| Loads. | |
| 150 miles of paved streets, yielding 1½ load of street mud per mile | 225 |
| 200 miles of paved streets, yielding ¾ load of street mud per mile | 150 |
| 375 | |
| Weekly amount of street mud during the wet season | 2,250 |
| Total ditto for six months in the year | 58,500 |
| 63,000 loads of street mud, at 3s. per load | £8775 |
The great sale for this mud, perhaps nineteen-twentieths, is from the barges. A barge of street-manure, about one-fourth (more or less) “mac,” or rather “mac” mixed with its street proportion of dung, &c., and three-fourths mud, dung, &c., contains from 30 to 40 tons, or as many loads. These manure barges are often to be seen on the Thames, but nearly three-fourths of them are found on the canals, especially the Paddington, the Regent’s, and the Surrey, these being the most immediately connected with the interior part of the metropolis. A barge-load of this manure is usually sold at from 5l. to 6l. Calculating its average weight at 35 tons, and its average sale at 5l. 10s., the price is rather more than 3s. a load. “Common street mud,” I have been informed on good authority, “fetches 3s. per load from the farmer, when he himself carts it away.”
The price of the barge-load of manure is tolerably uniform, for the quality is generally the same. Some of the best, because the cleanest, street mud—as it is mixed only with horse-dung—is obtained from the wood streets, but this mode of pavement is so circumscribed that the contractors pay no regard to its manure produce, as a general rule, and mix it carelessly with the rest. Such, at least, is the account they themselves give, and they generally represent that the street manure is, owing to the outlay for cartage and boatage, little remunerative to them at the prices they obtain; notwithstanding, they are paid to remove it from the streets. Indeed, I heard of one contractor who was said to be so dissatisfied with the demand for, and the prices fetched by, his street-manure, that he has rented a few acres not far from the Regent’s Canal, to test the efficacy of street dirt as a fertilizer, and to ascertain if to cultivate might not be more profitable than to sell.
Of the Surface-Water of the Streets of London.
The consideration of what Professor Way has called the “street waters” of the metropolis, is one of as great moment as any of those I have previously treated in my details concerning street refuse, whether “mac,” mud, or dung. Indeed, water enters largely into the composition of the two former substances, while even the street dung is greatly affected by the rain.
The feeders of the street, as regards the street surface-water, are principally the rains. I will first consider the amount of surface-water supplied by the rain descending upon the area of the metropolis: upon the roofs of the houses, and the pavement of the streets and roads.
The depth of rain falling in London in the different months, according to the observations and calculations of the most eminent meteorologists, is as follows:—
| Months. | Depth of Rain in inches. | Quantity of rain falling in the different seasons. | Number of days on which rain falls. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Royal Society, according to observation. | Howard, according to observation. | Daniell, according to calculation. | |||
| January | 1·56 | 1·907 | 1·483 | Winter. 5·868 | 14·4 |
| February | 1·45 | 1·643 | 0·746 | 15·8 | |
| March | 1·36 | 1·542 | 1·440 | 12·7 | |
| April | 1·55 | 1·719 | 1·786 | Spring. 4·813 | 14·0 |
| May | 1·67 | 2·036 | 1·853 | 15·8 | |
| June | 1·98 | 1·964 | 1·830 | 11·8 | |
| July | 2·44 | 2·592 | 2·516 | Summer. 6·682 | 16·1 |
| August | 2·37 | 2·134 | 1·453 | 16·3 | |
| September | 2·97 | 1·644 | 2·193 | 12·3 | |
| October | 2·46 | 2·872 | 2·073 | Autumn. 7·441 | 16·2 |
| November | 2·58 | 2·637 | 2·400 | 15·0 | |
| December | 1·65 | 2·489 | 2·426 | 17·7 | |
| Totals | 24·04 | 25·179 | 22·199 | 24·804 | 178·1 |
The rainfall in London, according to a ten years’ average of the Royal Society’s observations, amounts to 23 inches; in 1848 it was as high as 28 inches, and in 1847 as low as 15 inches. The depth of rain annually falling near London is stated by Mr. Luke Howard to be, on an average of 23 years (1797-1819), as much as 25·179 inches. Mr. Daniell says that the average annual fall is 23⅒ inches. The mean of the observations made at Greenwich between the years 1838 and 1849 was 24·84 inches.
The following extract from an account of the “Soft Water Springs of the Surrey Sands,” by the Hon. Wm. Napier, is interesting.