T D 
 
 UC-NRLF 
 
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LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 GIFT OK 
 
 Class 
 

 Twenty -Five Cents. 
 
 DEFECTS 
 
 IN 
 
 HOUSE DRAINAGE, 
 
 AND 
 
 Their Remedies. 
 
 By EDWARD S. PHILBRICK, 
 
 fflaM Engineer. 
 
 BOSTON : 
 
 -A.. 
 
 & CO. 
 
 1876, 
 
DEFECTS 
 
 HOUSE-DRAINAGE, 
 
 THEIR REMEDIES. 
 
 By EDWARD S. PHILBBIOK, 
 
 n 
 Civil Engineer. 
 
 Boston : 
 
 A. WILLIAMS & CO. 
 1876. 
 
The question of House-Drainage has been for some years past forcing 
 itself upon public attention, and yet the most extraordinary indifference 
 prevails on the subject. 
 
 The following pages were originally written for the valuable Report 
 of the Massachusetts State Board of Health. The subject discussed is of 
 such vital importance to the public at large, and is receiving so general 
 attention at the present time, that it has been thought best to present an 
 edition in this form. 
 
 S j 
 
 BOSTON, April, 1876. 
 
OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE, 
 
 The following is written for the latitude and climate of 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 It is not the purpose of this paper to prove the necessity Limit of 
 of removing fecal matter promptly from our houses. This discussed. 
 may be assumed as already proven. The intention is rather 
 to point out how, in our community and under existing con- 
 ditions, it can best be done. Neither does it seem worth 
 while now to discuss the relative merits of the various 
 systems by which this removal is accomplished in different 
 places. Volumes have been written on this branch of the 
 subject, and new schemes are constantly under trial. But the 
 experience of all the large towns in this country, as well as 
 that of most large European towns for the past ten or fifteen 
 years, indicates the water-closet system for the removal of fecal 
 matter, and the uniting with this of the refuse of kitchen 
 sinks, for removal by water carriage through a system of 
 drains and sewers to a destination suited to the locality, as 
 best adapted to meet the wants of our people. It is, on the 
 whole, likely to be attended with less difficulty in its details, 
 and more efficiency when applied to all sorts of houses and 
 all classes of population, than any other system of removal 
 yet devised.* At any rate, this system has had a very water-car- 
 
 J riage system 
 an estab- 
 
 * Menzies, in his " Treatise on the Sanitary Management and Utilization l ^ d cus - 
 of Sewage-," page 8, says : " Looking at the question in all its bearings, I 
 am forced to the conclusion that the water-closet system will supersede all 
 others, while I believe that I shall be able to show that, agriculturally 
 speaking, it is the best and most profitable." 
 
 Baldwin Latham, in his " Sanitary Engineering," page 328, says : " A good 
 water-closet is the only appliance fit to be used within a house, for by it all 
 matters are at once conveyed away, and cease to have the power of produc- 
 ing evil, so far as our houses are concerned. It is not so, however, with 
 those systems which conserve fecal deposits within, or in close proximity 
 to, our dwellings, as there is always danger in storing a dangerous article, 
 however carefully we may tend and guard against its evil effects." 
 
 Mr. Simon, in his report as medical officer of the Privy Council and Local 
 
 158580 
 
DEFECTS IX HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 Defects to 
 be pointed 
 out. 
 
 extensive application, and is widely popular. Until some- 
 thing better is devised, and has had the test of time to prove 
 its worth, this will continue to be used. ' It has its weak 
 points, however, and much remains to be done /towards avoid- 
 ing the dangers incident to its mismanagement, and towards 
 perfecting its details. It behooves us, also, to seek to adapt 
 it to the conditions existing in our community in the simplest 
 and most efficient manner, so that they can be understood by 
 any one who owns a house, or hires one. 
 
 Drains out- 
 side the 
 house. 
 
 Cesspools 
 objection- 
 able. 
 
 Essential 
 conditions. 
 
 DRAINS BETWEEN THE HOUSE AND SEWER OR OTHER 
 
 RECEPTACLE. 
 
 The prime object of house-drainage is the removal of the 
 refuse with all possible speed. Every device by which any 
 part of it is hoarded or retarded in or about the premises is 
 to be carefully avoided. Hence, cesspools are an abomina- 
 tion.* Wherever sewers exist, they are worse than needless. 
 The only excuse for any sort of cesspool near a house is the 
 need of separating grease from kitchen-drains. Small, tight, 
 brick tanks, or stoneware grease-pots, seem to be a necessary 
 evil among a population who waste, or whose servants waste, 
 so much fatty matter iu their kitchen-sinks as ours. The 
 best way to provide for this will be described later. 
 
 To secure a prompt and continuous flow, drains must be 
 smooth inside, must be well laid, of a proper size, and have 
 sufficient slope to render them self-cleansing. Where the last 
 is not practicable, there should be provision for frequent 
 They should also be as nearly impervious as pos- 
 
 flushing. 
 
 Government Board, London, 1874, says : "The advantages of the water-closet 
 system, where. it can be adopted, and will be properly worked, are, as regards 
 the extremely important object of getting the refuse continuously and com- 
 pletely removed, too evident to require advocacy. Those advantages, how- 
 ever, may fail to be realized if the system be adopted without due circum- 
 spection ; and the conditions which ought to be kept in view in order to 
 avoid any such failure are, apparently, these three : First, that the closets 
 will universally receive an unfailing sufficiency of water properly supplied 
 them ; secondly, that the comparatively large volume of sewage which the 
 system produces can be, in all respects, satisfactorily disposed of; and 
 thirdly, that on all premises which the system brings into connection with 
 the common sewers, the construction and keeping of the closets and other 
 drainage relations will be subject to skilled direction and control." 
 * See Menzies' Treatise, page 20. 
 
DEFECTS TX HOUSE-DKAIXAGE. 
 
 sible, to avoid contaminating the surrounding soil. For Best mate- 
 house-drains, no material is so good as cast-iron, with calked 
 lead joints. 'But glazed stoneware pipes, carefully put together 
 with hydraulic cement, will make very good drains outside 
 the house walls, if the soil is firm and not liable to settle. 
 There is much of it made in this country ; but it is mostly 
 inferior in strength to the Scotch or English, which is imported 
 at slightly higher rates. Their connections or branches gonnee- 
 should never be at right angles, but oblique, so that T-joints 
 or branches should never be used. 
 They always tend to produce an accu- 
 mulation of solid matter. Y-joints or ^:~-rr.^^^^ T branches. 
 branches can always be obtained (see 
 Fig. 1 and 2), and the position of the FIG. i. T-joint in Drain, 
 drain can generally be adapted to their 
 use by taking a little pains. When 
 being laid, a swab should always be 
 drawn through them, to wipe the sur- 
 plus cement from the joint on the inside, 
 every new piece put into the trench FIG. 2. Y-joint. 
 being strung on to the line or rattan which carries the swab, 
 and draws it along. The writer has seen a good drain, which 
 would otherwise have been successful, entirely choked by 
 sewage accumulating against those burrs of cement inside 
 the joints, which should have been wiped out when laid. 
 Col. Waring recommends a hemp gasket at the joint, to pre- 
 vent the cement from running through, but this cannot be 
 applied without shortening the joint to some extent, and 
 thereby impairing its tightness. The lap is never very long, 
 at best, and cement is never so sure of stopping water as 
 when its surface is wiped, while fresh, on the side where the 
 water seeks to enter it.* 
 
 A frequent mistake is made in laying too large-sized pipes Drains often 
 for drains, arising from the notion that small pipes are more 
 likely to be choked. The fact is, that all increase of size 
 above the requirements of capacity is an actual injury, by 
 diminishing the scouring power of the current ; so that, if laid 
 
 * A gasket, carefully applied, would tend to hold tlie ends concentric, and 
 insure a continuity of the interior lines, but it should be applied with skill, 
 and in limited quantity. 
 
6 DEFECTS IX HOUSE-DKAIXAGE. 
 
 with a fall of two feet or more in a hundred feet of length, a 
 four-inch pipe is better than a larger one for a house-drain 
 used by some fifty persons, because, with this limited flow, 
 the small one would scour better than the larger one. If 
 rain- water is admitted from the roof-gutters, either for con- 
 venience or flushing, a larger size is perhaps needed, but six 
 inches is ample, even then, for any ordinary house-roof. If 
 the fall is less than two per hundred, flushing may be needed. 
 Latham says that, in order to be self-cleansing, the house- 
 drain should convey its contents at the rate of three feet per 
 dmhS f second. To attain this velocity, a four-inch drain must have 
 a fall of about one in a hundred, and a six-inch drain must 
 have a fall of about one in a hundred and forty, even when 
 half-full. As such drains seldom run half- full, they cannot 
 be relied upon as self-cleansing, unless laid with nearly double 
 the above rate of slope, say two per hundred for four-inch 
 drains, or one and a half per hundred for six-inch drains. 
 For hotels and large establishments containing many recepta- 
 cles for sewage and many branch drains, a six-inch pipe would 
 be ample, unless rain-water be admitted from extensive roof- 
 whenused surfaces. In this case the size of the drain is governed 
 water'/this first, by its rate of fall, which is generally limited by local 
 size. topography ; and second, by the size of the roof to be drained. 
 
 In our climate, a rainfall of at least one and a half inches per 
 hour from the roof-surface should be provided for, adjusting 
 the size of the drain to carry this rainfall. In such cases, the 
 sewage can be practically ignored, for its volume is quite in- 
 significant in comparison with that of the rain-water. The 
 problem then becomes a question of hydraulics, and reference 
 must be had to the governing elements and well-known phys- 
 ical laws, thence computing the required size. 
 
 Drains are not intended to carry broken crockery, old 
 clothing, rags or shoes. Such things are often found in them, 
 it is true ; but increasing the size of the drain is no remedy 
 for such abuse, which would choke a street sewer. On the 
 other hand, the smaller the drain which will carry the largest 
 flow with which it is likely to be taxed, the better is the 
 scour, and the more likely it is to keep clean. Any accumu- 
 lation of sewage in the pipes is sure to decompose and give 
 rise to abundance of poisonous gas, which it is next to inipos- 
 
DEFECTS IK HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 sible to keep out of our houses. It cannot be expected that f 
 the interior of sewers and drains should always be free from S" h 
 such gases, but it is by all means desirable to reduce their vol- volume - 
 time to a minimum, and then to apply all possible precautions 
 to prevent their mixing with the air we breathe. To prevent Traps. 
 their access to our houses, traps are used. To a certain ex- 
 tent, and in certain places, they are essential, but there may be 
 too many traps. Every trap in the line of. a waste or soil 
 pipe is necessarily a place for sewage to be arrested tempo- 
 rarily, and, if the use of the pipe be not very frequent, de- 
 composition occurs, evolving gases. 
 
