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- ^ That ^ itt the opinion of this meeting , the war in -wf tich England and France- are now engaged with Russia 3 s a great contest forced upon them by the outrageous aggression- of the latter Power upon the Turkish empire , ¦ and is intended to "Create a spirit of aggrandisement on depart of the Czar which threatens the independence of other nations , and this meeting is of opinion that the "war ought to bfr prosecuted with the ntmost vigour -untfl' safe and honourable terms of peace can be obtained . " The following amendment was then proposed and seconded : —
" That this meeting , without giving any opinion on the origin or conduct of the war , earnestly desires that the present negotiations for peace may be carried to a successful issue , and the further evils of a protracted ^ jontest spared to this country , to Europe , and to the world . " The voting , however , was-decidedly against it , and oa the original motion being put v ery few hands were held against it .
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NEW METROPOLITAN COMMISSION OF SEWEKS . —MB . F . 0 . WARD'S STATEMENT . Having disposed of those branches of the subject which relate to the collection of sewage in the houses , * to its conveyance through districts of the town , and to its diversion by intercepting tunnels from the Thames , Mt . F . O . Ward proceeded to state his views as to the policy which the Commission should adopt with respect to that much vexed branch of the question—the Agricultural utilisation of the sewage . The value of town refuse as manure , Mr . Ward said , had been called in question very recently by no less an authority than Mr . Caird , who had distinguished himself as the agricultural commissioner of that able journal the Times . Mr . Ward thought , ¦ however , that he could produce an overwhelming " body of evidence , both scientific and , practical , in support of the view adopted by his sanitary friends and himself , —that town refuse was one of the most valuable fertilising agents we possessed . To shorten his argument he w ould direct attention solely to the Iizotized ~ lngredients of the sewage ; for though the phosphates , the potass , and the soluble silica of sewage were valuable , and ought by no means to be wasted , yet their value was insignificant as compared with that of its azotized or ammoniacal elements .
Professor Way , the able chemist of the Royal Agricultural Society , —a man who had brought eminent ability to bear , with great success , upon subjects of tne highest national importance—had illustrated the high relative value of ammonia by what might be termed a chemico-econoraical analysis of guano . Mr . Way had shown , that of the total price given for the best guano , at least 80 percent , was paid for the ammonia in it *—Guano-contained-16 per cent , of ammonia , 24 per cent , of earthy phosphates , and 3 £ per cent , of potass ; the remaining 56 £ per cent , consisting of me re sand and water , which were not only worthless themselves , but diminished the worth of the other ingredients , by diminishing their portability . Nowr looking to the prices at which these several substances could be procured in the market ,
it appeared that of 10 / . paid for a tou of guano , 81 sit least were paid for the 336 lbs . of ammonia in it , . and only 2 / . for the 537 lbs . of earthy phosphate and tha 79 lbs . of potass . It was clear , therefore , that , for all practical purposes , they might confine their attention to the ammonia of the sewage ; for if its ammonia would not yield a profit , neither the phosphates , nor potass , nor anything else in it would . Now ,, on comparing the various investigations that had been , published , by Berzelius , Lecanu , Boussingault , Gasparin , Paulet , and others , as to the weight iind composition of human residua , he found that an Adult produced annually about 1 GJ lbs . of ammonia , of which 4-5 tha , or 13 lbs ., were secreted by the kidneys , the remaining l-5 th , or 3 ^ lbs ., being contained in the move solid residuum . Ch . ildr . eu and old
persons produced less ammonia ; but as the horses , cows , dogs , and other animals in London yielded a large annual quantity , besides that which was pro . duced by gasworks and other manufactories , he believed that it would be an undor-eatiuiate to put the not produce , after all deductions had been allowed for , at 15 lbs . per head of the population , taking 4-5 ths as uriue ammonia and l-5 th as fascal ammonia . Now , amongst the many valuable experiments which had been made by that able and eminent man , Mr . Lawes , of Rothompstead , there was one that would just servo to illustrate the value of the ammonia thua produced , every year , by each individual . Mr . Lawes had put on a plot of cornland a quantity of sulphate of ammonia , corresponding , to' 14 lbs . of real ammonia ( the quantity was 435 lbs . of the impure commercial sulphate ) and he had
'compared the produce of that plot with the produce df an adjacent plot kept tmmanttred for the purpose . The unmanured plot produced 16 bushels of cornthe manured plot 21 bushels ; so that 14 pounds of ammonia , used as manure , had produced an increase of no less than fire bushels of corn , worth , at present prices , he believed , about 40 shillings ^ The proportion of increase varied of course with weather and other circumstances ; but this result , was rather below than above the average effect of ammonia on corn crops ; and on grass lands its influence was greater still , quadrupling the ordinary crops . But he was content to take it that the average annual produce of ammonia by each individual of a mixed urban populat ion would , if delivered to the roots of growing corny produce an increased yield of five bushels of dressed grain .
