Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-10-14 00:00:00

large sums, in order to render them more efficient
for supplying water to fires and other public
purposes. And when the Medical Officer of
Health requested a daily supply of water to be
given to the poor in 1847, the Harrington Com-
pany at once responded to it. Not so the
Bootle Company. In fact the short-comings of
this Company were notorious, and consequently a
strong prejudice was excited against them both.
This was carefully fostered by those whose
interest it was to depreciate these works, and the
home supply of water. Hence, when they
became the property of the Corporation in 1848,
it was publicly asserted that the award made by
Mr. STEPHENSON was outrageously in excess of
their value—that, in fact, they were all but
worthless, the engines being delapidated, the
pipes rotton, or eaten through by oxidation, and
the water all but completely exhausted from the
various wells. Such were the views carefully
instilled into the minds of the Council by those
interested in misleading them, and such deep
root had these taken in many instances, that it
was utterly impossible to shake them.
When the works passed into the hands of the
Corporation in 1848, Mr. HAwKasLEy, the pro-
jector of the Pike scheme, was retained by the
Corporation to report on their capabilities, and
arrange as to their consolidation. This was a
proceeding equally indiscreet as it was unfortu-
nate. Mr. HAWKESLEY might have known that
all the outcry about scarcity of water had mainly
been got up for a purpose ; no one knew better
than he that the wells were capable of yielding
a much larger quantity of water than was stated,
and that this could be still further increased
without any assignable limit. But, then, had
he put the Council in possession of these im-
portant facts, there would at once have been an
end put to his own scheme. The temptation to
carry that out, even at the cost of truth, appeared
too strong to be resisted. Hence we find that
in the report he presented to the Council on
the Bth of April, 1848, he says that the yield of
the Bootle and Harrington springs did not then
exceed 2,700,000 gallons per diem ; that this
might be greatly reduced in dry weather; and,
moreover, that there was a constant diminution
of the supply, which, after the lapse of a few
years, would have the effect of leaving the town
without any water at all. He repudiated the
idea of any permanent addition being obtained
by further sinkings or deeper borings, main-
tairijng that the maximum supply had been
reached, that the sandstone had been fully
explored, and its water-bearing capabilities
ascertained to the perfect satisfaction of all
geologists ; and he declared his conviction to be
that, unless the Rivington scheme should be
forthwith carried out, the town would be left
without water. Small wonder if the Corporation
stood aghast at the very contemplation of
cuoh a cataztrophe. It became a fixed
idea in their minds, and, as we have already
remarked, nothing would shake it the
Pike must be carried out at whatever sacri-
fice. In vain did certain of their own servants
endeavour to demonstrate the important fact,
that the wells were capable of furnishing; ample
for all the requirements of the town. Their
statements were divided, and they themselves
doomed to penury and degradation for their
honesty of purpose. Such is the effect of pre-
judice. In this instance it amounted to positive
fanaticism, and it admits of no doubt that the
spirit of persecution displayed to those who
differed from the views of the Pikeists was such
that it would have pursued them to the scaffold
or the stake had such been possible.
We come here to the blackest page in the history
of the Pike—we may well say the blackest--in our
local if not even in our national history. It became
necessary for the concocters of the Pike job to
maintain the deception with which they had
commenced, and as the water would rise up in
judgment against them it was determined to get
rid of it in the most nefarious manner. We have
already described the modus operandi employed,
and shall not stop to repeat it here. A water
famine was proclaimed, and the town was to be
starved into an approval of the job, regardless of
consequences. Fortunately this abominable con-
spiracy was discovered and defeated ; and what
do we now find ? In place of there being. a
falling off in the yield, there has been a very
large increase. The wells, which in 184 S were
declared to be incapable of yielding more than
twenty-four million gallons per week, are no w '
proved to be acievate to the supply of nearly
fifty millions.

Hid this important fact bean acknowledged at
the outset, should we ever have been afflicted
with the Pike bog-wash ? Cartainly ; yet to
this it has come at last. These despised wells
are now our only stay and salvation. The Pike
is smothered in its own rottenness, and it has
proved a boon only to the Pockets of its pro-
jectors. Let us hope that to-day will see it
quietly inurned; and that no fresh jobs, whether
big or little, will be raised up in its stead.

GALWAY ELECTION INQUIRY. Tao commissioners
appointed wrier her Majesty's warrant to inquire into
the existence of corrnpt praztiees at elections for the
town of Galway, will clo3e their proceedings upon an
early day during the present week. Some idea of the
amount of business transacted during the eight days on
which the commission actually sat Inv be gained from
the fact that nu less a number than 229 witnesses had, up
to Saturday evening, been examined. The evidence con-
sisted necessarily to a very great extent of mere recapi.
tulation ; but the result of the inquiries has been to
establish the existence of corruption to an extent that
was little dreamt of by very many of the leading inhabi-
tants of the town. It would appear that among a certain
portion of the constituency a candidate, desiring to suc-
ceed, or his friends, without his knowledge, were necessi-
tated to:,expendllargo BUMS in bribing or treating ;