 In all houses draining into sewers, the place where a trap 
 is most essential is outside of the house walls, on the main 
 house-drain, after it has collected all the branches which are 
 tributary to it, and between this point and the sewer. Prof. 
 Edmund Parkes, in his treatise on practical hygiene, says, 
 page 343 : "It is hardly possible to insist too much on the 
 importance of this rule of disconnection between the house- 
 pipes and outside drains. Late events [supposed to be the 
 illness of the Prince of Wales] have shown what a risk the 
 richer classes of this country now run, who not only bring the 
 sewers into their houses, but multiply water-closets, and even 
 put them close to bedrooms. The simple plan of disconnec- 
 tion, if properly done, would insure them against the other- 
 wise certain danger of sewer air entering the house. Houses 
 which have for years been a nuisance from persistent smells, 
 have been purified and become healthy by this means." The 
 medical officer of the Privy Council, London, says : "This 
 condition ought to be insisted on : that every private drain be 
 properly trapped and ventilated in relation to the common 
 sewers," etc. (Report of 1874, p. 32.) 
 
 In England and other places having a mild climate, it is Traps be- 
 
 i . , , -, f, tween house 
 
 usual to disconnect the house-drams from the street sewers by and sewers. 
 providing that the former should discharge their contents into 
 a chamber or tank, open at the top, just outside the house 
 walls, into which the rain-water spouts are often turned. The 
 rigor of our New England winter prevents our people from 
 following many of the devices which in Old England are quite 
 efficient, and this one among others. All out-of-door drains 
 are here of necessity kept deep in the ground, with as little 
 
8 
 
 DEFECTS ES T HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 exposure as possible to a temperature of 40 Fahrenheit below 
 freezing, which sometimes prevails for several successive 
 days.* The best sort of disconnec- 
 tion we can apply, is to introduce a 
 pipe-trap between the house and the 
 sewer. This should not be a built 
 chamber with square corners, which 
 FIG. 3.-Trap for Drain, might collect solid matter, but a mere 
 depression in the pipe itself, having the same sectional area 
 as the pipe, and therefore containing the minimum of matter 
 for decomposition. (See fig. 3.) 
 
 Such traps may sometimes be forced by the compression 
 of air in the street sewers, especially if these are tide-locked 
 
 FIG. 4. 
 
 vents for at high water, like many of those in Boston. To provide 
 
 outside J 
 
 trap. against this, a vent-pipe, of four inches diameter at least, 
 should in cities be led from the hole in the trap directly up 
 the side of the house, like a water conductor, and above all 
 dormer windows. The water conductor itself will not answer 
 for this purpose, for the compression of air in the sewer is 
 most likely to occur during a heavy rain, when the water- 
 spouts are fully occupied as such, and are, therefore, incap- 
 able of giving vent to the gas, for which special outlet must 
 
 * At the moment of writing this, November 30, 1875, the thermometer has 
 averaged only two degrees above zero, Fahrenheit, for the past twenty-four 
 hours, with a gale of wind from the north-west, forcing the air into every 
 crack and cranny of our houses. 
 
DEFECTS rtf IIOUSE-DKArN-AGE. 9 
 
 be given. In suburban districts, a vent into a pile of loose 
 stones, or a man-hole chamber under ground will answer. 
 (See fig. 4.) During the winter this chamber may be filled 
 with dry leaves, etc., and the vent covered with wire netting, 
 in order to prevent freezing. 
 
 A perfectly ventilated system of sewers would doubtless sewer-ven- 
 
 J ~ ' tilation gen- 
 
 render this vent-pipe needless ; but few of our towns, if any, cmiiyim. 
 
 perfect. 
 
 have attained this stage of perfection in this respect. The 
 method of sewer-ventilation advocated by Baldwin Latham, 
 and largely practised in England, and by J. H. Shedd in this 
 country, consists of small holes in the man-hole covers in the 
 streets. In our climate, such vents are completely sealed by 
 ice or frozen mud for six months, and perhaps by liquid mud 
 and dust for a large part of the other six, unless cared for by 
 men kept for the purpose. 
 
 The subject of cesspools has been alluded to above. Even 
 where no street sewers exist, the cesspool may sometimes be 
 dispensed with. Col. George E. Waring, Jr., in a series of 
 excellent articles lately published in the "Atlantic Monthly," 
 tells of his own experience in distributing his sewage through 
 the soil of his lawn by porous pipes, serving to utilize the 
 material in the simplest and cheapest manner. The writer 
 has pursued a similar plan for over twenty years successfully. 
 But many people have too little land about their houses to 
 provide even this small " sewage farm " within their own 
 limits. 
 
 The cesspool, then, in the absence of sewers, becomes a 
 necessity, and large numbers of our people are thus driven, 
 by the increase of poulation, to live on quarter-acre lots, and 
 even smaller ones, with their old privy-vaults, cesspools and 
 wells for drinking-water within one or two rods of one 
 another ! The habits of our people demand all " modern con- 
 veniences " inside their houses. They ask for water-supply 
 and waste-pipes in all directions, and upon every floor ; but 
 if dependent upon wells for their drinking-water, these Poisoning 
 sources are sure to become sinks in the course of time. 
 Neither can they expect any warning, appreciable by the 
 senses. The change is insensible and invisible. The well- 
 water may look as pure as ever, and taste as cool and re- 
 freshing, and yet contain the seeds of disease. Some argue 
 
10 DEFECTS IN HOUSE -DRAINAGE. 
 
 that because their cesspool is on lower ground than the well, 
 the latter cannot be affected, for, say they, " the dirty water 
 can't run up hill." They forget that the contents of the cess- 
 pool may be twenty or thirty feet higher than the bottom of 
 their well, from which they generally get their supply, and 
 that although underground drainage, which supplies the well, 
 generally runs in a direction indicated by the slope of the 
 surface, there is no certainty about its always being so. 
 There are times when the well-springs are low, and but little 
 water is found in them. How do they know, then, that the 
 cesspool, though in ground lower than the top of the well, 
 may not soak in the direction of the well, whose bottom, 
 nearly empty, is many feet below it? If the soil be once 
 polluted about the house below the absorbing powers of sur- 
 face vegetation, whose roots seldom go deeper than one or 
 two feet, it never can be relied upon again with safety for 
 the filtration of water for drinking. 
 
 The accumulation of filth in the soil around these porous 
 cesspools is just as certain as the annual rise of the streams 
 after the winter rains, and such accumulation is as certain to 
 be followed by injurious effects upon the health of people 
 whose houses are near such influences, as is any other viola- 
 tion of sanitary laws. It is said to be the invention of the 
 shirt that brought us immunity from the plague, through the 
 improved cleanliness of the skin. But if our people go on as 
 they have done to pollute the soil about their houses by using 
 water, as they now do, to dissolve their filth, rinse it out of 
 their houses, and soak it down into their soil, the most 
 frequent changes of linen will not save them. They must 
 invent some other source for their drinking-water, than to 
 pump it up again from the same soil, or the plagues of the 
 East will visit us again in some form or other. 
 
 SEWERAGE should follow immediately, or be provided 
 simultaneously with water-supply. For, if wells are aban- 
 doned, and aqueduct water is to be substituted, the consump- 
 tion of water is multiplied at once, and cesspools become 
 quite inadequate to dispose of the house- washings. If sew- 
 erage is not provided simultaneously with a water-supply, the 
 surroundings of our houses soon become saturated with water 
 as well as filth, and steam up, under our July suns, to infect 
 
DEFECTS IX HOUSE-DKAINAGE. 11 
 
 our systems, through the lungs instead of the stomach, with 
 consequences quite as fatal, and probably more speedy. 
 
 The details of the construction of sewers, and the ultimate 
 disposition of the sewage, are subjects demanding a separate 
 study for each new locality, and their investigation would be 
 beyond the limits of this paper. No branch of civil engineer- 
 ing is more important, or more fraught with difficulties de- 
 manding skill and a careful study of the experience of others. 
 It is, in fact, one of the most important questions connected 
 with the growth of our modern civilization. No community 
 can afford to ignore it. 
 
 Trouble often arises from the settling and breaking of Drains laid 
 house-drains, when laid upon filled land. The books say that nd ned 
 they must be laid in "virgin soil." It might puzzle the 
 wisest to find any soil to answer that description among the 
 many thousand houses built upon pile foundations in Boston 
 and its suburbs. The occupants of such houses at the South 
 End of the city, and in the fine mansions on the "Back Bay" 
 have had a good deal of trouble from this source. In fact, it 
 must exist, in some degree, over the greater part of wards 
 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11 (old divisions). The houses being built 
 and occupied long before the mud bottom under the filled 
 streets has become thoroughly settled, this process of settling 
 continues in some places for years, carrying down with it the 
 house-drains, which are inevitably sheared off near the outside 
 of the house walls, for these are built on rigid foundations. 
 The immediate consequence is a leak in the drain close to the 
 outside of the cellar wall, and in some cases, entire breach of 
 continuity. 
 
 If leaking alone, the only warning received by the occu- Broken 
 pant of the house is in the percolation of the sewage through dl 
 the wall or up through the cellar floor, for there is not one 
 wall in five hundred that will stop it. Neither will con- 
 creting cellar bottoms stop it. The more resistance there is 
 offered to the influx by such walls and floors, the more the 
 filth is accumulated in the surrounding soil by lapse of time 
 and constant leakage from the cracked drain, till the clean, 
 porous gravel with which the street was once filled becomes 
 saturated with the sewage, a sponge of an uncertain extent, 
 filled with the foulest of matter, which it is next to impossible 
 
12 DEFECTS IX HOUSE-DEAINAGE. 
 
 to shut out of the cellars, for it is both fluid and gaseous, and 
 penetrates the minutest pores. 
 
