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7
Management of the Dead-House and a Public Mortuary for
the Parish.
The Sanitary Committee has of late been seriously occupied
in attending to numerous complaints against the condition of the
Dead-house. Two reports on the. subject have been prepared, and
await the decision of the Vestry, on the course they will
pursue with regard to Secs. 27 and 28 of the Sanitary Act
of 1866. In the report laid before you I have endeavoured
to show that, in order to realize what is contemplated in
these Sections of the Sanitary Act, greater attention to
decency and decorum must be observed than what is
given in Dead-houses under the present system of parochial
management; that some pretensions to architectural and
ecclesiastical decorations ought to be observed in the building ;
and that the essential features of a public Mortuary are: 1.
A reception room for bodies in a coffin or shell to await
interment: 2. An adjoining, although distinct, apartment for
uncoffined bodies which in many cases have to await identification,
and where post-mortem examinations have to be made.
3. A provision should be made for the Coroner to hold
Inquests on certain bodies brought into a Public Mortuary.
For these and many other details, and for those recommendations
which I have made for the harmonious working of persons and
interests concerned, I would refer to the report itself. The
necessity for immediate steps in carrying out the suggestions
there made cannot be better understood than by information
obtained from the diary of the Inspector of Nuisances, in which
it is found that more than twenty orders have been made for
special cleansing and disinfecting during the three last summer
months.
The Canal Basin.
During the past Summer offensive smells from the waters of
the Canal Basin attracted much notice from persons living in
its vicinity ; and the Inspector of Nuisances had to make
constant supervision of the offensive trades carried on on the
wharves. On receiving information of these complaints, the
Directors of the Company took immediate steps to run off the
water, and removed many boat loads of offensive mud which
had accumulated near the margin of the wharves, from the
careless habit of loading the barges. They are desirous of
enforcing more strictly the by-laws of the Company relating to
the fouling of the water from careless loading; and I have
their assurance that my recommendation to repeat the emptying
and cleansing twice a year, an operation which can be effected
in less than twenty-four hours, shall be scrupulously attended to
tin future.