234 ADDITIONAL NOTES ON TREE-TRUNK WATER-PIPES.
their feet. Will it be unreasonable to infer that nature teaches quadrupeds that
in such a state it is not only wholesome, but actually medicinal ? "
My own view would be that cattle, which usually find
admission to a stream only where it is shallow close to the bank,
and consequently where the muddy bottom is close to the
surface, walk towards the centre in order to drink where the
water is deeper and clearer, even though they make muddy the
stream between the bank and their drinking place. How much
light is thrown on the preference of the people of Page Green4 for
their shallow well water over that supplied by the local water
company, even in 1865, when we read these views on turbidity
of an eminent advocate of waterworks in 1835.
In the case of the New River we learn that its purity
suffered to some extent from the state of the criminal law in.
1835 :
" The New River, being an open aqueduct, has one attendant annoyance,
which is the practice of bathing in it by persons contrary to the wishes and rights
of the proprietors. To obviate its continuance, but without, at the same time,
depriving those who might be desirous of enjoying the pleasure, several years
ago the New River Company liberally offered to supply water gratuitously for
the purposes of free baths, if they were erected for general accommodation at the.
public expense ; but the offer was unavailing, though the convenience and
utility of such an institution must be strikingly evident. The nuisance of public
bathing is therefore improperly persisted in, from the company not possessing
the power to punish individuals who may commit the offence, except by an
action for trespass upon their property, and as the penalty imposed by the law
is transportation, considerations of humanity have hitherto prevented the
prosecution of the offenders."
The concluding chapter of Hydraulia is occupied with a
description of various schemes then put forward for obtaining
water from streams less polluted than the Thames at, or close
to, London, such as the Verulam above Watford and the
Wandle at Beddington. The author strongly disapproves of
them as needless, and as calculated simply to cause great
expense, and to injure the existing companies. As to the
alleged deleterious nature of the existing supply, he says :—
" Various facts related in the preceding pages have shown the fallaciousness
of the assertion that the refuse from different manufactories imparted deleterious
qualities to the Thames, and perhaps no statement was ever less supported by
rational and creditable testimony. It is indeed far from improbable that the
substances, to which the term refuse was applied, have a tendency to promote
the decomposition of animal and vegetable matters, and really operate to render
the water pure and wholesome. If the water be turbid, it may not be either
4. Essex Naturalist, Vol. XIII., p. 72.