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pumps with triple expansion cylinders, to assist their existing beam
pumps, and also to pump the sewage of the new sewer which they
are laying down in order to relieve the main low level sewer. This
new sewer will take the Isle of Dogs and Hackney Wick branches
in St. Leonard's Street, and will tend to minimise the risk of flooding
of the districts drained by these branches.
I reported to the Sanitary Committee the insanitary condition of
the ditch which begins at the Thames in the Deptford Ferry Road,
and after a winding course empties itself into the sewer near the
Glengall Road end of Stebondale Street. This ditch is in the most
part of its course uncovered, and receives not only the drainings from
the mounds formed of the dredgings from the Millwall Docks, but
also is used as a general receptacle for dead animals and vegetable
garbage. I suggested abolishing the ditch by keeping the penstock
shut down, and thus preventing the water flowing in from the river.
The Committee inspected the ditch and agreed with me that it was
in a most insanitary state. The County Council's portion was
cleansed, and in order to prevent the escape of gas in the vicinity of
the houses, a trap was fixed to the mouth of the sewer where the
ditch empties itself.
I also inspected the mounds mentioned above during the hot
weather, but failed to find any nuisance arising from them ; no doubt
the compressed air method adopted for blowing the dredgings on to
the mound, causes aeration and lessens the danger of putrefaction.
Poplar being a riparian district, the condition of its river is of the
highest sanitary importance to its inhabitants. The purity of the
Thames water has continued to improve. At the instigation of the
Chairman of the Drainage Committee of the County Council, a test
was carried out, which consisted in trawling the river with a small net
off Erith. It was reported that there were captured in the net
specimens of Whitebait, Jelly-fish and Shrimp. It will also be remembered
that in the House of Commons, in April last, a question