The Press. — London, England, 1858-07-24 00:00:00

• 714 /Web! liofl rl, HOUSE OF OOl[UONS.—Tuoasn.►x. -ft 0 :; The Earl of - DERBY, in reply to the Duke of New castle. said that some alterations agreed upon in various clauses in the Government of ludia• Bill should be attended to in due time. The following bills were then read a third time and passed: Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction (Continuance) Bill, Charitable Trusts Acts (Continuance) Bill, Turnpike Trusts Arrangement* Bill, Copyhold and Enclosure Commission , :, &c., Bill, Indemnity Bill, Administration of Oaths by Committees Bill, and Army Service Bill. The Copyhold Acts Amendment Bill went through committee. The Local Government Bill also went through committee. Act Amendment Bill was read a The Art Unions second time. mi. The Titles to Llititj (Scotland) Bill went through committee. 1. The amendments liit,the Sale and Transfer of Land (Ireland) Bill were agreed to. The Universities (Scotland) Bill was read a third time and passed. The County Property Conveyance Bill was read a second time. The Stipendiary Magistrates Bill was road a third time and passed. Ths following bi'ls went through committee : Enclosure of Lands Bill, Legitimacy Declaration Bill, Sheep, Sic., Contagious Diseases Prevention Bill, Turnpike Acta Continuance Bill, Public Health Bill, and Vaccination (Ireland) Bill. The Chelsea-Midge Act Amendment Bill was read a second tithe. The Returns to Secretary of State Bill and the Detached Parts or Counties Bill were also read a second thin. ei; l h i t ise o ir 'c l l o o r c i k' iAlourneft at twenty minutes before STATE MP THE FINANCES. At the morning sitting, on the order for going into committee upon the Consolidated Fund (Appropria tio 8.11, Sir G. LEWIS called attention to details of figures, with the view of showing, first, that the Chanoellor of the Exchequer had erred in the calculations as to the finances of the current year given in his budget; and, secondly, that. the charge of lavish ex - ptnditure brought against the late Government was uniounded. Mr. Disraeli had estimated the revenue, he said, at 03,900,0001., and the charges at 03,610,0001., leaving an apparent surplus of revenue amounting to about 300,0001. It, appeared from the Appiopria• tion Bill, however, that, instead of a surplus, as the matter now stood there was an excess of estimated charge over the estimated revenue, or a deficiency of 8415,0001., the total charge to be defrayed being, not 63,610,0001., but 64,145,000/. A further charge might also be expected on account of the militia. The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER observed that estimates were at all times difficult end liable to error, and no doubt there had been an excess of ex• penditure beyond his estimate ; at the same time the estimated revenue had considerably exceeded the amount at which be had assumed it. From the returns for the first quarter of the financial year—the prospects of which were the most gloomy—it appeared that there was a surplus of Income or 223,9441., ex tending to all the chief items, and in the eighteen days of the present quarter, from the Ist to the 19th of July, there was a surplus of revenue from the four sources of Customs, Excise, Stamps, and Post-office of no less than 304,0001. Although the house had given to the Government a power to raise two millions, they had availed themselves of that power to the extent of 1,000,0001. only, and there was every hope that they would not find it necessary to exceed this amount.. There was no reason to anticipate the necessity of any additional expenditure for the militia. He thought he might congratulate the country upon the state of our finances, and their highly favourable prospects. T 1 ere were hopes of a good harvest, and our foreign relations were in a far more satisfactory state than a year or six months ago. Even the con. dition of affairs in India, he hoped and believed, was far more favourable than might have been expected. The condition of the country altogether was therefore one upon which he thought be might very fairly con gratulate the country, and so tar as its finances were concerned they never were in a more healthy con dition than at. present. After some observations by Mr. Wilson, Mr. Hamilton, and Sir H. Willoughby, the house went into committee upon the bill, and subsequentl), after some discussion, upon the Metropolis Local Manage ment Act Amendment Bill, in which little progress was made. In the evening, in reply to a question by Mr. ACME, Lord J. MANNERS stated that there wa no ground for the rumours that serious decay had taken place in the foundation-stone of the house, and that nothing had occurred in the least degree to affect the stability of the structure. c ''l 1 c I ..'