Cautery

“ The workmen, when they come to-morrow to stop up that hole, would certainly have found the stiff abandoned there, and it might have been possible, thread by thread, straw by straw, to pick up the scent and reach you. Some one has passed through the sewer. Who? Where did he get out? Was he seen to come out? The police are full of cleverness. The sewer is treacherous and tells tales of you. ”

“ Whenever the edge of a canal was reached, without a moment's hesitation, the fugitives would plunge right into the water, and give cause for merriment by the wild efforts they made to regain dry land, often rolling back, and floundering helplessly through the soft mud. ”

“ This well has been carried through the caverns, if to water, probably to a depth of another hundred feet, but it has subsequently been covered over with plank, at the level of the cavern floor, and so now remains. The pipe of the well above is very rugged, as though sunk by unskilled workmen—perhaps convicts,—and is stained, as though used as a cesspool. Also, for many yards around, the rubbish, elsewhere of pure white, is dark and foul, as though, failing to reach water, or afterwards disused for that purpose, the well had been employed as a receptacle for all the filth of the prison. ”

“ Their spars dwarfed with their loftiness the corrugated-iron sheds, their jib-booms extended far over the shore, their white-and-gold figure-heads, almost dazzling in their purity, overhung the straight, long quay above the mud and dirt of the wharfside, with the busy figures of groups and single men moving to and fro, restless and grimy under their soaring immobility. ”

“ The whole city is thus served with water, which they carry in canoes through all the streets for sale, taking it from the aqueduct in the following manner: the canoes pass under the bridges on which the reservoirs are placed, when men stationed above fill them with water, for which service they are paid. At all the entrances of the city, and in those parts where the canoes are discharged, that is, where the greatest quantity of provisions is brought in, huts are erected and persons stationed as guards, who receive a certum quid for everything that enters. ”

“ Both gangs are divided into several classes of workmen: overseers, reservoir-keepers, inspectors, pavers, plasterers, and other workmen; of these, some must be outside the city for purposes which do not seem to require any great amount of work, but yet demand prompt attention; the men inside the city at their stations at the reservoirs and fountains will devote their energies to the several works, especially in case of sudden emergencies, in order that a plentiful reserve supply of water may be turned from several wards of the city to the one afflicted by an emergency. ”

“ Day before yesterday—the morning after the fire—the district inspector was due here to pass judgment on the two upper laterals. As you know, the contract provides that the inspector must look over every yard of excavation and approve it before it can be considered as actually done. Lo and behold, no inspector appeared. The boys were wild with anxiety to start their levee-work before the rain should wash the soft new banks down into the canal; for the company is responsible for every cave-in, and every slide of land means double labor in digging all that soil out of the ditch again. ”

“ The latter can rest only on cobblestones, shells, piles of iron, madriers, dry docks containing the naked hulls of vessels, and the grey walls of the prison, where a man leans out of the windows and tests the iron bars with a hammer. ”

“ Not very long after their exit the German sentry noticed the hole in the wire and so that chance was spoilt for anyone else. The clump of bushes, which had been so useful to the three escapers, was cut down by order of the commandant, and after that a hundred yards of open clearing surrounded the wire fence, making a good field of fire for the sentries.
[72] Owing to the sandy nature of the soil, which had all the dirt-causing propensities of coal dust and none of the advantages of clean sand, we had to be constantly washing our feet if they were to be kept clean at all. ”

“ Through the lock our steamer took us in tow again, along the most awful sewer, with chemical works, scavengers' heaps, manure-factories, and unnamable abominations on its banks – the lighter in front of us, being deeply laden, churning up the pestilential mud from the bottom. ”

“ At such times it was common to see enormous swarms of rats come out from the lower doors and windows of the prison and make head for dry land in swimming platoons amid the cheers of the prisoners in the upper windows. On one or two occasions Rose observed workmen descending from the middle of the south-side street into a sewer running through its center, and concluded that this sewer must have various openings to the canal both to the east and west of the prison. ”

“ An essential adjunct to a canal is a sufficient number of waste-weirs to discharge surplus water accumulating during floods, which, if not provided with an exit, may overflow the tow-path, and cause a breach in the banks, stoppage of the traffic, and damage to adjoining Waste-weirs and stop-gates. lands. The number and positions of these waste-weirs must depend on the nature of the country through which the canal passes. Wherever the canal crosses a stream a waste-weir should be formed in the aqueduct ”

“ This gave rise to the invention of the water-closet communicating with the house drain, and so with the sewers, and the river. An admirable contrivance was the closet—for the rich man living on the upper ground. He could, by merely laying on water, get a cheap transference of all filthy matters. The drains were out of sight, the sewers out of sight; but he was rich enough to pay people for digging them up without suffering the foulness to enter his dwelling. ”

“ A little water, trickling here and there through a dam, is a small matter in itself; but it may be a sinister menace to the security of the dam, which those living in the valley below will do well to heed. ”

“ Two onagri sometimes hurled stones at the workmen; but they, well shielded and always in motion, were seldom struck. Towards evening the embankment was barely twenty feet from the quay wall, and the water—rather low at that season—ran through the sunken fascines without endangering the stability of the dam. The Franks continued all night working at the consolidation and enlargement of the causeway; then they brought timbers and ladders, and raised on its extremity about fifteen feet from the quay wall a stage of timberwork prepared beforehand. ”

“ Convicts of the lowest class could be advantageously employed in the construction of slips, quays, a careening dock, barracks, enclosures for cattle, dwellings for government officers, stone portage, military works, levelling town allotments, road-laying, brick-making, drainage, well sinking, and cutting channels for the supply of water to the town and shipping. ”

