The Sun.
London, England, 1854-11-09 00:00:00

pRELIMINA.RY INSPECTION OF TBE
SITE OF A MODEL LODGING-OUSE
IN DRURY-LANE.

The labours of the Society for Improving the Condi-
tion of the Working Classes, under the auspices of its
benevolent and indefatigable president, the Earl of
Shaftesbury, are already favourably known to the
public. In some of the lowest and hitherto filthiest
parts of this huge metropolis, lofty edifices have by its
agency been constructed, containing large and roomy
apartments, and fitted with every convenience required
for the attainment of domestic civilisation. Thorough
ventilation, constant and abundant supply of water,
and all the machinery requisite for complete sewage
and drainage, have been provided in these club-houses of
the working man, and the result has been the complete
success of the undertaking even as a commercial specu-
lation. In these large " model-houses," as they are
called, although the rents are lower than those which
were before paid for wretched accommodation, the re-
turn is above six per cent. on the outlay. The rooms
are always full, and there is generally a long list in
arrear, of applications for apartments. So far an im-
mense good was effected, in the establishment of so
many standards of decency and cleanliness, in districts
where previously both had been for the most part occult
sciences ; but the state of the poorer classes required a
much wider and more immediate application of the prin-
ciple than could be effected by the tedious and expen-
sive processes connected with the purchase of ground,
clearing it away, and the rearing of these immense piles
at a great preliminary outlay of capital. Besides, al-
though six per cent. is considered to be a tolerably fair
return for money in other departments of trade, the
cupidity of the builders was not satisfied, and thus the
necessity was thrust upon Lord Shaftesbury and his co-
adjutors of devising some means by which the poor could
more speedily acquire human domiciles, and the bene-
volence of " the trade" be stimulated by what they con-
sidered an adequate percentage on their outlay—that is
to say, from twelve to fourteen per cent. With this
view it was determined to plunge boldly into some of the
dens of filth and misery at present existing, cleanse them
of their abominations, supply them with water and drain-
age, and then re-let them to their previous miserable oc-
cupants. A beginning is about to be made in one of the
most wretched purlieus of Drury-lane, and yesterday a
preliminary inspection was made in order that the revo-
lution about to be effected may, some twelve months
hence, be more fully appreciated. Wyld-court, the locality
against which our philanthropic commander-in-chief is
about to open his first parallel, is a wretched passage lead-
ng out of Great Wyld-street, having six or seven wretch-
('l-looking, tumble-down old houses of a side, and an
open gutter running down the centre, that reeks and
limners with the fermentation of every conceivable filth.
The windows are all broken, dimmed with the dirt and
dust of years, and further obscured by the labours of
many generations of spiders. The street doors lie open
day and night, for the fastenings have all been stolen
long ago, and the wretched inmates need allow no fear
of burglars to disturb their slumbers. The stairs feel
like soft soil to the tread, so thickly are they encrusted
with successive layers of dirt, and the balustrades are
iscid and clammy to the touch, whenever a visitor is so
reckless as to lay his hand upon them to assist his
ascent. The rooms, although the work of cleansing has
already made some progress in them, are sickening to
ook upon them, and the whole atmosphere is laden with
a faint sickly odour, which tells of cholera, and typhus,
and all the other plagues which may be said to be the
almost daily visitants of the London poor. The means
supplied with sewage and drainage are quite in keeping
with the other noisome peculiarities of the place, and,
but for ocular proof, would hardly be believed to exist
in any civilised or Christian country. For each house of
eight or ten rooms, there is but one open privy, with
merely a rail across the top, and this is situated on one
side of a yard about six feet square, the opposite side
of which is occupied by the tank that supplies all the in-
habitants with water. So near are the two to each
other, that a man could stand in the middle of the yard
and touch both with his hands ; and yet these two con-
veniences of the first importance are intended to answer
the natural wants of perhaps fifty human beings ! As
a consequence of such a state of things, the yard is
daily covered with five or six inches of filth, which, per-
colating through the bottom of the water tank, must
make its contents little better than so much liquid
poison. For the inhabitants of the garrets a still more
horrible contrivance has been adopted. A sort of
wooden trough, quite open, is placed at the front room
door, which communicates with an open gutter running
literally along the cornice, and this pours its contents
into the gutter on the roof. Into this trough the
dwellers in the upper parts of the house throw all their
filth, which runs in a constant stream past the beds of
the people in the front room, and goes to s well the
contents of the gutter in front, all the vapour from
which enters through the broken windows. These
are sickening details, but they must be made public, in
order that the dwellers in clean and comfortable houses,
who are just recovering from their cholera panic, may
know where their great enemy gathers strength, and
how and where he is to be grappled with. In the thir-
teen or fourteen houses so appointed, of which Wyld-
court consists, nearly one thousand human beings have
hitherto found shelter ; the very staircases being nightly
covered with poor wretches, to whom even the pestilen-
tial accommodation of the rooms was an unattainable
luxury. During Lord Shaftesbury's visit yesterday the
inhabitants clustered round him in groups, and their
appearance spoke plainly as to the effects of their
dwelling places on their vita:DT. They were all pale
and haggard, with that peculiar look of physical de-
pression which is known to be the result of breathing
a vitiated atmosphere. Like Coleridge's ancient ma-
riner, their universal cry was " Water, water," and
they seemed most grateful for the deep interest taken by
his lordship in their condition, and his noble exertions
f3r its improvement. We were informed that ex-
treme poverty had nothing to do with the wretchedness
of their appearance. They are all earning what, with pro-
per management, might be called a decent living, but
exorbitant rents cause them to crowd into these dread-
ful dens, and the depressing influences that act upon
them at home drive them to spend all their earnings in
the gin shop. It is Lord Shaftesbury's opinion, and few
have had better means of judging, that three-fourths of
the intemperance of the London poor may be attributed
to the dreadful state of their dwellings which drives them
to the lofty and brilliantly lighted gin palace, with its
bright cheerful look and other tempting appliances. It
may be urged that much of the dirt of the houses is attri-
butable to the habits of the inmates, but how can people
be clean without water, or decent without the commonest
means of decency ! The society deeply feel the difficulty,
and having taken a lease of these houses have deter-
mined on giving them a thorough cleansing and repair,
the latter being rendered more easy by the fact that,
although the houses are so dilapidated in appearance,
the walls are strong and sound, and the woodwork under
all the dirt in tolerable preservation. Water with co •
stant supply will be carried to every room, and proper
water-closets placed on every landing. The walls will be
newly plastered and coloured, the windows glazed and
cleaned, and a fresh coat of paint will give a wholesome
and cheerful aspect to this now dreary-looking re
court.
When all is ready, they will be ra-let at considerablye
less
than their present rents to the poor people who have
now been temporarily removed, and for whom immediate
accommodation has been provided in one portion of the
houses while the others are under repair. They are all
not only contented but delighted with the arrangement,
give to their new landlords every facility for their chari-
table work, and look anxiously forward for the day when
they may be able to enter upon and enjoy the clean-
liness and comfort which are being prepared for them.

