Handbook of rural sanitary science : illustrating the best means of securing health and of preventing disease / by C.F. Gardner [and others] ... edited by Lory Marsh.

Date:
1876
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Handbook of rural sanitary science : illustrating the best means of securing health and of preventing disease / by C.F. Gardner [and others] ... edited by Lory Marsh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the colouring matter was not thrown down for two or three days. ' From one pound weight of mud from a settling reservoir 4*17 grains of arsenic were obtained. It is a cumulative poison ; yet if this quantity were taken in one dose it would more than suffice to poison a man. ' To afford some idea of the quantity of dye-stuffs and chemicals consumed at calico-printing works, the establishment above referred to used in three months 215 tons of solids and 8,894 gallons of liquids. ' There are no counties in England where the streams are worse polluted than those of Lancashire and Yorkshire. The river Irwell, which passes through the city of Manchester, is a reeking sewer, of which the rivers Irk and Mediock, and a foul stream called the Cornbrook are tributaries. The waters of these rivers are as black as ink; and, in addition to their many impurities, the sewage of Eochdale, Oldham, and other populous places, is brought by them through the city. The corporation turn many million gallons of water into tlie Irwell; its water is, therefore, less polluted on leaving the city than when it enters. In Broughton and other low-lying districts diarrhoea prevails more or less, and this river's foulness is becoming a serious and urgent matter to the inhabitants of the city.' There are old residents still living who have fished in the Irwell, but owing to the increase of towns and manufactures its waters have gradually and still continue to get worse. The Lancashire