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104 SUGGESTED ALTERATIONS IN ACT.
of two years, every one interested in its success
must have felt the advantage of that limited duration,
and have rejoiced in the opportunity thus
afforded of rendering it eventually the most perfect
embodiment of sanitary law.
Parts of the Act have abundantly fulfilled your
intention. In the all-important particular of housedrainage—in
the enforcement of water-supply, so
far as circumstances rendered possible—in the effective
preservation of exterior cleanliness—in the
abatement of innumerable nuisances—in the provision
and maintenance of sewerage and paving and
lighting throughout the City—the public has seen
your Honourable Court exercising very large powers
with very unusual success. And this, let me add,
during a time of no ordinary difficulty: a time when,
day by day, the vast importance of sanitary improvement
has been gaining ground among the educated
classes of the country, as a deep and settled
conviction; a time when the feelings of all classes
have been powerfully excited, and when the metropolis
especially has been convulsed with alarm, in
the anticipation and in the aspect of a pestilence.
In some other respects the Act has been less operative,
and for an obvious reason. To legislate for
health was new to you. It was only through the
gradual investigation of officers appointed under the
Act that you could become adequately informed
of those sanitary requirements on which your ultimate
legislation for the City must found itself: only