Volume 2

London labour and the London poor : a cyclopaedia of the condition and earnings of those that will work, those that cannot work, and those that will not work. / by Henry Mayhew.

  • Mayhew, Henry, 1812-1887.
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: London labour and the London poor : a cyclopaedia of the condition and earnings of those that will work, those that cannot work, and those that will not work. / by Henry Mayhew. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    464/492 (page 412)
    3. In the providing works of deposit or storage in low districts, or of discharge where the natural outlets are free, such works should be provided as would not subject any place, or any man's pro- perty, to the risk of inundation, or any other evil consequence; while in the construction of the drainage of the substratum, the works should be at such a depth below the foundation of all buildings that tenements should not be exposed to that continued damage from exhalation and dampness which leads to the dry rot in timber, and to an immature decay of materials and a general unhealthiness. There are other points insisted upon in many Reports to which I need but allude, such as (a.) The channels containing sewage should be of enduring and impermeable material, so as to prevent all soakage. (b.) There should be throughout the channels of the subterranean metropolis a fall or inclination which would suffice to prevent the accumulation of any sewage deposit, with its deleterious in- fluence and ultimate costliness. (c.) Similar provisions should be used were it but to prevent the creation of the noxious gases which now permeate many houses (especially in the quarters inhabited by the poor) and escape into many streets, courts, and alleys, for until improvements are effected the pent-up sewage and the saturated brickwork of the sewers and older drains must generate such gases. {d.) No tidal stream should ever receive a flow of sewage, because then the cause of evil is never absent, for the filth comes back with the tide; and as the Thames water constitutes the grand fount of metropolitan consumption, the water companies, with very trifling exceptions, give us back much of our own excrement, mixed with every conceivable, and sometimes noxious, nastiness, with Avhich we may brew, cook, and wash—and drink, if we can. Filtering remedies but a portion of the evil. Now it would appear that not one of these requirements, the necessity of which is unques- tioned and unquestionable, is fully carried out by the present system of sewerage, and hence the need of some new plan in which the defects may be remedied, and the proper principles carried out. The instructions given by the Court Avere to the following effect:— A. The Thames should be kept free from sewage whatever the state of the tide. B. There should be intercepting drains to carry the sewage (so keeping the Thames unsoiled by it) wherever practicable. C. The sewage should be raised by artificial means into a main channel for removal. D. The intercepting sewers should be so con- structed as to secure the largest amount of effective drainage without artificial appliances. In preparing his plan, Mr. Forster had the ad- vice and assistance of Mr. Haywood, of the City Court of Sewers. The metropolis is divided into two portions— the northern portion of the metropolis, or rather that portion of the metropolis which is on the north or Middlesex bank of the Thames; and the southern portion, or that which is on the south or Surrey side of the river. The northern portion is in the new plan con- sidered to divide itself into two separate areas, and to these two areas different modes of sewerage are to be applied : 1. The interception of the drainage of that district, which, from its elevation above the level of the outlet, is capable of having its sewage and rainfall carried off by gravitation. 2. The interception of the drainage of that district, which, from its low lying position, will require its sewage, and in most localities its rain- fall, to be lifted by steam-power to a proper level for discharge. The first district runs from Holsden-green (be- yond the better-known Kensall-green) in the west, to the Tower Hamlets in the east. Its form is irregular, but not very much so, merely narrow- ing from Westbourn-green to its western extre- mity, the country then becoming rural or wood- land. Its highest reaches to the north are to Highgate and Stamford-hill. The nearest ap- proach to the south is to a portion of the Strand, between Charing-cross and Drury-lane. Care has evidently been taken to skirt this district, so to speak, by the canals and the railroads. This di- vision of the northern portion is described as the district for natural drainage. The area of this division is about 25| square miles. The second division meets the first at the high- way separating Kensington-gardens from Bays- water ; and runs on, bordering the river, all the way to the West India Dock. Its shape is irre- gular, but, abating the roundness, presents some- Avhat of that sort of figure seen in the instrument known as a dumb-bell, the narrowest or hand- part being that between Charing-cross and Drury- lane, skirting the river as its southern bound. At its eastern end this second district widens ab- ruptly, taking in Victoria-park, Stratford, and Bromley. The area of this division of the northern por- tion is 16|- square miles. There are, moreover, two small tracts, com- prising the southern part of the Isle of Dogs, and a narrow slip on the west side of the river Lea, which are intended to alloAV the rainfall to run into the Thames and the Lea respectively. The area of the two is If square mile. The area to be drained by natural outfall com- prises, then, 25| square miles as regards rainfall, and the same extent as regards sewage; while the [ area to the drainage of which steam power is to [ be applied comprises 14^ square miles of rainfall, and 16^ square miles of sewage; the two united areas of rainfall and sewage respectively being and 411 square miles. The length of the great ''high-level sewerage will be, as regards the main sewer, 19 miles and 106 yards; that of the low-level sewerage, 14 miles and 1501 yards. I will now describe the course of each of these constructions.