The following regulations sufficiently show the nature of the agreements made between the contractors and the authorities as to the cleansing of the more important thoroughfares especially. It will be seen that in the regulations I quote every street, court, or alley, must now be swept daily, a practice which has only been adopted within these few years in the City.
“Sewers’ Office, Guildhall, London, Rakers’ Duties,[15] Midsummer, 1851, to Midsummer, 1852.
“Cleansing.
“The whole surface of every Carriage-way, Court, and Alley shall be swept every day (Sundays excepted), and all mud, dust, filth, and rubbish, all frozen or partially frozen matter, and snow, animal and vegetable matter, and everything offensive or injurious, shall be properly pecked, scraped, swept up, and carted away therefrom; and the iron gutters laid across or along the footways, the air-grates over the sewers, the gulley-grates in the carriage-way of the streets respectively; and all public urinals are to be daily raked out, swept, and made clean and clear from all obstructions; and the Contractor or Contractors shall, in time of frost, continually keep the channels in the Streets and Places clear for water to run off: and cleanse and cart away refuse hogan or gravel (when called upon by the Inspector to do so) from all streets newly paved.
“The Mud and Dirt, &c., is to be carted away immediately that it is swept up.
“N.B. The Inspector of the District may, at any time he may think it necessary, order any Street or Place to be cleansed and swept a second time in any one day, and the Contractor or Contractors are thereupon bound to do the same.
“The Markets and their approaches are also to be thus cleansed DAILY, and the approaches thereto respectively are also to be thus cleansed at such an hour in the night of Saturday in each week as the Inspector of the District may direct.
“Every Street, Lane, Square, Yard, Court, Alley, Passage, and Place (except certain main Streets hereinafter enumerated), are to be thus cleansed within the following hours Daily: namely—
“In the months of April, May, June, July, August, and September. To be begun not earlier than 4 o’Clock in the morning, and finished not later than 1 o’Clock in the afternoon.
“In the months of October, November, December, January, February, and March. To be begun not earlier than 5 o’Clock in the morning, and finished not later than 2 o’Clock in the afternoon.