 Remedies. The remedy for this nuisance is by no means simple. 
 Wooden boxes are slightly pliable, and, if made with care, 
 and well clamped, may answer sometimes for temporary 
 house-drains, till the material under the street has ceased 
 settling ; but even wooden boxes cannot be bent far without 
 opening joints and becoming leaky. If houses must be built 
 and occupied in such places, the only sure way of construct- 
 ing a permanently tight house-drain would be to drive a row 
 of piles for its foundation, between the house and the sewer. 
 Even then, if the sewer is not built upon piles, and they 
 rarely are, the break would occur where the piles cease, for 
 nothing else is rigid over the compressible mud of these 
 regions. This evil is so widely prevalent, that great com- 
 plaint has arisen about the drainage of those districts, the 
 source of which is more likely to be traceable to cracked 
 house-drains, than to any defects in the sewers themselves. 
 It is certainly a serious matter for any one who contemplates 
 living upon newly-filled lands. ' The use of cast-iron drain- 
 pipe all the way to the sewer, with calked lead joints, is 
 recommended by some authorities, in soils subject to settling. 
 But even iron pipes will break, if rigidly connected, about 
 as soon as stoneware, though, having fewer joints, they may 
 break in fewer places. They are certainly no sure remedy 
 for this evil. If a tight, flexible pipe could be made, it might 
 answer the purpose for awhile, but such a thing is yet to be 
 invented in a permanent form.* 
 
 Man-holes A commission recently appointed by the city government of 
 recommend- Boston to consider the drainage of that city, recommend 
 making a man-hole for access to the house-drain close to the 
 outside of the house wall, so as to allow of ready inspection 
 for detection and mending of leaks, caused by settlement of 
 newly-filled lands. This is an excellent suggestion, and if 
 the leaks were confined to this point, would help the case 
 materially. This point is the one where settlement is most 
 likely to occur, and it may cover the whole trouble in a 
 
 * A flexible drain-pipe, made by coupling short joints of iron with rubber 
 gaskets, if carefully put together, might answer for a number of years, but 
 any packing of such organic matter is subject to decay, and then leakage 
 occurs. 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 13 
 
 majority of cases, if well watched. Of course, it would need 
 protection from frost in exposed situations. This could 
 readily be given by filling the man-hole chamber with straw 
 or litter. 
 
 Where a "virgin soil" exists, there is, of course, no excuse 
 for the breaking of drains. Yet they sometimes do break, 
 from the want of care in the laying or in packing the earth 
 around or under them, especially where passing across the 
 earth newly filled around the outside of a cellar wall. Such 
 places should always be puddled with water when filling, both 
 under and over the drains. Of course, every leak is a source 
 of great risk, contaminating the soil in its vicinity to an ex- 
 tent dependent on its permeability. In short, no workman- Good work. 
 
 manship is 
 
 ship can be too good to be employed in laying house-drains, essential. 
 They are out of sight, and, therefore, out of mind. More- 
 over, a defect can only be detected after months, if not years, 
 during which time the soil may have become polluted to an 
 incurable extent, rendering a home a mere pest-house which 
 might otherwise have been healthy. 
 
 The increased use of water in our houses is justly regarded increased 
 
 J use of water 
 
 as one of the most valuable agents in raising the standard of bri jgy* eau 
 cleanliness among the poor, and in contributing to the com- 
 fort and luxury of the more wealthy. But it must not be 
 forgotten that it brings with it these increased risks, and 
 demands the most careful attention ; for the more water we 
 dilute our sewage with, the further will it penetrate through 
 pores and diffuse itself through the soil, unless securely led 
 off in proper channels to proper places. 
 
 DRAINS WITHIN THE HOUSE WALLS. 
 
 The above remarks apply chiefly to the drains outside of Drains 
 houses. But that portion of the drain which is within the house. 
 walls deserves still more rigid scrutiny. The soil outside has 
 certain absorbent powers, combining chemically with the poi- 
 sonous gases, or holding air in its pores for their partial oxi- 
 dation. Moreover, the poisonous influences within the walls, 
 are much more likely to be absorbed by and act upon our 
 systems through the lungs, than those which are partially shut 
 out by the walls, or partially diluted by the open air. A 
 New England climate does not admit of much "fresh air" 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 The poor 
 cannot af- 
 ford fresh 
 air in win- 
 ter. 
 
 " Modern 
 improve- 
 ments " in- 
 cheap 
 houses. 
 
 inside the homes of those who cannot afford to heat it during 
 six months of the year. The suffering from frost is immedi- 
 ate, leading the poor man to calk every crack, while bad air 
 is a slow poison, warning us perhaps by the sense of smell, 
 in some degree, yet not in the urgent manner which would 
 lead to an appreciation of its importance. If not immediately 
 attended to and changed, the bad air soon ceases to attract 
 our attention through the sense of smell, and is never thought 
 of as a serious matter by a large part of our population. In 
 fact, they might perish with the frost if they failed to shut 
 out the pure air, and so choose the chance of living by shut- 
 ting out both frost and air together. We must therefore 
 expect to find poorly ventilated houses among the poor in 
 winter. The exhalations from the skin and lungs are, unfor- 
 tunately, not so easily collected and got rid of as the fluid and 
 solid excretions of the body. But in getting rid of the lat- 
 ter, if we do not take great care 4 they, too, become gaseous, 
 and return to plague us in the air, already heavy with the 
 vapors from the lungs and skin in badly ventilated houses. 
 The introduction of water-closets and slop-sinks into tene- 
 ment houses should therefore be guarded with peculiar atten- 
 tion, or the benefits to be derived from their use will be more 
 than cancelled by the evils which may arise from their defect- 
 ive construction. 
 
 A great number of houses have been built within a few 
 years upon speculation in the vicinity of Boston and other 
 large towns by a class of professional builders who erect long 
 blocks with borrowed money, reducing the cost to a minimum 
 by doing the work in a wholesale way, building by the dozen 
 as it were. Every part of the work is subjected to competi- 
 tion and the lowest bids taken, regardless of the reputation 
 of the builder. The drainage and plumbing of such houses 
 is generally calculated to please the eye by a display of marble 
 slabs and plated mountings in convenient places ; but there 
 being no reward offered for good workmanship or good plan- 
 ning, neither is to be expected. It is here we find a combina- 
 tion of bad designs, defective work, and poor materials, with 
 a display to catch the eye, making a sort of man-trap or 
 vvhited sepulchre ; for no sooner does a family attempt to use 
 such a house as a home, and to turn its drainage into the 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 15 
 
 receptacles conveniently provided for the purpose, than we 
 find sewer-gas diffused everywhere. The occupants of such 
 a house would be safer, in many cases, if all their sewage were 
 thrown into the middle of the street, or even on the side- 
 walks, to decompose in the sunshine, or to be eaten by the 
 dogs and rats in true Oriental style ; for the products of its 
 decomposition would then at least be diluted and scattered by 
 the winds, and would not be carried about their houses in 
 concentrated form by pipes and passages, to poison the air of 
 the bed-chamber and nursery. 
 
 Menzies says (page 13) : "The gas which arises in foul 
 drains is of a singularly light character, and has a tendency 
 to ascend or draw towards any heated part of a house. 
 Hence it often arises that houses in towns situated on the Lightness of 
 highest ground are more unhealthy than those in the valleys, 
 the foul air rises to them through the drains ! As during the 
 greater part of the year the internal temperature of an inhab- 
 ited dwelling, and especially of some parts of it, is much 
 higher than the surrounding atmosphere, it is obvious that 
 the gas naturally ascends to the living-rooms, especially if 
 during the winter and autumn they are warm and comfort- 
 able. These water-closets are also generally on the bedroom 
 floor, and it is more injurious to health to sleep in foul air 
 than to be in it during the day-time." 
 
 In planning house-drains, they should be got outside the Drains to be 
 walls of the house as directly as possible. In public institu- thewaiis. 
 tions, or other large buildings, where a large number of recep- 
 tacles of sewage is provided, the main drain for the collection 
 of the whole should be outside the walls, wherever practica- 
 ble, for the reason that fewer joints of pipe, and fewer chances 
 of leakage from imperfect work, would thus occur within the 
 walls. 
 
 The material for drains within the walls should be metal in Material for 
 all cases. It is often customary to lead a drain across under insTdeof 
 a basement floor by stoneware pipes, which, though much 
 better than the old-fashioned brick drain, is far inferior to 
 iron. The writer has seen such a drain, well laid with Scotch cement is 
 pipe and full cement joints, and covered with concrete of gas? 101 
 hydraulic cement on the cellar floor, giving off through this 
 cement an amount of stench that made the cellar nauseous, 
 
16 DEFECTS I1ST HOTJSE-DRAESTAGE. 
 
 even though the soil-pipe above was ventilated. The sewer 
 in the street may have been in fault, but this case serves to 
 show how penetrating are these gases, and that good hydraulic 
 cement mortar, though impervious to water, is not impervious 
 to them. A ventilated trap outside the house afterwards 
 stopped this nuisance in the case referred to, but even this 
 may not be enough in all cases, for a certain amount of slime 
 inevitably collects upon the insides of house-drains themselves, 
 which, by its decomposition, evolves gases requiring metal 
 sewer-gas joints to hold them. Menzies says (p. 14), "I have known 
 
 very pene- J J \ 1 / ' 
 
 trating. ^his gas pass through floors and through chinks in two-feet 
 walls. It will find out the smallest opening in any pipe 
 that will give it a chance of getting to the heat or the open 
 air." This same gas, if escaping from a slight leak in a drain 
 buried in the soil outside the house, would doubtless be 
 absorbed and rendered innocuous by the soil and by the air 
 within its pores, but under a house the case is widely differ- 
 
 iron pipes, ent. Cast-iron pipes, with leaded joints, well calked, and 
 painted, are safe ; and unless subjected to such great changes 
 of temperature as might loosen the joints by expansion and 
 contraction of length, will prove satisfactory for a long term 
 
 should be of years.* If iron is used inside the walls, there is seldom 
 
 above floors 
 
 anything to be gained by burying it under the cellar or base- 
 ment floor. Such pipes should be readily accessible for in- 
 spection. If a little attention be devoted to the subject, they 
 can generally be placed along some wall or partition, or hung 
 from the ceiling, where their joints can all be readily seen to 
 be recalked and painted whenever necessary. If a water- 
 closet be placed in the basement, it should be near the wall, 
 where the soil-pipe leaves the house, so that this pipe, pass- 
 ing just above the floor, can serve for its drainage. If neces- 
 sary to this end, the floor of the closet can be raised one 
 or two steps above the rest of the basement floor. Prof. 
 
 * Latham, in his Sanitary Engineering (p. 319), gives preference to lead 
 over iron for soil-pipes. But the superiority of cast-iron over lead has been 
 amply proven in this country for over ten years. Latham's objection to the 
 rusting of iron pipes may be applicable to wrought-iron, but does not seem 
 valid as to cast pipes, the insides of which soon become coated with a film, 
 beyond which the rust does not penetrate far. Lead soil-pipes, on the other 
 hand, are very difficult to secure against sagging out of place, against rats, 
 and against corrosion, or nails carelessly driven. 
 
DEFECTS IK HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 17 
 
 Parkes says (Practical Hygiene, p. 343) : " It should be a 
 strict rule, that no drain-pipe of any kind should pass under a 
 house. If there must be a pipe passing from front to back, 
 or the reverse, it is much better to take it above the base- 
 ment floor than underneath, and to have it exposed through- 
 out its course." 
 
