OF ENGLAND. 17 



of flashes. The pound locks are out of repair and 

 ineffectual. The 'Commissioners are unable to im- 

 prove the existing state of the navigation. As a body 

 they are insolvent. They have a bonded debt 

 amounting to 88,400, upon the security of their 

 tolls, and no interest has been paid for several years." 



" Whether the navigation of the Upper Thames, or 

 any part of it, can ever be made profitable, as a com- 

 mercial undertaking, is a question on which we would 

 express no opinion. If the navigation is to live 

 against the competition of railways, it will only be 

 after it has been placed in thorough good repair and 

 working order," etc., etc. " That traffic should un- 

 der such a system exist upon the river, in the face of 

 railway competition, is a thing utterly impossible," 

 etc., etc., i.e., under present arrangements. 



The above extracts are taken from the Commission- 

 ers' Report, and shew the present state of the Thames 

 navigation. These mill dams are the receptacles for 

 all the refuse and filth that passes down the river, and 

 over which the water supplied to London has to flow, 

 and in consequence becomes polluted. 



If the navigation and the milling power could be 

 purchased, and the latter converted into steam power, 

 the river water would then flow along its natural bed 

 and be kept pure by constant sereation ; thousands 

 of acres of land that now are covered by floods during 

 the winter season would be left dry, and promote the 

 health of the population, and valuable crops sometimes 

 destroyed by the summer floods, would be saved. 



This principle is not only applicable to the Thames 

 but to the weirs and many mill dams all over the 

 Kingdom, which are most serious hindrances to the 

 effective drainage of our main valleys, and are most 

 detrimental both to their agricultural value and to 

 the health of the people who inhabit them. 



If this obj set could not be effected on the lower 



