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Leader (1850-1860), 17th November 1855, Edition 1 of 2, Page 1107, Untitled Article

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      MR . F . O . WARD ON THE SMALL TUNNEL SYSTEM . The controversy between Mr F . O . Ward on the one hand , and Messrs . Stephejtson , Cubitt , and Bidder , the eminent engineers , on the other , has been continued during the week with considerable vigour . Mr . Stephenson , calculating by a formula , propounds , , for the North-side main drainage , colossal tunnels , costing 1 , 600 , 000 / . ; Mr . F . O . Ward , relying on the experience of Mr . Roe , who , it appears , passed twenty years in experimenting on the run of the Fleet sewer in all weathers , fixes less than half this size and cost as ample for the purpose . Mr . Ward holds out a saving of three-quarters of a million sterling on the north side alone ; and a still larger relative economy on the south . He advocates , with this view , the main drainage scheme put in by Mr . Roe ; and he shows that , to defeat this formidable rival , Messrs . Stephenson , Cubitt , and Bazalgettb , have had recourse to expedients by no means of a creditable nature . This , we think , appears plainly from the subjoined passage in a letter published by Mr . Ward , in the Daily News of Thursday last . The point in . question : in this passage , we must premise , is the alleged misquotation by Mr . StepiiENSoy of the declivity and drainage area of his great High level tunnel , in order to bring it into factitious conformity with a formula which had been employed to show Mr . Roe's tunnel inadequate to the duty required of it . This misquotation , Mr . Bidder describes as only an " apparent discrepancy ; " adding , that Mr . Stkphenson had explained this to Mr . Ward , at an interview at Lord Eurimgton's house , but that , in consequence of Mr . "Ward ' s " superficial knowledge , " the explanation had failed to produce " any clear conception in his mind . " Mr . Ward ' s reply is as follows : — The discrepancy in question is not an apparent , but a real one . It is of the utmost importance . It involves the whole question , whether the liigh level floodint < rception , which particularly characterizes Mr . Buzul gette ' s plan , can or cannot be accomplished by the tunnel designed for the purpose , tested by the same formula which is employed to test John Roe ' s . I will ; therefore , concisely explain this point . The outfall length of the High-level line , running from Hackney to the Leu , stands drown to scale , and , figured in red ink , in our published soctions , as falling 1 in 1 , 359 ; wliioh declivity is also printed , opposite the same sewer , in Table 1 of the North-side Drainage Report . The duty assigned to this sewer by Mr . J 3 azalgetle , at page 1 of his High-level Report , is " the diversion of the whole of the sewuge mid flood-ivutcra of 14 square miles of the upper districts . " Nothing can be p luiner than this statement , coupled with the sections . Tine ' whole of the flood-waters " from " 11 square milt's " ure to go through a tunnel of 12 feet 0 inches diameter , falling 1 in 1 , 359 . On the 30 ih October , 1854 , Mr . Buzalgettc reported against John llou ' s plan ; showing by tho old fonnulu that John Roc ' s 7 foot G tunnel , lulling 1 in 4 H 0 , and proposed ad a flood line for seven square milra . haw a carrying power of only 15 , 000 cubic feet per minute against a duty of 2 H . ; / Hid therefore is too small . Tried by the suiie formula Mr . Bazulgutto ' b own Highlevel Bflivoi' in iaitdequate to the duty he assigns it ; for the duty is f > 9 , 0 <) 0 cubic feet per minute , and the carrying power only 32 , 000 . On the llih . of December following , two months ! after Mr . Bujsulgotto had committed hhnaclf to this mode of calculation , Mr . Stuphoruton , in his turn , reported on Mr . Hoe ' s plan . How could he confirm Mr . Ha / . iilgcite ' s calculations ugi »» i > flt John Uoe , yet suvo Mr . JLJujsulgftte ' s High level lino from condemnation on similar grounds ? If the nominal duty of Mr . Bazalgette ' d tunnel could be reduced , and ( ta nominal discharging power increased , the two might be brought into apparent ( i ' , , ' ' , i ' < ' ' , , ,

