All the streams which Fitzstephen mentions flowed into the river of Wells, and, in fact, gave that name to it; although it appears to have been also known from a very early period as the Fleet. As this river forms an important illustration of our subject generally, we may as well first notice such other running streams that originally watered and drained London as had no connection with the Fleet. The Wall-brook came from the north (probably Moor) fields, and, entering the City wall between Moorgate and Bishopsgate, divided the City into two parts. "From the wall it passed to St. Margaret's Church in Lothbury; from thence bencath the lower part of the Grocers' Hall, about the east part of their kitchen; under St. Mildred's Church, somewhat west from the Stocks Market; from thence through Bucklersbury, by one great house builded of stone and timber, called the 'Old Barge,' because barges out of the river of Thames were rowed up so far into this brook; on the back side of the houses in Walbrook Street (which taketh name from the said brook); by the west end of St. John's Church upon Walbrook; under Horseshoe Bridge; by the west side of Tallow Chandlers' Hall, and of the Skinners' Hall; and so behind the other houses to Elbow Lane, and by a part thereof down Greenwich Lane into the river of Thames."*

As the City increased in wealth and importance, and became the centre towards which the wealthiest merchants and men of business pressed, every inch of ground grew valuable. Bridges here and there were thrown over the Walbrook, and houses erected upon them; the example became generally followed; until at last the whole was arched over as it remains to this day. Some interesting traces of this once "fair brook of sweet water" were recently discovered. In making the excavations for the new line of streets north of the Mansion House, the soil at the depth of thirty feet below the present surface was found to be moist, highly impregnated with animal and vegetable matter, and almost of inky blackness in colour. Throughout the same line were at intervals noticed a vast and almost continuous number of piles, which in Princes Street were particularly frequent, and where also they descended much deeper. From this we may perceive at what an early period the Walbrook had been embanked, and how important its stream must have been thought when such extensive labours were bestowed upon it. The Langbourn, which gave name to the ward, and was so called from the length of its winding stream, has disappeared in the same way as the Walbrook. This welled out of the ground in Fenchurch Street, and ran through Lombard and other streets to Share-bourn Lane, which received that name on account of the bourn here sharing or dividing into several rills, taking each a separate way to the Thames.

The source of that river which Pope has immortalized as

"The king of dykes! than whom no sluice of mud

With deeper sable blots the silver flood,"

is in a spot somewhat different from the place where one might look for it who knew it only by Pope's famous allusions. The Fleet has its origin in the high grounds of that most beautiful of heaths, Hampstead; nor did its waters for some centuries belie the place of their birth. From Hampstead it passed by Kentish Town, Camden Town, and the old church of St. Pancras, towards Battle Bridge,

* Stow, b. ii. p. 2.

in the neighbourhood of which place an anchor is said to have been found, from which it is inferred that vessels must have anciently passed from the Thames so far up the river. It next directed its course past Bagnigge Wells and the House of Correction, towards the valley at the back of Mount Pleasant, Warner Street, and Saffron Hill, and so to the bottom of Holborn. Here it received the waters of the Old Bourne (whence the name Holborn), which rose near Middle Row, and the channel of which forms the sewer of Holborn Hill to this day. We have Stow's express testimony to the ancient sweetness and freshness of the Fleet; but it did not long retain its original character when a busy population had gathered upon its banks. So early as 1290 the monks of White Friars complained to the King and Parliament that the putrid exhalations arising from it were so powerful as to overcome all the frankincense burnt at their altars during divine service, and even occasioned the deaths of many of the brethren. The monks of the Black Friars, and the Bishop of Salisbury, whose house was in Salisbury Court, joined in the complaint. The state of the river appears to have been as injurious to the commerce, also, as to the health of the metropolis. At a Parliament held at Carlisle in 1307, Henry Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, complained that, whereas, in times past, the course of water running at London, under Old Borne Bridge and Fleet Bridge, into the Thames, had been of such breadth and depth that ten or twelve ships, navies at once with merchandizes, were wont to come to the foresaid bridge of Fleet, and some of them unto Old Borne Bridge; now the same course (by filth of the tanners and such others) was sore decayed; also by raising of wharfs, but especially by "diversion of the water made by them of the New Temple, for their mills standing without Baynard's Castle." The river was accordingly cleansed, and the mills, which for a time gave to it the name of Turnmill Brook, removed; but it did not recover its former depth or breadth. From that time down to the last century numerous were the occasions on which it was found necessary to scour the whole channel through; and towards the close of the sixteenth century a great endeavour was made to accomplish a still more important measure-that was the

