My excellent and eloquent friend, Lyttleton, of Pump Court, Temple,
barrister-at-law, disturbed me on a damp morning at the end of last
month, to bespeak my company to a meeting at which he intended to hold
forth. ‘It is,’ he said, ‘the Great Water Supply Congress, which
assembles to-morrow.’
‘Do you know anything of the subject?’
‘A vast deal both practically and theoretically. Practically, I pay for
my little box in the Regent’s Park, twice the price for water our friend
Fielding is charged, and both supplies are derived from the same
Company. Yet his is a mansion, mine is a cottage; his rent more than
doubles mine in amount, and his family trebles mine in number. So much
for the consistency and exactions of an irresponsible monopoly.
Practically, again, there are occasions when my cisterns are without
water. So much for deficient supply.’
‘Is your water bad?’
‘Not absolutely unwholesome; but I have drunk better.’
‘Now then, Theoretically.’
‘Theoretically, I learn from piles of blue books—a regular blue mountain
of parliamentary inquiry instituted in the years 1810, 1821, 1827, 1828,
1834, 1840, and 1845—from a cloud of prospectuses issued by embryo Water
Companies, from a host of pamphlets _pro_ and _con_, and from the
reports of the Board of Health, that of the 300,000 houses of which
London is said to consist, 70,000 are without the great element of
suction and cleanliness; I find also that the supply, such as it is, is
derived from nine water companies all linked together to form a giant
monopoly; and that, in consequence, the charge for water is in some
instances excessive; that six of these companies draw their water from
the filthy Thames;—and the same number, including those which use the
Lea and New River water, have no system of filtration—hence it is
unwholesome: that in short, the public of the metropolis are the victims
of dear, insufficient and dirty water. Like Tantalus of old they are
denied much of the great element of life, although it flows within reach
of their parched and thirsty lips. And by whom? By that many-headed
Cerberus—that nine gentlemen in one—the great monopolist Water Company
combination of London! Unless, therefore, we bestir ourselves in the
great cause for which this numerous, enlightened, and respectable
meeting have assembled here this day—’
‘You forget; you have only two listeners at present—myself and my
spaniel. I can suggest a more profitable morning’s amusement than a
rehearsal of your speech.’
‘What?’
‘Your theoretical knowledge is, I doubt not, very comprehensive and
varied. But second-hand information is not to be trusted too implicitly.
Every statement of fact, like every story, gains something in
exaggeration, or loses something in accuracy by repetition from book to
book, or from book to mouth.’
‘Granted; but what do you suggest?’
‘Ocular demonstration. Let us at once visit and minutely inspect the
works of one of the Companies. I am sure they will let us in at the
Grand Junction, for I have already been over their premises.’
‘A capital notion! Agreed.’
The preliminaries—consisting of the hasty bundling up of Mr. Lyttleton’s
notes for the morrow’s oration, and the hire of a Hansom cab—were
adjusted in a few minutes.
The order to drive to Kew Bridge, was obeyed in capital style; for in
three-quarters of an hour we were deposited on the towing path on the
Surrey side of the Thames, opposite the King of Hanover’s house, and a
quarter of a mile west of Kew Bridge.
‘Here,’ I explained, ‘is the spot whence the Grand Junction Company
derive their water. In the bed of the river is an enormous culvert pipe
laid parallel to this path. Its mouth—open towards Richmond—is barred
across with a grating, to intercept stray fish, murdered kittens, or
vegetable impurities, and—except now and then the intrusion edgeways of
a small flounder, or the occasional slip of an erratic eel—it admits
nothing into the pipe but what is more or less fluid. The culvert then
takes a bend round the edge of the islet opposite to us; burrows beneath
the Brentford road, and delivers its contents into a well under that
tall chimney and taller iron “stand-pipe” which you see on the other
side of the river.’
‘And is _this_ the stuff I have to pay four pounds ten a year for?’
exclaimed Mr. Lyttleton, contemplating the opaque fluid; part of which
was then making its way into the cisterns of Her Majesty’s lieges.
‘Certainly; but it is purified first. We will now cross the bridge to
the Works.’
