MAGAZINE OP SCIENCE AND ART. 
57 
mnin streets, however, might, perhaps, with advan- 
tsige in this warm climate, and where such appen¬ 
dages would not too much interfere with ventilation, 
be constructed with light piazzas, or colonades, as a 
protection from the sun or from rain. The squares, 
as large reservoirs of a more temperate and purer 
air, it would bo well, perhaps, to distribute symme¬ 
trically in respeetto their position in the city, which, 
no doubt, would placo them, where they would bo 
most required. Certain arrangements and regula- 
lations as to houses would next claim attention. 
Matters, comparatively of minute detail, it is true, 
but, without attention to which, every other sanitary 
measure might be utterly frustrated. 
In the first place, no house within either the city 
or its environs should have a leas frontage than 
about 20 feet, nor should it stand on an allotment of 
ground of less depth than 100 feet; duo attention, 
both by regulation and otherwise, being also paid to 
the entire premises, so as to exclude the possible ex¬ 
istence of any mephitic accumulations Nor, unless 
we are desirous of emulating some of the purlieus 
of London of Liverpool, or what wo hoar of the 
cities of China generally, should more than a due 
number of poisons (to be determined by size and ac¬ 
commodations) bo permitted to resido in any one 
dwelling. 
So far as to what might hare been the sanitary 
organization of this city, and that long since. 
The proximate means by which it would have 
been realized, may he briefly stated as follows : 
1st. The due levelling, or'prepa rations for the duo 
levelling, the entire ground-plot of thecity, including 
2nd. Arrangements for securing to the entire city 
a system of drains, with every desirable degree of 
fail, and no more, and to their debouchures fitting 
sites, for the ready removal of their contents during 
the night, whether by land, by means of steam or 
tram communication, or by water, hut in either 
instance most probably deodorized by carbonaceous 
matters or lime. 
3rd. Ttao removal of ovory source of mephitic 
effluvia, including 
4th. The arrangements for the ventilation of the 
entire city with the purest obtainable air. 
5th. Arrangements securing to the entire city un¬ 
limited supplies of the best, and, at all times, the 
clearest water, at least as a beverage, for personal 
use and other similar purposes, freed from all pos¬ 
sibility of metallic or other noxious impregnation, 
As well as Unlimited supplies of water, not ouiy for 
extinguishing fires, flushing sowers, watering streets 
once or twice daily, eras required, but for flushing 
the streets themselves, or thoroughly washing them, 
whenever deemed desirable, oitlmr for reducing their 
temperature , or the utter removal of all dust or mud, 
(as soon at least as tho streets shall have been put 
into a fit state to undergo so searching an operation. 
6 th. Arrangements for securing to tho citizens 
the full benefit of fresh water baths, as well as sea 
bathing. 
7th. Arrangements for ensuring to every part of 
the city an abundance of “ constitution” walks or 
promenades, rides, drives, exclusive of parks, public 
gardens, dsc. 
8 th. Arrangements for converting our Cemeteries 
from being (as our Cemeteries, almost without ex¬ 
ception, are at present and have ever been hitherto,) 
“ depots’’ or “ factories” of mephitic poison, into 
sanitary agents. 
9th. To exclude all Abattoirs from the city or its 
vicinities, ail factories involving operations of an 
offensive or deleterious tendency, (as far at least as 
might be consistent witli sound policy), and the 
taking of steps for securing, ns soon as possible, tho 
abolition of all suiokc, or at least, in the meantime, 
of those offensive volumes of smoke, which at pre¬ 
sent not only pollute the air of tho city, deface the 
beauty of its buildings, and destroy yearly an incal¬ 
culable amount of property, but operate to tho great 
discomfort of the inhabitants, and to the serious in¬ 
jury of their health. 
Before olosing this Paper it may perhaps bo ex¬ 
pedient to anticipate any doubts that might possibly 
be entertained in respect to the proposed “reforms,” 
in particular, as to their engineering and physical, 
as well as financial, practicability. As to their en¬ 
gineering practicability, analogy, will be our safest 
guide in coming to a conclusion. If so, I have only 
to refer for my proofs to the stupendous work3 of 
analogous description both of tho past and present 
day, in old and in young countries, in the parent 
country, in America, whether we refer to their 
canals, their railroads, their tunnellings, our 
Menai." tubular bridge, with other stupendous 
bridges in our own and other countries, and, lat¬ 
terly, the gigantic operations at Holyhead, for tho 
construction of a “ Port of Refuge.” Before most 
of which tho engineering difficulties now proposed 
to be surmounted, sink into utter insignificance. 
While, if want of labourers be urged as a plea, we 
have only to refer to the fact that a very few men, 
aided by machinery, do that now which some time 
since, would have required the labour of thousands. 
Besides the execution of the works proposed would 
not have been urgent; on tho contrary, they would 
nave required in the first instance, and moat of 
them, for years afterwards, merely to bo planned, 
when, generally speaking, they might have been 
left to grow with our growth ; in fact, to be carried 
out either rapidly or slowly, precisely as might have 
been found most convenient in respect to our menus. 
As to any possibly supposed physical difficulty, the 
practicability of sparing tho proposed unlimited 
supplies of fresh water, if there bo any doubt, I will 
only observe that, in respect to Sydney, exclusive of 
rain, the sources of supply meet us in every direc¬ 
tion ; in the contiguous swamps, which have, by 
some authorities, beeo pronounoed inexhaustible, in 
the bed of tho “ Cook’’ rivulet, which lias been pro- 
poseu and partly prepared for this purpose, or thoso 
still more abundant and excellent supplies so readily 
procurable from the “ Georgo” and the “Nepean,” 
and thoso not only within a legitimate distance from 
the city, but from a most desirablo elevation of 
level. 
And now as to the financial practicability In 
early days any financial difficulty would have been 
little more than nominal, inasmuch as the financial 
requirements would have scarcely exceeded the cost 
of tho mere feeding and clothing of tho labour em¬ 
ployed, together with its superintendence, and the 
trivial cost of a few rewards for due exertion and 
general good conduct. In these days the main cost 
would be for the importation of a requisite amount 
of rough, though, in a certain sense, skilled labour— 
in fact, “navvies.” An expense sure to be repaid to 
the colony by tho perpetual demand for such labour, 
for the construction of our railways and other similar 
works of necessity. And, as to tho wages, tho 
whole, almost without exception, would have gone 
to the benefit of our internal commerce. 
While tho whole of tho above expenditure, what¬ 
ever the amount, would have become, both from tho 
public nature of the works themselves, and tho 
general benefit they would confer, as well as in mere 
accordance with one of its professed objects, a fair 
charge upon the Land Fund. 
Let us admit, however, for the more sake of argu¬ 
ment. that the cost of these reforms «ould have 
been large, and that any moneys required for them 
by the Government from the general or land re¬ 
venues, could only bo lent. Bo it so. let, then, 
as 1 trust I shall be able to show, the returns from 
these reforms would also themselves be most ample, 
indeed, most probably infinitely more than adequate 
to the cost. As for instance— 
1. By the greatly enhanced value of tho land so 
