THE ESSEX OYSTER CULTURE.
43
(2) to appropriate Canvey Island and fill it to the top of its sea wall with
'sludge ;' (3) 'to send the whole to the North Sea, flowing as a river for forty-
six miles through Essex ;' and this latter has the sanction of Sir R. Rawlinson
and the eminent professional gentlemen present at the meeting.
Doubtless, the cheapest and easiest way of getting rid of a nuisance, whether
a dead cat or a gallon of sewage, is to throw it over your neighbour's wall ; but
it is possible that he may have a word to say on the subject.
The effect of spreading what Sir R. Rawlinson calls 'the most corrupt and
putrid sewage in the kingdom' on the Burnham marshes, the Maplins, and the
Crouch oyster beds would be the absolute ruin of Southend. Leigh, and Burnham,
and the destruction of the Essex oyster trade ; while inland, along the course of
this putrescent river, the fanners, according to Sir R. Rawlinson, are 10 produce
milk, rye, turnips, and mangolds, though the failure of the Essex Reclamation
Company is not an encouraging example ; and Mr. Chas. Beloe states in his let-
ter of Feb. 3 :—'Farmers on the route of the sewage canal declined to take it,
even when given them for nothing, after having given the sewage a fair trial.'
As to discharging into the sea, experience of the Mersey, Dee, and Ribble proves
its failure.
The London County Council, with the rateable value of London at their back
and a new broom in their hands, are not to be trifled with. South-east Essex is,
unfortunately, somewhat weak in finance and population, and the obvious course
is to disregard our remonstrance, and utilise us as the line of least resistance ;
but when it is recognised that this scheme means ruin to a district sufficiently
hard hit by agricultural depression, destruction of the oyster industry and the
towns on the estuary of the Thames, public opinion should support us in urging
upon those eminent engineers and their Main Drainage Committee a plan some-
what less barbarous and Chinese."
Such a proposal as this, which threatens the annihilation of the
marine fauna and flora of our coast, cannot tail to greatly interest
the Essex Field Club, and we have considered it our duty to
place the above details before our readers, and with the same
object, we requested Mr. Rome to be kind enough to draw up an
article discussing the probable injury to the oyster culture (and, of
course, to the natural history of the estuaries and coast) which would
result from Sir R. Rawlinson's scheme if carried out.—Ed.]
IN compliance with the wish of the Honorary Secretary, I beg to
submit some additional reasons to those already expressed
through the daily press, why the sewage of London should not be
discharged upon the Essex coast. One of the aims of the Essex
Field Club being to conserve and protect the natural characteristics
of the county where thought desirable, I have little fear but that I
shall elicit the help of its members in endeavouring to avert a
scheme, which if carried out would prove to be little less than a
national calamity.
It is said that a plan is shortly to be submitted for the approval
of the London County Council, the object of which is the creation
of a vast sewer making its way from London through various dis-
tricts of Essex, and finally discharging its volume of impurities into
the sea near the Maplin Sands. The outfall would thus be brought