67 
matter, and the doing of that which should have been done 
30 years ago will now be a matter Of the greatest difficulty. 
In 1840 the Irwell approached Salford in so pure a state 
that numerous fish were seen in its waters near the present 
Peel Park, but after Manchester and Salford sewers had 
entered it none were to be met with in it at Cornbrook. 
Fish were also at that time in the Medlock above Pin Mill 
Bridge. 
In order to show how long a time authorities take to 
consider before they trouble themselves with action he 
brought a Report on the Streams of Manchester, published 
by Dr. Lyon Playfair in the Health of Towns Commission 
in 1844. After describing the geology, watersheddings, and 
streams of the district, the report proceeds as follows 
“ When the boroughs of Manchester and Salford were not so 
thickly populated as at present and the surface of the soil 
was in its primeval condition, without any irregularities 
arising from artificial excavations, since caused by the making 
of bricks and for other economical purposes, the sites of the 
towns, from their undulating surfaces alone, would possess 
good top drainage into the streams and rivulets before men- 
tioned. Some little obstruction to the drainage might arise 
from the rows of cottages which are generally built nearly 
at right angles to the inclinations of the surface of the land • 
still the irregularities produced by the hand of man have 
doubtless been in part rectified by public sewering into the 
watercourses above alluded to, and had such watercourses 
been allowed to pass unimpeded through the towns, although 
they might have caused some nuisances, still they would not 
be in anything like the filthy condition which they are now, 
owing to the weirs and dams marked X in map appended to 
this report that stop their courses and form so many cess- 
pools, allowing some of the top waters certainly to flow 
along but collecting all the heavier particles, and thus con- 
tinually generating the most offensive effluvia. 
