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37
In houses watered on the intermittent plan, all direct communications
with drains closet-cisterns and dust-bins being removed, the capacity of
the drinking cistern is to be calculated, and for every gallon it holds, 7 grains of
slaked lime, if using Southwark Water, and 10 for the Kent Service, must be put into
it, when full, and the supply temporarily checked. The lime will, of course, sink to
the bottom, carrying with it the earthy salts (which constitute the "hardness") and
the "organic pollutions," the clear water can then be drawn off as needed, and when all
is expended, the cistern is cleaned out, refilled and recharged with the proper quantity
of lime. Thames water from the main, thus treated, will prove almost equal in organic
purity to the Kent as delivered, whilst both will he quite soft, and the organic matter
removed will be left at the bottom of the cistern with the precipitated chalk.
Many persons who have adopted this method at my suggestion, find it both workable
and advantageous.
For the constant system, the Porter-Clark plan is more suitable.
Kent Water, though very free from organic contamination, is so hard (averaging
30 grains per gallon of earthy salts), as to be unsuited to many delicate persons and
children, and it answers badly for cooking and washing.*
In most streets of Rotherhithe a fair quantity of water is supplied throughout the
year; but in some parts of Union Road, Gomm Road, round Jamaica Level, and
notably on the Slipper Estate, there is a regular though short water famine in the
summer and autumn, this is partly caused by waste from defective fittings, and partly
by some receptacles on the intermittent system which are hardly adequate to the
demands made on them in hot and dustv weather, though sufficient in cold and wet
times; this evil was formerly brought under your notice, and not deemed sufficiently
crying to necessitate your attacking it.
SANITARY WORK FOR THE YEAR.
A complete Report of this cannot be given, since I had not the honour of holding
my present position as your Medical Officer before July 2nd, 1878; up to that date the
duties were no doubt carried out to your satisfaction. On my election, I met with a
large amount of general sickness, a few sporadic instances of Small-pox and Enteric
Fever, and an outbreak of imported Typhus Fever, 4 cases of the latter occurring in
succession in a house tenanted by two labouring families. I ascertained that some bedding
on which typhus patients in Bermondsey had laid was subsequently used by these people.
With the co-operation of Dr. Johnston, the District Medical Officer, each person
attacked was removed to a special Hospital as soon as the illness was evident, and their
bedding, &c., having been at once destroyed, the house was thoroughly disinfected,
quarantined, and those next it carefully inspected. No further cases occurred either in it
or the lane where it was situated.
*See Table VII for some analyses I made of Southwark and Artesian well water from the rotherhithe
chalk, shewing the superiority of the former, and also some reports on Sewer polluted waters from houses in
which fatal contagious disease occurred, and on the average impurity of the air in our open spaces,