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40
faction, and proved very useful, have been permanently retained,
thus affording a very much needed accession to the strength of the
sanitary staff at my disposal.
DOMESTIC WATER STORAGE.
Next to the unwholesomeness of houses arising from the neglected
state of dust bins—to whatever cause the neglect may be
attributable—no subject, perhaps, so often engages the attention
of Sanitary Inspectors as that of water supply and the neglected
state of cisterns. It would almost seem as if many householders
thought that the water supply needed no more attention than
that of gas, which is usually comprised in a quarterly settlement
with the collector. Months and probably years elapse in some
cases without any attention being paid to the condition of cisterns
which, I need hardly say, ought to be cleaned out periodically,
and not less frequently than once a month. It is true that the
inconvenient position in which the cisterns are sometimes placed
occasions difficulties in getting at them, which may in some measure
account for the neglect. But in other cases where no such difficulty
exists the result is the same. One among the " water regulations"
by which the Companies are almost constituted a
sanitary authority, and which might be enforced with public advantage,
relates to the position of cisterns which are required to
be placed in accordance with their views. This regulation is of
a retrospective character, but so far as I know it is not carried
out. Another valuable regulation would abolish the " waste pipe "
—a fertile and unsuspected cause of foul water, and in many
cases of illness, being often untrapped and then serving as a
ventilator to the drains, giving exit to noxious gases which the
water absorbs freely. But I cannot say that I have heard of any
instance in which the Companies have exercised their powers in
this respect—powers, be it understood, claimed by and conceded
to them, not on sanitary grounds, but simply to prevent the
waste of water. It is one of my most often repeated instructions
to the Inspectors to view the apparatus for water supply when
making a house inspection, and to abolish waste pipes whenever
practicable. Another regulation has for its object, to prevent
waste of water, by the intervention of a service box for the supply
of the water closet, thus limiting the discharge at each elevation
of the lever to a maximum of two gallons. This regulation I
have no doubt is carried out in the case of new houses; but it is
perhaps of even more importance in old ones, in which, as too
often happens, the domestic and the closet service are drawn from
one and the same cistern. In a special report (November 20, 1872)
I referred to all these points, and to many others, and I have
seen no reason to modify the expressions of regret with which I
then had occasion to speak of the stringency of the regulations,
which is, I apprehend, the main, if not the sole cause of our being
still without the constant system of water supply which it was
supposed the Act of 1871 would give us. The stringency to