Page:The Building News and Engineering Journal, Volume 22, 1872.djvu/438

 416 THE BUILDING NEWS. May: 24, 1872. PROPOSED ENGLISH CHURCH IN ROME. Ese Church proposed to be built for the English congregation in Rome was designed by Mr. G. E. Street, for a site which it was hoped to obtain close to the Porta del Popolo, inside the walls, and so placed as to make the building very conspicuous from the Piazza. This site has not, however, been obtained, and the design which we publish will, therefore, no doubt have to be much altered when- eyer the site is finally decided and obtained. The American Episcopalians have been more fortunate than the English, having secured a capital site for their church on the new Via Nazionale, and for which Mr. Street is now, we believe, making the plans. The English Church is proposed to have accommodation for 800 persons, together with a house for the clergy, library, vestry, &e. Our il- lustration is taken from a drawing now on view at the Royal Academy. ——— THE WHITECHAPEL DISTRICT. N his quarterly report just issued, Mr. John Liddle, Medical Officer of Health to the Whitechapel District Board, records the completion of 786ft. of new sewers, making altogether a total length of new sewers constructed in the district of 21,345ft., or upwards of four miles. In the return of routine work done by the Sanitary Inspectors occurs a rather unusual item, which chronicles the removal of ‘‘one donkey kept so as to be a nuisance.” We hoped at first that it sarcastically set forth the transportation of an obstinate manufac- turer in Goulston-street, who has defiled the atmos- phere of the neighbourhood and, as yet, defied all attempts made by the officers of the Board to effect an abatement of the nuisance he creates. Further proceedings are, however, to be taken, and the next quarterly report will, we trust, record his remoyal. It must not be thought, however, that the inhabi- tants of Goulston-street are at all a particular or delicate race. Anybody entertaining such an opinion should have accompanied Mr. Wrack, one of the in- spectors, on a visit made by him onthe 2nd of March last to several houses in the street in ques- tion. At No. 5,a woman and three children were sleeping in a cupboard’on the ground-floor, imme- diately adjoining an offensive privy, the room immediately in front of this cupboard being occupied by a man and three female children. At No. 13, in a small back room, closely contiguous to three privies and a dusthole, one man, six women, and three children were sleeping, each person enjoying about 75 cubic feet of air-space. Thanks to Mr. Liddle’s efforts, the owners of each of these hovels have been compelled toclose them. Want of room is undoubtedly the greatest need of the poor people who are obliged to inhabit these horrible places, yet when re-papering their rooms they appear to strive to reduce them to as contracted limits as possible, for it is not at all an uncommon thing to find layer upon layer of wall paper—the whole upwards of an inch in thickness—pasted on to the walls, from some mistaken idea of economy. This dirty practice is, of course, attended with considerable danger, as the paper is likely to retain contagious and unhealthy matter. One has to turn to the records of results achieved by past work to gain hope for the future. Progress has been made even in Whitechapel. Excluding those in the London Hospital, the deaths in 1871 were 25:0 per 1,000; in 1838 they were 38:6 per 1,000. May we not hope for still greater results when the question of the impurity of the atmosphere in crowded localities receives that consideration due to its importance, and larger powers are conferred on local boards to deal with confined courts and in- sufficiently ventilated dwellings ? Mr. Liddle suggests that in the Public Health Bill now before Parliament a clause should be introduced giving power to local boards to make such bye-laws as will provide for the sanitary condition of all new buildings, whereby the extension of unhealthy habitations may be prevented. Some such power is certainly required. ee GENERAL SCOTT’S METHOD OF SEWAGE UTILISATION. HETHER or notit ultimately proves of any value, the idea of converting our sewers into wash-mills for the manufacture of Portland cement is certainly anew one. This is really the principle of Major-General Scott's plan for dealing with sewage, a short account of which we recently gave, and fuller particulars of which were afforded by a paper read before the Society of Arts on Wed- nesday week by its author. General Scott does not propose to do any of the thousand and one impossible or impracticable things that have been propounded by the sewage doctors, the majority of whom more and more remind one of the Laputan professor