 It has been a common practice in England to provide a cellar and 
 
 basement 
 
 drain from the cellar or basement into which the scouring drains. 
 water can be emptied which is used in the washing of floors, 
 etc. This drain is generally discharged into the main drain 
 outside of the house. A trap is generally provided under 
 the gulley or sink where the water is poured, but, as the 
 place is not in daily use, this trap is likely to become dry or 
 filled with sand from the scouring water, and in either case 
 useless. It is better to dispense with the trap in such places, 
 and depend upon the trap which should always exist outside the 
 house. The only risk of bad gas from such a sink, would be 
 from the other house-drains themselves. This risk is not to 
 be ignored, and in order to escape it, such a sink should be 
 placed, not under the house, but in an outer shed, or, better 
 yet, in the yard, outside the house, where a grating can cover 
 it. A pocket or catch-basin for sand should always be pro- 
 vided under the grating. 
 
 The drainage of the soil on which a house is built, if it Foundation 
 
 an ^ subsoil 
 
 consist or porous sand or gravel, will not require much atten- drains. 
 tion, unless the level of the cellar be decidedly below that of 
 most of the surrounding land, as in broad plains or valley- 
 bottoms. When such cases occur, or when the soil is imper- 
 vious, a porous tile-drain should be laid, three or four feet 
 deep if practicable, with porous material over it around the 
 bottom of the foundation- wall, with a delivery to the house- 
 drain above its outside trap which disconnects it from the 
 sewer. In case no sewers are provided, among a scattered 
 population, such a drain can generally be led to some point 
 low enough to discharge it on the surface of the same lot ; if 
 not, the lot is very ineligible for building purposes. 
 
 Branch drains from sinks, wash-trays and wash-bowls are Branch 
 generally made of lead, which seems to be the most suitable w 
 material. Its pliability and durability are valuable qualities. 
 The first may lead to its distortion of form, by sagging, if not 
 
18 
 
 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 well supported. Where these lead waste-pipes enter the iron 
 ones, a common practice among plumbers is to secure the 
 
 puttyjoints. joint by glazier's putty. This is but little better than a rag 
 packing for such a place, for the slightest expansion and con- 
 traction of the pipes, endwise, by changes of temperature, will 
 crack the putty and lead to its crumbling away in one year. 
 The only proper way to make such a joint, is to solder a tinned 
 iron or brass ferule to the outside of the lead pipe, which is 
 to enter the bell of the iron pipe. This ferule gives a stiff 
 material against which a lead joint can be calked in the same 
 way as between two pieces of iron pipe. This lead packing 
 will yield to the expansion, without breaking or crumbling. 
 When lead traps are used under water-closets, the joint 
 between them and the iron soil-pipe should be secured in the 
 same way. 
 
 SasSpTpes The connection of waste-pipes from wash-bowls, bath-tubs, 
 
 from bowls, was h_t ra y S) and of tank overflows, with the soil-pipes, has given 
 rise to much trouble. In this neighborhood, it is customary for 
 plumbers to enter them into the trap of the nearest water- 
 closet below the water-line. This is often carelessly done, 
 making the connection so near the surface of the water in the 
 
 Overflows, trap that the seal is not reliable. Moreover, the emanations 
 of foul gas from the water in the trap would rise through the 
 cistern overflows and render the water in such cisterns unsafe 
 for drinking, for the rarity of the use of such overflows ren- 
 ders traps in them liable to dry up, and therefore of little 
 va ^ ue> The English discharge such waste-pipes over a grat- 
 j n g j n ^ ne O p en a j r> which drains into the main drain below, 
 thus insuring complete disconnection. But this is not prac- 
 ticable in our climate, and we must seek some other method. 
 The overflows of tanks must needs have open mouths at their 
 upper ends, and should, therefore, not connect with a foul 
 pipe below. The rain-water conductor from the roof is a fit 
 place to discharge them, unless itself connected with the 
 drains below. When thus disqualified, the overflows can ter- 
 minate in the open air outside the house, for they will never 
 carry water enough to cause annoyance, the water being 
 always clean. The wastes can be safely discharged, as above 
 described, into a water-closet or slop-sink trap, if pains be 
 taken to enter them at its bottom, as far as possible below the 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 19 
 
 water-line. If such wastes are of considerable lengtn, say 
 ten feet or more, they may become offensive, from the decom- 
 position of the slime inside them in warm weather, and should 
 have S-traps near their upper ends, with vents from the top 
 of these traps at least one inch in diameter, connecting with 
 the main .vent of the soil-pipe. The practice of drawing Drinking. 
 drinking- water from a tank or cistern must be condemned should not 
 
 be drawn 
 
 under any circumstances. There is no reason for it, with a from tanks - 
 constant supply in the mains, such as is universally given 
 in our country. The practice originated with the system of 
 intermittent supply, formerly prevalent in England, but now 
 going into disuse. 
 
 Soil-pipes from water-closets were formerly made of lead, Material for 
 at first by soldering sheet-lead into cylinder form, and after- BC 
 wards by the seamless process. The first show more rapid 
 corrosion at the solder-joint ; both are subject to corrosion 
 and sagging, and to being gnawed by rats. Iron is much 
 safer, and fortunately cheaper also, and is therefore now gen- 
 erally used. 
 
 Plumbers sometimes connect branching soil-pipes by T- r-joints, 
 
 ... J andnoT's. 
 
 joints, when it serves their convenience. Y-joints should 
 always be used, for the same reasons as given above for con* 
 necting outside drains. The Y-joint sometimes requires the 
 introduction of another small bend to complete the necessary 
 change of direction. Hence arises the temptation to use the 
 T-joints in contract -work, to save the cost of the bend and its 
 application. 
 
 Rain-water cisterns are sometimes built in basements, or Rain-water 
 
 cistern over- 
 
 outside of houses, underground, having their overflows in the flows - 
 house-drain. Such an arrangement is never safe. However 
 carefully the overflow may be trapped, the long drouths of 
 our climate may dry up the water-seal, and allow the sewer- 
 gas to spread over the water and be dissolved by it. More- 
 over, the drain may be obstructed below the junction of the 
 overflow, and the whole house-sewage is then backed up 
 through the overflow into the cistern. Such an instance actu- 
 ally occurred within the knowledge of the writer, where about 
 a barrel of grease was allowed to collect in the drain from the 
 kitchen-sink, after filling the cesspool provided for the pur- 
 pose. The first intimation received of this obstruction by the 
 
20 
 
 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 occupants of the house was that the cistern- water, which was 
 used through a filtering-pump for drinking, got a " coppery 
 taste," as they expressed it. On cleaning the cistern, it was 
 found that the whole drainage of the house had been emptying 
 into it, apparently for some weeks. Cistern-overflows can 
 generally be discharged on to the surface. 
 
 The need of pots, tanks or other receptacles for the collec- 
 tion of kitchen-sink grease, has been alluded to above, and 
 will be generally felt in all houses where the inclination of the 
 drain is not very rapid. The writer has tried various devices 
 for this purpose. The subject is ever fruitful of annoyance, 
 especially among small families who employ no man-servant, 
 and whose members dislike to meddle with dirty messes. 
 Sufficient space must be given for the accumulation of grease 
 during the intervals between the times of cleaning. The 
 inconvenience of frequent cleaning in our winters, when the 
 congelation of the grease is most rapid, and the inconvenient 
 depth below the surface required to escape frost, have led to 
 putting" them in cellars, and even above the kitchen floor, 
 under the sink, in some cases. The latter was found unen- 
 durable, from the stench arising when cleaned, and the fre- 
 quent cleaning rendered necessary by the limited space for 
 storage. Stoneware pots were tried, of about ten gallons 
 capacity, both in kitchen and cellar. When in the cellar, the 
 cleaning is less offensive ; but in severe weather it is difficult 
 to so ventilate a cellar as to keep out of the house all effluvia 
 so arising, while their limited size requires attention once or 
 twice every month in winter. In the days when our grand- 
 mothers presided over their houses, there was more attention 
 given to the small economies of the household, either by those 
 grandmothers in person, or by some servants who felt more 
 impressed with the sin of wastefulness than do the denizens 
 of our modern kitchens. Certainly there is a value in the 
 grease now thrown away in dish-water which ought to lead 
 to its being collected before going into the water, instead of 
 encumbering our house-drains with it to such an extent as is 
 now done. Until such an end be attained, however, some 
 means must be provided for keeping it out of the pipes, for 
 no matter how large these may be, if as large as a flour bar- 
 rel, they would be filled solid with grease in one winter by 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DKADSTAGE. 
 
 21 
 
 some sinks, even where the family consisted of but five per- 
 sons, all told. The best plan yet devised for this purpose is, 
 perhaps, a small brick tank, laid in hydraulic 
 cement, and plastered smooth inside, placed 
 as close as possible to the cellar wall on the 
 outside, with the sink as close as possible to 
 
 SECTION 
 
 PLAN 
 
 FIG. 5. Cesspool or tank for grease. 
 
 the same wall on the inside, so that the grease shall not congeal 
 in the pipe between the two. (See Fig. 5.) For small and 
 medium houses it should be 
 from one and a half to two 
 feet square on the inside, 
 with the bottom about two 
 feet below the outlet-pipe, 
 which is to turn down about 
 a foot on the inside, with a 
 smooth, round turn, so that 
 its mouth may be so much un- 
 der water. The inlet should 
 be about six inches higher 
 than the outlet-pipe, to allow the grease to collect to that 
 
22 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 thickness above the water line, which is governed by the 
 level of the outlet, without obstructing the mouth of the 
 inlet. The grease will then float on the water, and become 
 congealed in the form of a dirty scum, while the water and 
 other matter in suspension flow out by the mouth of the out- 
 let, about a foot below the surface. The whole must be so 
 placed as not to freeze. The depth needed for this will de- 
 pend largely upon the exposure. The walls being built to 
 the surface of the ground can be covered with a flag-stone, 
 with hole and iron cover. 
 
 The soil-pipes from the water-closets should by no .means 
 enter this receptacle. It should be upon a branch drain, 
 serving the kitchen and scullery sinks alone, having its outlet 
 into the principal drain.* If more than one sink delivers 
 into it, the tank itself should have a vent-pipe, to prevent the 
 air, compressed by the influx of water from one sink, from 
 being forced up through the trap of the other inlet-pipe into 
 the house. If the waste-pipe becomes choked with grease 
 between the sink and cesspool, as will often happen when the 
 fall is not rapid, it may be sometimes kept clear by flushing 
 occasionally with boiling water, provided the passage be not 
 wholly obstructed. 
 
