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118
tion of premises in regard to which orders had been made;
and that, during the last year, the regulations with respect
to the drainage of new houses, and the reconstruction of the
drains of houses already built, which you adopted on the
22nd of May, 1889, on the recommendation of the Surveyor
and myself, have come into force, and that consequently
the Inspectors' time has, during the last ten months, been
largely given to work of this nature.
This is a subject which I discussed fully in my last
Annual Report, and which I shall not now re-discuss.
All I need say is, that the work is of a most important
character; that until the Spring of last year it belonged to
no official of the Vestry to take the matter in hand, and
had been absolutely neglected to the serious detriment
of the Parish; that the work is one which very few
Metropolitan Parishes have down to the present time taken
seriously in hand; and that, so far as I know, ours is the
only Parish in which it has been devolved on the Sanitary
Inspectors, or the officers, that is to say, whose training,
knowledge, and special sanitary duties make them best
fitted to discharge such a function, and to carry it out
successfully. During the last year in 452 cases, either
new buildings have been drained and their sanitary arrangements
carried out according to the directions of the Surveyor
and myself, and under the immediate supervision of
the Sanitary Inspectors; or there has been a total reconstruction
of the drainage and other sanitary arrangements
of houses already built. I need scarcely say that the duties
here spoken of have proved, as was expected, very difficult
and very exacting: for they have demanded, first of all, the
careful consideration of plans of drainage; second, frequent