whose attention was so unre- mittingly devoted to his weekly Bristol barrel of sewage; but, recognising the fact now generally ad- mitted by all but enthusiasts, that the use of water for the carriage of fecal matters is a necessary evil, Major-General Scott aims simply at removing from the sewage water (whatever its ultimate destination may be) the feecal matters which are injurious by the cheapest possible precipitants, and subsequently converting what has hitherto proved a worthless nuisance into a marketable substance. Sewage-utilisers up to the present time have, with searcely a single exception, been men of one idea. Whatever was done with the sewage, its ultimate total conversion into manure was universally aimed at, and this in spite of adverse testimony. As early as 1861, the Sewage of Towns Commissioners stated that “the value of the solid portions of sewage being small, all attempts at realising profits from its preparation have signally failed;” and in 1870 the Rivers Pollution Commissioners reported that ‘ ex- perience has warned the manufacturer of these feeble manures that the value indicated by chemical analysis cannot be counted on in the market.” Dr. Odling characterises another sewage manure as ‘so extremely poor ;” Krepp adduces instances ‘‘ enough to prove that solids extracted from fluid sewage cannot be manufactured into dry manure so as to pay for the trouble;” and Mr. Corfield, the author of the “Treatment and Utilisation of Sewage,” testifies that “the manures they produce are in every case very inferior, as may be expected from the known value of the sewage constituents that can be precipitatet.” Still, sewage-manure schemes —or some of them—prosper, showing, as General Scott remarks, that the utilisation of sewage slush is an object of the greatest importance to the com- munity. The precipitation of sewage by lime, carefully performed, has undoubtedly been successful from a sanitary, though not from a commercial, point of view. Two well-known instances are those of its application at Tottenham and Leicester. At each of those places, while the system was carefully pursued, the improvement was most manifest, but as soon as at Tottenham the undertaking proved unproductive, and Mr. Hicks, the projector, sold his machinery and plant to the Local Board, the process was neglected and improperly managed, until, says Dr. Letheby, it became “ at last a mere pretence of the objects for which it was designed and employed.” A like failure from similar causes at Leicester has not unlikely been attributed to the lime process in itself, rather than to the carelessness and false economy of those who have had the management of it. Another substance generally available and at nominal cost for the purifying and decolorising of sewage is clay, both in its ordinary conditions and partially dissolved in sulphuric acid. Both in the A.B.C. and sulphate of alumina processes, clay is largely used. Thus, in these two substances—lime and clay—easily procurable everywhere, one at little cost and the other at a nominal price, we have two agents which react on each other, and increase the effect which each is capable of separately producing in the defecation and purification of sewage. Clay and carbonate of lime—the substance pre- cipitated on the addition of lime to ordinary sewage water—are the chief components of those limestones which produce on calcination hydraulic limes and cements. The so-called Portland cement is made by calcining, at a high temperature, 75 per cent. of chalk (or carbonate of lime ground to powder), intimately mixed with 25 per cent. of clay. The process of manufacture is commenced by triturating the chalk and clay in a wash-mill with a large quantity of water. From the chalk-mill there is an overflow by which the water which is constantly running into the wash-mill may pass off, carrying with it some of the chalk and clay in suspension. The milky fluid thus produced is allowed to run into large tanks, or is pumped into them, the coarser particles being detained in the channels leading to the tanks by catch pits, or some other means. When the tanks are full, the solid matters are allowed to subside, the top water is drained off as far as possible, and the operation of running the mixture into the tanks is again commenced, As the matters in suspension do not very readily settle, the process of filling the tanks with the mixture is slow and tedious; owing, also, to the greater fineness of the division of the clay than can be produced by reduc- ing chalk to a powder there is a considerable tendency to separation between the chalk and the impalpable particles of clay, which is rectified as far as may be by subsequent admixture of the com- pounds, either in the process of removal