Eemarlcs on the Meport of the Water Commission. 59 



of water may be relied upon, and the citizens have been justly 

 alarmed lest the growth of population should rapidly outstrip 

 the capacity of the existing Water-works. 



So obvious was the urgency that the Grovernment appointed a 

 Commission to investigate the whole subject. 'Ilie members of 

 this Commission bestowed great pains on the enquiry, and made 

 an exhaustive list of all the possible sources of supply. After 

 considering the merits and demerits of each separate scheme, 

 they decided finally on recommending a plan for drawing water 

 from the Upper Nepean, and storing it in a reservoir near 

 Prospect. At the close of their report they speak in modest and 

 candid language of their consciousness that there may be defects 

 in their work, and desire in the public interest that general 

 criticism on their labour may correct its errors, and supply its 

 omissions. " We now," they say, " invite the closest scrutiny of 

 our results, sensible that if our scheme be in the main the best 

 attainable, it will be improved by passing through the ordeal of 

 enlightened criticism, while if any better scheme still lies 

 undiscovered, the same criticism will we trust, bring it to light." 



It is in the spirit of this invitation that I now venture to 

 criticise the scheme recommended by the Commission ; as, with 

 all due deference to the talents of the gentlemen employed, and 

 with a Hearty appreciation of their painstaking labours, 

 I cannot but think that the conclusion they have come to is 

 erroneous, and requires in the interest of the public to be revised. 

 It is now nearly nine months since this report has been issued, 

 and yet the scheme recommended has not been at all adequately 

 discussed, though it is of the utmost importance that no grave 

 error should be committed. Under the impression that a dis- 

 cussion of the merits of such projects might be of public service, 

 I have by request undertaken to prepare a short paper on the 

 question, and, in the absence of abler critics, I trust that it will 

 not oe thought presumptuous for an unprofessional man to take 

 a popular survey of the scheme for which the public are invited 

 to pay. 



After a careful consideration of the report, I cannot avoid the 

 conviction that there are many grave objections to the plan 

 recommended by the Commissioners — that their natural enthu- 

 siasm for their own scheme has prevented those objections from 

 being fully presented in their report, and that to this? extent 

 therefore they have left it to outside critics to put the project in 

 its least favourable light. I also think that they have too readily 

 discarded the proposal for closing the estuary of the George's 

 Eiver — a scheme which I hope to be able to show will supply a 

 larger quantity of water with more certainty and at less cost, 

 than can be otherwise done. 