Those of my readers who make prandial expeditions to Richmond, must have
noticed at the beginning of Old Brentford, a little beyond where they
turn over Kew Bridge, an immensely tall thin column that shoots up into
the air like an iron mast unable to support itself, and seems to require
four smaller, thinner, and not much shorter props to keep it upright.
This, with the engine and engine-houses, is all they can see of the
Grand Junction Waterworks from the road. It is only when one gets
inside, that the whole extent of the aquatic apparatus is revealed.
Determined to follow the water from the Thames till it began its travels
to London, we entered the edifice, went straight to the well, and called
for a glass of water. Our hosts—who had received our visit without
hesitation—supplied us. ‘That,’ remarked one of them, as he held the
half-filled tumbler up to the light, ‘is precisely the state of the
water as emptied from the Thames into the well.’
It looked like a dose of weak magnesia, or that peculiar London liquid
known as ‘skim-sky-blue,’ but deceitfully sold under the name of milk.
‘The analysis of Professor Brande,’ said Lyttleton, ‘gives to every
gallon of Thames water taken from Kew Bridge, 19·2 parts of solid
matter; but the water, I apprehend, in which he experimented must have
been taken from the river on a serener occasion than this. To-day’s rain
appears to have drained away the chalk—so as to give in this specimen a
much larger proportion of solids to fluids than his estimate.’
‘In this impure state,’ one of the engineers told us, ‘the water is
pumped by steam power into the reservoirs to which you will please to
follow me.’
Passing out of the building and climbing a sloping bank, we now saw
before us an expanse of water covering 3½ acres; but divided into two
sections. Into the larger, the pump first delivers the water, that so
much of the impurity as will form sediment may be precipitated. It then
slowly glides through a small opening into the lesser section, which is
a huge filter.
‘The impurities of water,’ said the barrister, assuming an oratorical
attitude, to give us a taste of his ‘reading up,’ ‘are of two kinds;
first, such as are mechanically suspended—say earth, chalk, sand, clay,
dead vegetation or decomposed cats; and secondly, such as are dissolved
or chemically combined—like salt, sugar, or alkali. Separation in the
one case is easy, in the other it involves a chemical process. If you
throw a pinch of sand into a tumbler of water, and stir it about, you
produce a turbid mixture; but to render the fluid clear again you have
only to adopt the simple process of letting it alone; for on setting the
tumbler down for awhile, the particles—which, from their extreme
minuteness, were easily disturbed and distributed amidst the fluid—being
heavier than water, are precipitated, or in other words, fall to the
bottom, leaving the liquid translucent. This is what is happening in the
larger section of the reservoir to the chalky water of which we drank. I
think I am correct?’ asked the speaker, angling for a single ‘cheer’
from the Engineer.
‘Quite so,’ replied that gentleman.
‘Provided the water could remain at rest long enough—which the
insatiable maw of the modern Babylon does not allow,’—continued the
honourable orator, rehearsing a bit more of his speech, ‘this mode of
cleansing would be perfectly effectual. In proof of which I may only
allude to Nature’s mode of depuration, as shown in lakes—that of Geneva
for instance. The waters of the Rhone enter that expansive reservoir
from the Valais in a very muddy condition; yet, after reposing in the
lake, they issue at Geneva as clear as crystal. But so incessant is the
London demand, that scarcely any time can be afforded for the impurities
of the Thames, the Lea, or the New River to separate themselves from the
water by mere deposition.’
‘True,’ interjected one of the superintendants. ‘It is for that reason
that our water is passed afterwards into the filtering bed, which is
four feet thick.’
‘How do you make up this enormous bed?’
‘The water rests upon, and permeates through, 1st, a surface of fine
sand; 2d, a stratum of shells; 3d, a layer of garden gravel; and 4th, a
base of coarse gravel. It thence falls through a number of ducts into
cisterns, whence it is pumped up so as to commence its travels to town
through the conduit-pipe.’
We were returning to the engine-house, when Lyttleton asked the
Engineer, ‘Does your experience generally, enable you to say that water
as supplied by the nine companies, is tolerably pure?’