. In answer to questickts pat by Sir J. ELPHINSTONE, Mr. S. FITZGERALD gave a detailed explanation of the instructions given, and the measures taken, by the British and the Turkish Governments in consequence of the recent outrages at Jeddah. Mr. WAI.POLE read the telegram, just received, of intelligence from India and China. The house went again into comirittee upon the Metropolis Local Management Act Amendment Bill, the clauses of which, with certain amendments and the addition of new clauses, were agreed to after long discussion. The house then went into committee upon the Judgments (Ireland) Act Amendment Bill, the clauses of which were agreed to . The Militia Act Continuance Bill, the Militia (Ser. vice Abroad) Act Continuance Bill, the Militia Pay Bill, the Encumbered Estates (West Indies) Act Amendment Bill, and the Draughts on Bankers Law Arneildeilettl3lll likewise passed through coin. mittee, Other bills were forwarded a stage, and the house adjourned at a quarter to two o'clock. • 711 rtt. 11 THE PURIFICATION OF THE THAMES. THE following is the Report of the Select Com mittee on the River Thames : Yonr committee, in accordance with their order of re ference, have proceeded to inquire into the merits of Mr. Goldsworthy Gurney's plan for purifying the Thames, and they have also considered some other suggestions having the same object in view. They have examined, with regard to these matters, many persons of great skill and eminent in their professions as engineers and chemists ; but the near approach of the termination of the session and other reasons, which will be stated iu this revet. have pre •ented them from examining several other persons who had suggestions to make upon the general subject, and in formation to give, which might doubtless be deserving of attention. The main object of Mr. Gurney's plan is to discharge all the sewage of the metropolis into the water of the Thames within the metropolis itself, and his plan is founded on the assumption that the bad smells which are so much com plained of proceed from the decomposition of sewage matter deposited on those parts of the bed of the rive l r which are left uncovered by water during the ebb and eat y flow of the tide. He is of opinion that this matter ferments while in contact with atmospheric air and exposed to solar beat, and that the fermentation thus begun continues after wards, when this matter is washed up by the rising water ; but he thinks that if this matter could be discharged at once into the stream it would not so fermeat, and would be almost inoffensive. In order to work nut this theory, Mr. Gurney proposes that the bed of the river, commencing from an average or mean line of the present wharfs and extending fur tidy yards towards the low-water line, should be formed with a slope of about 1 in 12, and covered with gravel. He reckons the{ on such a slope, so covered, no mud or sewage matter would permanently lodge, and that whatever was deposited upon such a sloping bank at hilt water would be swept down into the permanent bed of the river by the receding title. But in imme parts of the river the distmice between high and law water marks is so greet that a slope of 1 inch in 12, beginning at the mean of the present wharf walls, would, by the time it reached low-water mark, end at point a good deal lower than the bed of the river there, and to get rid of this difficulty, as well as to insure a stronger current and a larger body of water at low-water mark to carry sway the matter swept down from the slopes, he pro. poses to form by dredging two channels, one on each side of the river, and each of them following the line of the present edge of the slopes. These channels he proposes to make ninety feet wide and nine feet deep ; and his notion is, that the sewage matter from each side, washed into these channels, would be carried inoffensively down the ri per, and that the force of the correct would keep these channels clear. Having thus, as he conceives, secured the bed of the river between high and low water mark from any permit wont deposit from the water of the river, he proposes to lengthen all the sewers that discharge into the river, and to carry them on, so that their mouths should all be below the low•water mark, so that everything coming down the sewers should always be discharged into the watpr of the titer. . But by this arrangement the sewers would always be water•locked, and the gases generated in the sewers, having no escape at the mouths, would be more driven than at pre sent to find their way into the streets and houses. In order to counteract this tendency, Mr. Gurney proposes that furnaces should be erected in various parts of London over some of the main sewers, and at suitable• places, and that these furnaces should draw the bad gases out of the goners, and by the process of combustion to alter their chemical condition, so as to render them hitt-micas and in offensive. Your committee cannot recommend the adoption of any part of Mr. Gurney's plan. Your committee consider it a mistake to suppose that sewage matter does not disengage offensive and notions gases when it is mixed with water. The contrary is proved by the offensive smell of those sewers through which large streams of water are constantly flowing, and by the offensive smells which, during the present summer, have proceeded from the water of the Thames at high title, at every part from Putney downwards. Any plan, therefore, which has for its object that all the sewage of London should, in the state in which it comes down the sewers, be discharged into the stream of the Thames, would tend to perpetuate and not to remedy the evils which are so widely felt, and so loudly complained of. Some advantages might possibly be derived from slopir. the bed of the river in the manner proposed by M s (),, ney, in places where the distance between high and low water mark would admit of it, but such an operation tak en singly would not get rid of the great evil which we are now considering. With regard to the side channels which Mr. Gunter proposes to make, it seems very doubtful whether UP I would be kept open without frequent dredging, and whether if kept open they would produce any beneficial effect cern. meusurate with the expense of forming them and keepi ng them open. Your committee are therefore of opinion that those parts of Mr. Gurney's plan which relate to