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as all other sewage matter, to conduct the whole
into a large reservoir, whence the liquid should be
pumped into the river, near its mouth, and the more
solid residuum be removed for manure. This plan
would have been very costly, and at the same time
wasteful, as it would have subjected the refuse from
privies, &c., to a process which would deprive it of
almost all value as manure.

In the meantime, the distance between the inha-
bited portion of the city and the nearest market gar-
dens or farm lands being several miles, and conse-
quently so great as to discourage the cartage of
the night-soil from the privies, the disposal of
the night-soil of the city was, until very recently, a
difficulty, as giving rise to a great nuisance. The
soil was removed in close carts, by night, to a piece
of land which, when originally reserved for the pur-
pose, was a mile or more distant from habitations,
but which, as population increased, became gradually
less remote. On this land, called the "Manure
Depôt," the soil was shot into shallow pits, which
retained the more solid refuse, and permitted the
liquid to flow away, through a gully, into a swamp
to the west of the city, and extending to the Yarra,
below Melbourne. This depot having been pre-
viously complained against, the City Council closed
it, and as inconvenience then arose from want of a
place of deposit for the refuse, a plan was adopted
which, from its simplicity and success, induced the
owners of land adjacent to the city to follow it, and
thereby brought the manure into request, and re-
lieved the corporation from further necessity of pro-
viding for its disposal. The plan was to plough the
surface of a portion of one of the parks which was in
an unimproved and arid condition, and which was
distant two miles from the General Post Office, and
nearly a mile from habitations; this land was then
dealt with as if with the intention of planting vines
or constructing an orchard. Along the upper edge
of the ploughed land a trench was dug about seven
feet in breadth and nine inches deep, divided every
twenty-two feet of its length by small partition walls
of undisturbed earth about six or eight inches wide,
for the purpose of confining the liquid soil;
the bottom of the trench was then broken with the
pick to the depth of about six inches. Into the several
divisions of this trench the carts shot their contents
at night, and, as they did so, a gang of labourers was
employed digging out along the lower side of the
trench earth to a depth of nine inches, and a breadth
of seven feet as before, and throwing the earth
so excavated over the soil as deposited, thereby at
once covering it up and rendering it inodorous, and
at the same time opening a parallel trench in readi-
ness to have the floor of it broken with the pick, and
prepared for use on the following night. A great
prejudice was shown against this plan at the com-
mencement, from fear that a nuisance would be
created; but it was presently admitted that, even
during the night-hours between 11, p.m., and 5, a.m.,
when the soil was being deposited, the effluvium was
less than would be observed in passing an ordinary
newly-manured field, the earth after the covering
over of the soil with dry earth, but a faint odour
could be perceived close along the leeward edge of
the trench, and none whatever at a parallel distance
of fifty yards off. The park to which this process
was applied is nearly 100 acres in extent, and, at the
ordinary rate of the supply of manure from the city,
say forty cart-loads per night if all sent there, a
period of two years would elapse before the whole
surface would be gone over. Other parks of equal
or greater extent then remained, which could be
dealt with in the same manner. But long before a
sixteenth of the original ground had been gone over,
the manure became in request around the city, and
as the Corporation has at present no property in it,
the work in the park was discontinued. The experi-
ment has, in the meantime, served the excellent pur-
pose of proving—That the pouring of the soil into
underground sewers, is as unnecessary as it would
be wasteful; that the suburban lands may be con-
tinually re-fertilized by its application; and that the
cost of constructing sewers for its reception is un-
necessary and undesirable. That which I believe to
be now thought of as the best plan of stormwater
which occasionally flood the central street (Eliza-
beth-street); and the sewers to converge and join the
west of the city, and central valley of the Yarra,
receiving in their course the smaller drains intended
to carry off the waste and refuse water from houses,
but to be seldom as possible converted into dis-
charge-pipes for water-closets, and not at all for privies

EARTH-CLOSETS.

With respect to these, I can give but little satis-
factory information. It is, I apprehend, not neces-
sary to describe their construction, from the simple
contrivance of an iron bucket beneath the privy-
seat and a box of dry earth and a scoop beside it, to
the more elaborate patented mechanically fitted in-
ventions, such as Draper's patent, which has a box
fitted up at each side of the seat and filled with
powered earth, of which a quantity is liberated by
cranks and valves attached to the seat each time this
is sat upon or pressed down. If carefully and
cleanly used, the pans not converted into urinals or
receptacles for slops, and regularly emptied, and the
hoppers always replenished with properly powdered
earth, they are almost inodorous, preserve
in the soil those fertilizing properties which a water-
closet would destroy, and enable the business of
cleansing to be carried on by day, and therefore
more conveniently and cheaply than it could be by
night. But it can scarcely be expected that the in-
habitants of the lower and worst parts of a city
would so use such closets, or that the owners of
property of that description would willingly incur
the cost of fitting up such contrivances, or provide
for their being properly attended to; nor is this the
case only with the owners of the less valuable pro-
perty, it is still more so with owners of the largest
and best houses, who have had the upper floors fitted
with closets having a never failing supply of water
from the Yan Yean Waterworks, and consequently
requiring far less attention. Therefore, although
there is an earth-closet, company here, which under-
takes for a sum of £5 per annum to keep each earth-
closet regularly emptied and supplied with earth,
the number of closets in use in private houses is
comparatively small, the greater number of build-
ings fitted with them being Government offices, the
military barracks, the Industrial schools, &c., and
we have two of them in the Town Hall, where, as in
the Government establishments, so far as I can learn
they work tolerably well.

SCAVENGING.

This is performed for the Corporation under a
contract—the expenses of the contractor's charge for
the twelve months, which will expire on the 30th of
this month, is £2,575. The specification adopted as
that under which tenders for the ensuing twelve
months are being invited, is somewhat more strin-
gent than that previously in use, and therefore will
probably entail a trifling increase of cost. You will
observe that the contract only applies to the cleans-
ing of streets, lanes, &c., and not to the removal of
refuse from houses, yards, privies, and such like, for