bringing together into one head, at or near Hampstead, all the springs that supplied it, in the hope that thus a sufficient stream might be obtained to keep the river constantly clean. The attempt, however, failed, and from that time may be dated the regular progress of the decline of the once important Fleet river. About this period it lost the charm attached to the name of river; it became known as the Fleet Dyke. The river never looked up after that. Everything was done for it that could be done. The Lord Mayor and the civic authorities, in 1606, cleansed it as before, and caused floodgates to be made in "Holborn Ditch and Fleet Ditch," with some little benefit. Several interesting remains were discovered on this occasion. At the depth of fifteen feet were found Roman utensils, and a little deeper a great quantity of Roman coins, in silver, copper, brass, and other metals, but more in gold. At Holborn Bridge were found two brazen lares, or household gods of that people, about four inches long-the one a Bacchus, the other a Ceres. Maitland and Pennant concur in thinking it highly probable that these were thrown in by the affrighted Romans at the approach of Boadicea, when seventy thousand of their people were slain and the city reduced to ashes. Some similar circumstance appears to have occurred in a later time, from the number of Saxon antiquities found in the same place, including spurs, weapons, keys, seals, medals, crosses, and crucifixes. After the fire of London, the Fleet was again cleansed, deepened, and enlarged, and various other improvements made. The sides were built of stone and brick, with warehouses on each side, which ran under the street, and were designed to be used for the laying in of coals and other commodities. It had now five feet water at the lowest tide at Holborn Bridge; the wharfs on each side of the channel were thirty feet broad, and were rendered secure from danger in the night by rails of oak being placed along it. Over the ditch were four stone bridges-viz. at Bridewell (close to the Thames), Fleet Street, Fleet Lane, and Holborn. The old river once more bore the broad barges of the merchants up even to Holborn Bridge. Unfortunately, however, but a few years elapsed before it was as muddy, noisome, and useless as ever. The wits now began to let fly their merciless shafts at it. One notorious offender in particular had the impudence to summon the heroes of his 'Dunciad' to

"Where Fleet Ditch, with disemboguing streams,
Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames,"-

with the invitation

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Here strip, my children; here at once leap in,

And prove who best can dash through thick and thin."

This was too much. Within the next ten years the unfortunate river ceased to trouble its enemies any longer. In 1732 a petition was presented to Parliament, in which we find the petitioners stating that “ a part of the said channel, from Fleet Bridge to Holborn Bridge, instead of being useful to trade, as was intended, is not only filled up with mud and become useless, but is now, and for some years past hath been, a common nuisance; and that several persons have lately lost their lives by falling into the same." To remedy this state of things the petitioners prayed for power to fill up the channel of the Fleet from Holborn Bridge to Fleet Bridge; and next year a bill was brought in to accomplish their desire. The late Fleet Market soon occupied the site of the river from Holborn to Fleet Bridge; and, somewhat later (in 1764), the present Chatham Place the remainder

of its course to the Thames, including its mouth, where the "navies" were formerly wont to ride. Henceforward the history of the Fleet merges into the general history of the sewers of the metropolis.

