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35
parish. I invite you to Regent Street, to the Melon Ground,
to New Peckham; aye, and to localities more wealthy and
respectable than these, where, unfortunately, no means of
drainage exist, in confirmation of the truth of my statement. I
need scarcely say, however, that the last two years' labours have
not been barren of result, and that in many places the nuisances
alluded to have been more or less effectually remedied. In
Wyndham Road, Nelson Street, Thomas Street, in Stock well
Street, Peckham Orchard, in the network of streets between
Camberwell High Road and Southampton Street, and in
numerous other localities, a vast number of cesspools are now
replaced by tolerably efficient closets; and I assure you that the
amelioration is striking. The inhabitants universally appreciate
the change, and mostly express approbation and gratitude.
And I may add that not only have landlords generally been
willing to carry out the necessary alterations, but that not
unfrequently they have been glad to avail themselves of the
relief offered by ditches recently covered.
The ill-effects of cesspools are not imaginary. They
do not offend the nostrils merely, but they affect the
health. They contain, not like a well-made sewer, a running
stream of a comparatively inoffensive mixture of sewage
and water; but their contents like the material, deposited
on the sides of a foul open ditch, and on the mud banks of
the Thames itself, form a stagnant mass of decomposing
ordure, which is the common parent of diarrhoea, of
fever, and of cholera, and often exerts a fatal influence over
the course of other diseases. I refer to the appendix for a
striking example of the dangerous effects of these abominations,
in respect of which I have spoken thus fully, in order to urge