, the crown forests, the Jloney Order Office, the 

 Mint, and the Ecclesiastical Commission. Those must be mad, 

 indeed, who trust the government willingly with the management 

 of anything. 



As the grand features of government management are irrespon- 

 sibility to the pultlic and inaccessibility to individuals, and as these 

 are the chief evils of the present water management, we may well 

 hesitate when the transfer of powers is proposed. As, too, the 

 management would be concentrated under the government without 

 any corresponding advantages, the result might be an exchange of 

 King Log for King Stork. 



So far for public interests: and as for professional interests, the 

 proposition of government administration bears with it no greater 

 inducements. It is never the object of the government to employ 

 talent; but to work their patronage for political purposes, resort- 

 ing to talent (July in the last emergency. This statement requires 

 no comment, for its truth is within the experience of every one. 

 Further, the government, wherever they can, avoid the employ- 

 ment of civil engineers, and employ military engineers, as the 

 many distressed members of the profession in the metrcqxdis know, 

 to their sorrow. Whereas, in other countries, civil engineers and 

 surveyors are employed to execute the general survey and cadasti-r, 

 here, without any reason, such work is given to the Ordnance 

 department. In the first new Commission of Sewers, not one 

 civil engineer was named; and, in the following Commission, 

 Messrs. Stephenson and Rendel are muzzled by twice the number 

 of military engineers. It is no uncommon thing at the meetings 

 of the Commissioners for no civil engineer to be present, or for 

 one civil engineer to be present and three military engineers. 

 Having seen these things, we do not advocate government manage- 

 ment; while so far as we know, the City of London, the C)ld Sewers 

 Commissioners, and paving boards, do not employ captains and 

 lieutenants, but competent civil engineers and surveyors. 



The profession have forced the government to do something to 

 name civil engineers on the Sewers Commission and the National 

 Exhibition Commission; and the wedge, having been thrust in, must 

 be driven home. 



As to mock public bodies under the name of independent trusts 

 and boards, they are as bad as regular government commis- 

 sions ; and we may refer to tlie Old Commissioners of Sewers, the 

 Trustees of the British Museum, the County Magistrates, the 

 M<ineyers of the ftiint, and the Royal Academicians. These par- 

 ties, unless it suits them, do not e\en acknowledge the jurisdiction 

 of the legislature, while the assessments of the county rates and 

 police rates are very unsatisfactory to the rate-payers, who have 

 no remedy but to send deputations to Sir George Grey, which are 

 not always received. A secretary of state is too great a man to 

 listen to parish vestries. 



No valid objection lies, so far as we know, to the management 

 by the jiublic of their own affairs. The City sewers and paving are 

 quite as well man;;ged as any ; and it is to be presumed the con- 

 stituency are catisf ed, as they are not turning out their repre- 

 sentatives, vihich they have the power to do when displeased. The 

 government have likewise been forced to allow the citizens to be 

 represented in the Metropolitan Ccmmission of Sewers. If the 

 government do not choose to give corporations to Marylebone and 

 Lambeth, that is no reason why the inhabitants should be depriveil 

 of the control over their own interests, which is allowed to the in- 

 habitants of Manchester and Birmingham, though neither of these 

 had a corporation before the ^lunicipal Reform Bill. No one will 

 say that the people of Marylebone are less fit to manage their 

 sewers and water supply than the people of Manchester, nor that 

 there is any greater need for go\ernment tutelage of the former 

 than of the latter. The peojile of Marylebone do not ask for 

 government tutelage, but repudiate it, and do not offer to give up 

 to the government the control over the poor, the paving and the 

 gas companies. 



Of course the government, whenever public management is talked 

 of, have a holy horror of jobbing; nay, if they durst, they would cast 

 the charge of jobbing in the teeth of the Corporation of London, 

 and the Marylebone vestry. Perfect management can never begot 

 from imperfect human nature, and therefore jobbing maybe ex- 

 pected; but at any rate the citizens of London, the burgesses 

 of Manchester, and the inhabitants of Marylebone, job with what 

 is their own, for their own benefit; whereas the government job 

 with what is ours, for their own benefit. There have been some 

 pretty things done in corporations; but while Lord Monteagle, Lord 

 Brougham, and Lord Ellenborough, sit in the House of Lords, the 

 less that is said in high quarters about jobbing the better. 



