BRIGHTON WATERWOKKS. 393 



C= 7^49 620 S'4S 5'38 6-07 7^45 8-91 9*94 10-30 



0= 7-7 6-4 56 s'5 6-4 76 9-1 loi 10-5 



C — 0=— -21 — -20 — •14 — -12 — -33 — •IS — '19 — 'iS — -20 



On the Brighton Waterworlcs. By Edward Easton^ C.E., F.G.S. 



[A communication ordered by the General Committee to be printed in exienso.'\ 



Obviottslt the fii'st question au engineer asks wlien called upon to design 

 works for the supply of water to a large population is, From what source can 

 water of pure quaUty, and practically inexhaustible in quantity, be obtained "? 



On taking a survey of the country surrounding Brighton, its most striking 

 feature, probably, is the entire absence of ail streams, and, indeed, of all signs 

 of the existence of the water the engineer is in search of. Standing on one 

 of the highest Downs above the town, and looking down upon the slopes and 

 valleys below him, the aspect of the country, as far as the eye can reach, appears 

 for his purpose as unpromising as the Great Desert of Sahara. But just as 

 in that vast arid region there exists beneath the burning sands the element 

 which, by the application of scientific knowledge and mechanical skUl, will 

 change the useless desert into a fruitful plain, so lie concealed within the 

 apparently dry material of the chalk stratum streams of excellent water which, 

 though not presenting to the eye the beauty so admirably delineated by our 

 great English painter, are none the less rmfailingly " flowing to the sea." 



Let us imagine our observer overtaken by one of those sudden and violent 

 storms of rain which were so frequent during the earlier part of this year. 

 He is looking down into a basin naturally formed in the chalk of perhaps 

 two square miles in extent. The middle or bottom of the basin is at least 

 60 feet below the lowest part of its sides. In an hour there falls sufficient 

 rain to fill the lower and smaller area of the basin to the depth of several feet. 

 No such result, however, follows the downpour ; the rain disappears as quickly 

 as it falls, and in less than an hour the surface of the ground is as dry us it 

 was before the storm. The water has all been received into the absorbing 

 ground, and is finding its way through the pores of the chalk down into sub- 

 terranean streams and so into the sea. That this is the case can be ascertained 

 by walking down to the shore at low water, and tasting any of the numerous 



