Holborn Bridge is now divided into two branches, which are carried along each side of Farringdon Street. Its commencement is from springs on the south of the ridge of Hampstead and Highgate Hills; and in its course it receives the drainage of parts of Hampstead and Highgate,-all Kentish Town, Camden Town, and Somers Town,-parts of Islington, Clerkenwell, St. Sepulchre,-and nearly all that part of the Holborn Division south of the New Road from Paddington to the City. The total surface draining into it in the Holborn and Finsbury Division is about 4444 acres. When Mr. Roque made his survey of London, in 1746, there was of this surface about 400 acres covered with streets and buildings: the surface now covered with streets and buildings is about 1788 acres. There has consequently since then been much less absorption through all those parts, and the waters to be carried off by the Fleet sewer have increased in proportion; so that it became necessary to enlarge the whole line from the City near Holborn Bridge to Grafton Place, Kentish Town. The length was 15,990 feet, the estimated cost 46,682. Of this length, 11,510 feet has been completed since 1826, at a cost of 30,556/.; and a further length of 1450 feet is in progress, estimated at 40167.; leaving only 3130 feet to complete the line the greater part of which will be carried along in the direction of the new street leading from Farringdon Street towards Clerkenwell Green. The portion now remaining open will then be arched over. The size of the sewer as enlarged varies, according to the locality, from 12 feet high by 12 feet wide to 9 feet high by 10 feet wide; then 8 feet 6 inches wide by 8 feet 3 inches high; and at the upper or northern portion it is 6 feet 6 inches high by 6 feet 6 inches in width. The size of the old sewer at the northern portion was 4 feet 1 inch wide by 4 feet high, with a superficial area of 12 feet 1 inch: the enlarged sewer at that point has a superficial area of 34 feet. Before reaching the Thames the dimensions of this great sewer are 14 feet wide and 6 feet 6 inches high, and at its mouth it is 18 feet by 12 feet. In the sudden thaw of last winter the superficial area occupied by the water at the northern portion of the sewer was 18 feet, so that, had the sewer remained in its original capacity, a great part of Kentish Town and other parts must have been flooded to a considerable depth. To prevent the contents of the sewer from being deposited on the bank of the river at low water, they are carried some distance into the Thames by an iron culvert, and thus are swept away by the tide. The water in this important drain sometimes rises five feet almost instantly after heavy showers-the surface waters collected in its upper course and by its hundred tributaries rolling in a dark and turbid volume to the Thames. The ordinary movement of the current from Bagnigge Wells is three miles an hour. The sewer from Holborn Bars to Holborn Bridge (formerly the channel of the Old Bourne) is one of the most considerable feeders of the Fleet. It is 5 feet high and 4 feet in width. The smaller public sewers are from 44 feet high by 24 feet wide to 5 feet high and 3 feet in width, the average size being 4 feet by 2 feet. The private drains from each house enter the main sewer in all cases about two feet from its level, and have a descent of one inch in thirty-six, their diameter being nine inches. These drains carry off every description of refuse, with the exception of such as is conveyed away by the dustmen, a remarkable class of London characters, who seem indigenous to the soil. Mr. Roe, the surveyor of the divisions, has made a series of scientific experi

ments, with a view of ascertaining the best and most economical mode of cleansing the sewers, the deposit at the bottom of which averages 1 inch yearly; and he has invented an ingenious apparatus for using water in flushes, by which the sewers are effectually scoured. The water used for forming a head is contracted for with the water-companies, and amounts to about 20,000 hogsheads yearly. When a sewer is to be cleansed the water is backed up, and when let off cleanses the sewer to an extent proportionate to the quantity of head-water, the fall of the sewer, and the depth of the deposit. By providing heads of water at suitable distances from each other, and "flushing" them periodically, perhaps three or four times a-year, the deposit of sediment might be prevented from accumulating at all, which is surely a most important improvement to the health of so densely crowded a population as that of London. The saving effected is very considerable; but the great benefit to the public consists in sweeping off the foul deposit which would otherwise remain for years, and at particular periods, when in a state of fermentation, creates that noxious effluvia which is at once disagreeable and dangerous. The breaking up of streets to cleanse the sewers, when their contents are deposited on the surface, is avoided by means of Mr. Roe's flushing apparatus. Under the old system the deposit accumulated at the bottom of sewers until the private drains leading into it became choked; and it was only from the complaints arising from this circumstance that the officers of the Commission of Sewers became aware of the state of the main drain; so that not only the main sewer, but the smaller drains connected with it, were generally choked at the same time.