‘Upon the whole, yes,’ was the answer.
‘Indeed!’ ejaculated the orator, sharply. ‘If that be true,’ he
whispered to me, in a rueful tone, ‘I shall be cut out of one of the
best points in my speech.’
‘Of course,’ continued the Engineer, ‘purity entirely depends upon the
source, and the means of cleansing.’
‘Then, as to the source—how many companies take their supplies from the
Thames, near to, and after it has received the contents of, the common
sewers?’
‘No water is taken from the Thames below Chelsea, except that of the
Lambeth Company, which is supplied from between Waterloo and Hungerford
Bridges; an objectionable source, which they have obtained an act to
change to Thames Ditton. The Chelsea Waterworks have a most efficient
system of filtration; as also have the Southwark and Vauxhall Company;
both draw their water from between the Red House, Battersea, and Chelsea
Hospital. The other companies do not filter. The West Middlesex sucks up
some of Father Thames as he passes Barnes Terrace. Except the lowest of
these sources, Thames water is nearly as pure as that of other rivers.’
‘Perhaps it is,’ was the answer; ‘but the unwholesomeness arises from
contaminations received during its course; we don’t object to the
“Thames,” but to its “tributaries,” such as the black contents of common
sewers, and the refuse of gut, glue, soap, and other nauseous
manufactures; to say nothing of animal and vegetable offal, of which the
river is the sole receptacle. Brande shows that, while the solid matter
contained in the river at Teddington is 17·4, that which the water has
contracted when it flows past Westminster is 24·4, and the City of
London, 28·0.’
‘But,’ said the Engineer, ‘these adulterations are only mechanically
suspended in the fluid, and are, as you shall see presently, totally
separated from it by our mode of filtration.’
‘Which brings us to your second point, as to efficient cleansing; you
admit that without filtration this is impossible, and also that only
three companies filter; the deduction, therefore, is that two-thirds of
the water supplied to Londoners is insufficiently cleansed. This indeed,
is not a mere inference; we know it for a fact, we see it in our ewers,
we taste it out of our caraffes.’
‘But this does not wholly arise from the inefficient filtration of the
six companies,’ returned an officer of this Company, ‘the public is much
to blame—though, when agitating against an abuse, it never thinks of
blaming itself. Half the dirt, dust, and animalculæ found at table are
introduced after the water has been delivered to the houses. Impurity of
all sorts finds its way into out-door cisterns, even when covered, and
few of them, open or closed, are often enough cleansed. In some
neighbourhoods water-butts are always uncovered, and hardly ever cleaned
out. The water is foul, and the companies are blamed.’
‘The blame belongs to the system,’ said the barrister. ‘Domestic
reservoirs are not only an evil but an unnecessary expense. Besides
filth, they cause waste and deficient supply: they should be abolished;
for continuous supply is the real remedy. Let the pipes be always full,
and the water would be always ready, always fresh, and could never
acquire new impurities. Still, despite all you say, I am bound to
conclude that although one-third of the water may arrive in the domestic
cisterns of the metropolis in a pellucid state, the other two-thirds
does not.’ Mr. L. then inscribed this calculation in his note book,
whispering to me that his pet ‘dirty water point’ would come out even
stronger than he had expected.
We had now returned to one of the engine-rooms.
‘You have tasted the water before, I now present you with some of it
after, filtration,’ said the chief engineer, handing us a tumbler. ‘This
is exactly the condition in which we deliver it to our customers.’
It was clear to the eye, and to the taste innocuous; but Lyttleton (who
I should mention, occasionally turns on powerful streams of oratory at
Temperance meetings, and is a judge of the article,) complained that the
liquid wanted ‘flavour.’
