View report page

Court a few miles upstream. He describes an experiment to detect the natural effects of the earth's
magnetic field conducted across Waterloo Bridge thus "Experimented today at Waterloo Bridge
by leave of Mr. Bridell, the Secretary. Stretched a long copper wire on the Parapet of the Bridge
on the Western side. It extended from the toll house, Strand side, over six arches and to the sixth
pier (these arches are each 140 feet, the piers each about 15 or 20 feet) it was therefore about
960 feet long. One of the plates very clean, was fastened to a wire and let down to the river
directly at the toll house. The end of the wire was taken into the toll house by the window. The
other plate, fastened to a similar wire, was let down into the river at the sixth pier, the other
end being connected with the wire just mentioned. The end of the long horizontal wire was taken
into the toll house and thus these two ends being connected by cups of mercury with the galvanometer
wire the whole became one wire from plate to plate: and the current was completed by
the water between the plates, which being in motion up or down was expected to produce by
magneto-electric induction currents rendered sensible at the galvanometer, and so on."
In 1855 he hit the headlines when he sent a letter to The Times calling attention to the
dangerous state of the river, which he described as "a real Sewer". Steaming up the Thames
one day in a penny boat — one of the fastest forms of transport at that time — he was appalled
at its offensiveness. Wetting some white cards to make them sink easily, he dipped pieces into
the river at each pier. They disappeared from sight at once in the 'opaque pale brown fluid' although
the sun was shining brightly, proof enough of the impurity of the water. Shortly afterwards Punch
issued a cartoon of Faraday giving his card to Father Thames holding his nose in the stench
and he noted that if matters were remedied more lives might be saved then by Humphrey Davy's
Safety lamp-
The menace of pollution and the stench from it permeated the precincts of the Palace of
Westminster, so much so during the parliamentary debate on 27th June 1858 memorable for the
"great stink" the penetrating nauseating stench from the Thames made even the Houses of Parliament
unbearable. Hansard records that during the debate to reinforce the case for the appointment
of a central medical officer the hard pressed Minister found the climax of his case in the
"pestitential state of the river which flowed close by and which really might soon be a terror
to this house".
It is interesting to reflect on the contrast of inspiration which led to the discovery of the
pulmonary and systemic circulations — the water pump at London Bridge undoubtedly had a
place in the latter, i.e. the systemic circulation. In connection with the pulmonary circulation,
we find it announced in a work of theology — Christianismi Restitutio, where we have the first
authentic account of the pulmonary circulation. Servetus' main theme is concerning the Holy
Spirit — the allpervading spirit immanent in creation in all its manifestations. He could have
subscribed to the Victorian poets' aphorism that he who understands the flower in the crannied
wall is able to understand what God and men are. To know the movement of the blood might well
lead to knowledge of movement of the stars. He who understands all about the breathing of man
has understood the breath of God, i.e. the spirit of God for did He not in the beginning breathe
into man's nostrils the breath of life and he became a living soul. This allied to the other Hebrew
doctrine that the soul or life or breath is in the blood. How appropriate that it should be located
in something which moves and cruises through the body. This might well have led to postulate
the full circulation.
In contrast Harvey's inspiration for the systemic circulation was much more mundane and
practical, viz. the water-pump at London Bridge. In 1582 Peter Morris completed the first waterwheel
at London Bridge, having been granted a lease of the first arch on the northern side. To
this German or Dutchman (Stow seemed uncertain of his nationality for he described him as both)
belongs the distinction of being the first to provide a supply of water to London houses by mechanical
means. His water-wheel was connected to pumps and was so successful that a second arch
was leased to him.
Until that time the City Corporation was the only body supplying water to the people of
London and for this purpose conduits were built to bring water from springs in the suburbs. In
1236 the Lord of the manner of Tyburn granted to the citizens and their successors liberty to
convey water into the City by leaden pipes. The springs which promoted this water were in the
neighbourhood of what is now Stratford Place, Oxford Street. Writing of this period, Stow tells us
that "certain merchants, strangers of Cities beyond the seas, to wit, Amiens, Corby and Nele, for
priviledges which they enjoyed in this city, gave £100. towards the charges for conveying water
from the town of Teybourne". In 1439 the Abbot of Westminster granted to the Corporation certain
springs in the manor of Paddington but, the population increasing, the City obtained an Act of
Parliament in 1543 empowering it to bring water from Hampstead by conduit. These conduits
terminated in cisterns which were themselves usually referred to as "conduits" and Stow in his
survey gives a detailed list of them. In Elizabethan times, therefore, one was either compelled
to fetch water from the conduit or to buy it off the Water Bearers, through the majority fetched it in
buckets from the Thames. There were, however, certain influential persons who prevailed upon the
City Corporation to allow them to tap the conduits and to run a private water supply to their house,
using narrow leaden pipes. In such cases the City was said to have granted a "quill" to these
people.