Any one who has seen London at night, from some elevation in the neighbourhood, will readily understand how minute, as well as extensive, must be the network of pipes overspreading its soil a few feet below the surface, to afford an unfailing supply to that glorious illumination. The history of gas we have already referred to in "Midsummer Eve;"* we need therefore only add to that account the following very striking summary of the statistics of the system :"For lighting London and its suburbs with gas, there are eighteen public gas-works; twelve public gas-work companies; 2,800,000l. capital employed in works, pipes, tanks, gas-holders, apparatus; 450,000l. yearly revenue derived; 180,000 tons of coals used in the year for making gas; 1,460,000,000 cubic feet of gas made in the year; 134,300 private burners supplied to about 400,000 customers; 30,400 public or street consumers (about 2650 of these are in the city of London); 380 lamplighters employed; 176 gas-holders, several of which are double ones, capable of storing 5,500,000 cubic feet; 890 tons of coals used in the retorts, in the shortest day, in twenty-four hours; 7,120,000 cubic feet of gas used in the longest night, say 24th December; about 2500 persons employed in the metropolis alone in this branch of manufacture: between 1822 and 1827 the consumption was nearly doubled; and between 1827 and 1837 it was again nearly doubled."†

In looking back from the position we have attained in science, art, manufacture, or in social or political economy, it must surprise any one to see how Mr. Hedley, Engineer of the Alliance Gas Works, Dublin.

* Page 97.

much we owe to the efforts of single individuals. It is often asked as an excuse for indolence,-what can one man do? It should rather be said, what cannot one man do? Passing by the cases which naturally rise to the memory on the first thoughts of the subject, we may observe that the history of the metropolitan system of water supply affords an additional name to that long and illustrious list of men who stand out in our common history as the landmarks of Progress. Sir Hugh Middleton bears some such relation to that magnificent system as Watt does to the steam-engine. He may rank less as regards the amount or value of his services as a discoverer; but as regards the sagacity which saw what could be done, and the strength of mind which determined to do it, and fulfilled that determination, he never had a superior. This praise will not we think appear to be more than justly belongs to him, after reading over the comparatively slight sketch that we shall be here able to give of his labours. As these will be better understood when we have seen the state of things in London before his interference, we will now first follow the previous history of the supply of water to the citizens of London from the time when the "sweet and fresh" running streams before mentioned formed their only but sufficient resource.

"The said river of the Wells, the running water of Walbrook, the bourns aforenamed, and other the fresh waters that were in and about this city, being in process of time, by encroachment for buildings, and otherwise heightening of grounds, utterly decayed, and the number of the citizens mightily increased, they were forced to seek sweet waters abroad; whereof some, at the request of King Henry III., in the twenty-first year of this reign, were (for the profit of the city and good of the whole realm thither repairing; to wit, for the poor to drink and the rich to dress their meat) granted to the citizens and their successors by one Gilbert Sanford, with liberty to convey water from the town of Tyburn, by pipes of lead, into the City."* These pipes were of six-inch bore. They conveyed the water to Cheapside, where the first of those characteristic features of old London, a conduit, was built. Its site was near Bow Church. It consisted of a leaden cistern castellated with stone; and, being repaired from time to time, remained down to the latter part of the seventeenth century, when it was removed in the course of the improvements that were made after the great fire. Other conduits were built immediately after this, and some of them supplied from it. A great one was erected in 1401 on Cornhill, called the Tonne. Among the other principal conduits were the Standard and the Little Conduit, both situated in Cheapside, and one that stood at the south end of Shoe Lane, Fleet Street, which is thus described: "On the same was a fair tower of stone, garnished with images of St. Christopher on the top, and angels round about lower down, with sweet-sounding bells before them, whereupon, by an engine placed in the tower, they, divers hours of the day, with hammers chimed such an hymn as was appointed." "Bosses" of water were also provided in different parts, which, like the conduits, in some cases drew their supply from the Thames. These conduits, it appears, used to be regularly visited in former times; and “particularly on the 18th of September, 1562, the Lord Mayor (Harper), aldermen, and many worshipful persons, and divers of the masters and wardens of the