for drying, or after the mixture has been burned to cement and ground to powder. As pointed out by General Scott, a great simi- larity exists between the compound thus produced and that which results from introducing quick-lime and clay, in the proper proportions, for cement or hydraulic lime, into a drain at some distance from the settling tanks, or into suitable mixing vessels, where the ingredients can be thoroughly incorpo- rated with the sewage water and with each other. The chief points of difference, which are entirely in favour of the sewage process, are:—1. The more intimate mixture which can be brought out in the sewage water, owing to the impalpable nature of the precipitate of carbonate of lime which takes place on the addition of the lime. 2. The more rapid settle- ment of the sewage precipitate than the mixture of chalk and clay. 3. The amount of organic matters which is carried down from the sewage with the car- bonate of lime and clay, and which will serve for the fuel to burn the mixture to lime or cement, The subsequent operations are similar to those in the ordinary process of cement manufacture. The mixture is dried on tiled floors with heated flues beneath them, such as are used in the Potteries for drying clay. It may be either completely dried on the flues, or it may, when it has reached a certain consistency, be made “into bricks, and allowed to dry in the air. In this condition the deposit can be kept for any time without creating the slightest nuisance. The final process of calcination, of course, destroys everything of a deleterious nature. Dr. Letheby is of opinion that from a million gallons of sewage water about two tons of Portland cement would be produced in a day at a cost of something like £2. Mr. White, the well-known manufacturer of Portland cement, endeavoured, in the discussion that followed the reading of General Scott’s paper, to obtain some data as to the amount of heat afforded by the consumed portions of the slush, and what additional fuel was required. On this point General Scott is not yet in a position to give any precise information. He stated that in his small kiln, in which he put a ton of material, and from three to five bushels of coal, he had a flue carried under the drying-floor, and he was able to keep that drying-floor red hot by this means, as well as burn the mixture to Portland cement. He believed that when he had got to the point of working a large kiln, ‘his difficulty would not be a want of sufficient heat, but that he should have so much heat that he would have some difficulty in controlling it. Of course, the sewage water which remains after the slush is taken from it by General Scott is not pure. It is not claimed that the plan supersedes irrigation or filtration, but simply that by its use the solid portion—hitherto the great difficulty—is effectually disposed of, and in the best manner hitherto discovered. lee BUILDERS’ BENEVOLENT INSTITUTION. HE thirty-seventh election of pensioners in con- nection with this charity took place at Willis’s Rooms, King-street, S. James's, yesterday (Thurs- day), Mr. Joseph Bird, one of the Vice-Presidents of the Institution, in the chair. There were five male and eight female candidates, but the funds at the disposal of the charity only allowed of the election of one male and one female at present. The names of the candidates were: Males :—Francis Sandon (5th application), Mark Mintry (4th application), Matthew Saich (2nd application), Daniel Thomas, and Richard Bibby. Females :—Frances Seare (6th application), Jane Brothill (6th application), Elizabeth Trevethan (4th application), Ann Budd (3rd application), Eliza Lambert (3rd application), Arabella Hambrook (2nd application), Sarah E. Bear (2nd application), and Ann Williams (2nd application). The poll opened at 12 o’clock noon and closed at 3 p.m. Messrs. Thomas Stirling and Matthew Hall having been appointed scrutineers, announced the successful can- didates to be Mr. Mark Mintry and Mrs. Jane Brothill. Mr. Walter Watson (Watson Brothers) proposed and the Chairman seconded a vote of thanks to the scrutineers. The motion having been carried, Mr. Stirling brieflyreplied. The proceedings closed by a vote of thanks to the Chairman, pro- posed by Mr. Thomas Smith and seconded by Mr. Waldram (Hill, Keddell, & Waldram). The Institu- tion was established in 1847 for giving relief and granting pensions to decayed members of the various branches of the building trade and their widows; also for affording temporary relief to workmen in case of accidents. It has at present on its funds 42 pensioners—19 men, and 23 women—the men receiv- ing £24 per annum, and the women £20. The amount of Stock standing in the name of the Insti- tution is now £16,131 17s. 3d.