‘In other words, then it wants _impurity_’ replied one of our cicerones
with alacrity, ‘for perfectly pure water is quite tasteless. Indeed,
water may be too pure. Distilled water which contains no salt, is
insipid, and tends to indigestion. It is a wise provision of Nature,
that waters should contain a greater or less quantity of foreign
ingredients; for without these water is dangerous to drink. It never
fails to take up from the atmosphere a certain proportion of carbonic
acid gas, and when passing through lead pipes it imbibes enough
carbonate of lead to constitute poison. Dr. Christison mentions several
severe cases of lead (or painter’s) cholic, which arose chiefly in
country houses to which water was supplied from springs through lead
pipes. The most remarkable case was that at Claremont, where the ex-king
of the French and several members of his family were nearly poisoned by
pure spring water conveyed to the mansion through lead pipes.
‘Mercy!’ I exclaimed, with all the energy of despair that a mere
water-drinker is capable of, ‘if river water be unwholesome, and pure
water poison, what _is_ to become of every temperance pledgee?’
The Engineer relieved me: ‘All the Chemists,’ he stated, ‘have agreed
that a water containing from eight to ten grains of sulphate of magnesia
or soda, to the imperial gallon, is best suited for alimentary,
lavatory, and other domestic purposes.’
We were now introduced to the great engine. What a monster! Imagine an
enormous see-saw, with a steam engine at one end, and a pump at the
other. Fancy this ‘beam,’ some ten yards long, and twenty-eight tons in
weight, moving on a pivot in the middle, the ends of which show a
circumference greater than the crown of the biggest hat ever worn. See,
with what earnest deliberation the ‘see,’ or engine, pulls up the ‘saw,’
or balance-box of the pump, which then comes down upon the water-trap
with the ferocious _àplomb_ of 49 tons, sending 400 gallons of water in
one tremendous squirt nearly the twentieth part of a mile high;—that is
to the top of the stand-pipe.
‘We have a smaller engine which “does” 150 gallons per stroke,’ remarked
our informant: ‘each performs 11 strokes, and forces up 4400 gallons of
water per minute, and thus our average delivery per diem throughout the
year is from 4,000,000, to 5,000,000 gallons.’
‘What proportion of London do you supply?’ asked Mr. Lyttleton.
‘The quadrangle included between Oxford Street, Wardour Street,
Pall-Mall, and Hyde Park; besides the whole of Notting-hill, Bayswater,
and Paddington. We serve 14,058 houses, to each of which we supply 225
gallons per day, or, taking the average number of persons per house at
nine, 25 gallons a head; besides public services, such as baths,
watering streets, or manufactories; making our total daily delivery at
the rate of 252 gallons per house. This delivery is performed through 80
miles of service pipes, whose diameter varies from 3 to 30 inches.
‘Now,’ said my companion, sharpening his pencil, ‘to go into the
question of supply.’ He then unfolded his pocket soufflet, and brought
out a calculation, of quantities derived, he said, from parliamentary
returns and other authorities more or less reliable:—
Gals. daily.
New River Company 20,000,000
Chelsea Company 3,250,000
West Middlesex Company 3,650,000
Grand Junction Company 3,500,000
East London Company 7,000,000
South Lambeth Company 2,500,000
South London Company and Southwark Company 3,000,000
Hampstead Company 400,000
Kent Company 1,200,000
——————————
44,500,000
Artesian Wells 8,000,000
Land-spring Pumps 3,000,000
“Catch” rain water (say) 1,000,000
——————————
Making a total quantity supplied daily to London, from all
sources, of 56,500,000
‘An abundant supply,’ said an engineer eagerly, ‘for as the present
population of the metropolis is estimated at 2,336,000, the total
affords about 24 gallons of water per day, for every man, woman, and
child.’
‘Admitted,’ rejoined Lyttleton; ‘but we have to deal with large
deductions; first, nearly half this quantity runs to waste, chiefly in
consequence of the intermittent system. I live in a small house with
proportionately small cisterns, which are filled no more than three
times a week; now, as my neighbours have larger houses and larger
reservoirs, the water when turned on runs for as long a time into my
small, as it does into their capacious cisterns, and consequently, if my
stop-taps be in the least out of order, a greater quantity descends the
waste pipe than remains behind. This is universally the case in similar
circumstances.’
‘_We_ supply water daily, Sundays excepted,’ remarked the Engineer.