      conformity ; and the condemnation , while holding good as against John Roe , might be averted from Mr . Bazalgette . Mr . Stephenson may have been totally unconscious of the effect of the course here indicated ; but it is precisely the course he pursued . He reduced Mr . Bazalgette ' s flood area from 14 square miles to 7 *; and increased the slope of the tunnel from 1 in 1 , 359 to 1 in 600 . The duty was thus brought down to 45 , 000 cubic feet per minute ; while the carrying power was raised to 47 , 000 cubic feet per minute . The condemnatory formula held good as against John Roe ; but Mr . Bazalgette ' s line was saved . The passage of Mr . Stephenson ' s report , in which the duty and carrying power of Mr . Bazalgette ' s High-level sewer are thus brought into factitious conformity with the formula employed against John Roe , contains , in a parenthesis , the remarkable words " as already explained . " . These words are surely misplaced in a paragraph which reverses all previous explanations ; and quotes , the one doubled , the other halved , the slope and flood-area set forth in all previous documents . The sewer " as ' previously explained " was shown taking off the upper Fleet-valley flood waters to the Lea ; the same sewer , as now newly explained , is shown letting the bulk of those floods rush down the Fleet river to the Thames . The words " as already explained" scarcely do justice to the suddenness and magnitude of changas such as these . One more remark before I quote this singular passage . It will be observed that the reduction of flood area is so put as not to attract the notice of a cursory reader . It takes a good deal of study to detect that the maximum floods ( which govern the size of a flood line ) are to be taken , not as before from fourteen square miles , but only from seven . That it is so , however , stands proved by the reduction of the duty from . 59 , 000 to 45 , 000 cubio feel per minute . I now give Mr . Stephenson ' language veibatim : " The High-level sewer ( as already explained ) must act as a drainage sewer for seven square miles , and remove the sewage , and a portion of the storm waters , from another seven square miles , estimated at about 45 , 000 cubic feet per minute . The lower portion of the sewer , designed for this purpose , would discharge 47 , 000 cubic feet per minute , being 12 ft . Gin . in diamettr , with a fall of 1 in COO . " Can a fall of 1 in 600 be more plainly affirmed than here ? Can such language be fairly construed to imply a fall of 1 in 1 , 359 , brought up to an equality with 1 in 000 by working the sewer under pressure , so that the sewage , accumulating in the tunnel above , would , by its hydraulic head , force a passage below ? For what reason should we build a sewer thus afflicted ( it I may so say ) with congenital stricture ? Why gratuitously reat .-, in the Hackney valley , the evils we deplore m the river-side districts—the outward pressure and flooding below , the retarded current and deposit above ? Why not at once cure the stricture by a few simple adjustments of relative size , calculated to bring about a real conformity between carrying power and duty . When Mr . Stephenson , at the interview to which reference has been made , offered this explanation of the discrepancy , I felt it my bounden duty as a Commissioner to declare to him , in the plainest terms , that 1 considered his explanation inadmissible , and that A . maintained my objection in all its original force . To the Tubular controversy , of which tins lunncl question is , according to Mr . Ward , the logical development , lie adverts as a debute which may now be regarded as closed , observing : — . Last year , no doubt , a commission of eminent e , ngineera declared my views on tubular drainage utterly opposed to sound principle und practice ; and they protested by a resignation m manse against the adoption or those views by the Government . But , during the present year , the successors of that body have , I urn liappy to aay , at my instance , caused several hundreds of pipe sewers to b « dug down on and examined , with results so satisfactory a « to place the success of the tubular aystem beyond all further contestation . Both in the metropolis and in the provinces that ayBtein is now being extended with extraordinary rapidity ; und I no longer hc-bitatc to mention cases which a few years ago would buvu nmed a shout of derision . Uhus , 1 can point out to Mr . Bidder , in tho metropolis , 250 middlesized houses drained in combination through a single 0-inch pipe : which docs the work perfectly , " « >» tn ' ? cleaner for its abundant ecuur . The suwage «»« „ , ! waters of conuiderublo towns now pab » through 1 . ' anu 20-ineh pipes-Bizea which , In tho old day » of bricK , were not thought excessive for a ( tiuglo h"u ^' { f ^ ' \ drainage in , in fact , a settled auction - •« «»«««« '" £ & fuuglu and won-a .. d with which I rti " " ^ " ^ , ^/ tut no more . My bu ., ine * H at present id ««» l vv . th tubes « mc 'Ti to charge . Mr . Waiu > with Wn used toward * . Air . liA ' ^ aicrr ( tli n ^ w-w theCommlHdou or ^ " ^ SH SSSsfers :

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      N- ov . 17 , 1855 . 1 THE LEADER . 1107