“ They flushed that four-foot drain-head and—it never choked again! You may hold with surface-drainage, and the sun-for-garbage cure, Till you've been a periwinkle shrinking coyly up a sewer. I believe in well-flushed culverts.... This is why the death-rate's small ”

“ In any case in which the provision of a proper mattress has been omitted, or when the mattress has been destroyed, or when a breach has occurred in an embankment, whenever, in short, it is evident that the gap cannot be closed until some other escape for the water is provided, it may be possible to provide such an escape by cutting partly through the dam or embankment on the downstream side at another place, and thoroughly protecting the place and extending the protection downstream and away from the dam or embankment. ”

“ In almost the whole distance, little or no regard has been paid to the keeping the side drains open, at least sufficiently so to carry the water freely from the road. The culverts are too few and small, particularly on the long slopes; and the manner of constructing the hollow-ways and catch-waters is defective. These errors of construction cause the water, in many places, to pass over the road, to its rapid destruction. I am aware of the difficulties you have to contend with under the contract system, and that to this cause most of the evils complained of may be traced. ”

“ No person shall divert the water of either creek to the injury of the claim or claims of any person below.
Sec. 11. No person or company or corporation shall erect a dam or reservoir or other obstruction in the creek which shall work any injury to claimants. ”

“ Even now, in the principal thoroughfares, it is forbidden to throw anything into the canals: the sweepings even of the streets may not be cast into them. No measures, however, are taken to prevent the rain, which here falls in sudden and violent torrents, from carrying off the dirt, which is collected in piles at the corner of every street, and washing it into the lagunes, nay, what is still worse, into the gutters for carrying off the water, which consequently are often so completely stopped up, that the principal squares are in danger of being under water. ”

“ The water-carriage system includes bowls or sinks for the deposit of refuse matters, connecting-pipes to remove such matters from the house, and public sewers for their further conveyance away from human abodes. ”

“ That each Slaughter-house be drained by a glazed pipe drain, not less than six inches in diameter, set in concrete and jointed in cement, or otherwise made impermeable, and communicating directly with the public sewer. That the gully at the inlet to the drain be trapped with a stoneware syphon-trap, or other trap of approved material and construction, and be covered with a grating, the bars of which shall not be more than three-eighths of an inch apart; the grating to be fastened with a lock and key, and kept at all times locked, unless opened for cleansing or repair. ”

“ Before the floating harbour was constructed, every facility was afforded for the removal of filth, by the unobstructed course of the rivers; but after the accomplishment of that work, the accumulation of the matters discharged by the drains in a stagnant body of water, occasioned no slight inconvenience to the citizens for many years. It is proper, however, to mention that, previously to the formation of the floating harbour, those parts of the city which stand upon the banks of the Froom were liable to serious inundations, the effects of which were highly prejudicial to the inhabitants. ”

“ The reservoirs of the city must be patrolled, and if it be deemed necessary, they must be opened and the water allowed to flood the low-lying streets by the river, if the enemy succeed in obtaining a foothold there. ”

“ When the owner of land constructs structures for the purpose of reservoiring, draining or drawing water, and if, by the disruption or obstruction of the works, damage has been done, or there is a possibility of damage to the other’s land, the other person may request the owner of the land to effect repair, to drain off the water, or to take preventive measures. ”

“ He was in evening dress, and evidently a gentleman, our foreman said, but where he came from was a complete mystery. My own idea is that the house has no direct communication with the sewer, for if it had, we should have discovered it. You say, sir, that you fell through a hole in the stairs?”
I replied in the affirmative.
“Exactly. You dropped down into a cellar or somewhere in the basement, and then, while you were insensible, they put you into the sewer—through some manhole, perhaps, of which they have a duplicate key. The house must be near a manhole. That’s my belief.” ”

“ When a person breaks the dam of a tank full of water, he shall be drowned in the very tank; of a tank without water, he shall be punished with the highest amercement; and of a tank which is in ruins owing to neglect, he shall be punished with the middle-most amercement. ”

“ Whenever a Sewer-Hunter passes through a sewer under a street grating, he is compelled to close his lantern, else the reflection of the light through the grating would call the attention of the police, and he would be taken before a magistrate. Dogs are never taken through the sewers, for the same reason, as their barking would be noticed, although they would be an excellent defense against the rats. ”

“ Along the public roads, canals and rivers, are placed, at certain intervals, small square guard-houses, at which are stationed from six to twelve men, who are employed in settling disputes upon the rivers or roads, and also in conveying the public dispatches. ”

“ Protection of Vessels during Floods.—On large open rivers, where vessels during high floods are exposed to injury from large floating débris and ice floes, shelter can be provided for them in refuge ports, formed in a recess at the side under the protection of a solid jetty or embankment constructed in the river parallel to the bank, these ports being closed against floods at their upper end and having their entrance at the lower end facing down-stream. ”

“ You can detect their impatience by watching the sway of the mastheads against the motionless, the soulless gravity of mortar and stones. As you pass alongside each hopeless prisoner chained to the quay, the slight grinding noise of the wooden fenders makes a sound of angry muttering. ”

“ And therefore he who spoils another's water, whether in springs or reservoirs, either by trenching, or theft, or by means of poisonous substances, shall pay the damage and purify the stream. At the getting-in of the harvest everybody shall have a right of way over his neighbour's ground, provided he is careful to do no damage beyond the trespass, or if he himself will gain three times as much as his neighbour loses. ”