‘Then you are wiser than your neighbours. But every inconvenience and
nearly all the waste, would be saved by the adoption of the continuous
system of supply. Secondly, a large quantity of water is consumed by
cattle, breweries, baths, public institutions, for putting out fires,
and for laying dust. The lieges of London have only, therefore, to
divide between them some 10 gallons of water each per day; and, as it is
generally admitted that a sixth part of their habitations are without
water at all, the division must be most unequally made. That such is the
fact is shown by your own figures—your customers get 25 gallons each per
day, or more than double their share. For this excess, some in poorer
districts get none at all.’
‘That is no fault of the existing companies. As sellers of an article,
they are but too happy to get as many customers for it as possible; but
poor tenants cannot, and their landlords will not, afford the expense.
If the companies were to make the outlay necessary to connect the houses
with their mains, they would have no legal power to recover the money so
expended—nor indeed is it clear, that were they inclined to run the
risk, the parties would avail themselves of it. In one instance, the
Southwark and Vauxhall Company offered to construct a tank which would
give continuous supply to a block of 100 small houses, at the rate of 50
gallons per diem to each—if the proprietor would pay an additional rate
sufficient to yield 5 per cent. on the outlay, such additional rate not
exceeding one half-penny per week for each house, but the offer was
declined.’
‘That is an extreme case of cheapness on the one side, and of stupidity
on the other,’ said the barrister. ‘Other landlords will not turn on
water for their tenants, because of the expense; not only of the
“plant,” in the first instance, but of the after water-rent. I find, by
the account rendered to the House of Commons in 1834, that the South
London Company (since incorporated with the Southwark, as the “Southwark
and Vauxhall,”—the very Company you mention,) charged considerably less
than any other. The return shows that while they obtained only 15_s._
per 1000 hogsheads; the West Middlesex (the highest) exacted 48_s._,
6_d._ for the same quantity; consequently, had the houses of the foolish
landlord who refused one half-penny per week for water, stood in
northwestern instead of southern London, he would have had to pay more
than treble, or a fraction above three half-pence per week.’
‘Allowing for difference of level,’ I remarked, ‘and other interferences
with the cheap delivery of water; the disparity in the charges of the
different companies, and even by the same company to different
customers, is unaccountable: they are guided by no principle. You have
mentioned the extreme points of the scale of rates; the remaining
companies charged at the time you mention, respectively per 1000
hogsheads, 17_s._, 17_s._, 2_d._, 21_s._, 28_s._, 29_s._, and 45_s._ The
only companies whose charges are limited by act of parliament are the
Grand Junction, the East London, the Southwark and Vauxhall, and the
Lambeth. The others exact precisely what they please.’
‘And,’ interposed Lyttleton, ‘there is no redress: the only appeal we,
the taxed, have, is to our taxers, and the monopoly is so tight that—as
is my case—although your next door neighbour is supplied from a cheaper
company, you are not allowed to change.’
‘The companies were obliged to combine, to save themselves from ruin and
the public from extreme inconvenience,’ said our informant; ‘during the
competition streets were torn up, traffic was stopped, and confusion was
worse confounded in the districts where the opposition raged.’
‘But what happened when the war ceased, and the general peace was
concluded?’ said Lyttleton, chuckling. ‘To show how ill some of the
companies manage their affairs, I could cite some laughable cases. When
the combination commenced, some of them forgot to stop off their mains,
and supplied water to customers whom they had previously turned over to
their quondam rivals; so that one company gave the water, and the other
pocketed the rent. This, in some instances, went on for years.’
Here the subject branched off into other topics. It is worthy of notice
that the conversation was carried on by the side of the enormous Cornish
engine, that was driving 4400 gallons per minute 218 feet high.
‘It is marvellous,’ I remarked, ‘that so much power can be exercised
with so little noise and vibration.’
‘That’s owing to the patent valves in the pump,’ said the stoker.
