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♦ KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



[March 20, 1885. 



"midden" type, and totally distinct from the carbon, 

 earth, and ash " closet " types, which are independent 

 and original methods for dealing with excremeutitious 

 waste, apart from other refuse. 



It may be well here for us to ailopt an unequivocal 

 nomenclature ; for we find, even in the works of eminent 

 sanitary officers, fo much confusion tlirough the lax usage 

 of otherwise clearly definite terms, that a great deal of 

 misapprehension is apt to arise therefrom. By the name 

 " midden " we shall henceforth designate heaps, or recep- 

 tacles full of indiscriminate rudbish, such as mixtures of 

 garbage, dust, excreta, &c. The word " closet " we shall 

 use exclusively for apparatus designed especially for 

 the disposal of excreta, apart from garbage ani 

 cinder refuse. The importance of this distinction 

 will at once become obvious ; for, it may be pointed 

 out that the midden jirooess can never become 

 perfect, on account of the obstacles presented in large 

 pieces of decaying matter, or the introduction of such 

 huge particlfs as pieces of cinders, bone^, shells of molluscs, 

 &c., which prevent, the reaction of suitable correctives, 

 such as dry sifted earth, powdered cirbon, soot, or sifted 

 ashes, by not peraiitting thewi to come' into that intimate 

 association with the decaying matters which is so neces- 

 sary for their eflective treatment. To the violation of this 

 principle m\ist be attributed much of the adverse criticism 

 on the value of dry earth, and particularly of ashes ; for, 

 in the former case, clods of earth, and in the latter in- 

 stance, large cinders, vitiate what would otherwise be an 

 excellent result. 



It may be interesting to some of our readers to know 

 exactly how the midden system, and its direct descendant, 

 the pail system, arose ; we confidently hope that they will 

 soon become things of the past. As late as 1869, the 

 state of aflairs in the midland counties of England, the 

 seat of the origin and growth of this system, was in a most 

 deplorable condition. In his report for that year to the 

 Privy Council, Dr. Buchanan says : — " At present it is 

 common to find " (in Birmingham) " huge, wet, foetid 

 middens, uncovered, undrained, unemptied, some of them 

 as deep and big as the foundations of an ordinary cottage. 

 Few of them are covered, the inspector of nuisances thinking 

 they are better left open. Many are under workshops, 

 where work is done amid stench all the year round, and 

 among swarms of flies in the summer." In Nottingham a 

 decided improvement upon the above shows the next stage 

 admirably. A huge pit, about 80 cubic feet in size, 

 rounded at the bottom, and lined with cement, formed the 

 receptacle, which was cleared out quarterly ; two privies 

 opened into this |iit Literally from above, whilst side doors 

 admitted the garbage and ashes, &c. ; a back doorway to 

 the pit afibrded access to the scavenger, and the whole was 

 sheltered from the rain by a suitable superstructure. In 

 spite of theintroduction of garbage and cinders into these 

 middens, the parts covered by the ashes were deodorised ; 

 but, nevertheless, the stench from the more or less exposed 

 parts was simply abominable. In Hull the midden is some- 

 what better ; it is limited in size to the space beneath the 

 seat, and is entirely above the level of the ground ; the 

 bottom of the brick-built receptacle is paved, and slopes 

 slightly from bsfore backwards; the garbage and fire refuse 

 is thrown in thiough the orifice of the seat. 



The Nottingham midden has now, to a considerable 

 extent, given place to the Nottingham tub, and thus 

 insensibly passed into the jiail system. It is nevertheless 

 very defective, and has led to a great deal of unnecessary 

 labour, for the Nottingham authorities are obliged to make 

 provision for very perfect yard drainage, to offer every 

 facility for the removal of house huld slops other than liquid 



excreta, and to enforce, to the utmost of their power, 

 strict observance of their rules and regulations. Even 

 amidst all these precautions the .system is a failure, 

 inasmuch as the corrective re-agent — ash-dust in this 

 case — is not freed from the large particles or cinders ; 

 and garbage, .fcc, is permitted to aggravate the nuisance. 

 A stage beyond this, and we come to the Goux pail, 

 adopted by the town of Halifax, whilst a retrograde step is 

 to be found in the hermetically scalable Haresceugh's 

 patent spring-lid receptacle of Rochdale, and the Birming- 

 ham pail. Both of the last-named forms are not, strictly 

 speaking, middens, but they are, without doubt, direct 

 developments therefrom, and are links which unite that 

 system to the essentially modern and ratiimal dry-closets, 

 two forms of which, the earth and the carbon, we have 

 already noticed. 



The problem of how to deal adequately with liquid waste 

 has been one of the most difficult to solve by the advocates 

 of the dry-closet .system. In our last i,ssue, we showed how 

 this could be done by using the carbon-closet. With 

 regard to the earth-closet, we cannot do better than quote 

 a portion of a letter recently addressed to us upon this 

 subject by our valued subscriber, E. D. Girdlestone, Esq., 

 B. A., of Clifton. He says : — " Touching the earth system, 

 I mention in my pamphlet* that the dry-earth system 

 prevailed at the ' West of England Sanatorium,' near 

 Weston super-Mare. (It has lately been given up, owing 

 to the land being almost entirely sea-sand, and, consequently, 

 unsuitable for coalescing with excreta ) But, when it 

 was in use, besides having Moule's Earth Closets for the 

 use of both sexes, we had, for the men, " urinals " of the 

 moist simple description devised by myself. — viz., square, 

 open, galvanised iron boxes, painted, and on wheels, fitted 

 with handles like wheelbarrow handles. One of these 

 boxes was filled two thirds full with dry earth, and placed 

 in a shed ; and then, when the earth had become sufficiently 

 saturated from the men using it as a urinal, it was wheeled 

 into the garden, and the contents put, with the contents of 

 all the earth-closets, into trenches dug for their reception, 

 and roots were planted, such as potatoes, radishes, beets, &c. 

 Further, the housemaid going into a dormitory, took with 

 her two slop pails ; one of them. A, for the reception of 

 the chamber utensil contents ; and the other, B, for the 

 bath and basin water ; then A was emptied into an earth- 

 box, like the urinals described above, which stood in the 

 yard, and B was emptied down a sink which also received 

 the scullery water. The sink led to a tank in the garden ; 

 some of the water travelling there oozed through the drain- 

 pipes into the earth, and what reached the tank was from 

 time to time used, having been first deodorised, for irriga- 

 tion. In that way every particle of solid and liquid 

 excreta and of waste water was utilised." 



There can be no doubt that Mr. Girdlestone's method is 

 a very valuable one for country houses, and even for 

 suburban dwellings with gardens ; but in large towns, and 

 for the dwellings of the poor in all parts where the allot 

 ment of land is confined to a small backyard, other plans 

 must be employed in order to perfect the dry-closet system. 

 In our next communication we shall give the details of 

 those methods. 



Coventry Sehagk. — The Town Council of Coventry have decided 

 to considerably enl.irge the sewage works of tlieir city to meet 

 increase in population, and have instructed Mr. Melliss to carry out 

 the work. The sewage of Coventry has been for the last ten years 

 dealt witli by a combined system of chemical preciiiitation with 

 liltration through land, and the operations have given general 

 satisfaction. 



*" Our Debt and Duty to the Soil." ' . . 



