THE THAMES AND ITS FRIENDS.
A COMMITTEE of the House of Commons has been performing one- bajfpf the duty which we wished to see peeormed by a Royal Com- munion : performing it of course with all the imperfect execution which necessarily belongs to the very organism of a Committee. It has been inquiring, and has we must confess, collected much very important evidence. Hitherto, however, the general ten- dency of the evidence appears to have been, as we might have expected from a Committee rather than a Commission, entirely after the old fashion. It throws the gravest doubts upon indi- vidual suggestions, without bringing us any nearer to practical execution ; it executes the duty of analysis when the very thing we want is synthesis. The doubts suggested are grave, and con- firm all that we have said respecting the necessity of one tho- rough, all-surveying, and final inquiry ; for we still doubt whether the Committee will be able to present a Blue Book that shall ab- solutely settle the subject. Some of the doubts indeed throw us back to the very beginning, to the first principles. Amongst many of the most promising plans has been a proposal form something like a channel, either in the bottom of the Thames river, or in the midst of its waters, by means of artificial separation, which should have the effect of filtering the water, subjecting the impurities to a chemical conversion, and permitting them to drift out in a state consistent alike with health and comfort for the neighbours of the stream ; but serious ques- tions have been raised as to the sufficiency of the materials sug- gested for these caissons, these sub-fluvial tubes. Great doubt has been thrown upon two important points, first whether inter- mixture with the water of the Thames, when the water is ample enough, does not effectually deodorize the impurity and disarm it of its noxious influences. If so, any plan which abstracts water from the river tends to enfeeble it for the process of natural puri- fication and necessitates a needless outlay for artificial purifica- tion. It has all along been known that the great auxiliary for the worst accumulations has been the mud-bank that forms in some part of the river's bed, and a very eminent scientific gentleman has suggested the making of an artificial bed, with an even sur- face, presenting a moderate incline,—one in twelve ; but practical men assert that such an arrangement will in no degree secure the river against accumulations ; and any traveller who has noticed the formation of river-beds where mud does most accumulate will be disposed to share this scientific doubt. A still more important doubt has been suggested by Mr. Goldsworthy Gurney, who affirms that the manure which could be collected by freeing the river from its impurities is so adulterated by chemical ingredients that is it almost worthless for agricultural purposes ; most espe- cially is it adulterated by iron from the wheels and horse-shoes of our enormous town traffic. If so, plans for purification by inter- cepting the larger part of the impurity are cast entirely into doubt ; and as we have said, the whole subject must be recon- sidered from its very commencement. Who in these days expects a Committee of the House of Commons to settle anything? Time was when Select. Committees have settled colonies ; now they con- tent themselves with the humbler achievement of " reporting the evidence."
Another very simple doubt has suggested itself to us, mate- rially modifying the whole relations of the subject. It has been observed that the grossest impurity of the river extends from about Greenwich to Ranelagh, and it is well known that the tide which sways backwards and forwards with a net descent of not more than half a mile in a day, extends as high as Teddington. These are indisputable facts, but their bearing upon the subject has been exaggerated and misconceived. Although it is true that the net descent of any given point in the effluent and refluent stream is only at the rate of about half a mile in twenty-four hours, and although the tide runs up as high as Teddington, it is to be observed that any body introduced into the river at high water will not return higher than the point at which it was intro- dueed. Thus a cork thrown into the river at Woolwich, at the moment of high water or just after it, would be carried down for some miles, and back again for some miles • but, instead of being borne back higher than Woolwich, it would in most cases not as- cend quite so high as the point at which it was thrown in. Take this fact along with the other fact, that the impurity cast into the stream is neutralized in proportion to the body of the stream, and we may materially modify our requirements with reference to the mere distance of the outfall from the Metropolis. But we still make these remarks subject to the question, whether the whole arrangement ought or ought not to involve any grand spe- cific "outfall" at all.
But what has Government done ? While the inquiry is thus proceeding, while the very foundations of the question have been thus unsettled, while we perceive more distinctly than we have done how far we are off any safe and practical conclusion, her Majesty's Ministers have come to that kind of empirical, rule-of- thumb conclusion which usurps and burlesques the " practical." They have decided that the work shall commence forthwith, though we have yet to learn what works, on what plan, what principle ? They, have decided that the cost shall be three mil, lions sterling, and the sages of the city are all calculating the effect which may be produced upon the Money Market by the gradual outflow of three millions in contract money and wages. And in lieu of the Commissioners who might gather up the sub- ject, determine the best course, and administer it with imperial power, her Majesty's Ministers have determined that the admin- istrators in this behalf shall be no other than those Metropolitan Commissioners of Public Works who have been an embodied bad joke from the hour of their first creation. A. bill, it is said, is to be introduced for the purpose of raising the money and augment- ing the powers of the Commissioners ; but if there does happen to remain any common sense in the House of Commons the bill of course will be stoppedat its earliest stages.
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