Considering the drainage of a new district: the under-drainage of the roads and houses and the surface cleansing, would not the public gain by putting the drainage, the road-construction, repair and maintenance of the roads, under the same management?—Yes, the public would get it done much better by one surveyor and one Board than by two. In the old districts, besides the double expense of officers, inconveniences arise from the want of unity between the contractors for the paving and the contractors for the drainage; there is always conflicting interests between the two, and the work is not in many cases done with the economy and expedition which would be practicable.
If the public, who may be ignorant of the science of sewerage and of what it may accomplish, make no complaints, and do not agitate for the adoption of any improved system, in how long a time do you think the improvements demonstrated in the Holborn and Finsbury divisions would reach the other end of the metropolis by the force of imitation and voluntary adoption?—From the apathy shown and prejudice against anything new, however valuable it may be as an improvement, and the various interests affected, such as the contractors for cleansing, I do not expect that they would become general in the metropolis during my life-time. The public are passive, and the adverse interests are active.
You know the description of persons engaged as surveyors of various descriptions in the rural districts and in the smaller towns?—Yes, I do.
Unless care be taken, is it to be apprehended that any new expenditure will be made on imperfect and unwholesome drains with flat bottoms and on false principles at a disproportionate expense?—Undoubtedly, except they have to act on rule, it will certainly be so throughout the country. The drainage that I have seen in the country districts is worse than in the metropolis.
Have you found the sewerage produce any effect in the drainage of the surrounding land?—Yes, we have found it lower the water in the wells, often at great distances. For instance, in forming a sewer in the City Road we found that it lowered by four feet a well nearly a quarter of a mile distance. The only remedy we could advise to the parties was to lower the well: they did so. We afterwards had occasion to lower the same sewer three feet, when the well was lowered again in proportion; so that the construction of the sewer, in this instance, drained an area of 40 or 50 acres on that side, and perhaps further. The water is sometimes in such quantities and so strong in the land springs as to require openings to be left in the side of the sewer for its passage.
Are there any fees taken in the Holborn and Finsbury divisions?—None.
Do you think the system of the payment of officers by fees objectionable?—Yes, highly so.
“Have you met with instances where the drains have not acted, owing to the inadequacy of the supplies of water?—I have not had my attention called particularly to any private drain, so as to notice whether it did not act owing to an inadequate supply of water, but taking the question on the broad principle of the effect of a sufficient supply of water to drains or sewers as beneficial in keeping them free from deposit, I beg to state that I have noticed the effect on sewers of the same form and having the same fall or inclination, and I have found that where there has been an adequate supply of water no deposit has remained in them, whereas where the supply of water was inadequate, deposit has accumulated so much as to render cleansing necessary in a few years: the effect must be the same in private drains.”
[Figure 1 is a representation of the form of the common sewers built in the Westminster division. It is a transverse section, representing, on a scale of a quarter of an inch to a foot, a sewer of the larger sort, the greatest height being five feet six inches and the width three feet. The smaller sewers are made of the same form, but only five feet high and two feet six inches wide. It chiefly differs from the more common form of sewers in not having a perfectly flat bottom.