Taking a last look at the monster, we went outside to view the
stand-pipe. Being, we were told, 218 feet high, it tops the Monument in
Fish Street-hill by 16 feet. Within it is performed the last stroke of
hydraulic art which is needed; for nature does the rest. The water, sent
up through the middle or thickest of the tubes, falls over into the open
mouths of the smaller ones—(which most people mistake for
supports)—descends through all four at once into the conduit-pipe, and
travels of its own accord leisurely to London. In obedience to the law
of levels, it rises without further trouble to the tops of the tallest
houses on the highest spots in the Company’s district. In its way it
fills a large reservoir on Camden-hill. The iron conduit-pipe ends at
Poland street, Oxford street, and is 7½ miles long.
Our inspection was now terminated. We took a parting glass of water with
our intelligent and communicative hosts, and returned to town.
I firmly believe that the success of Lyttleton’s speech at the great
meeting next day, was very much owing to this visit. The room was
crowded in every part. His tone was moderate. He avoided the extravagant
exaggerations of the more fiery order of water spouters. Neither was he
too tame; he was not—as Moore said of a tory orator—like an
‘awkward thing of wood
Which up and down its clumsy arm doth move;
And only spout, and spout, and spout away,
In one weak, washy, everlasting flood,’
but he came out capitally in the hard, argumentative style. His oration
bristled with logic and statistics to a degree of which I cannot pretend
to give the faintest notion.
Sipping inspiration out of a tumbler filled with the flowing subject of
discussion, Mr. Lyttleton commenced by declaring his conviction that the
water supplied to the metropolis was, generally speaking, bad in
quality, extravagantly dear, and, from excessive waste, deficient in
quantity. In order to remedy those defects an efficient control was
essential. Continuous supply, filtration, and a uniform scale of rates
must be enforced. Some of the companies were pocketing enormous
dividends, and was it a fair argument to retort, that they are now being
reimbursed for periods of no dividend at all? Are we of the present day
to be mulcted to cover losses occasioned because the early career of
some of these companies was marked by the ignorance, imprudence, and
reckless extravagance, which he (Mr. Lyttleton) could prove it was? If
our wine merchant, or coal merchant, or baker, began business badly and
with loss, would he be tolerated, if, when he grew wiser and more
prosperous, he tried to exact large prices to cover the consequences of
his previous mismanagement? Mr. Lyttleton apprehended not. With this
branch of the question—he proceeded to remark—the important subjects of
distribution and supply were intimately connected. It had been
ascertained that a vast proportion of the poor had no water in their
houses. Why? Partly because it was too dear; but partly he (the learned
speaker) was bound to say from the parsimony of landlords. He had
pointed out a remedy for the first evil; for the second he would propose
that every house owner should be bound to introduce pipes into every
house. The law was stringent on him as to sewers and party-walls, and
why should not a water supply be enforced on him also?—In dealing with
the whole question of supply—the honourable gentleman went on to say, he
could not agree with those who stated that the delivery of it was
deficient. A moderate calculation estimated the quantity running through
the underground net-work of London pipes at 56,000,000 of gallons per
day. Waste (of which there is a prodigious amount), steam-engines,
cattle, public baths and other supplies deducted, left more than 10
gallons per diem per head for the whole population,—that is supposing
these gallons were equitably distributed; but they are not,—the rich get
an excess, and the poor get none at all. He (the learned barrister) was
not prepared to say that 10 or 20 gallons per head daily were sufficient
for all the purposes of life in this or in any other city, great or
small; but this he would say, that under proper management the existing
supply might be made ample for present wants;—whether for the
requirements of augmenting population and increased cleanliness we need
not discuss now. What was wanted at this time was a better distribution
rather than a greater supply; but what was wanted most of all was united
action and one governing body. Without this, confusion, extravagance,
and waste, would inevitably continue.
Mr. Lyttleton wound up with a peroration that elicited very general
applause. ‘Although we must,’ he said, ‘establish an efficient control
over the existing means of water supply, we must neither wholly despise
nor neglect them, nor blindly rush into new and ruinous schemes. We must
remove the onus of payment from the poorer tenants to their landlords,
and into whatever central directing power the Waterworks of this great
city shall pass,’ concluded the learned orator, with energetic unction,
‘our motto must be “continuous supply, uniform rates, and universal
filtration!”’