The Lancet suggests a very practicable plan for converting the
Serpen- tine water in Hyde Park from a nuisance into a really ornamental and useful basin— "How is this Aegean ditch to be cleansed of ita accumulateclabominations? Either by carting these away, or by covering it over. If the fifty acres of pu- trescent mud were at once exposed to the contact of the air and the influence of the sun, and if all these latent seeds of infection were stirred up by the carting of it away, no doubt the neighbourhood would be decimated by fever, if not by cholera. We therefore reject this plan•' and propose that forthwith the water should gradually be drained off, to allow the mass of mud to subside in the deep- est portions of the bed of the Serpentine. This mass of mud should then be covered over with gravel or concrete, or both; so that, instead of being forty feet deep, as it is now in certain portions, the Serpen- tine should be but twelve feet deep in its centre, and so levelled as to be- come less and less deep towards the shores. This should be done during the following months; and in the early spring it would be necessary to cover two- thirds of this levelled surface with a coat of concrete six inches thick. We say two-thirds, because many parts have a good gravel bottom' and need not be meddled with. The time thus employed would neutralize all noxious gases, and this coat of. concrete would also prevent the growth of those masses of weeds which corrupt the water by their decay, and have often proved fatal to the bather. At any future period the cleaning of the Serpentine would be merely sweeping its bed of concrete. These improvements might be made at no great cost; for gravel is to be found on either side of the Ser- pertine, and the excavation thus made could be soon filled up with rubbish. On the whole Southern bank, the depth of water should not exceed four feet, even at fifty feet from the shore; so that in future parents may there at least allow their children to bathe or skate without anxiety; and numerous water-marks an- nouncing the depth of water should be conspicuously planted on the banks. If something similar were done to a portion of the Bayswater extremity of the Ser- pentine, it would afford to the inhabitants a convenient bathing spot, and to the Commissioners of the Woods and Forests an opportunity of atoning for having so long unmercifully inflicted disgusting odours upon the vicinity. Is it necessary to state that the Bayswater sewer should no longer, on any pretence, be allowed to discharge its filthy and corrupt current into our great metropolitan bath?
"Either the Serpentine must be supplied with more water, or less must be taken from it; and as the Parks must be watered, and St. James's Caual and the Barracks supplied, there is no reason why they should not receive their supply from the Serpentine, provided a sufficiency of wholesome water be conveyed into this reservoir.
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