Sewer manure. Statement of the course of investigation & results of experiments as to the means of removing the refuse of towns in water, and applying it as manure : with suggestions of further trial works (for voluntary adoption) of the practicability of applying sewer water as manures by subterranean channels; prepared for the consideration of the Committee of Works / by Edwin Chadwick, Esq., C.B., with appendices.

  • Chadwick, Edwin, 1800-1890.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sewer manure. Statement of the course of investigation & results of experiments as to the means of removing the refuse of towns in water, and applying it as manure : with suggestions of further trial works (for voluntary adoption) of the practicability of applying sewer water as manures by subterranean channels; prepared for the consideration of the Committee of Works / by Edwin Chadwick, Esq., C.B., with appendices. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    51/52 (page 51)
    It is marked off by patting down a few sticks into stretches of forty yards wide The man with the jet starts at A and goes on to B, watering the whole breadth of the stretch before him and adding fresh lengths of hose as he proceeds. From B he goes to D, and then returns up the other stretch D E, but he does not require addi¬ tional length, the other man moving the hose for him as he advances, so that he will get nearly to G before he requires additional lengths. At that point the hose will lie in the direction AG; and in this manner he proceeds over the whole field. Adding or taking off a length of hose was at first attended with some trouble, it being neces¬ sary to put down the valve at the tank and sometimes to empty the hose before it could be done, on account of the pressure. This is obviated by a simple contrivance —two pieces of wood and two screws thus between which the hose is placed, and on tightening the screws is effectually closed. The next consi¬ deration is the cost of the application. We have already stated the quantity deli¬ vered per hour to be 2,000 gallons, and this I shall assume as sufficient for an acre, which gives ten acres per day; the labourers are paid 2s. per day each, which makes the cost of the application 5d. per acre. The hose, at Is. 2d. per yard, and 2d. per yard for kyanizing and fitting up, cost 53Z. The per-centage to be charged on this amount for interest of capital and for wear and tear is at present a matter of speculation, but I have reason to suppose it would be covered by five per cent, on the capital and ten per cent, for wea? and tear, together fifteen per cent., amounting on 53/. to 7/. 19s. to be charged on eighty acres, being 2s. per acre. I may here observe that had the tank been more favour¬ ably situated, had it been the centre of a circle instead of the apex of a triangle, the same length of hose would have sufficed for 415 acres, and then the per-centage would only amount to 4|d. per acre. As it is, however, the cost is 2s. per acre and fid. for the labour, making 2s. fid. I have, for the sake of comparison, made a recent trial with water-carts. The result was that two men with two horses, making in all fifty-six journies, covered in two days five acres, the distance from the tank being 600 yards. Five shillings per day in this country is a low charge for a man and horse, and rating it at this it gives 20s. for the five acres, or 4s. per acre. There are other advantages, beside cheapness, which the hose possesses over the water-carts. The first and most important is that the ground is not injured by the carting over it. The best time for the application of liquid manure is during wet weather and while the grass is growing, and this is just the time when most injury would be done by carting heavy loads over it. I know an instance of a field which is said twenty-five years ago to have been a capital pasture, without a ruck no it, but now little else. At that time it was much cut up by carting stone over it to build a weir, and it has never recovered it nor will it till it is broken up. A second advantage is the despatch with which the work is done: two men with hose being equal to eight men with eight horses and carts; or, upon our own farm, two men with hose would do eighty acres in eight days* whereas it would take two men with water carts five weeks and two days to do the same. w