542 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 43. 



rates. Some years ago, Boston, in the 

 same manner offered to the cities along the 

 Charles and Mystic rivers a plan for the 

 disposal of their sewage, as, by thus join- 

 ing forces, the cost to each would be 

 greatly lowered. Many examples of the 

 recent tendency towards municipal econ- 

 omy might be enumerated; among others 

 the modern sentiment on the value of 

 street railroad franchises; the feeling that 

 gas and water should be furnished to citi- 

 zens at moderate rates; for no private com- 

 pany has the right to demand more than a 

 reasonable profit; also that it is the duty of 

 the city authorities to exercise their right 

 of jurisdiction in these matters. There are, 

 too, signs of growing enlightenment in the 

 direction of caring for waste. People are 

 beginning to realize the dead loss incurred 

 by mixing different kinds of garbage, some 

 of which have a value. There are now 

 many manufactories that use as raw mater- 

 ial what, in time past, was regarded as 

 waste product. We might go on to speak 

 of the folly of individuals making dirt which 

 the municipality must clean up ; to the use 

 of water meters, to prevent waste even 

 where there is plenty of water; all these 

 things go to show inclination towards more 

 careful consideration of municipal economy. 

 Apply this tendency to the question of 

 water supply, and make the maintenance 

 of its purity a question of public economy. 

 Water is not only a prime requisite of food, 

 but it also acts as chief among our scaveng- 

 ing agents. In our water works it does 

 double duty; it brings water for cooking, 

 drinking and cleaning into our houses, and 

 after being made foul and unhealthy it 

 carries away with it most of the waste of 

 our vital processes. The large streams of 

 a country act in the same way as the water 

 in the pipes of a house. They bring into a 

 city supplies for its daily life, and they 

 carry away the waste. Since, except for 

 the city at the river's source, the stream 



cannot serve both purposes, it must be de- 

 cided for each stream which service it shall 

 perform. This question should be settled 

 by some authoritj^, learned not only in the 

 quality of the stream, and its inherent fit- 

 ness for being used for either purpose, but 

 learned also in the economic phase of the 

 question. Would the community as a 

 whole be better served by having, for ex- 

 ample, the Passaic river kept, by the exer- 

 cise of some authority, pure and wholesome 

 for domestic purposes, or by allowing it to 

 be made an open sewer, a proper place for 

 the discharge of all manufacturing M^aste. 

 Shall the stream in question remain through- 

 out its length as pure as at its source, or 

 shall it be avowedly given up to pollution, 

 is a question to be settled, not by asking if 

 any one city along its banks desires to use 

 the water of the stream for drinking pur- 

 poses, but by a determination of the needs 

 of the community. Contamination, or that 

 which renders a stream unfit for further 

 domestic use, is caused by the introduction 

 of manufacturing wastes and of human re- 

 fuse, and in order to keep a stream pure 

 these two sources of contamination must 

 be avoided, either by keeping all such mat- 

 ter out of the stream entirely, or by re- 

 quiring some process of purification which 

 shall render them non-injurious. It seems 

 almost inevitable that these waste products 

 will sooner or later find their way into the 

 stream. It has been proved that intermit- 

 tent filtration, well and carefully managed, 

 will restore polluted water to a pure condi- 

 tion, and the practicability of its use for 

 large cities is now being tested in several 

 places in this country. The economical 

 question to be answered with reference to 

 any stream whose water is to be used at 

 any point for drinking purposes, is: should 

 the polluted water be made pure in such 

 quantities as are needed for a specific use, or 

 should the stream be kept pure hj prohibit- 

 ing its pollution at anj' point; that is by re- 



