The Sun.
London, England, 1844-04-13 00:00:00

HEALTH OF TOWNS.-FILTRA-
TION OF WATER.

The importance of pure water is admitted by all to he
very great as one means of improving. and maintaining
the health of large towns. The supply for the metro-
polis has often been complained of, as being by no means
so clear, bright; or limpid as water for drinking and for
other domestic uses should be. Any plan, therefore,
that is calculated to remedy the evil, demands immediate
and serious attention. On this account, attendance was
yesterday given at Brownlow-mews, Gray's Inn-lane, to
witness Stuckey's patent filter in operation. It was ex-
hibited on the scale of three feet square, the filter itself
being thus of nine feet surface, and purifying the large
quantity of 100,000 gallons in the 24 hours. The water
filtered was from the New River; and, certainly, the
process clarified it to an extraordinary degree. The ori-
ginal liquid appeared thick and turbid; but when it hal
passed through the sponge of the machine, the stream
was as limpid and sparkling as if just procured from a
crystal spring. This new method of filtration has ex-
cited much attention in Parliament, where Lord
Brougham has declared it to be of immense importance
to the public welfare. Tho inventor, Mr. W. H. Stuckey,
is a native of Russia, but the son of English parents.
The principal novelties in the invention are the rapidity
of the filtration, and the employment of sponge, in a
highly compressed state, as the filtering material. The
rapidity is of twofold importance—the saving of time
and cost, and the preservation of the best qualities of
the watee With regard to the latter object, it appears
that any process that filters water drop by drop, or in
very small quantities, deprives it of the carbonic acid
gas it previously contained, thus rendering the
flat, far less wholesome, and more liable to
sp edy decomposition. By this invention, however, the
W.lter is filtered with rapidity, and in large quantities ;
tied thus every good quality is retained, while the agree-
able briskness and (to use the German expression) " the
spirit of the well" is unimpaired. With respect to the
filtering material, sponge, from its very porous and reti-
celate-structure. it net only allows the water to pass
through with great rapidity, but arrests every extraneous
matter mechanically mixed with it ; it can be more easily
cleansed than any other medium, hitherto employed for
filtration ; and it has this further recommendation, that
it imparts neither taste nor smell to the water. Mr. S.
thuS sums up the advantages of his invention over the
present system of filtration—that it presents an economy,
in space, of one foot for one acre ; in money, of 7,3001.
per annum, as the current expenses, instead of the esti-
mate.l current expenses of the New River Company, of
19,0001 per annum ; and in time, of filtering in six
hoefs by machinery of one foot to the acre, more than
2,100,003 gallons, which quantil in the Chelsea Water-
works, it takes twenty-four hours to filter. In an expe-
rime= made before Lord Brougham, and other scientific
individuals, and the representatives of several of the
i great water companies, Mr. Stuckey has, by a single
machine of only five feet square, filtered water in a thick
and• muddy state, and produced it bright, limpid, and
sparkling, at the rate of 2,500,000 gallons in twenty-four
hours. Sebsequently, a filter of not more than 100 cu-
bical contents has delivered at the rate of from three to
four million gallons per day. The plan has already been
in operation in Russia, in Government and other works,
for tire years ; and it is about to be introduced, we be-
lieve, in Paris. It certainly seems calculated to effect it.
purpose well and cheaply ; and, therefore, deserves at-
tention froth the metropolitan water companies, and all
to whom pure, wholesome water is a desideratum ; and
1 to whom is it not ?

