Land Treatment of Sewag^e. 



over nndrained land. Bacteriological Note. — All the 

 effluents were unsatisfactory. 



Ghemical Note. — The sewage and 

 Sandhurst. effluents were weak; the latter did 

 not withstand the incubation test. 

 Bacteriological Note. — The samples of effluent were 

 not satisfactory, but a high percentage degree of 

 purification as compared with the settled sewage 

 was effected. 



Ohemical Notes. — The sewage 

 LIndfield. was distinctly strong both as 

 regards nitrogen and oxidisable 

 matters generally. The effluents were bad. Bacterio- 

 loffical Notes. — The sewage yielded exceptionally 

 high figures (one sample, 102,400,000 gelatine at 

 20 deg. C. and 13,360,000 agar at 37 deg. C). The 

 effluents in comparison were remarkably good. 



DR. POORE'8 SYSTEM. 



The author of this system very 

 Andover. kindly attended the discussion 



on the paper I had the honour 

 of reading at the Surveyors' Institution on 

 January 12, 1903, and said he had to thank 

 me for the very clear statement of his views and 

 practice. A short summary from that paper 

 ("Rural Drainage and Sewage Disposal"*) may, 

 therefore, be not out of place. The burial of putres- 

 cible refuse in the upper layers of cultivated soil has 

 been the successful practice of the agriculturist in 

 all ages and climates. For over eighteen years the 

 garden of the late Dr. Poore received daily (Sundays 

 excepted) the fffices from nineteen to twenty-three 

 cottages. These faeces were packed methodically in 

 shallow parallel furrows (less than a spit deep) and 

 carefully covered. It is well, both from the economic 

 and sanitary standpoints, to take two crops from the 

 soil thus treated ; the first of the cabbage order, the 

 plants being dibbled in at the earliest opportunity. 

 The garden in question is near the centre of the 

 town of Andover, has 1 a. 1 r. 7 p. devoted to spade 

 culture, and receives the fesces of about 100 persons. 

 Most scavenging schemes are doomed to failure by 

 reason of the cost of collection and transport. The 

 distance travelled and the weight carried are need- 

 lessly great. A daily removal is to be aimed at, as 

 being most sanitary and economical. The buckets 

 used for the conveyance of feeces must be scraped 

 out and dusted with soil or ash — soil being the best 

 of all deodorants and antiseptics. In the middle of 

 the garden is a shallow well, about 5 ft. 6 in. deep, 



* Thi Scbtiyob, January 16 and February 6, 1903, 



the sides lined with concrete, and in ten years no 

 sign of mud has appeared. The slop water, which 

 is not foul-smelling until putrefaction sets in, should 

 be discharged first through a strainer (a basket with 

 a wisp of straw, to be changed on becoming clogged), 

 then through a coarse filter (a galvanised-iron 

 bucket with a hole at the bottom and filled with 

 coke or clinker), and finally into a filtration gutter 

 (a perforated gutter laid upon coarse rubble of any 

 kind), the sides of the gutter being planted with 

 moisture-loving plants such as black currants or 

 raspberries. The reduction in the uppermost layers 

 of the soil of feeces to humus is largely due to 

 the growth of fungoid organisms. Dr. Poore ap- 

 peared before the Commission on May 21, 1901 

 (pages 610 to 516), and the following notes are from 

 Part II, pages 241 and 242 ; Part III., page 160 ; and 

 Part IV., page 114. There is a good depth of soil 

 (about 4 ft.) in the garden overlying the chalk. A 

 sample of well water, drawn while fsecal matter was 

 being dug in at a distance of 50 ft., was found to be 

 exceedingly pure chemically, and to maintain its 

 aeration after being incubated ; bacterially the 

 results were surprisingly good, but the presence of 

 bacillus coli in 1 c.c. showed that contamination, 

 presumably of animal sort, was not altogether 

 absent. The crops of fruit and vegetables were 

 phenomenal. The weak point of the system would 

 be shown by a long-continued frost, rendering the 

 ground too hard for cultivation. The arrangement 

 for disposing of slop water would not, of course, be so 

 easily carried out on a stiff non-porous soil. 



Though taken to task somewhat I was unable to 

 change my views on his system, nor have I since 

 found any reason to alter my opinion, which was 

 expressed as follows : " Unless and until our rural 

 population have overcome the prejudices and altered 

 the habits of generations, I fail to see how the system 

 so strenuously advocated by Dr. Poore can be widely 

 adopted. The experience of all concerned with 

 sanitary matters in relation to small property leads 

 to the conviction that there is no class more prone 

 to neglect that constant attention on which the 

 success of the whole operation depends. In his own 

 case supervision (unpaid, be it noted) is assured, 

 because the doctor himself runs the experiment as a 

 hobby. His gardener also is interested in getting 

 daily as much manure as he can, because he receives 

 a percentage on the amount realised by the sale of 

 the garden produce, and could readily make use of 

 much more material . . . The general opinion, how- 

 ever, will be that in most cases the daily disposal of 

 feeces by burying, and of urine, sink and slop wastes 



67 



