373 



chievous, a sum not less than £2,000 had been expended 

 on the construction of a reservoir, and the Directors had 

 then under consideration estimates to a large amount for its 

 alteration, so as to admit new streams and exclude some of 

 the old. In another case, much trouble and expense were 

 incurred in attempts to obtain a supply of improved quality, 

 with very indifferent success, though a river, yielding very 

 good water, was within a quarter of a mile of the terminus. 

 The space between being covered with houses, many of them 

 held by small proprietors, there was no chance of obtaining 

 consent from every owner to the laying down of pipes to 

 the river without a fresh Act of Parliament, though it was 

 currently stated that had the contingency been foreseen, 

 little or no opposition would have been made to the insertion 

 of the needful clauses in the original Act. 



In these instances, and in others within my knowledgej 

 the inquiry after better water has been forced upon engineers 

 or proprietors of steam engines, by the destruction of a 

 boiler and its appurtenances, in a period of time far shorter 

 than ought to elapse between the construction of an engine, 

 and its requiring such repair. In others, the quality of the 

 water has been attended to at the beginning, as well as its 

 quantity ; and where there has been opportunity for choice, 

 that has been selected which chemical analysis has shown to 

 be best fitted for the purpose. In others, I doubt not, the 

 old hap-hazard routine is continued, of employing indiscrimi- 

 nately such water as can be most abundantly or most cheaply 

 obtained, and changing it if mischief is occasioned to such 

 an extent as to become intolerable. The manner in which 

 this mischief shows itself is by the deposit of an earthy fur 

 or crust upon the tubes principally, but also upon the body 

 or shell" of the boiler. 



This crust consists chiefly of carbonate of lime, sulphate 

 of lime, or a mixture of these two. Such substances con- 