* Stow, b. i. p. 24.

twelve companies, rid to the conduit heads for to see them after the old custom. And afore dinner they hunted the hare, and killed her, and thence to dinner at the head of the conduit. There was a good number entertained with good cheer by the Chamberlain. And after dinner they went to hunting the fox. There was a great cry for a mile; and at length the hounds killed him at the end of St. Giles'. Great hallooing at his death, and blowing of horns."* of the "conduit heads" here referred to is shown in the following engraving.

One

On some very festive occasions the conduits flowed forth a more potent fluid than would delight the Naiads of the springs. At the coronation of Anne Bullen, for instance, claret flowed from the mouths of the lesser conduit in Cheapside during the time the Queen was being welcomed by Pallas, Juno, and Venus; those deities having condescendingly alighted there to meet her. Mercury also was present as spokesman. He presented the Queen, in the name of the goddesses, with a ball of gold divided into three parts, signifying the three gifts bestowed on her by the Olympian triune, namely, Wisdom, Riches, and Felicity. Poor Anne Bullen! what a bitter mockery of the fate that awaited her!

Great as was the improvement consequent upon the introduction of conduits, they had inherent evils which showed plainly enough that they were fitted only for a transition state from a comparatively inartificial and not very thickly peopled society to one presenting exactly opposite characteristics. Water had to be fetched by hand-a circumstance of itself productive of continual annoyance, were it only for the mere trouble and loss of time. But there were more serious evils. Of all the articles necessary for domestic comfort, there can be none so necessary as a plentiful, lavish, even supply of water. Cleanliness without it is impossible.-Health, whether of the individual or the society to which he belongs, without it is impossible. Yet let us ask ourselves, habituated as we are to the use of an unlimited supply, whether, even under those circumstances, we should not be apt to lose some considerable portion of the advantages that supply affords if it could only be obtained in the old way? An inconvenience of a less serious

*Stow, b. i. p. 25.

and more amusing nature attached to the conduits is illustrated to this day, by the collection of men, women, and children, one sees gathered round a plug in the winter when the pipes are frozen up.

In the Print-room of the British Museum there is a very curious sheet engraving—a woodcut, partly coloured or daubed over; a copy, apparently, of a print of the seventeenth century. It is headed, "Tittle Tattle, or the Several Branches of Gossiping;" and has for its object a little good-humoured satire against what the author appears to have thought the prevailing female vice of the age. Accordingly, he has here represented groups of ladies at market-at the bakehouse at the ale-house, where they are taking their "noggins" of beer-at the hot-house, apparently a bathing-house, where, in one compartment, they appear to have just left, or are about to enter the bath, and in another are refreshing themselves with some kind of collation-at the river, where some of the washers are beating the clothes with a small flat instrument like a mallet (the batler)— at the church, where the men and women are standing divided into separate bodies, the last all eagerly talking-and, above all, at the conduit, where two of the ladies, being unable to agree as to the right of precedence, are endeavouring to settle the matter by a summary but not very gentle or graceful process; in short, they are fighting, and with good old English earnestness. There is still one other inconvenience connected with the conduits which must be mentioned; and that is, the great interruption they caused to the streams of business constantly flowing through the great thoroughfares of the metropolis, increased by the occasional throngs of people collected to witness squabbles of the kind just mentioned. It was this consideration that ultimately caused the removal of the chief ones after the fire, when Sir Hugh Middleton, and his predecessor, the Dutchman, at London Bridge, had deprived them of their original claim to respect and preservationtheir utility. One feature of London which co-existed with the conduits we own we regret the loss of-fountains. What a graceful ornament would a structure like that which formerly stood in Leadenhall Street be opposite the Mansion