populated and on low ground near the river. Dr. Shapter attributes this
lower rate of mortality, and I believe rightly, to St. Edmund’s being
freely intersected by running streams of water. The people would
probably not drink more of the water than in parts of the town where it
was less plentiful, and had to be paid for, but they would have much
better opportunities for personal cleanliness: so that whilst they would
be exposed to only the same number of scattered cases, they would be
less likely to have the malady spreading through families, and by
personal intercourse. After the cholera of 1832, measures were taken to
afford a better supply of water to Exeter; not, so far as I can find by
Dr. Shapter’s work, that its impurity was complained of, but because of
its scarcity and cost. Waterworks were established on the river Exe, two
miles above the town, and more than two miles above the influence of the
tide. Exeter has since been very plentifully supplied with this water,
and Dr. Shapter informed me that in 1849 there were only about twenty
cases of cholera, nearly half of which occurred in strangers coming into
the town, and dying within two or three days after their arrival. This
last summer there was only one death from cholera in Exeter.
[Sidenote: CHOLERA IN HULL.]
We will now consider the town of Hull, in which, together with other
sanitary measures adopted since 1832, there has been a new and more
plentiful supply of water, but with a far different result to that at
Exeter. In 1832 Hull was scantily supplied with water conveyed in pipes
from springs at Anlaby, three miles from the town. About 1844, new
waterworks were established to afford a more plentiful supply. These
works were situated on the river Hull, at Stoneferry, two miles and
three quarters from the confluence of that river with the Humber. About
half the sewage of the town is delivered into the river of the same
name, the rest being discharged into the Humber, as appears from
information and a map kindly furnished me in 1849 by Dr. Horner of Hull,
who was making great efforts to have better water obtained for the town.
The tide flows up the river many miles past the waterworks, carrying up
with it the filth from the sewers. The supply of water was, to be sure,
obtained when the tide was down, but as the banks of the river are
clothed with sedges in many parts, and its bottom deep with mud, the
water can never be free from sewage. Moreover, there are some parts of
the river above Stoneferry much deeper than the rest, and where the
deeper water is, according to the testimony of boatmen, nearly stagnant;
thus allowing the water carried up by the tide to remain and gradually
mix with that afterwards flowing down. There are also boats, with
families on board, passing up the river to the extent of five thousand
voyages in the year. The water when taken from the river was allowed to
settle in the reservoir for twenty-four hours, and was then said to be
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