 ^ n e demand for modern conveniences has introduced waste- 
 pipes pip es ft N over our houses. Their orifices are found in bed- 
 found in too rooms, and on every floor, from attic to cellar. With perfec- 
 piaces. ^ on m planning^ workmanship and management, such things 
 may possibly be made safe. But we cannot expect perfection 
 in either of these departments. The nearest approach to it 
 ought to be looked for among the homes of the wealthy, 
 whose means can command the services of good architects 
 and good workmen, and who are not stinted as to the cost of 
 
 * The reason for excluding the soil-pipes of water-closets from the grease- 
 pot or tank, though their introduction is apparently recommended by Col. 
 Waring, in speaking of Field's flushing-tank, is the same as has been given 
 against the storage of all fecal matter near a house, for however limited a 
 period, in hot weather. Moreover, the separation of the grease is much more 
 difficult if fecal matter be introduced into the same receptacle. Field's 
 flushing-tank is doubtless an excellent arrangement for mild climates ; but 
 our winters would require its inlet to be placed so far below the surface, that 
 the additional depth required to work the siphon would render its outlet 
 inconveniently deep, except where the ground slopes rapidly, and then the 
 flushing is of little importance, comparatively. 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 such appliances as conduce to safety in drainage. But it is 
 precisely in the most costly houses that the waste-pipes are 
 found most widely scattered. The chances of imperfect work 
 are too great to justify the practice of putting wash-basins or 
 water-closets in sleeping-rooms under any circumstances, or 
 even in dressing-rooms, closets or passages leading directly 
 from sleeping rooms, unless these conveniences are supplied 
 with the most ample and thorough ventilation, put together 
 in the most careful manner, and most scrupulously taken care 
 of. English authorities say that water-closets should be built Placing of 
 
 * ^ t water- 
 
 Over one another in a tower projecting from the house.* The closets. 
 
 placing of one over the other is a great advantage in point of 
 economy of construction. But the placing them outside of the 
 line of the house-walls is hardly practicable in our climate. 
 Our winters compel their construction, either on the south- 
 erly side of our houses or in their interior, unless special 
 heating arrangements are applied. It therefore becomes all 
 the more necessary to provide special means for their venti- 
 lation. 
 
 The water-closet is used by thousands who know little or General 
 
 ignorance as 
 
 nothing of its mechanism, and who necessarily consider it as to their 
 
 mechanism. 
 
 an automatic arrangement, needing little or no attention, and 
 who therefore bestow none upon it. But, as it is no more 
 perfect in its way than all other work of human hands, it has 
 many faults and weak points, particularly in the form of the 
 pan-closet, now so generally used. It therefore behooves the 
 architect who plans a house for the rich man, the mechanic 
 
 * See Eassie's " Sanitary Arrangements," page 62 ; also the supplementary 
 report for 1874 of the medical officer of the Privy Council (England), from 
 which the following extract is taken, page 33 : 
 
 " In considering the admissibility of water-elosets, it has always to he 
 remenihered that the working of an ordinary water-closet is easily deranged, 
 and that water-closets, when out of order, and especially if in the interior of 
 houses, are apt to hecome very dangerous nuisances. The ordinary water- 
 closet is, therefore, a thoroughly ineligible form of privy for those who are 
 unlikely to take proper care of it, or are from poverty unable to give it such 
 occasional repairs as it may require." 
 
 u Among such classes of population it is, of course, unfit that any form of 
 indoor privy should ever be sanctioned ; but even in the best-ordered houses 
 the occasional danger of indoor water-closets must not be disregarded. 
 Water-closets ought never to stand where they cannot have outside win- 
 dows : they ought, if possible, to stand as projections from the body of the 
 house, and with windowed lobbies dividing them from it." 
 
24 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DEAINAGE. 
 
 who plans his own, or who builds to sell again, and lastly the 
 householder and head of family himself, to know something of 
 the general principles of its construction, and to avail himself 
 of such knowledge in planning, building and taking care of a 
 house. There seems to be a deplorable lack in this respect, 
 for instead of closets and drains, placed so as to insure the 
 getting rid of the refuse with safety, we often find poisonous 
 gases emitted from them, and conducted all over the house, 
 by an ingenious system of pipes, floor-spaces and partition- 
 spaces in our plastered buildings. 
 
 ctosets'of ^ e use ^ wa ter-closets dates from a very remote pe- 
 origiT. 1 riod. Thomas Ewbank, in his historical treatise, says 
 (p. 561) : "They are an ancient and probably an Asiatic 
 device. The summer chamber of Eglon, king of Moab 
 (Judges iii. : 20-25), is supposed to have been one. They 
 were introduced into Rome during the Republic. Those 
 constructed in the palace of the Ciesars were adorned with 
 marbles, arabesques and mosaics. At the back of one still 
 extant, there is a cistern, the water of which is distrib- 
 uted by cocks to different seats." Their general use in pri- 
 vate houses dates, however, from a very recent period. It 
 Syhfvery * s ^ ^ e regretted that among the hundreds of patented inven- 
 aefective. ti ons> recently brought before the public, one of the most 
 defective and dangerous of them all should have got into such 
 general use in this country; viz., the ordinary "pan-closet." 
 Baldwin Latham speaks of them in his " Sanitary Engineer- 
 ing" (page 329), as "cumbrous appliances, which cannot be 
 introduced into a house without creating a nuisance." The 
 fact remains, however, that thousands of our fellow-citizens 
 have already fitted their dwellings with them, at a considerable 
 cost, and it becomes important to remedy their defects as far 
 as possible where already in use. The following devices are 
 recommended for those who have already made this bad in- 
 vestment, while advising those who are building anew to 
 adopt some of the simpler and safer inventions which will be 
 described afterwards. 
 
 The pan-closet is described in the annexed cut, figure 6, 
 and consists of several parts : First, The bowl of crockery, 
 directly under the seat. Second, The copper pan, which, 
 when ready for use, is in the position shown by the dotted 
 lines, is full of water, and seals the bottom of the bowl. 
 
DEFECTS 
 
 HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 25 
 
 Third, The cast-iron receiver, standing on the floor, within 
 which the pan is tilted when discharging its contents ; and 
 Fourth, The lead trap just below the floor. Its defects are 
 numerous, but its chief defect arises from the reservoir of 
 foul air always present in the iron receiver below the crockery 
 bowl. The inside of this receiver is necessarily foul. It is 
 quickly smeared with filth when first put in use ; its in- 
 
 FIG. 6. A, Wood seat. B, Annular ventilating tube. C, Crockeiy bowl. D, Iron 
 receiver. E, Floor. F, Lead trap. 
 
 terior is inaccessible, and can therefore never be cleansed. 
 Directly below it is the large metal trap, whose contents gen- 
 erally emit noxious gas from their decomposition, and this 
 trap cannot be safely dispensed with. Whenever the pan is 
 tilted and discharged, there is suddenly dropped into this re- 
 ceiver several quarts, and sometimes a pailful of water. 
 This must of course displace its own volume of the foul air 
 pent up there, for which there Is no escape in any direction 
 but upward, with a rush, past the tilted pan into the bowl, 
 where it mixes freely with the air of the room. Various 
 
26 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 schemes have been devised for getting rid of this nuisance. 
 When not gotten rid of, the pan-closet is a dangerous neigh- 
 bor. Several devices are described by Eassie (" Sanitary 
 Arrangements," p. 74) for injecting a disinfecting fluid by an 
 automatic apparatus into the pan or bowl at the instant of 
 Defecting 'opening the valve. Such contrivances may serve a good pur- 
 dosets. pose, if well regulated, but the adjustment of these additional 
 parts, and the occasional renewal of the disinfecting agent, 
 complicates matters somewhat, and renders such a remedy 
 less simple and less adapted to general use than it is desir- 
 able that it should be. 
 
 wa?er! ating ^ ^ ie water-closet can be located near a chimney, which is 
 sure to be in constant use, as the kitchen chimney, the evil 
 can be abated by building a zinc tube of some three inches 
 diameter into the chimney-stack, alongside the hot flue, or 
 inserting an iron tube within the old flue, and leading its 
 
 FIG. 7. Annular ventilating-tube over bowl. 
 
 lower end into the space under the water-closet seat. In 
 wooden houses and other houses also, if in the country in 
 isolated positions, windy weather often crowds air up through 
 openings in the floor from the communicating floor-spaces, so 
 that in order to insure that the draught of this tube may draw 
 directly from the bowl of the water-closet under such circum- 
 stances, the tube should end in an annular flat tube of galvan- 
 ized iron, to be placed directly over the top edge of the bowl, 
 and under the seat, with perforations around the inner edge 
 of the ring, for withdrawing the air which we wish to get rid of. 
 These annular tubes are now made in Charlestown, and are 
 sold and applied by most plumbers. (See figure 7.) The 
 cover of the seat must then be arranged so that the valve can 
 be drawn after closing such cover, and care should always be 
 taken to so close the cover before lifting the valve. The foul 
 air which is puffed upwards at the instant of emptying the pan 
 is then sucked up by the draught of the chimney, without 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DEAENAGE. 27 
 
 an opportunity of mixing with the air of the room. Where no 
 warm chimney can be had near enough to be thus used, the 
 draught-tube can be run directly through the roof, with some 
 ventilating attachment at its top to encourage the upward 
 draught of air. This will often work well in winter, when the 
 air of the house is artificially heated, and tends to escape by 
 its own buoyancy. But in warm weather, it is not so likely to 
 be of use. At that time the chief reliance is upon open win- windows 
 
 A L needed in 
 
 dows and a free current of air through the house. For this summer. 
 purpose it is always advisable to provide at least a part of a 
 window directly over every water-closet. The pan and hopper 
 closets which are often found tucked into corners, under stair- 
 ways, and in other dark places, without special ventilation 
 into chimneys, are sure to become nuisances, and poison all 
 their surroundings. It has been suggested that the iron re- ventilation 
 
 for iron re- 
 
 ceiver of the pan-closet should have a vent-tube between the cdvers not 
 
 * efficient. 
 
 pan and the lower trap, so as to provide for the exit of the 
 foul air displaced by the descending charge of water. But 
 this displacement is so sudden, and in such a large volume, 
 compared with the capacity of such tube to receive it, that 
 this does not appear feasible. Moreover, if the inner surface 
 of the receiver is tapped by any sort of tube, its orifice would 
 soon be likely to become smeared and stopped by the wet 
 paper and fecal matter which is dashed about. 
 
