The water question. Memoir addressed to the Commissioners appointed by His Majesty ... to inquire into the state of the supply of water to the Metropolis / [J. Wright].

  • Wright, J. (John), 1770?-1844
Date:
1828
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The water question. Memoir addressed to the Commissioners appointed by His Majesty ... to inquire into the state of the supply of water to the Metropolis / [J. Wright]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    by calling the attention of the House of Commons to so crying a Grievance. To this letter I received from Sir Francis an immediate reply, in which he stated, that he considered the subject to be one of great importance ; that he would recommend a Public Meeting of the aggrieved Inhabitants, and a Petition to Parliament—and that he should be happy to lend a helping hand towards the overthrow of so mischievous and so unprincipled a Con¬ federacy. Thus encouraged to proceed, I set about collecting toge¬ ther my facts; and, on the 19th of March last, I published a small pamphlet, which I called 44 The Dolphin.” I have been blamed for giving to it a title, which not one man out of a thousand would comprehend the meaning of: but, that very ignorance, on the part of the Inhabitants, was precisely my reason for selecting it. So immediately bound up are the health and comfort of every family with the supply of pure and wholesome Water to their habita¬ tions, that a knowledge of the qualities of that which they are daily using for domestic purposes, must, at all times, be an object of great importance. Self-evident, however, as this proposition appears, it is nevertheless fact, that, during the twelve-months’ attention which I had paid to the subject, I had not met with half a dozen individuals, out of the many thousands interested in the present In¬ quiry, who could point out to me the source, whence the impure Water which they saw running into their cisterns was drawn. Being anxious that such a state of things should no longer continue; but that every man, woman, and child, compelled, by monopoly, to drink the water supplied by the Grand Junction Company, should be aware of the spot from which it was taken, I determined on calling my publication 44 The Dolphin,”—that being the name given by the W ater Companies to the small wooden erection, somewhat resembling a Martello tower, which they place