Next to the unwholesomeness of houses arising from the neglected state of
dust bins—to whatever cause the neglect may be attributable—no subject,
perhaps, so often engages the attention of Sanitary Inspectors as that of
water supply and the neglected state of cisterns. It would almost seem
as if many householders thought that the water supply needed no more
attention than that of gas, which is usually comprised in a quarterly
settlement with the collector. Months and probably years elapse in some
cases without any attention being paid to the condition of cisterns
which, I need hardly say, ought to be cleaned out periodically, and not
less frequently than once a month. It is true that the inconvenient
position in which the cisterns are sometimes placed occasions
difficulties in getting at them, which may in some measure account for
the neglect. But in other cases where no such difficulty exists the
result is the same. One among the “water regulations” by which the
Companies are almost constituted a sanitary authority, and which might be
enforced with public advantage, relates to the position of cisterns which
are required to be placed in accordance with their views. This
regulation is of a retrospective character, but so far as I know it is
not carried out. Another valuable regulation would abolish the “waste
pipe”—a fertile and unsuspected cause of foul water, and, in many cases
of illness, being often untrapped and then serving as a ventilator to the
drains, giving exit to noxious gases which the water absorbs freely. But
I cannot say that I have heard of any instance in which the Companies
have exercised their powers in this respect—powers, be it understood,
claimed by and conceded to them, not on sanitary grounds, but simply to
prevent the waste of water. It is one of my most often repeated
instructions to the Inspectors to view the apparatus for water supply
when making a house inspection, and to abolish waste pipes whenever
practicable. Another regulation has for its object, to prevent waste of
water, by the intervention of a service box for the supply of the water
closet, thus limiting the discharge at each elevation of the lever to a
maximum of two gallons. This regulation I have no doubt is carried out
in the case of new houses; but it is perhaps of even more importance in
old ones, in which, as too often happens, the domestic and the closet
service are drawn from one and the same cistern. In a special report
(November 20, 1872) I referred to all these points, and to many others,
and I have seen no reason to modify the expressions of regret with which
I then had occasion to speak of the stringency of the regulations, which
is, I apprehend, the main, if not the sole cause of our being still
without the constant system of water supply which it was supposed the Act
of 1871 would give us. The stringency to which I allude has reference
principally to the costliness of the apparatus and fittings on which the
companies insist as a condition of constant service; and not to the
exercise of the powers they possess, but do not as a rule employ, to
improve the present system by insisting on the due carrying out of the
really useful and valuable regulations quoted above. The adoption of
this constant system would enable us to get rid of our cisterns, if not
altogether, yet so far as the supply of water for culinary use and
drinking is concerned. The neglect of cisterns to which I referred
above, would then be a matter of less moment; and as the pipes would be
always charged, we should be less liable, than we are now, to the
contamination of water, for such an accident as I am about to mention
would be almost impossible.
Complaint was made that the first portion of water entering certain
cisterns in a street and mews at Notting Hill, each time the water was
turned on, was of a disgusting character; and this happened at a time
when there was an obstruction of the sewer in the mews, the effect being
to saturate the ground and flood the surface with sewage and surface
drainage. I surmised that the main was defective, and that when the
water was turned off the sewage was sucked into the pipe to fill the
vacuum, and then forced through the service pipes so soon as the water
was turned on. It turned out, so I was informed by the Company, that the
defect really existed in a service pipe of one of the houses; the effect,
however, was the same, and dangerous nuisances of this kind may occur at
any time, or in any locality, under similar circumstances, so long as the
intermittent system of water supply is continued. In the present
instance several cases of illness were traced to this fouling of the
water, and had the sewer contained typhoid excreta, the results might
have been lamentable in the extreme, and of the same kind as at Over
Darwen, and at Lewes during the recent epidemics of Enteric Fever. As I
have remarked in another place, we seem as far off as ever from the
constant system, the only gleam of hope in respect of it being that the
companies have made, and are making extensive preparations, so as to
enable them to supply their districts when called on to do so. They are
enabled to give a constant supply even though it should not be required
of them by the Metropolitan authority, and they would be gainers by so
doing, if the prevention of waste is really of any moment to them, which
may be reasonably doubted. The Metropolitan authority is the
Metropolitan Board of Works, a body which it is well known are unwilling
to execute the authority conferred on them by the Act, strongly
disapproving, as they do, of the regulations, the stringency of which
they did their utmost, but in vain, to modify.