The Sun.
London, England, 1861-12-11 00:00:00

CITY COUMISSION OF SEWERS.

Yesterday, at a meeting of the City Commission
of Sewers, held at Guildhall, Deputy Christie in
the chair, Deputy Read presented a petition from
the inhabitants of the ward of Cripplegate- without,
praying the court to take into serious consideration
the whole question of the supply of gas to the city,
particularly as to the necessity of applying to Parlia-
ment for an act exempting the citizens from the
operation of the Metropolis Gas Act of 1860. The
petition, the ptyer of which was strongly recom-
mended by Dr. Abraham, was referred to the special
committee now engaged in considering the question
o f the supply of gas. That committee reported that,
it having been recently referred to them to consider
whether a joint case should be prepared for the opi-
nion of the Court of Queen's Bench on the question
submitted to counsel on the provisions of the Great
Central Gas Company's Act of 1851, and the Metro-
poliq Gas Act of 1860, they had been attended by
Mr. Alderman Dakin, the chairman of the Great
Central Gas Company, in conference, and he had
agreed on behalf of the company to a joint case
being stated as suggested, and the committee had
instructed the City Solicitor, with the assistance of
the Remembrancer, and in conjunction with the
solicitors of the Great Central, to prepare it accord-
ingly. The report was agreed to. Mr. Beaks, one
of the contractors for scavenging to the Commission,
was fined £5 for the act of two of his men in
putting a quantity of mud down a gully-hole
communicating with a sewer in Farringdon-
stryet, contrary to an express prohibition con-
tained in the statute under which the Commission
acts. The Court was occupied for some time in
hearing, with closed doors, an appeal of Messrs.
Freshfield and Newman, on behalf of the Carron
Iron Company against the assessment of their pre-
mises in Upper Thames-street. The result was that
the appeal was disallowed, and the present assess-
ment confirmed. Dr. Letheby, the medical officer of
health, reported on the state of 222 houses that had
been inspected during the week, and he submitted a
list of 57 places for sanitary improvement. He like-
wise reported that, in consequence of the prevalence
of fever in the neighbourhood of Golden-lane, he
had visited the locality and inquired into the causes
of the disease, and had obtained from the inspec-
tor a circumstantial account of the condition of
all the houses in Sun-court, Smith's-buildings,
Brackley-street, Bridgewater-place, and Bridge-
water-gardens, and he submitted a return of the
sanitary improvements that were required. He also
directed attention to the spaso of open ground in
Brackley-street, which had for some years been in
a disgraceful state, and was the depository of all
the filthy refuse of the neighbourhood. Dr. Letheby
submitted certificates of the indecent and unwhole-
some overcrowding of three houses in Plough-
court, reported that the markets and slaughter-•
houses of the city had been duly inspected during
the week, and the officers had seized 1,3801 b. of
meat and 209 head of game and poultry as unfit
for human food. It consisted of 1 sheep, 12 quar-
ters of beef, 24 joints, 92 fowls, 47 ducks, 22 geese,
and 48 pheasants; 9261 b. of the meat was diseased,
251 b. was putrid, and the rest was from animals
that had died from natural cases. All of it had
been treated with chymical agents and destroyed as
food. The mortality returns for the week are on
the increase ; last week they were 64, in the preced-
ing week 52, and the week before that 49. Still,
however, they are under the average (68) for the
corresponding week of the last six years. 24 of the
deaths were among children of less than 5 years of
age, and 12 among old people of 60 and upwards ;
10 of these were over 70, and 2 were above 90. The
chief causes of death were as follows :—Phthisis, 9 ;
mesenteric disease, 2; bronchitis, 10; pneumonia,
3 ; fever, 4, all of children; infantile diarrhoea, 2;
scarlet fever, 3 ; whooping cough, 4 ; croup, 1; and
measles, I—making together 11 deaths from tuber-
cular diseases, 13 from acute pulmonary, and lo
from zymotic.