 If an upward air-draught can be secured from the bowl, it is 
 constantly at work, removing not only the foul air discharged 
 when the pan is tipped, but all exhalations from water 
 standing in the pan. This water is always exposed to the Gases 
 foul air of the receiver, around the outside of the bowl, through 
 
 water by 
 
 and dissolves a certain amount of the gases from this source, 
 to be given off and scattered by rapid diffusion in the air 
 above, even when at rest, for the air is as a vacuum to 
 other gaseous bodies. No vent from the iron receiver could 
 remedy this, for that is foul past redemption. No circula- 
 tion provided by such a vent could much affect the degree of 
 its foulness. 
 
 The above-described defects in the pan-closet may in some 
 degree be remedied by an efficient air-draught, in cases where 
 this closet is already in use, but a surer remedy yet is found 
 
28 
 
 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DKAESTAGE. 
 
 Improved 
 water- 
 closet. 
 
 Jennings Water-Closet. 
 
 in another style of closet, which can be applied with little 
 extra cost when building anew. The closet made by George 
 Jennings of London (see figure in margin) has accomplished 
 the much-desired end of dispensing with the pan entirely, 
 
 together with the air 
 
 ' space between the bowl 
 
 and the lower trap. It 
 also dispenses with a 
 separate trap below, 
 having such a trap in 
 itself, made in connec- 
 tion with the bowl, all 
 in one piece of crockery. 
 Baldwin Latham calls it 
 "a perfect sanitary ap- 
 pliance." Its water-sup- 
 ply is taken directly 
 from any supply-pipe, 
 adjustable to the actual pressure, so that no separate tank, or 
 service box or valve, wires or cranks are needed. The ordi- 
 nary pan-closet alone costs less than half as much as Jennings', 
 but its cost, with all those accessories, set up in working order, 
 would be nearly as great. A supply direct from the pipes in 
 the ordinary pan-closet is objected to with reason from the 
 risk of back-flow of foul air from the closet into the pipes in 
 case of lack of water-pressure from any cause at the moment of 
 using the closet. But in the Jennings closet this risk is entirely 
 avoided by the construction of the valve, which is a flap- valve, 
 made of a rubber disc, rendering all back-flow impossible, and 
 opening only with the pressure of water. Ample flushing of 
 the bowl is secured by having the valve worked by a float, so 
 that it remains open till the water reaches the prescribed level 
 in the bowl. The Jennings closet does not seem to be quite 
 all that could be desired, but it is certainly the best thing in 
 the market. Its weak points are, 
 
 First. The hollow plug, made hollow to act as an overflow 
 for possible surplus of water delivered, allows the free escape 
 of noxious gas, if any sueh there be, from the contents of the 
 trap below. The only protection against this, as the apparatus 
 is now constructed, would be the second lifting of the handle 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAIN" AGE. 29 
 
 every time the closet is used to insure the complete expulsion 
 of the foul matter from the lower trap.* 
 
 ^Second. Most of these closets in our market have no pro- 
 vision for a vent-hole in the trap. The necessity for such a 
 vent was pointed out by Mr. Kogers Field, C. E.,f and a 
 vent-hole is now provided, when demanded, by the makers 
 at the point marked V on the diagram. 
 
 The cut should show the plug to be hollow, to act as an 
 overflow. The draughtsman drew the plug in elevation, 
 while he should have drawn it in section. 
 
 With this closet, the use of a disinfecting fluid, or the spe- 
 cial ventilation of the closet-seat will probably be needless. 
 But it does not escape the need of giving a vent to its own 
 trap, as above described. 
 
 A copious vent for the soil-pipe itself should never be vents for 
 
 omitted. J 
 
 The reason for this vent is as follows : 
 
 The main drain of the house is supposed to be provided 
 with a large trap, outside the house, as described above. 
 There is also to be a trap under the water-closet, or forming 
 a part of it. Between these two traps there must always be 
 a confined column of foul air; this column, if not connected 
 with the outer air by a vent made for the purpose, is subject 
 to compression or tension from the following causes, acting 
 together or separately. Compression is caused, 
 
 * Since the above was written, the writer learns that this defect has been 
 entirely remedied by Mr. Jennings. He now attaches an inverted cup to the 
 handle, just above the hollow plug, which effectually traps this air-hole. 
 Parties ordering Jennings closets, should see to it that this important 
 improvement is not omitted. 
 
 t The following is taken from a private letter of Mr. Field to the Secretary 
 of the State Board of Health, in speaking of such a vent-pipe : " The func- 
 tion it has to perform is simply that of admitting air whenever the closet is 
 worked so as to prevent the water being sucked out of the trap by the par- 
 tial vacuum that would otherwise be created by the sudden rush of water 
 down the arm leading from the closet to the soil-pipe. This pipe in no way 
 does away with the necessity of having the soil-pipe properly ventilated ; and, 
 vice versa, the ventilation of the soil-pipe by carrying it up above the roof 
 does not do away with the necessity of this air-pipe." 
 
 t Mr. Simon, in the report above quoted, says : " That every private drain 
 having inlets within a house, must have ascending from its head or heads 
 into some suitable high position in the open air, and where it cannot infect 
 the interior, a ventilating pipe or ventilating pipes of sectional area amply 
 proportionate to its own." 
 
30 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DKATN~AGE. 
 
 First. From changes of temperature, either from change in 
 that of the surrounding air, or by the pouring of hot water 
 into the pipe. 
 
 Second. From the blowing of air into the soil-pipe from the 
 sewers, which may not always be ventilated, and which may 
 occasionally find the disconnecting trap disabled from some 
 accident. 
 
 Third. From the influx of a considerable volume of water 
 into the column from above, forcibly displacing an equivalent 
 volume of air. 
 
 When compressed from either of the above causes, the foul 
 air is blown out into the house at the orifice of some waste- 
 pipe in connection, in spite of its trap. 
 
 Tension may occur from the reduction of temperature, or 
 from the efflux of water as it leaves the confined column through 
 the outside trap. In either case the vacuum is supplied by 
 sucking the water out of some of the connecting traps, leav- 
 Boii-pipeto ing their waste-pipes unsealed. The remedy is simple enough, 
 and i s often applied now in new buildings by carrying the 
 soil-pipe up through the roof, with an open end, to connect 
 the interior with the open air. In small houses, having but 
 one or two water-closets, it will answer the purpose to apply 
 a two-inch lead or iron pipe, to run from the top of the trap 
 of the upper closet, up through the roof. If, however, the 
 outside disconnecting trap is not ventilated, as above recom- 
 mended, and if such small houses empty their drain into a 
 public sewer, nothing less than the whole size of the soil-pipe 
 will be safe for its vent. In building new houses, it is recom- 
 mended that the soil-pipe be carried beyond the roof, and of 
 its full size. If the sewers are ever tide- locked, a heavy rain 
 at such times displaces an immense volume of air, which is 
 forced into the house-drains, causing these vents to be fully 
 taxed. 
 
 Where several water-closets are placed one above another, 
 on different stories, drained by a perpendicular soil-pipe, as 
 often occurs, it is not enough to extend the soil-pipe up 
 through the roof. The trap on each of the closets below the 
 upper one, except perhaps the very lowest, if this be at thf 
 bottom of the column, must have its own separate vent, ot^ 
 erwise the rush of water down the column from the uppti 
 
31 r ( 
 
 
ng. 9. 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 31 
 
 story, or from any of the closets above the lower one, will be 
 likely to siphon the water out of the intermediate traps in 
 passing, or the trap itself which is used. The vents for this 
 purpose should be at least two inches in diameter, and may 
 all branch into each other and into the soil-pipe above the 
 upper closet, as shown in the annexed diagram, Fig. 9. Thus, 
 if we suppose a pailful of water to be emptied into the slop- 
 sink on the upper floor at A, its rapid fall through the ver- 
 tical soil-pipe would be likely to take with it by friction the 
 air in the branches draining the closets at B, C, D and E. 
 The traps of these closets would be likely to be drained by 
 this siphon action, as above described, or by their own use, 
 unless provided with vent-pipes, as shown in the figure. A 
 closet placed as at F, connecting with the main soil-pipe 
 where the latter is not vertical, is not subject to such action 
 from use of those above, and has been found by actual ex- 
 periment to be unaffected by their use when the main soil- 
 pipe has an open top, as here shown. It would therefore 
 probably not be necessary to apply a special vent-tube to its 
 trap unless the vertical pipe immediately below it is several 
 feet in length. If such be the case, the discharge of this 
 closet itself might siphon the water out of the trap behind it, 
 unless such a vent be provided, so that it is hardly safe to 
 omit the vent in any case. 
 
 For those places where the cost of a Jennings water-closet simpler 
 is felt to be a burden, a simple hopper-closet is the best sub- closets. 
 stitute. But it should be properly ventilated under the seat, 
 and its trap ventilated, and good provision made for flushing. 
 This closet is described in Fig. 8 (p. 454), and consists 
 of a hopper or bowl of crockery, set over a lead trap, or, 
 what is better, a bowl with crockery trap in one piece. This 
 closet gets rid of the confined chamber of foul air which con- 
 demns the pan-closet, and this is also easily cleaned, and 
 simple. Its only fault is that the contents of the trap are 
 directly exposed, so that trouble would ensue if ample flush- 
 ing were not provided. It is sometimes provided with a con- 
 stant flow of a driblet of water, which is both wasteful and 
 inefficient. The flushing-water is needed only at the time of 
 using the closet, or rather when leaving it, and it should then 
 be applied in a sufficient quantity to drive the contents of the 
 
32 
 
 DEFECTS 
 
 HOUSE-DEAINAGE. 
 
 Drrect sup- 
 ply of water- 
 closets. 
 
 trap entirely through into the drain below. If a tank or 
 
 service-box be applied to flush it, a definite supply of water 
 
 can always be insured without such a waste as would render 
 
 its use objectionable. In the way it is now used, the large 
 
 >s amount of water wasted has led to the imposition 
 
 s of a special tax upon hopper-closets by the Boston 
 
 Water Board. This waste, however, is an abuse, 
 
 jj- - 
 
 n^ and not a necessary contingent upon the hopper- 
 closet. The aperture at the bottom should be 
 limited to about three inches in diameter, to pre- 
 vent the admission of substances which might choke 
 the drain.* 
 
 FIG. 8. Hopper-Closet. 
 
