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117
(3.) Page 8. As to water supply. "The water supply is almost entirely by the
"New River Company, and the service is constant. The action which the
"Vestry took, at the instigation of its Medical Officer of Health, to secure for
"the inhabitants a constant, in place of an intermittent, service, with its
"numerous attendant evils, as set out in the Annual Reports, and as given in
"evidence before us—is worthy of all praise. In the course of our inspection
"we found the constant system universally in operation and hardly a storage
"cistern was to be seen."
Constant
supply of
Water.
No Cisterns.
(4.) Page 9. As to drainage, &c. "The proof of thoroughness in the execution
"of the drainage work is the sustained satisfactory working of that which is
"underground, and, consequently, out of sight. This part of the work, so far as
"we have been able to judge, has been admirably executed. As regards the
"sanitary surroundings and appurtenances of dwellings, evidence of good work
"is also apparent, not only in the method of paving the yards, but in the
" institution of a particularly cleanly pattern of water closet."
Drainage.
"The Shoreditch
Watercloset."
The Water Closet, commended by the Commissioners as "a particularly cleanly
pattern of water closet," was introduced by your Inspector eighteen years ago, and
closets of that pattern are now numbered in Shoreditch by thousands. They were
introduced as a corrective to the foul and dangerous condition inseparable from closets
of the ordinary form of construction, and during those years their advantages have
been steadily pressed upon the attention of owners of property, their surveyors, and
builders, in all cases where foul and dilapidated closets have been dealt with officially.
The pattern is now adopted generally in Shoreditch ; is spreading into other districts ;
and it has led to the general recognition that the space under and around a closet seat
should be open, and as free to be cleaned as any other part of a house ; and it is
reforming the whole previous conception of water closet fittings, as shown in the
various forms of pedestal arrangements which within the last nine or ten years have
followed upon its introduction.—See Plate appended, page 127.
COMMISSIONERS' REPORT—continued.
(5.) Page 7. "The Counsel for the Vestry laid stress on the fact that the death
"rate for 1889 was as low as 19.1, contending that this was proof of the sanitary
"condition of the parish being not unsatisfactory. We do not consider that
"any such inference can be drawn from the death-rate of one year. At the
"same time, we do attach importance to the fact, which we have carefully
"verified, that the death-rate for the past four years has continuously declined
"from 23.5 to 19.1, and this, we think, may be taken as satisfactory evidence that
A falling
Death-rate.