The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1894-05-22

People Take All For Granted and Don't
Know How Things Are Done.
Londoners in general are wonderfully
apathetic about matters which concern
them closely and which conduce to their
health, happiness and comfort. We
turn on little tap and are at once sup
piled with abundant light or plenty of
water. but little heed is given to the
previous deep thought and incessant
care which have brought us to this well
arranged state of affairs. Water pipes
and gas pipes ramify through every
street and lane and alley, distributing
their valuable contents to the inhabit-
ants of the dwellings therein. Then
there are huge sewer pipes, which car
nv away for us all that is disagreeable
and unwholesome. We do not say that
our present supply of gas and water is
perfect, nor that our mode of dealing
with the disposal of our sewage is per-
feet, but at all events they are on the
highroad to perfection.
1t was one day, when cogitating on
the vast machinery requisite to meet the
demands of Londoners, and more espe-
cially to keep them in healthy santa
nv condition, that was led to visit the
outfall works of Crossness, where the
sewage from the south side of London
is poured into the Thames. 1t comes
along in a sewer II feet inches in d.
ameter. The main pumps lift the sew
age into reservoirs, where the sewage is
treated chemically with lime and proto-
sulphate of iron in the proportion OF
four grains of lime per gallon and one
of protosulphate of iron. The sewage
in the course of treatment flows along
large reservoirs.
The flow is very slow, in order that
the majority of solids may be deposited.
It flows finally over a weir wall, and
thence into the river. This is called the
eff1uent. This treatment necessltates
the use of Is to IS tons of lime per day,
and to tons of protosulphate of iron.
The sewage is drained off the reservoirs
every two days, and men go down and
thoroughly clean all the sludge out,
which is swept down to stump and
pumped from there into the sludge set
thing channels, where it undergoes fur
Their draining. 1t is then let down into
a lower sludge store and pumped from
there on to ships and taken to sea Fiji
teen to twenty thousand tons per week
of sludge are sent to sea.
There are five sludge ships altogether,
which are sent out at every tide. They
go some 40 miles away to the Barrow
deeps. Two engines are required for
pumping up the sludge from the reser-
voirs to the sludge settling channels, and
two for pumping the sludge from the
sludge store ON to the ships. There are
four precipitation reservoirs, the capac-
ity of two being 6, $50, 900 gallons each,
and that of the two smaller ones 3, 1885,
900 gallons each.
In the warm weather the effiuent is
deodorized by means of manganate OF So
da and sulphuric acid in the proportion
of one gain of manganate to rs grain
of sulphuric acid per gallon of effiuent.
This deodorizing at Crossness costs Lon
doners just e100 day, so that it is not
continued longer than absolutely neces-
sary. Crossness Outfall works employ
from 100 to 200 men. They have an en-
gineers' shop ON the spot fitted up to
carry out the various repairs that are
constantly required to be done.
Some strange things get into the sew
ers of London, and now and again ba-
bies have been found. Such are some
of the most important features of sec
ton of the great machinery of the me-
| tropolis, which never rests, never sleeps.
Notwithstanding the room which exists
| for further improvement in the disposal
of its sewage, the reduction which has
been brought about in the death rate OF
| London in modern times is as notewor-
thy as it is satisfactory. In the latter
| half of the seventeenth century the av-
erage mortality of London is said to
have been not less than so per 1000,
at the end of the eighteenth century It
had dropped to so per 1000, while in
1890 it had fallen to 1913 per 1000
The main intercepting and principal
branch sewers which have been con-
structed for the conveyance of the sew
age of London to the two outfalls into
| the river Thames at Barking and Cross
ness respectively measure about 80 Eng
lish miles. AS illustrating the magni-
tude of London, ii has been computed
that the streets and roads within the
metropolis, if placed end to end in one
continuous line, would measure about
2, 500 miles, equal to the distance from
London to Lands End, thence across
the Atlantic ocean to the mouth Of the
gulf of st. Lawrence in Canada on the
west, or going eastward would extend
across the entire continent of Europe
and beyond the Ural mountains into
Asia.
So one can understand at a glance
what it means to control its drainage,
water supply, etc. Surprising we were
to employ animals to do the work which
our engines do for us in pumping water
and sewage, we should require four
times the number of horses in the entire
British army, both at home and abroad.
This gives some idea of the labor in
volved in giving us our water and taxi
ing away our sewage. Mall Bud
get.
The Young Moon.
The editor Of The Popular Science
Monthly takes certain imaginative writ
ers to task for their unscientific and alb
4 Il.