HORRIBLE OCCURRENCE IN
NORFOLK. •

On Monday morning last the parish of Wbitwell, in
this county, and the neighbourhood, were thrown into a
state of excitement and consternation, in consequence of
a man, generally accounted honest and respectable,
named William Frost, having murdered four of his
children in his cottage. He is a journeyman tanner, and
has worked for Mr. Leamon, of Whitwell, for the last
thirteen years. He had killed his three elder children
by beating them on the back of their heads with a large
heavy hammer. The youngest, an infant, he put head
first into a large earthern pot full of water. The names
and ages of the children are as follows:—Harriet Frost,
five years ; Charlotte Frost, three years ; Eliza Frost,
eighteen months; and Louisa Frost, only ten weeks. The
father (William Frost) is only about thirty-six years of
age, and was taken into custody immediately after the
horrible occurrence, by Samuel Parker, an inspector of
police, residing at Reepham.
Notice was soon after given to Mr. Pilgrim, one of the
county coroners, who instructed the constable to em-
pannel a very respectable jury from different parishes.
On the following morning the Coroner arrived, and held
an inquest at the Falgate public-house, occupied by
Samuel Vyall. The jury having assembled and been
sworn, proceeded to the cottage to examine the bodies,
and when they arrived there they were shocked at the
deplorable spectacle of dead bodies. The Coroner and
jury having returned to the public-house, the following
evidence was given:—
SaraliAllen, the wife of Thomas Allen, of Whitwell,
deposed as follows: —I live in a cottage adjoining that
in which William Frost resides. I have known him
about twenty years. I have always considered him a
very steady man, and he always, as far as I have seen,
conducted himself very respectably. I knew his four
children well. Their names are Harriet Frost, about
five years of age; Charlotte Frost, three years old; Eliza,
eighteen months; and Louisa, ten weeks. I saw them
all on Friday or Saturday last, in the morning. They
were then in good health. Yesterday morning, about
nine o'clock, or a little after, I saw Martha, the wife of
William Frost, go out of her own gate adjoining her
cottage. She told me she was going to Mrs. Wilkins for
a shilling owing to her. She then walked on towards
Mrs. Wilkins's, and very soon returned—l think in
ab:,ut five minutes—and I saw her again by my gate,
which is very near her cottage. She told me she was
disappointed, as Mrs. Wilkins had gone to Rcepbaln.
We stood together some little time, and she then
.went
into her own cottag., and I went into na.i,ne.o
her as she was going into her cottage,
r
husband—is he got to work?"
troat%hveorrkunwiemllmfoeraiasotemiye
after she
aware hevilh is
sda lybdeo been
o entl as if some-
SI hiwieaadss.a ifdo
nliea s! into• nothe her cot-
;
tage, I heard Mrs. Frost call out
could.th i wasAftrhs€:
Frostmatt was I ran into hovirt, house“ci3'h,
,as
mfays t
rahsul
dreti I took hold of her, and asked her what was
the matter. She was unable to explain what had oc-
curred. I turned round, looked into the pantry, and there
I saw Eliza Frost lying dead. I then went up stairs,
and there I saw Harriet Frost and Charlotte Frost lying
on the floor quite dead. I saw there a quantity of blood.
I then went down stairs and looked for the other child,
but I could not find it. I called out violently at the,
rsetnot
rommyecihio.ld,
Issviii
to.
door for some onetottg)cc,terna
en;eiganhdboul
was by my door,
liani Frost, the father, was all this time sitting by the
fireside, in his kitchen. I took hold of him, and said,
" Oh, man! what have you done?" Ido not recollect
that he made any reply. I then took hold of his wife to
comfort her all I could; 'she was very much distressed.
I went into the pantry to show Elizabeth Yarham, who
was just come into the house, the child Eliza Frost,
which I had previously seen lying dead, and as I was
going into the: pantry I turned my eye and I saw the
babe Lotisi Frost standing in an earthen pot, which was
partly filled with Water, with its head downwards. I
lifted the child sip. It was dead. I laid it on a b isket.
A Mr. Savory, who was at this time present, made an
observation that I ought-not to have taken the child out
of the earthen pot. I was so much alarmed that I can-
not say whether I put the child into the pot again, or,
whether Mr. Savory put it in. lam quite satisfied the
child was dead. There was co person in Frost's house
when I first went in but Frost., his wife, and the children.
No person lodged in the house with Frost and his wife.
I have since heard Mrs. Frost say, when she went out
after the shilling, that she left the three elder children
at breakfast with her husband, and the youngest in the
cradle, and they were then all well. William Frost has
lived under the same roof where I reside for four or five
years, and I have had every opportunity of knowing bow