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It is not easy to form an adequate conception of the inconvenience and annoyance which the inhabitants of London must have experienced before the formation of underground communications for carrying off the drainage of private houses. Soil had to be carried from the houses to places appointed by the City authorities, and there were no means of avoiding those domestic inconveniences which were experienced until within a recent period in Edinburgh, and are still so annoying to the inhabitants of many towns on the Continent. In 1670 the public laystalls and dunghills were at Mile End, Dowgate Dock, Puddle Dock, and Whitefriars. The consequences were, that Pestilence and Disease marked the city as their own. One time with another," says Sir William Petty, writing towards the close of the seventeenth century, "a plague happeneth in London every twenty years." In short, London generally must have been then almost as bad as St. Giles's is now! The first attempt of any importance in the way of remedy was an act passed in 1531, appointing a commission, the members of which were authorised "to survey the walls, streams, ditches, banks, gutters, sewers, gotes, calcies, bridges, trenches, mills, milldams, floodgates, ponds, locks, and hebbing wears." Under this very act, passed in the reign of Henry VIII., two of the seven existing boards of commissioners still exercise their powers. From the passing of that act down to the present time the progress of improvement has been slow but steady; and although much still remains to be done, enough has been accomplished to make London in all these matters an example to most of her sister capitals throughout the world. We must notice a few of the chief features of the system. The metropolitan district of sewers includes an area of ten miles round the General Post Office, which is subdivided, and placed under the management of the seven "boards" we have mentioned. The commissioners assess the inhabitants in their respective districts to the sewer-rate, which is expended in the repair of old sewers or in the forming of new. When the

older commissions were instituted, surface drainage alone was thought of; and as all the houses on the line were considered to be benefited by it, all were taxed for its support. The covering in of these ancient drains has, however, given an advantage to all those persons whose houses have a direct communication with them, which should have been followed by a corresponding arrangement with regard to payments. But at present houses which have no underground communication with the main sewers pay precisely the same as if they had. It is to be hoped that this difficulty will be ultimately got rid of through the facilities afforded (and which are continually increasing) of extending the advantages of the system to every part of the metropolis. In all that concerns this subject we have every one of us the deepest interest. Dr. Southwood Smith's striking observation to the Committee on the Health of Towns should be constantly remembered: "If," he says, "you were to take a map and mark out the districts which are the constant seats of fever in London, as ascertained by the records of the Fever Hospital, and at the same time compare it with a map of the sewers of the metropolis, you would be able to mark out invariably and with absolute certainty where the sewers are and where they are not, by observing where fever exists; so that we can always tell where the commissioners of sewers have been at work by the track of fever."

The progress of the sewage in London is now, however, very rapid, and but a few years more will elapse before the system must become essentially complete. At present the aggregate length of the sewers of the metropolis is enormous; and there is, perhaps, no other instance to be found where the expenditure of the requisite capital has been attended with such beneficial results. From 1756 to 1834 the number of sewers either built wholly or in part in the City district was one hundred and fourteen, some of them of very large dimensions; and one-third of the sewers had been made in the ten years preceding 1834. But a few facts relating to the Holborn and Finsbury Division will most strikingly illustrate the extent and rate of progress of the London Sewage. In this, the length of main covered sewers is 83 miles; the length of smaller sewers to carry off the surface water from the streets and roads, 16 miles; the length of drains leading from houses to the main sewers, 254 miles; and the length of main sewers constructed within the last TWENTY years, 40 miles. From July, 1830, to December, 1837 (a period of six years and a half), there was constructed of the above, 12 miles; and from January, 1838, to December, 1840 (a period of three years), the length of main covered sewers constructed was 10 miles. The very poorest parts of London now alone remain to be intersected with an underground communication; and, looking at what has been already done, we can not despair of the accomplishment of the rest. Indeed, the bill at present before Parliament, with every probability of being passed, will effect whatever is necessary. It provides that no future houses shall be built without sufficient drainage, and that the occupants of those already erected shall construct drains where requisite.

The works of the Metropolitan Sewage are as large as their objects are extensive. The general rule of the Commissioners of Sewers appears to be, not to make any public sewers which workmen cannot enter for the purpose of effecting repairs. The great drain which once formed the channel of the Fleet from