“The public is at present without any protection, even against a further indefinite extension of demand. In cases of dispute, there is no tribunal but the boards of the companies themselves to which individuals can appeal; there are no regulations but such as the companies may have voluntarily imposed upon themselves, and may therefore revoke at any time, for the continuance of the supply in its present state, or for defining the cases in which it may be withdrawn from the householder. All these points, and others of the same nature, indispensably require legislative regulation, where the subject matter is an article of the first necessity, and the supply has, from peculiar circumstances, got into such a course that it is not under the operation of those principles which govern supply and demand in other cases.” Since the period of that report, there has been no legislation on the subject other than that in new Acts, or on the renewal of old ones, clauses have been introduced empowering any individual rate-payer to demand a supply of water. In some instances legislative permissions have been given to the local authorities to obtain supplies for the use of towns, but the permissions have not been accompanied with the requisite powers to make them available. Bath, however, is supplied with water under the authority of the local Act of the 6 Geo. III. (c. 70), for paving, &c. which, after reciting that there was a scarcity of water within the city and precincts, and that there were in the neighbourhood of the said city several springs of water belonging to the corporation, enacts that the corporation shall have full power to cause water to be conveyed to the said city from such springs, and gives them authority to enter upon and break up the soil of any public highway, or common, or waste ground, and the soil of any private grounds within two miles of the city, and the soil or pavement of any street within the city, in order to drain and collect the water of the springs, and to make reservoirs sufficient for keeping such water, and to erect conduits, water-houses, and engines necessary for distributing it, and to lay under ground aqueducts and pipes most convenient for the same purpose. The Act vests the right and property of all water-courses leading from the said springs to the city, and also of all reservoirs, conduits, water-houses, and engines, erected or used for the purpose, in the mayor, aldermen, and citizens of Bath. The following extract from a communication from the _Rev. Whitwell Elwin_, who has closely investigated the economy of the poorest classes in that city, thus describes the present state of the supply:—