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a lapse of three months no Petition being yet forthcoming, the Governor was obliged to inform these gentlemen that unless their Petition was presented within a stated period the Ordinance must be transmitted home without it. A third and of course unavoidable delay occurred in the reference of the Ordinance by the Secretary of State to the Local Government Board, in the consideration of it by the latter, and finally in the confirmation of it by Her Majesty the Queen.
12. The Ordinance has been in force since the 2nd of June, 1888, but more delay has occurred, for after a lapse of over two months it has not yet been found possible to pass in the Sanitary Board the Bye-Laws relating to house-drains; even the original motion made by me to give preference to this most urgent matter was not carried without opposition.
13. These delays are unfortunate as it is of urgent importance to the Public Health that the reconstruction of defective and insanitary house-drains should be grappled with without further loss of time, and this can be done without any need whatsoever of waiting for the adoption or otherwise of the Separate System as pointed out by Mr. COOPER in his Report.
14. The many miles of modern main sewers that have been built by the Government within the last ten years and which have almost entirely replaced the former old defective main drains of the earlier days of the Colony, more especially in the upper levels of the city, have been well constructed and laid to proper falls as testified to by Mr. CHADWICK in his Report on the Sanitation of Hongkong, but it is clear that in spite of the best workmanship and of every precaution the newest and best built main drain in the world will become an offensive nuisance along its whole length if the liquid matter that is led into it at every step from the connexion drains of private houses, is already in a high state of decomposition by reason of previous long stagnation, and this is what is now occurring in the city of Victoria and calling for an early remedy.
15. The remedy to be adopted to remove the bad smells in the streets which are found to emanate from the Government main sewers is so obvious that no person examining the matter for himself can fail to see it. The evil must be attacked at its source: that is at the house-drains. All house-drains found in a defective and insanitary condition, wherein kitchen and other foul waters stagnate and ferment for long periods, must be taken up and relaid to proper falls in impervious glazed stoneware in lieu of porous black brick, and must be furnished with those safeguards to health in respect of trapping, ventilation, and disconnexion which are now clearly specified in the new Ordinance and its proposed Bye-Laws. When properly reconstructed and passed by the Sanitary Board such house-drains may be connected with the present main-drains, and when the time arrives for laying the new pipe mains on the Separate System, it will be the duty of the Public Works Department to see that the connexion between such improved house-drains and the new Government mains is properly effected free of cost to the house-owner. groups of the worst of those defective old house-drains are taken in hand at the same time and dealt with in rapid succession-and there is no reason why this should not be done the Sanitary Board at the end of twelve months will be already far on the road to relieve the public frequenting the streets of the city from the smells that have given rise to complaints, and what is far more important, as regards the inmates of private dwellings, the Board will have done more for their health and comfort than could possibly be obtained at this moment from any other form of sanitary improvement.
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16. I make the foregoing remarks lest it be misapprehended that the con- sideration of the Separate System need retard early drainage reforms in private premises.
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