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      to Italy , vet , judging the Italians by their own proverb , " who suffers deserves it ; " they are more entitled to sympathy than the French to extenuation . One after another the Italians prostrated themselves under the heel of their scornful conqueror . Charles Emmanuel might yet have saved Piedmont , had he understood the hearts of his people , as well as did that conqueror , who wrote the Directory that " one regiment of Piedmontese troops was stronger than the whole Cisalpine republic . " But what little power was left to him among his subjects , Charles used to suppress with undue hastiness , and even barbarity , all symptoms of revolt or dissatisfaction , that his own overbearing control , added to the miseries of the late taxation , gave rise to ; so that when the French , having secured peace with Austria by the treaty of Campofarrino , had nothing more to dread or hope from the Sardinian king , they first incited his own subjects to rebel against him , and after exposing him to the most ignominious treatment , depriving him of all but the resemblance of royalty , they put the finishing stroke to their policy , by forcing him to give over all his continental dominions into their hands ! Charles Emmakoel signed his abdication and retired to the island of Sardinia , and for twenty-four years Piedmont remained passive in the hands of strangers , shifted from one to the other , regardless of her own destinies , or of her royal rulers in their exile . At the termination of that period , when Europe awoke from her slumbers to league against Napoleon , whom France , consistent always in her inconstancy , deserted in his hour of need , V . ctor Emmanuel I . received permission to take possession of his brother ' s dominions , who had ceded them in his favour . By virtue of the infamous Vienna parchment , which must reflect eternal shame on all whose signatures are affixed thereto , Genoa — whose Ligurian traditions of republicanism and freedom made the idea of a union with the Piedmontese monarchy odious in the extreme—Genoa was , regardless of her menaces and protestations , annexed to the continental dominions of the King of Sardinia . Russia and Prussia , intent on crushing the nationalities round their immediate domains , were willing that Austria should be recognised "as legitimate sovereign of Tetria , Dalmatia , Venice , the islands hitherto belonging to the Venetians in the Adriatic , the duchies of Milan and Mantua , the Tyrol , Friuli , Trieste , Carriala , Upper Carinthia , etc ., and also of the Valteline , Barrino Chiavcnna , and the territories formerly constituting the Itepublic of Ragusa . " So decreed Austria , Spain , France , Portugal , Prussia , Russia , Sweden , and Great Britain , " ¦ in the name of the holy and undivided Trinity . " In the name of "God and humanity , " Italy also awakened , in silence and in weakness it might be , but no less solemnly , registered a different vow . Piedmont has began to fulfil it , is fulfilling it ; every Italian state and Italian heart will aid her to fulfil it , until in letter and in spirit that oath shall be accomplished . Then let tlae abovementioned nations , at war already among themselves , remember their decree . The first cry that greeted Victob JDmaianukl after liis welcome to his hereditary dominions , was that " ( Jucrra ai Tedeschi , " which from time im- memorial had rung , and does still ring , in the eai'B of Italian princes . On this war against the Austrians on national grounds , and on the winning a constitution for themselves , the minds of all the Pied'nontese wore bent . They saw that their king , despite the grudges that he ought to feel for Austrian treachery and Austrian desertion , was willing to settle down by the side of the traitors , gloating on the booty that their treachery had won . They saw that their king -was intent on restoring the ancient regime ; that by his lettrcs da cachet he intended to set aside nil law and the ad- ministration of justice when it interfered with him royal will . The Genoese vowed fiercely that if they must be subject to kingly yoke they would submit to no tyrant . The Piedmontcse were glad to have their king among them , they had suffered much and learned much during the last twenty- four jcars of the horrors of anarchy und of civil war ; they desired to go hand-in-liand with their rulers ; to be subjects , but not slaves . Their demands wore reasonable but the king was inexo- Table . I ' oo arbitrary to yield , too weak to resist ,

      he abdicated his crown in favour of his brother Charles Felix , and appointed Charles Albert , Prince of Carignano , regent in his absence . Had he ascended the throne as king , instead of as regent , at that critical juncture , it is probable that the whole aspect of Italian affairs would have been changed . In a concluding article we will try and enter into the merits and demerits of the deeds and character of this man who , had he been a Cromwell or a Luther , might have given back Italy to the Italians ; who , as Charles Albert , with all his shortcomings and failings , did re-make a kingdom outof the disjointed , disunited Sardinian States ; did consolidate it , did reform it , did give it to Italy as a bulwark and a foreshadowing of that which is to come .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 17, 1855, page 1107, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2115/page/15/