the river are not cal. enlisted to effect the purification of the Thames. Your committee, however, thought it was desirable that they should investigate that part of Mr. Gurney's plan which relates to the burning of the gases in the sewers, and the more so because that process has been practised by Mr. Gurney with success in regard to sewers in the int. mediate vicinity of the Rouses of Parliament. But the inquiries made by your committee have eatisfied them that this process, though it may be successful as to sewers within a short distance of the furnace by which the gases are to be burnt, could not be successfully applied t.) the wide range of the metropolis. There are stint a vast number of unavoidable openings in the immense ramifi cations of the sewers of the metropolis, and in the Mouse• drains which communicate with those sewers, that the air which would be drawn out from any part of a Brest sewer over which a furnace might be erected, would be replaced, not by the offensive gases in the whole network of sewers and drains communicating with the sewer over which the furnace was placed, but in a great degree by atmospheric air rushing down through openings near to the furnace, and thus the gases in the further parts of the sewers 41)41 house drains would remain unaffected by the action of the furnace. This furnace system, therefore, even with the improve ments made by Mr. Gurney, though possibly very efficacious for a particular and limited area, could not be relied mama for the general ventilation and purification of the sewers of the metropolis at large. Your committee have taken much valuable and in. teresting evidence upon the deodorization of sewage. It appears to be easy to aeoarate the more solid from the liquid parts of the sewage, and to deprive both of all offensive stuelL By an infusion of lime into sewage the solid matter is rapid:y precipitated, and the water thtt is left above the precipitate is cleared of all the matter which is held in suspension, retaining only some salts, which it holds in solut i on. If the sewage of London could be so treated, and the solid precipitate could be got rid of in a satisfactory man ner, the liquid might be discharged into the Thames with out injury or inconvenience, provided that no nuisance arose during the process of deodoriz.ition. This system is now adopted at Liecester, and, in u far as it is a sanitary arrangement, with complete success. The town is freed from all offensive matter, and the liquid which is discharged intd the river does not pollute the water of the streams. "" I Experience has not Yet determined in what degree the precipitate can be made useful as manure fur agricultural purposes. Several persons capable of giving valuable information on this subject have offered to be examined by your com mittee, but your committee have not deemed it expedient to prolong their inquiries on this branch of the subject. In the first place, they have felt it their duty, consider ing how near the session is to its close, not to delay longer their report upon the main subject. referred to them by the house—namely, Mr. Gurney's plan ; and in the next place, they conceive that the decision as to the expediency of ap plying a system of deodorization advantageously to the sewage of the metropolis belongs rather to the functions of the Metropolitan Board of %Yorks than to those of a com mittee of the House of Commons, and the Metropolitan Board of %Yorks have ample means of making all necessary inquiries on that subject without the assistance of a corn miitee of the 1-louse of Commons. Your committee have to observe that some of the eminent engineers who have been examined express an opinion in favour of embanking the •Thames for the pur pose of increasing the scour of the stream and preventing the accumulation of mad. in ounclueion, your committee beg leave to state their decided opinion that no plan ought to be adopted in regard to the sewage or the metropolis that does not provide for one of two thinga—either that the sewage shall be carried down to some point in the river sufficiently far from the metropolis to prevent the sewage from being brought back in an offensive state by the flowing tide, or else that the sewage shall be deodorized, and that only the puritizd liquid part of it shall be discharged into the river. The whole subject is one of great and of growing public importance. The metropolis is extending in all directions, and in every part of its circumference. Esery year fresh masses of buildings are springing up, whose drains are dis charging into the Thames, and streets that had only cess pools are furnished with house-drains, leading into the general network of sewers; thus every year the quantity of sewage-discharge into the Thames goes on increasing. On the other hand, year by year the quantity of water in the bed of the river, by which this increasing quantity of sewage is to be diluted, progressively diminishes . A large portion of the water which is supplied to the metropolis is taken from the Thames a b ove Teddington-lock, and with the yearly increase of the metropolis, and the improvi ng habits of its population, th e consumption of this water in creases, and a larger portion of the diluting current Is withdrawn from the down stream of the ricer. An extensive and abundant supply of pure water, and the general substitution of huuse•draina for cesspools, are immense improvements in the arrangements of the metro• polls, and contribute most essentially to the comfort aud health of its inhabitants. ltut these salutary arrangements as. 1111. till ell