Dec. 1 6, 1 886] 



NA TURE 



163 



and Labourers' Dwellings Acts, or what have been more recently 

 termed the liousing of the working classes, and also Acts for 

 checking the adulteration of food, as well as other Acts relating 

 to the diseases of animals. This general legislation has been 

 largely supplemented by bydaws issued by local authorities, 

 with the sanction of the Local Government Board, and by means 

 of Local Acts obtained by various towns. 



The Act of 184S initiated the system which subsequent legis- 

 lation has supplemented, under which many towns and rural 

 districts have borrowed money for and have executed public 

 sanitary works during the last forty years. The importance of 

 this measure may be gauged by the fact that the money borrowed 

 since that time for sanitary works, and nit yet repaid, amounts 

 to over 130,000,000/., in addition to very large sums spent out 

 of current r.ites ; and in addition to an enormous private expen- 

 diture, which is beyond the reach of calculation, for the recon- 

 struction of house drains. This legislation and e.\penditure have 

 caused a complete revolution in that branch of engineering 

 science connected with public health, viz. drainage and water 

 supply, and has gradually established it on a scientific basis. 



Modern sewerage may be said to date from tlie introduction 

 of oval forms in sewers, by Mr. Roe and Mr. Phillips,' under 

 the Commissionei-s of Sewers, in 1845 ; the construction of 

 impervious clay pipes for smaller drains ; the recognition of the 

 necessity that sewers and drains should be water-tight and self- 

 cleansing ; and that junctions should be carefully made. Ven- 

 tilation of the sewers followed a severe outbreak of typhoid fever, 

 consequent upon the construction of a new unventilatcd sewer at 

 Croydon. In 1849-50, Sir Robert Rawlinson introduced the 

 system of constructing sewers and drains in right lines from 

 point to point, with lamp-h^les or man-holes at every change of 

 direction or of gradient ; this is now the recognised method of 

 construction among all English-speaking races. The reconstruc- 

 tion of the sewers led to a reform in house drainage, of which 

 the leading characteristics are imperviousness of material, free 

 aeration, and facility of inspection at all points. 



The disposal of water-carried sewage began by leading to the 

 widespread pollution of our streams and ri\'ers, and the serious 

 injury- of the sea beach in many of our seaside health resorts. 

 The problem was complicated by the doctrine that as the pollu- 

 tion was caused by a vast amount of fertilising matter, large 

 profits might be made out of its removal. But those who made 

 this assertion generally overlooked the fact that the conveyance 

 of the refuse would have to be paid for just like any other work. 

 The subject has been repeatedly discussed in this hall, but it is 

 far too extensive for me to enter into here. 



Let us now turn from the community generally to the metro- 

 polis, which was excluded from the operation of the Sanitary 

 Acts of 1S4S and 1875. The population of London was 960,000 

 in 1801. .A.t the Queen's accession it had nrore than doubled, 

 and amounted to about 1,900,000. At the present time it is 

 very nearly 4,000,000. The metropolis has, from its situation, 

 all the attributes of a healthy city. It lies in a valley through 

 the centre of which the Thames sweeps from west to east, and 

 the winds rushing over its water afford a continuous supply of 

 fresh air to the middle of the City. But the advantages of this 

 situation had been largely frustrated by the unopposed efforts of 

 the landowners to accumulate the greatest possible number of 

 houses on the least possible space, by which the free circulation 

 of air was impeded in some districts, and the fa'jiilies of artisans 

 were crowded in small, low, close rooms, without space for the 

 safe retention of refuse ; and there was no adequate machinery 

 for its rapid removal. 



London is now, undoubtedly, the finest capital in the world. 

 It was far from being so at the beginning of the Queen's reign. 

 Among other things, there were deplorable deficiencies in the 

 sewerage. The drainage found its way through badly-formed, 

 leaky drains into the old water-courses, and thence to the river ; 

 the sewage was floated up and down by the tide in the heart of 

 London, until it was deposited on the shore at low water in 

 fetid banks, which covered the foreshore from Blackfriars to 

 Battersea. 



One of the early effects on the metropolis of the report of the 

 Poor-Law Commission, was a Metropolitan Building .\ct for 

 improvement of drainage, and for .securing a sufficient width of 

 streets and alleys, and due ventilation of buildings, and to 

 regulate the construction of buildings, authorising the vestries 

 to appoint district surveyors. 