 It has been usual with many plumbers of late to recom- 
 
 mend the flushing of water-closets of the common " pan " 
 
 or 
 
 "hopper" style by a valve to be opened in a branch of 
 
 * In order to insure a sudden delivery of water to expel the foul contents 
 from the trap of a hopper-closet, the service-box should have a capacity of at 
 least a gallon, with a funnel-shaped bottom. The valve should be not less 
 than two inches or two and a half inches in diameter, and the pipe leading 
 the flushing- water to the hopper should be two to two and a half inches 
 diameter, according to its length. Without such special provision for the 
 sudden dash of water in a considerable volume, the exposure of foul matter 
 in the trap would be sure to give trouble, as is the fact in all those in com- 
 mon use. 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 33 
 
 the main water-supply of the house, from which drinking- 
 water is drawn through another faucet. But the only safe 
 way is to break this connection by providing a small tank and 
 service-box for the closet. With the valve furnishing water 
 direct from the main, the following risk is incurred : The 
 water-supply, even though nominally "constant," is some- 
 times shut off temporarily for repairs in the street, and if 
 at such time the water-closet valve should be opened, 
 the air is drawn rapidly into the water-pipes from the 
 interior of the closet, which is filled with organic vapors, 
 and perhaps with actual contagium from disease. The 
 water is soon let into the pipes again, mixing with this air 
 and dissolving a portion, thereby becoming contaminated 
 and unfit for drinking. This direct connection-valve has 
 become so popular that one of the prominent dealers in 
 plumbers' supplies recently alluded to the service-box sup- 
 ply as an " old-fashioned way which was going out of use," 
 while conversing with the writer. In the supplementary Fever at 
 report of the medical officer of the Privy Council for 1874, iege, 8 cam. 
 there is an interesting report from Dr. Buchanan, upon an 
 outbreak of enteric fever in Caius College, Cambridge, where 
 fifteen students were attacked while living in a building which 
 was supposed to be provided with the most perfectly arranged 
 sanitary appliances. After a most painstaking investigation, 
 the fever was traced, by convincing evidence, to the use of a 
 water-closet with direct supply from the mains, which had 
 poisoned the water used for drinking in precisely the manner 
 indicated above. In the same report, the following extract is 
 found from the regulations under the metropolis water act of 
 1871 : "These regulations having for their object the pre- 
 venting of undue consumption or contamination of water, are 
 the result of an inquiry made for the Board of Trade by Lord 
 Methuen, Captain Tyler, and Mr. Rawlinson, C. B. They c 
 have the sanction of the Board of Trade, and may be put in 
 force by the London water companies." "Every boiler, 
 urinal and water-closet in which water supplied by the com- 
 pany is used (other than water-closets in which hand-flushing 
 is employed) shall, within three months after these regula- 
 tions come into operation, be served only through a cistern or 
 service-box, and without a stool-cock, and there shall be no 
 
34 DEFECTS I 
 
 direct communication from the pipes of the company to any 
 boiler, urinal or water-closet." " No pipe by which water is 
 supplied by the company to any water-closet shall communi- 
 cate with any part of such water-closet, or with any apparatus 
 connected therewith, except the service-cistern thereof." 
 
 PUBLIC PKIVIES. 
 
 Public pnv- The need of a system of public privies for the crowded parts 
 of large towns is a subject inviting the earnest attention of all 
 who are interested in sanitary reform. All decent people 
 who have occasion to frequent the narrow and crowded alleys 
 where the poorer part of the people are lodged, will often be 
 reminded of the streets of Rome and other European cities by 
 the want of decency there prevailing. Among the various 
 appliances used in different towns for this purpose, all have 
 failed, unless where kept under the supervision of the local 
 authorities. One thing is certain : the removal of filth is 
 imperative, and it cannot be left for the people who use such 
 public privies to take care of the apparatus. Under the same 
 class may be considered the privies of jails, asylums, and other 
 public institutions where large numbers are housed whose 
 habits of cleanliness cannot be relied upon. For this pur- 
 pose the water-carriage system is quite as applicable as in pri- 
 vate houses, if only suitable apparatus be provided, and if it 
 
 Liverpool be supervised by local authorities. Such apparatus has al- 
 ready been perfected in Liverpool, and in Bristol, England. 
 Similar apparatus has lately been introduced in the schools at 
 Dantzig, where the climate is about as rigorous as in Massa- 
 chusetts. Annexed to the report of the medical officer of the 
 Privy Council for 1874 is an interesting report by Mr. J. 
 Netten Radcliffe on the means used in various towns for 
 removal of excrement. Among his " conclusions " is the fol- 
 lowing (p. 154) : "As regards the parts of a town or village 
 inhabited by the poorer classes, a water-closet system may be 
 managed so as to be entirely applicable to the circumstances 
 of the most ignorant and most careless population. Essen- 
 tial conditions of such applicability, however, are, that the 
 structural arrangements should be adapted to their purpose, 
 and that the management should be wholly undertaken and 
 efficiently done by the servants of the sanitary authority. 
 
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DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 35 
 
 Where these conditions are observed as thoroughly as they 
 are observed in parts of Liverpool and Bristol, water-closets 
 are the best means of removing excremental matters from the 
 poor neighborhoods of a town." In speaking of the introduc- 
 tion of these improvements in Liverpool, the same report 
 says (p. 206) : "The council, in order to secure uniformity 
 of action, and likewise to prevent future mistakes in the ap- 
 plication of remedial measures, directed the town clerk to 
 notify the several owners against whom proceedings should 
 be taken, 'that it appears to the said council of the said bor- 
 ough, that the only effectual remedy for such privies and cess- 
 pools is by converting the same into water-closets.'" 
 
 " Since Dr. French has been medical officer, and mostly 
 since 1866, he has ordered and obtained the conversion of 
 14,393 privies into water-closets ; and there were in 1869, in 
 Liverpool, 20,000 privies attached to ash-pits and 31,150 
 water-closets, 2,150 of which are tank or trough closets." 
 " These closets are constructed on a pattern ordered by the 
 corporation, and approved, as to details, by the borough sur- 
 veyor. Now, in 1874, the number of troughs for trough- 
 closets is 3,304, serving for about 6,000 closets, and the num- 
 ber of water-closets other than trough-closets, 43,395." In 
 order to explain more definitely the nature of the trough-closet, 
 the annexed plates are copied from the same report of Mr. 
 IJadcliffe (figs. 10 and 11), with the following remarks (p. 
 206) , viz. : " There is peculiar interest in the arrangement and 
 working of the trough-closets which are in use by numerous 
 families in the sort of neighborhoods where in other towns 
 ordinary water-closets are commonly a failure and a nuisance. 
 It remains to say that the position chosen for these new closets 
 has been carefully determined by the circumstances of each 
 place where they have been erected, and that peculiar facili- 
 ties for their being well placed have been obtained by the 
 time of their erection concurring with that of other improve- 
 ments. The closets that are common to several families are 
 cleansed in rotation by the people using them, and a register 
 is kept of the order in which this should be done. Inspectors 
 visiting the closets every two or three days see that this duty 
 is performed, and are themselves held responsible for any 
 shortcoming. By a little patience and firmness the inspector 
 
36 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 succeeds in obtaining the necessary cleansing even among the 
 most intractable classes, with very little assistance from the 
 law. He will, if necessary, wait and see the closet cleaned 
 out by the proper person. Last year only a dozen or so of 
 people were summoned for neglect in this respect, and three 
 of the offenders had to be sent to prison. It will be seen from 
 the drawing that in connection with these closets there is au 
 opening of access to the trough and water supply. This 
 opening is for the scavenger, and the people using the closets 
 have no concern with it. The scavengers are employed by 
 the corporation, and every day they visit each of the trough- 
 closets, unlock the iron door of access, discharge the contents 
 of the trough, flush it out with hose and water, sweep it 
 thoroughly clean, and leave it charged with fresh water for the 
 next twenty-four hours' use. Frost has done no harm to these 
 trough-closets, nor yet to the ordinary siphon-closet with its 
 service-box." "There can be no question of the admirable 
 efficiency of the working of the arrangements above described 
 in the semi-public privies, nor of the recognition by the peo- 
 ple of the superiority of the new to the old arrangements. 
 Nor can there be any question that these results are due even 
 more to the management of the whole business by the public 
 authority than to the excellence of the constructive arrange- 
 ments themselves. And not only is complete freedom from 
 nuisance obtained where formerly filth and stink were uni- 
 versal, but Dr. French states that in 1868, when an epidemic 
 of enteric fever was prevailing in and about Liverpool, ' the 
 only localities that seemed exempt from it were the places 
 occupied by the poor, in which we had removed all the privies 
 and made trough water-closets.'" 
 
 Traps. The use of traps on every waste-pipe inside of a house is a 
 
 point upon which some difference of opinion is found. If the 
 outside trap upon the main drain is well constructed and ven- 
 tilated, there is somewhat less importance to be attached to 
 those on each separate waste-pipe. Dr. O. Reynolds, in his 
 little work entitled "Sewer-Gas, and How to Keep it out of 
 Houses," thinks they may in most cases be safely dispensed 
 with. But every waste-pipe becomes lined with a slimy film 
 which, in a climate subject to such summer heats as ours, 
 must needs decompose and give off offensive effluvia. The 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 37 
 
 difference of temperature in different parts of a house, and the 
 winds outside, would always keep up drafts through waste- 
 pipes if not trapped, passing down one orifice and up another, 
 so that a dwelling-house can hardly be considered safe with 
 us unless traps are provided at every waste somewhere within 
 ten feet of its orifice. The chief objection to traps, except 
 their cost, is that they delay or hinder, to a certain extent, 
 the rapid efflux of the sewage, and keep a small quantity of it 
 shut up to decompose within themselves. Moreover, there is 
 always a column of confined air in a waste-pipe between any 
 two traps in the same line of drainage. Care must therefore 
 be taken to give this column a free connection or vent to the 
 atmosphere, so that its tension may always be in equilibrium 
 with the atmospheric pressure. Without this system of 
 vents the traps are worse than useless, and deserve their 
 name from the disappointment that would be sure to follow 
 their use. 
 
 The best form of trap is that which gives least obstruction Form of 
 to the flow of the sewage, and requires the least quantity of 
 water to insure its seal. All square corners tend to promote 
 an accumulation of sediment or slime, which should be avoid- 
 ed. No form of trap is so simple and so generally efficient 
 as the ordinary S-bend. Its calibre should be about as large 
 as that of the pipe of which it forms a part, with continuous, 
 smooth lines. When a waste-pipe is expected to carry at 
 times a full stream of water, as from slop-sinks, wash-trays, 
 and bowls, there is risk of having the traps siphoned by the 
 last water passing down, unless they be provided with a vent- 
 hole at the top, and this must of course have a pipe to carry 
 its effluvia to the top of the roof. 
 
