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On the other hand, the proper performance of this unsavoury
task removes danger, allays apprehension, and produces satisfaction,
quietness, and content, whilst it relieves the Local Authorities, who
are responsible, from a constant source of irritation and anxiety.
Since my acquaintance with this subject, it has been my
unpleasant task to be compelled to regard and review it from the
darker side only of these two aspects, with feelings nearly akin to
despondency ; and under a continuance of the regime of the
contractors, it is not too much to suppose that my experience would
never have been enlarged, or extended to the brighter side, unless
through the medium of the faintest gleams of hope.
Happily, the scene has been transformed, and it is rather in
this latter aspect that I am now enabled to write upon the subject.
The contrast between the work carried out, as it has been with
considerable efficiency, during the twelve months ending at Lady
Day 1877, by the Vestry, through their Dusting and Slopping
Committee, and the work as it was formerly performed by the
contractors, more especially during the previous year, which was
both their last and worst, was so great that I should think no vestige
of doubt can remain as to the wisdom displayed by the Vestry in
becoming their own contractors.
Something of this contrast may be traced in the Table No. X.
presented in accordance with my usual custom, and containing a
summary of the 22,671 applications for the removal of dust which
were received during the year extending from Lady Day 1876, to
Lady Day 1877, the number of applications received from the
different Wards of the Parish, during each quarter, being specified
therein.
Of these 22,671 "applications," or, as I have designated them
elsewhere, " complaints " (for I regard these words as synonymous
and interchangeable terms in connection with dusting), 16,095 were
received by letter or postal card, and 6,576 were made personally or
by message at the Vestry Hall.
During the previous year, when only a small portion of the
work, about one-twelfth, was performed by the Vestry, and the
remainder, or eleven-twelfths, was in the hands of Contractors, the
number of the complaints was 36,867, being no less than 14,196, or
rather more than three-fifths (.62 per cent.), in excess of the year
under review.