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Transactions Texas Academy of Science. 
water company had been notified and was told that they had not — and 
this simply because it was too much trouble, notwithstanding the people 
had a telephone in the house. Between January 2nd and February 13th, 
inclusive, of this year, there were discovered, in Hartford, Connecticut, 
3231 leaking and running fixtures, 190 being running wide open. This 
probably heads the list of reckless wasters of water, and it is safe to say 
that if these houses had been metered the instances of waste would have 
been greatly reduced, and in any case the reckless wasters of water would 
have been compelled to pay for their negligence instead of making every 
other consumer contribute to the payment for water they had wasted. 
If the water consumption records for many of our cities be plotted there 
will be found a general resemblance in the curves for unmetered cities — 
nearly all of the unmetered ones showing a rapid increase in the per 
capita consumption of late years. In Philadelphia the increase has been 
such that instead of something ldss than 75 gallons per capita consumed 
in 1885 the amount has now reached the alarming figure of about 230 
gallons, while Pittsburg exceeds this slightly — the amount being put at 
233 gallons per capita. Of the other cities in which meters have been 
introduced there is shown a fairly uniform falling off in the consumption 
in proportion to the number of taps metered, Milwaukee representing 
one of the most pronounced of this type. 
But, passing on to the matter of sewage purification, let us consider 
how the sanitary engineer may influence the public health. Upon him 
devolves the duty of designing and constructing systems for this very 
important purpose, and it should also be his duty to inform the public 
how best to dispose of this character of waste matter. It is not uncom- 
mon to find communities so lacking in information regarding the dan- 
gers from this source that they even allow their own wastes to pollute 
the source from which they draw their water supply, and so inconsiderate 
of the rights of others lower down stream that sewage is discharged 
directly into streams from which other communities are obliged to secure 
their supplies of water. Houston discharges her sewage directly into 
Buffalo Bayou, the stagnating waters of which flow very slowly through 
the heart of the city. Sometimes lack of water in the artesian wells, or 
the call for a higher fire pressure than the supply from the wells will 
afford, make it necessary for the water from the bayou to be pumped 
directly into the mains, where its appearance or odor bears testimony to 
its unfitness for domestic use. Fresh sewage, which ordinarily contains 
less than two parts of organic matter per 1000, has never been known to 
injure any one by reason of its proximity, but when allowed to stand and 
concentrate by reason of daily augmentation, and the growth of bacterial 
life causing putrefaction, it does become a menace, especially if it find its 
way into the mains from which the supply of domestic water is drawn, 
