25 SEPTEMBER 1880, Page 3

Mr. Rawlinson, the engineer employed by Government, when the Army

was hi the Crimea, to suggest sanitary im- provements, in a speech before the Sanitary Congress at Exeter, told some extremely unpleasant truths about the drainage of some great Government offices which it has been his duty to inspect. He declares that the sewage of Somerset House is foul beyond description, so foul that, if ordered to take chambers there, he should at once resign—a statement which we recommend to the careful attention of the autho- rities responsible for King's College and School. Government clerks are free agents in a sense, but schoolboys are not, and one has heard of " College headache." The War Office in Pall Mall, also, he described as " fouler than any common beggars' lodging-house ;" and " as was the basement, so were the rooms." Belgravia was, on the whole, the worst part of London, in re- spect to sewage, a fact probably concealed by the long intervals during which the owners of Belgravian houses live in the country. Mr. Rawlinson made his statement under all respon- sibility, and with a full knowledge that he might be " wigged " for indiscretion.