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181
It appears from these results that the illuminating power of
the gas at the Station was above the Parliamentary standard.
But it was stated, in the Annual Report of the Metropolitan
Board of Works for 1884—and as the result of testing with a
portable photometer—that there are parts of London the inhabitants
of which do not always get their gas of the quality which it
was thought had been secured to them by Act of Parliament; the
gas having been frequently found to be inferior in lighting power to
the prescribed standard, sometimes by as much as one candle.
There is no way of preventing this, the companies in default
being subject to no forfeiture or penalty, as they are when the gas
is shown to be defective at the regular testing places. The above
facts point to the necessity for an alteration of the law. The
gas referees, it was stated, approve of the testing of gas by means
of a portable photometer; and the Metropolitan Board of Works
have advised the Board of Trade that statutory power should be
obtained for that mode of testing, so that gas companies may be
liable to forfeitures for gas which the portable photometer shews
to be defective in lighting power. The Metropolitan Board also
suggested the expediency of an alteration in the standard of light
prescribed by the statutes. The statutory standard is obtained by
burning a sperm candle of six to the pound, at the rate of 120
grains an hour; and the gas is required to be of such lighting
power as to produce, when consumed at the rate of five cubic
feet an hour, a light equal to that produced by sixteen such candles.
A Committee, appointed by the Board of Trade, has reported
adversely to the continuance of the use of the sperm candle as a
standard, it having been proved that, in spite of all the precautions
taken to secure uniformity in the manufacture of the candles,
there remained considerable variation in their lighting power. In
the Report of the Metropolitan Board for 1886, no reference is
made to the important matters dealt with in the above paragraph.
2. As regards purity. The gas was free from sulphuretted
hydrogen throughout the year; and the quarterly average quantity
of other sulphur compounds with which the gas was charged, was