But he would now turn from physiological and chemical considerations , and from experimental trials , to the rougher but not less reliable results of practical experience on a large scale . Take the Edinburgh meadows for example . Here was a case in which town sewage , very roughly applied no doubt , and without the necessary precautions to render the operation inoffensive , had nevertheless raised land of the most barren description—much of it , in fact , mere sea-side sand-hills—to such a state of fertility that 30 / . per Scotch acre was paid for several portions of it ; and that the a verage rental was as high as 20 / . per Scotch acre . The yield of these irrigated sands was actually tenfold the average yield of agricultural lands in Great Britain . Look ,
again , at the sew age-manured meadows below Mansfield ; thirty years ago those meadows were a wilderness—the higher parts covered with gorse , the lower levels a snipe-haunted bog . To these lands—worth 4 s . an acre at the utmost—rtlie town sewage of Mansfield had been conveyed by a dyke , and distributed by a system of gutters and sluices ; and what was the consequence ? They were at this moment producing no less than 12 / . 5 S . per acre per annum . This had been accomplished by a very dilute form of town sewage ; for the whole river ( the Maun ) had been diverted into the dyke , with the drainage of only that small part of the houses which had been as yet fitted up with water-closets . As these were multiplied-the fertility of the irrigated lands below the town would doubtless-increase ; and
it was satisfactory to find that these sewage irrigations were so rapidly absorbed by the land as to be imperceptible a few minutes after the water had been turned on , producing far less offensive smell than the ordinary top-dressings of farm-yard manure , which lay for days together , exhaling ammonia , beneath the sun . Sewage irrigation was practised with equal success , by very similar means , in many parts of the continent . The sewers of Milan , for example , are discharged by a canal called the Vettabbia , which , flows a distance of ten miles to the river Lambro , and irrigates in its course a considerable tract of meadow land . These meadows are every year four times moAved for stable-feeding
—besides yielding three abundant hay-crops ( in June , July , and Angust)—and furnishing , in September , plentiful pasturage-for the cattletill the winter irrigations begin . In-all these cases , however , the sewage was distributed by open gutters —a far costlier and Ie 9 s efficient method than the distribution through pipes with hose and jet now extensively practised in this country , which had the honour , he was proud to say , of having originated this plan . Already the sewage of Rugby had been taken on lease by an enterprising landowner , who- had laid down pipes for its distribution over five hundred acres of land ; and who , it was stated , was so well satisfied with the result , that he
was about to pipe five hundred acres more . He ( Mr . Ward ) had no doubt that the produce of this land would be quadrupled ; and that the owner , who had got the lease of the Rugby sewage at an almost nominal rent , would make a fortune by his speculation—and a fortune he richly deserved for his boldness in leading the way . He ( Mr . Ward ) would therefore assume that the commission , recognised the value of town sewage as a powerful manure , and he would come to the question how , under the circumstances of so vast a city as London , this valuable matter might best be made available . Two methods , they were aware , had been proposed for thi » purpose—the moist and the dry method : the plan of
liquid manuring as practised at the places just referred to , and tho plan of precipitation , different forms of which had been proposed by Messrs . Higgs , Wickstcad , Stotharfc , Angus Smith , and other able and ingenious men . Each of these plana had its advantages . Undoubtedly , if a precipitate , as rich as guano , could be cheaply obtained from sewage , by some agent capable of throwing down the whole of its fertilising ingredients , such a product would have a high degree of practical value , especially in tho case of towns whose great size or disadvantageous position made it difficult to utilise the wholo of their refuse on land in their immediate vicinity . On the other band , the deUvory of liquid manure by gravitation ox steam power , through pipes , obviated the
the ammonia which was furnished to the « ewage by the more solid ejeeta ; instead of precipitating it disengaged and wasted the ammonia derived from urine . The reason of this was obvious . That portion of the ammonia which was derived front urine existed in sewage in the form of ammoniaeal salts ; and linie being an alkaline earth combined with the : acids of these salts , and set free their volatile base , of which part flew off as gas , and part was carried , away in solution in the water . The faecal ammonia , on the contrary , was in the form of organic compounds which lime eould not thus rapidly decompose ; and these the lime entangled and took down in its descent , very much as white of egg clarifies coffee by entangling and withdrawing from the liquorthepnlverulent matter in suspension * Unfortunately , the fsecal ammonia was only l-5 th of the whole , the other 4-5 ths befog contained in the ammoniacal salts derived from the urine .
