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Villafje Sanitary Economy. 
Fourth. Drainage of subsoil for the 2»2/9roumeft^ of the climate 
immediately surrounding dwellings. 
Fifth. The removal of common nuisances. 
And Sixth.* The disposal or utilisation of collected seivage in 
an unobjectionable manner. 
Existing Sanitary Laws for the Local Government of Small 
Towns and Villages. 
At the present moment powers exist under the Nuisance 
Removal Acts, the Sewag-e Utilisation Acts, the Sanitary Acts, 
and the Sanitary Loans Act (18 cSc 19 Vict. cap. 121 ; 23 & 24 
Vict. cap. 77 ; 28 & 29 Vict. cap. 75 ; 30 & 31 Vict. cap. 113 ; 
29 & 30 Vict. cap. 90; 31 cSc 32 Vict. cap. 115; and 32 & 33 
Vict. cap. 100), for the removal of nuisances and preventible 
causes of disease, the purification and ventilation of dwellings, 
the provision of water, the construction of sewers, and the utilisa- 
tion of sewage. By these Acts a local authority — now termed a 
"sewer authority" — exists in some form or other in all places to 
put them in force, and in all rural parishes where there do not 
already exist local boards or improvement commissioners, or- 
dinary vestries, or other bodies acting by virtue of any Act of 
Parliament, prescription, custom, or otherwise, constitute, ex 
officio, the " sewer authority." Where local circumstances render 
it expedient to sub-divide parishes, the Sanitary Act, 1866, and 
the Sewage Utilisation Acts, 1865 and 1867, provide the means 
of doing so. Any undefined inhabited place may, by petition of 
one-tenth of the rate-payers, apply to the Secretary of State to fix 
a boundary, and thus form a special drainage-district ; and, when 
so formed, it is deemed a parish for the purposes of the Sewage 
Utilisation Acts. Under the Nuisance Removal Acts any pre- 
mises in a state to be a nuisance, or injurious to health, may be 
ordered, by two justices in petty sessions, to be made safe and 
habitable ; while any house or building unfit for habitation may 
be prohibited until the causes rendering it so are removed. 
Open ditches, watercourses, privies, cesspools, drains, or ash- 
pits, which are so foul as to be a nuisance or injurious to health, 
may be ordered to be amended, removed, or a proper substitute 
provided. Animals, too, so kept as to be a nuisance or injurious 
to health, may be ordered to be kept differently, and if that be 
impossible, the animals may be removed ; and any accumulation 
* This paper being necessarily limited in length, will treat on those objects 
only ■which may prevent human maladies rather than those which may effect their 
cure. Many objects not referred to might be usefully included as branches of 
sanitary economy, such as village hospitals, and the establishment of depots for the 
sale of vhoh mme food, both of which deserve the attention of the wealthy and 
the influential. 