(I=T22Z ,WTROPOLITAAT BRIDGES.

Some weeks back we drew attention to the Report
of the Select Committee of the House of Commons ort
on
the Bridges of the Metropolis ; but the evidence taken
before the committee,
which has only just been pub-
lished, and which con stitntesthe most valuable portion of
their labour, induces ustorecur to the subject. In fact,
it scarcely required much senatorial wisdom to arrive at
such conclusions as that the present bridges are inade-
quate to the traffic of London, that,l as there are
several toll-paying bridges, which are
to
used, it might
be as well, before buildine, new onese,mokseee whether, by
some means or other, we cannot the existing
bridges free. On reading these very obviousa suggestions,
we thought that Parliamentary time had loegelgLpire.fit-
ably spent on propositions as simple as the P
TUTTh itself. Some curious things, however, came 'oUntnin
the evidence. Father Thames is, we regret to say,e
be-
coming a vast public nuisance. Besides being a cesspool
of malaria and of all unutterable foulness, it robs us of
time, temper, and income. To cross the Thames is
almost as serious a matter as to cross the Alma. Once
our noble river was called the Silent Highway—now, we
fear, it only stands in the way. What with the inland
acilities of traffic afforded by the railways, which
superseded it as an artery of communication, and
what with the positive instructions and abominations
connected with it, we are surprised that some enter-
prising engineer does not propose to divert the Thames
from London or to fill it up. Anyhow, it is a social
d ttLe"ltY of the day. Its lack of bridges is, however,
th
_g,r,ievance we have now to do with. It is remark-
ablel,nat,
and traffic, as
compared with the amount of population
Londonis, perhaps, worse supplied in this
respect than any other city in the world. We find the
bridge accommodation of Paris reckoned at ten times
that of London
Lyons has nineteen bridges. If the
metropolis were as
to iv
have 13, instead
of
bridged as Glasgow, we ought to
only free accommodation of five below Westminster. The
odation in width of roadway over the
Thames,
for a population of two millions and a half, is
138 feet, Across London bridge alone 63,000 persons,
114 single horses, and 11,500" t vehicles are forced in the
course of a single day.
We may, therefore, assume tivilist it is incontestable
Walker, the et-les-
t hat we want more bridges.
we might eas,lr. increase our accAm.
neer, tells us that
addition to
modation 150 per cent. by purchyas;
etheiwark, Water-
our three free bridges --London, Bia'nei,frijaers
but
required a
minster—thethree toll-paying ones— ' and West-
matter
00, and Vauxhall. Perhaps it scarcely
engineer to make this suggestion •
is not quite so easy as it appears. The toll-paying
bridges, it is superfluous to remark, have not -alsPraoYvinedg
very profitable specull :ions. In some cases,
years' experience, they return less than when theyter 3°
opened. Southwark-bridge, in its first clear were
year,
brought in 5.000/. of toll—last year. its receipts were
under 3,0001. The income of Waterloo-bridge has
risen from 9,0001. to 19,0001., thanks to the South-
Western Railway. The dividends paid by the Vauxhall
Company are still very small ; and the Hungerford Sus-
pension-bridge is not A paying concern. But the pro-
prietors of all these structures refuse, and we think
fairly, to part with their property at its present rental.
If they cannot reasonably expect to sell on their origi-
n 4 4)la's 79 at least doubt whether they would be ,