expense of the p * eeipi « ating process ^ and-substituted the cheapest-known means of conveyance 4 A& distribution for costly cartage atnd lmnd -labour . His chief objection to the precipitating processes was , that no chemical agent had yet been discovered which would throw dowtt < z 8 the valuable ingredients of sewage in & fern * sufficiently compact to come into eowipetitlbn with guano . Messrs : Higgs , Wfcfcatead , and Stofchart all used lime as a precipitant . Dr . Angtts Smith , an excellent chemist , and a gentleman ft * whom he had a great personal esteem , had suggested sulphite of magnesia ; while the Sewage Manure Company were producing a compost , which he believed had a ready sale , by filtering the Ranefctgh sewer water through tanks filled with peat charcoal . Now lime precipitated only that portion of
The ammoniacal vapours given off it was proposed to condense , no doubt ; and some part of the waste might possibly be thus prevented ; but a great deal of free ammonia would still , he feared , escape in watery solution . The ammonia retained by Che compost , moreover , would be so small a per-centage , encumbered with so much comparatively inert lime , that five or six tons of the precipitate would be required to produce the effect of a single ton of guano . Hence fivefold cartage costs , and a proportionate increase in the labour of spreading it on the land . Mr . Stothart , besides the lime , proposed to employ the sulphates of alumina aiid zinc ^ na well as night-soil burned to a sort of charcoal , in the hope
of absorbing the ammonia disengaged by the lime ; but much would still escape ; and , moreover , a question of cost would arise , which , in dealing with large masses of sewage , would , he feared , defeat the plan—full of merit and ingenuity as it undoubtedly was . Dr . Angus Smith proposed sulphite of magnesia as a precipitant of the ammoniacal phosphates of the urine ; and these it would no doubt effectually throw down , as double phosphatic salts of magnesia and ammonia . But sulphite of magnesia cotrld not throw down carbonate of ammonia , a salt which , unluckily for this plan , was fifteen times more abundant than the phosphate of ammonia in the urine . The plan of filtration through peat charcoal had been attended
with some degree of success ; but there was reason to -fear that-this -agent ,--having-a rapid bxydlsing power in virtue of its porosity , must decompose and waste a large proportion of the ammonia , though a certain proportion was certainly absorbed and retained . Much depended on these proportions , which he had not yet been able to ascertain , and which would be a very fit matter for investigation . Any sensible waste of ammonia or of the other valuable ingredients of sewage , would suffice to condemn the plan ; and such waste , he was afraid , took place to a considerable extent in this process as in all the other precipitating processes . Then again it was to be remembered , that all these composts were to be used as '
dressings , and , like other top dressings , wouid be exposed to have their ammonia evaporated by the sunshine , or washed into the ditches by storms of rain ; while liquid manure was no sooner delivered than it sank down at once to the roots of the plants . Fertilising matters , the } ' were aware , must be in solution , in order to be available as plant-food ; and it did not seem desirable to be at great cost to solidify substances , which must be re-dissolved before tho roots could absorb them . For these and other reasons ho looked forward to pipe distribution , as the perfect method which would ultimately prevail for the utilization of the London sewage . The cost of pipage , with steam engine and pumps complete ,
allowing 7 £ per cent , for interest and maintenance , is only 5 s . per acre per annum ., and the nverago working expenses are rather less : so that tho outlayis amply reimbursed by the increase of tho very flrst crop . The cost of brick culverts with branches to convey the London sewage to farms so orranlsod would also bo inc onsidornblo , relatively to tbo vast increase in the produce of tlte land , and to the cheapness of provisions which would thence ensue . Quadrupled grass crops would enable double tho quantity of meat to bo raised on half the extent of land ; and this would set free a vast breadth of the soil for tho growth of groin and roots- This abundance of food would of itself remunerate tho
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^ AJwabig 20 , 1855 . ] fl 3 B AII BAD OB R . oS 5
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 20, 1855, page 55, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2074/page/7/
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