' Mr. Phillips is at present employed in superintending the reconstruction 

 of the drainage of the Houses of Parliament. 



In 1.S46, a new Commission of Sewers was formed, and 

 charged with the duty of revising the metropolitan drainage. 

 The Commissioners applied for an Ordnance survey of the 

 metropolis, which was commenced in 1847. 



The water supply of London was furnished by water com- 

 panies, who trenched upon each other's districts. Its volume 

 may be assumed, at the Queen's accession, to have been about 

 36,000,000 gallons per twenty-f jur hours. It was estimated by 

 Mr. Wicksteed, in 1845, at 45,000,000 gallons. Some was 

 derived from the tidal part of the Thames, and was more or less 

 filtered ; but, from its doubtful purity, pumps in surface-wells, 

 often adjacent to ch.irchyards, were frequently preferred for 

 drinking-water. In many of the courts and sinaller streets 

 water was obtained only from a small stand-pipe, where the 

 water was turned on for an hour or less daily, when the inhabit- 

 ants stood around waiting with whatever vessels they might 

 have at hand for their turn to procure a portion of a miserably 

 scanty supply, which was then stored for use in probably the 

 only room occupied by a whole family. Amongst the poorer 

 classes, almost the only receptacles that existed were wooden 

 butts, frequently in a state of decay ; and, as they were for the 

 most part without covers, the water was placed under favourable 

 circumstances for the reception of dirt and refuse and for the 

 development of animal and vegetable growths. 



After the cholera epidemic, the question of the purity and 

 quantity of the water supply attracted notice ; and in 1852, 

 Parliament passed an Act forbidding the supply of water from 

 the tidal part of the Thames or its tributaries, and requiring all 

 river water to be filtered and to be kept covered after filtration ; 

 also requiring a constant .service when demanded by four-fifths of 

 the houses in a district. In 1S5S, the average daily supply had 

 risen to 75,000,000 gallons. In 1871, another general Act was 

 passed, to make further provisions for securing to the metropolis 

 a constant supply of pure water ; this .\ct defined the sources of 

 supply of the several companies, and required, amongst other 

 matters, efficient filtration, and the application of tests of purity. 



The amount of water delivered into London by the water 

 companies for September last was 178,196,597 gallons in twenty- 

 four hours, of which about 90,000,000 gallons came from the 

 Thames above Teddington Lock ; its purity is ascertained by 

 continual analysis ; and it may now be said that the water 

 supplied to London rivals that of any other city in purity. 



It w.as not till 1852 that the Secretary of State was authorised 

 to prohibit burials within the metropolis. 



A new era in metropolitan sanitation was inaugurated in 1855. 

 In that year the Metropolitan Board of Works was created. In 

 this body was vested the main drainage of the metropolis, but 

 the charge of the subsidiary parish sewers was left to the vestries, 

 who were also charged with the care of the streets and roads, 

 the Metropolitan Roads Commission being abolished, and all 

 duties of lighting, control of removal of refuse, &c., were placed 

 on the vestries. 



Thus the formation of this new Board was somewhat of a 

 retrogade movement, because the concentration of functions, 

 which had been commenced under the Metropolitan Roads 

 Commission and Metropolitan Sewers Commission, instead of 

 being strengthened in the new Board, was abandoned, and 

 something approaching chaos was introduced. This Board has, 

 however, by degrees had remitted to it the care of London 

 improvements, and certain other general municipal functions, as 

 well as power to levy general rates. The City retained its 

 individuality, excepting as to the main sewers, and effected 

 improvements and opened out thoroughfare; in the part under 

 its jurisdiction. The improvements in the other parts of London 

 are mainly due to the action of the Metropolitan Board of 

 Works. Great alterations have taken place in our thorough- 

 fares. Many of those large tracts of London which were 

 occupied by dwellings of the most wretched description, are now 

 tra,versed by wide thoroughfares, and covered by arti-^ans' dwell- 

 ings erected by private enterprise. But there is no diminution 

 of the rate at which the vast aggregation of population in London 

 still continues to progress ; and, unfortunately, many of the 

 wretched crowded dwellings still remain, where those born in 

 close rooms, brought up in narrow streets, and early made 

 familiar with vice, are deteriorated in physique, and grow poorer 

 from inability to work. 



The reconstruction of the drains, the removal of the sewage 

 from the midst of the population, the opening out of thorough- 

 fares so as to admit ventilation into crowded districts, have all 

 tended to improve the sanitary condition of London. 



