396 HjiPOKT— 1872. 



rills flowing from the higher parts of the beach through the ishingle. But 

 these streams are rills and not torrents, as they might be expected to be 

 after the enormous downfall of rain ; and there is clearly some storage reser- 

 voir inte]:yening which has prevented its immediate discharge. This is the 

 chalk itself, which acts as a sponge and stores up the water until saturation 

 takes place, and it is obliged, as it were reluctantly, to give up what it has 

 lost the power of retaining. 



The problem now to be solved by the engineer is, How can this water 

 thus running wastefuUy into the sea be made use of for the purpose in view ? 

 A description of the waterworks constructed for the supply of this place will 

 go far to answer the question. Brighton has always been supplied with 

 water from wells sunk in the chalk stratum. In a description of the toM'n, 

 written in the year 1761, by Dr. Belhan, a physician who succeeded the 

 well-known Dr. Eichard Eussell, it is stated : — " The town is supplied from 

 a variety of wells. The water most esteemed by the inhabitants is drawn 

 from a well in North Street, and that preferred by the Company is obtained 

 at the Castle Tavern. These waters answer every domestic purpose of life 

 extremely well ; and as the qualities of springs of any place have been from 

 the time of Hippocrates to this day looked upon as a mark of those of the 

 air, the sweetness and goodness of spring-water here may with propriety be 

 esteemed a corroborating proof of the healthfulness of the air of this town." 

 Such wells as these supplied the inhabitants until about the year 1830, 

 when a Company was formed by a few public-spirited men, the late Mr. 

 Peter Cazalct and Dr. Tajdor, who, I believe, is still living, being among its 

 most active members, and a system of waterworks was established. A well 

 was sunk near the Lewes Eoad, about l:j mile in a direct line from the sea- 

 shore ; and the water obtained was pumped by steam into a reservoir 220 

 feet above the sea, and thence distributed through pipes over the town. It 

 was soon found that a single weU would not give sufficient for the rapidly 

 increasing population, and that the engines drew the water faster than the 

 springs would give it ; and tunnels or adits were driven in the form of a cross 

 for the double piu'pose of obtaining more water and of making a storage from 

 which the pumps might dra^v. A boring was also made into the chalk below 

 to a great depth, but, for reasons which will be presently apparent, without 

 any beneficial result. In the year 1852, in consequence of the great com- 

 plaints of the scarcity of water, a new Company was formed, and an Act of 

 Parliament obtained authorizing the construction of more extensive works. 

 In the following year another Act was jDassed, by which the old Company sold 

 their works to the new comers, and under the powers of which the works as 

 they now exist were commenced. 



It was soon found that the wells and tunnels were totally inadequate for 

 the supply even of the services then laid on, whose number was scarcely half 

 that of the total number of houses ; and the new Company, acting under the 

 advice of the late Mr. Easton, their engineer, immediately on coming into 

 possession of the works, commenced a new series of tunnels on a principle 

 successfully adopted by Mr. Easton in the year 1834 when constructing works 

 for the supply of the town of Eamsgate, a principle, as far as the writer is 

 aware, which had never been before proposed. Eamsgate, as is well known, is 

 built on the Chalk formation of the Isle of Thanet. Mr. Easton, in making 

 his survey of the locality, observed that aU along the sea-coast there issued 

 at the base of the chalk cliffs numerous streams of fresh water running across 

 the beach into the sea at low water ; and he concluded that these streams 

 came from cracks or fissures in the chalk, and that if tunnels were driven 