 The position of traps is a matter of some importance. If Position of 
 close to the orifice, as in the common sink bell-trap, a slight 
 obstruction of sediment will soon serve as a nucleus for a 
 complete dam ; but if two or three feet below the orifice, and 
 directly under it, such a slight obstruction would soon be 
 swept away by accumulation of the two or three feet head of 
 water above. The common bell-trap used in sinks, and at- Beii-traps 
 tached to the strainer, conforms to neither of the above con- 
 ditions, and is a mere subterfuge. Being close under the 
 strainer, no head of water can accumulate to flush it, and its 
 
38 
 
 DEFECTS 
 
 HOUSE-DKALNTAGE. 
 
 Workman- 
 ship. 
 
 Too little 
 emulation 
 for excel- 
 lence. 
 
 large annular depression is a receptacle of rubbish, In fact, 
 it is a mere obstacle to the drainage, so that most cooks lift 
 the cover when they want the water to run off, losing the 
 benefit of both strainer and trap together. A strainer is use- 
 ful, if screwed fast down, with holes of ample size and num- 
 ber, and a trap made of the S form about the level of the floor, 
 under a wash-tray or sink, will run for years and keep itself 
 clear of sediment, with such a strainer over it. 
 
 WORKMANSHIP. 
 
 This subject has been mentioned above, but its importance 
 may justify something further. There is generally but one 
 way in which to do a thing properly and well, while there is 
 an endless number of wrong ways into which workmen stum- 
 ble, through ignorance or recklessness. The importance of 
 having the best quality of work in matters that so nearly 
 affect the health and lives of our families, need not further be 
 dwelt upon. These two facts confront us. Grood work is 
 the Alpha and the Omega of good drainage, and good work 
 is too rare an article among the workmen in mechanical trades. 
 Two hundred years ago, the artisans' guilds of the north of 
 Europe developed a degree of skill which often made an artist 
 of the artisan, producing such men as Albrecht Diirer and 
 Peter Fischer, of Niirnberg, while the general emulation led 
 to a degree of excellence in workmanship among large num- 
 bers that calls for our admiration, and gave a tone to the 
 civilization of that age well worthy of imitation. Our mod- 
 ern "trades unions," however, seem to have encouraged a 
 lack of thoroughness and lack of interest in the artisan by 
 making too little distinction between the faithful and the un- 
 faithful workman. They combine for mutual protection 
 against evils which they themselves tend to aggravate, and 
 are led by demagogues to fix arbitrary rates of wages, regard- 
 less of merit, and encourage no emulation for excellence. The 
 consequences are bad enough, morally, in the lowering of the 
 standard of excellence among artisans, and thereby degrading 
 their intellects, as well as their morals ; but the results are 
 particularly disastrous among those who employ artisans to 
 construct such important works as house-drains, for the aver- 
 age householder necessarily depends largely upon the intelli- 
 
39 
 
 DEFECTS 1ST HOUSE-DKALNAGE. 
 
 gence and skill of the artisan for the perfection of details in 
 such work, concerning which he, the employer, is ignorant. 
 Of course the blundering and reckless apprentice becomes, in 
 time, the ignorant and stupid master-workman, deficient in 
 skill, and confined to routine. 
 
 Instances often come to our notice like the following : cases of 
 
 . unfaithful 
 
 borne years since the writer employed a man sent from one work. 
 of the best plumbing establishments in Boston to attach a 
 vent-pipe to a soil-pipe in an old house, which had been built, 
 like thousands of others, without one. The workman was 
 directed to lead the vent into the kitchen chimney-flue, which 
 was conveniently near. This pipe was afterwards seen, en- 
 tering the side of the chimney-breast, and appeared all right. 
 A few weeks since, a new tenant in the house complained of 
 a bad smell. After searching all about for its source, sus- 
 picion led to an examination of the connection of this vent 
 with the chimney. It was found that it never entered the 
 chimney at all, but ended with an open mouth in the furring- 
 space between the chimney and plastering ! Of course all 
 the gases passing out of this vent, had for years had free 
 access to all the floors of the house. Luckily nobody had had 
 typhoid fever ; but no thanks are due to the plumbing for the 
 immunity. 
 
 Another instance of bad faith in a laborer occurred within 
 a few months in the same street. A recent introduction of 
 aqueduct-water led to laying a service-pipe into a house 
 where it happened to cross under the drain in the front yard. 
 The foreman was cautioned about the drain, which was of 
 Scotch pipe. Some months afterward the occupants of the 
 house found filth oozing through the front cellar wall of the 
 house in midwinter. On digging down through four feet of 
 frozen ground in the front yard, the Scotch drain -pipe was 
 found to have been broken open and placed together again 
 without using any cement, while putting the water-pipe 
 through under it. No mention being made of this fact, it 
 was not suspected till the leakage made its way through the 
 cellar- wall, as above related. Men who are guilty of such 
 acts of bad faith are not likely to be employed further by 
 the same parties ; but some more serious penalty than loss 
 of patronage seems to be needed for such cases, where the 
 
40 DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 
 
 results may be the illness and death of their fellow-citizens 
 and neighbors. 
 
 ^ e wan ^ f s kiU among artisans has been aggravated by a 
 degree of ignorance on the part of architects upon points 
 where they are expected by the community to be experts. 
 It may be urged in their defence that house-drainage is a 
 comparatively new luxury. If so, the architects should be 
 the very class who, from their position, should do the most 
 towards developing its perfection, and not leave it, as is often 
 done, for the confused notions of their clients to work out the 
 details, with the advice of the head mason, neither of whom 
 have probably ever studied the subject from any point of view 
 more comprehensive than from their own limited experience. 
 Much has been written on these subjects ; so much, that but 
 few new ideas have been brought forward in this paper. 
 Those who wish to study it further will find it more amply 
 treated by such men as Bazalgette, Latham, Corfield, Eassie, 
 Menzies, Parkes, Reynolds, Waring, Shedd, and others, all in 
 our own language, besides as many more in German and 
 French, wherein the peculiar stand-points of the various 
 writers give rise to different treatment, each suited to its 
 own locality or climate. Besides the study of the experience 
 of others, much remains to be done to adapt means to ends, 
 taking into account the peculiar circumstances governing each 
 case under treatment. What the community has a right to 
 expect, is, that men having in hand the designing and erec- 
 tion of their dwellings, should inform themselves of the 
 conditions on which such dwellings can be made healthy 
 places of abode. If they did this, as a rule, and if artisans 
 had, as a rule, that pride of character and love of good 
 workmanship which is the capital of the mechanic, we should 
 soon see better results. 
 
 The writer does not intend to ignore the fact that there are 
 many intelligent and painstaking architects, who have given 
 this subject careful attention ; but for some reason or other, 
 there are many of our important buildings designed and 
 erected under the charge of those who are not so distin- 
 guished. The following examples came under the writer's 
 notice, within a short time, which may serve to illustrate this 
 point! 
 
DEFECTS IN HOUSE-DRAINAGE. 41 
 
 A conspicuous public building, costing nearly $200,000, ^ 
 was lately erected under the charge of a leading architect. 
 Like most similar buildings of the present day, it contains a 
 good deal of plumbing. For some time past a nauseous odor 
 pervaded the cellar, which no amount of window opening 
 would remedy. It increased to such an extent as to fill the 
 whole building, and render its occupation sickening. On in- 
 quiry, it was found that some square cesspools had been con- 
 structed under the cellar floor, into which various drain-pipes 
 entered, and from which a brick drain led, covered with flat 
 stones, an invention of a past age. One of these reservoirs 
 of filth under the cellar floor had been forced to overflow, and 
 had saturated the concrete pavement, after a temporary ob- 
 struction of the outlet by a careless workman. Although 
 the obstruction was promptly removed, the stench remained 
 a long time. What good purpose the cesspool served, or is 
 capable of serving, is past comprehension. Its presence is a 
 mere nuisance. The brick drain could hardly have been 
 planned by a person who had taken pains to learn the inher- 
 ent faults of such structures, and the great superiority of 
 smooth pipes. 
 
 Another case : a large public building was recently planned 
 by an architect, chosen by the parties who had the subject in 
 charge, as peculiarly versed in the wants of such an institution 
 as this was to accommodate. The plans showed a brick drain, 
 big enough to crawl through, running under the building for 
 a length of over two hundred feet, too large to be self-cleans- 
 ing, and, therefore, merely a prolonged cesspool, over which 
 a population of about five hundred persons were to be lodged, 
 those living on the lower story being on a stone floor, resting 
 on the ground, without a cellar or any subsoil drainage, except 
 the brick sewer ! This was not all. A large tank or cess- 
 pool was provided, just outside the building, in which the 
 whole sewage of this population was delayed, to settle and 
 ferment till convenient times for its removal, although a good 
 sewer was at hand for its immediate and rapid transit to a 
 safe distance. 
 
42 
 
 DEFECTS IIST HOUSE-DEAINAGE. 
 
 Duties of 
 proprietors. 
 
 Care re- 
 quired. 
 
 Dangers 
 from frost. 
 
 Record of 
 drains 
 
 DUTIES OF PROPRIETORS AND OCCUPANTS. 
 However well a system of house-drainage may be planned 
 and constructed, it cannot be expected to be entirely auto- 
 matic, or to serve its owner for an unlimited period without 
 intelligent supervision. In fact, " eternal vigilance " is the 
 price of safety in such matters in a climate where such vio- 
 lent and sudden changes occur as in ours. Sometimes a trap 
 may freeze in January and dry up in July. Deep frosts 
 sometimes break up drains, and leave them leaky. Rats bur- 
 row into and gnaw into drains, if not thoroughly built. The 
 gases given off by sewage often corrode lead pipes, and the 
 ammonia in water-closets corrodes the copper pans. Valves 
 become leaky by wear. Counterpoises get loose. But 
 frost is our greatest enemy ; a frozen water-pipe often does 
 much damage, but a frozen drain is the climax of discomfort. 
 With the extended use of plumbing come the increased risks 
 of such mishaps, till many householders long to simplify the 
 apparatus. It cannot certainly be well taken care of in coun- 
 try houses in our climate, unless the occupant knows where 
 to find the pipes, and how to empty them on frosty nights. 
 The risks of leakage of drains are of course very serious, and 
 the difficulty of tracing such troubles to their sources renders 
 it imperative to keep a careful record of their position, and 
 to take the alarm from the only sense by which we can often 
 be led to detect them, acting vigorously to repair the defect 
 when found. Those who do not wish to trouble themselves 
 with such matters had better dispense with drains entirely, and 
 do as in the days of our fathers ; viz., carry the refuse- water- 
 to a safe distance from the house in pails, where it can be con- 
 signed to mother earth. Then they can feel sure that it is 
 beyond the chance of harming them in the house. 
 
RETURN CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT 
 TO- > 902 Main Librar 
 
 AS STAMPED BELOW 
 
 TlNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BbkKELEY 
 FORM NO. 006,40m, 3/78 BERKELEY, CA 94720 ^