68 REPORT— 1870. 



of it for profitable consumption. These box-experiments will, it is hoped, 

 also aiford data for ascertaining the amount of water evaporated from the 

 surface of the ground under different conditions. They will, it is hoped, 

 show whether or not sewage can be applied to fallow land, and so stored up 

 in the winter for use in the growing season as to enable the farmer to pur- 

 chase at all seasons. 



It is hoped that they will further test the efficiency of intermittent down- 

 ward filtration in purifying sewage. 



The tenant entered into the occupation of Breton's Farm on the 29th of 

 September of last year, but there were no appliances for distributing the 

 sewage. There existed merely the main sewer from the town to the farm, 

 the pumping-engines, and a small but quite insufficient underground iron pipe 

 from the engine to a point in plot G, from which point there was further, 

 running along the top of plot G, an earthenware pipe raised up on the top 

 of an earthen bank some 3 or 4 feet in height. These appliances were, 

 however, ludicrously insufficient, whether as to level or capacity, for distri- 

 buting the sewage ; and during the greater part of the time, from September 

 29 to May 18, the sewage was either not put upon the farm at all, being 

 applied to other ground elsewhere, or it was simply allowed to stand in pools 

 anyhow on plot F, I, and U, with the occasional formation of similar pud- 

 dles in G and E. 



Since the 18th day of May, however, the whole of the sewage has been 

 applied to the farm ; and during a great part of that time the whole of the 

 effluent water escaping from the land above the contour-Une of drainage has 

 also been pumped back over the farm, while during the preceding thirty 

 days, namely, from the ISth April to the 17th Ma)% both inclusive, the 

 night-sewage only was pumped on to the farm during the day, and, though 

 very much weaker, was j^et valuable as moisture. 



But it is not possible to apportion this quantity with absolute exactness to 

 the difi'erent crops grown. There are always four men superintending the 

 distribution of the sewage, and it would not be possible to check the quanti- 

 ties distributed by them with absolute exactness unless by the emplojinent 

 of an assistant engineer to supervise each man ; and this was an expense 

 which the Committee did not feel warranted in incurring. However, several 

 very accurate experiments were conducted to ascertain the capacity of earth 

 laid out in beds of 30 feet wide for the absorption of liquid ; and on the 19th 

 March, a period when the land was in what may be considered an average 

 state of moisture, the quantities of sewage which land broken up and stirred 

 on the previous day to a depth of 9 inches, and also land consolidated by 

 rolling, could respectively absorb. 



The experiments were conducted in three different ways, so that the cal- 

 culations may be relied on as being correct. The methods adopted were : 

 first, the ordinary weir or notched board ; secondly, a box wdth a sluice at 

 each end which held an ascertained quanrity, by which means the sewage 

 flowing upon the land was subjected to actual measurement ; thirdly, a weir 

 was placed in one of the main carriers resembling in form an ordinary notch- 

 board, but the square notch or opening in the centre was grooved, and a 

 series of little sluices was fitted in, so that the opening could be filled up 

 from the bottom and the water behind maintained at any required depth so 

 as to give any desired head a pressure behind it. Then in one of the lateral 

 openings in the carrier behind the weir was placed a smaller, but similar 

 weir, also with a rectangular opening in the centre, the edges of which open- 

 ing were likewise grooved ; and into this groove fitted iron slides having 



