Sewage utilisation / edited by James Forrest.

Date:
1876
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sewage utilisation / edited by James Forrest. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    (i8 to its consideration, for that was the way in which things were eventually brought to perfection. In the meantime their first duty was to study the sanitary question, and leave the matter of profit to be settled hereafter. \ ice-Admiral Sir Frederick Nicot.sox said he could in every respect confirm the facts stated by Mr. Abemethy. There could be no question that if a large quantity of sewage was poured into a river, there must be a deposit somewhere. The latest surveys in the neighbourhood of Crossness showed that a shoal was un- doubtedly being formed precisely opposite the outfall. No doubt Sir Joseph Bazalgette’s figures were correct from his point of view ; but they resulted, as Mr. Abernethy had stated, from considerable dredging having been carried on on the opposite side of the river. Sir Joseph had alluded to the fact that he had not yet heard from the Conservators of the Thames that they required that part of the river to be dredged. The Conservators had for the last few years been carefully watching this part of the river; they had taken careful soundings, and had had the deposits analysed; and he felt confident that it would not be long before it would be necessary to have a large amount of dredging done, not only close to Crossness, but in the reach above. He believed when that time arrived, both the Board of Works and the Conservators would jointly do all in their power to keep the river as pure as they could, and, above all, to keep the navigation always open. Mr. Lemon thought the injudicious advocates of sewage uti- lisation had done more to retard the solution of the sewage problem than the strongest opponents. The same system had been recommended in every place regardless of local circumstances, and the result had been a considerable financial loss. He agreed with General Scott that the best thing to be done with sewage was to throw it away : that it was no longer to be looked upon as some- thing to make money out of, but must be got rid of as quickly as possible. After seeing every process in the kingdom for dealing with sewage, he had arrived at the same conclusion as Sir Joseph Bazalgette, viz., that the dry-carriage system was a barbarous one, and, moreover, it was costly; for where the dry-closet system had been carried out there was also a system of sewers to carry oft’ the slops. Having had to lay out a scheme for draining a large district, where there were some strong advocates of the dry system, he took the trouble to make a few calculations as to what would be the saving in the area of the sewers required if the dry system were adopted, and he found that the same area of sewers was requisite for the dry system as for the water-closet system. Boili systems