This shows an increase in 36 years of very nearly 400 per cent, but still it constitutes little more than one-half the cesspoolage of London.

The quantity of refuse matter which is daily drawn from the cesspools, Mr. Rammell states—and he had every assistance from the authorities in prosecuting his inquiries—at “between 600 and 700 cubic mètres; (21,180 and 24,710 cubic feet), giving, in round numbers, the annual quantity of 230,000 cubic mètres.

“Dividing this annual quantity at 230,000 cubic mètres (or 8,000,000 cubic feet) by the number of the population of Paris (94,721 individuals, according to the last census), we have 243 litres only as the annual produce from each individual. The daily quantity of matter (including water necessary for cleanliness) passing from each person into the cesspool in the better class of houses is stated to be 1¾ litre (3·08 pints), or 638 litres annually. The discrepancy between these two quantities, wide as it is, must be accounted for by the fact of a large proportion of the lower orders in Paris rarely or ever using any privy at all, and by allowing for the small quantity of water made use of in the inferior class of houses. There can be no doubt that this latter quantity of 1¾ litre daily is very nearly correct, and not above the average quantity used in houses where a moderate degree of cleanliness is observed. This proportion was ascertained to hold good in the case of some barracks in Paris, where the contents of the cesspools were accurately measured, the total quantity divided by the number of men occupying the barracks, and the quotient by the number of days since the cesspools had been last emptied; the result showing a daily quantity of 1¾ litre from each individual.

“The average charge per cubic mètre for extraction and transport of the cesspoolage is nine francs, giving a gross annual charge of 2,070,000 francs (82,800l. sterling), which sum, it would appear, is paid every year by the house-proprietors of Paris for the extraction of the matter from their cesspools, and its transport to the Voirie.”

Mr. Rammell says that, were a tubular system of house-drainage, such as has been described under the proper head, adopted in Paris, in lieu of the present mode, it would cost less than one-tenth of the expense now incurred.

The principal place of deposit for the general refuse of Paris has long been at Montfaucon. A French writer, M. Jules Garnier, in a recent work, “A Visit to Montfaucon,” says:—“For more than nine hundred years Montfaucon has been devoted to this purpose. There the citizens of Paris deposited their filth before the walls of the capital extended beyond what is now the central quarter. The distance between Paris and Montfaucon was then more than a mile and a half.” Thus it appears that Montfaucon was devoted to its present purposes, of course in a much more limited degree, as early as the reign of King Charles the Simple.

This deposit of cesspool matter is the property of the commune (as in the city of London it would be said to belong to the “corporation”), and it is farmed out, for terms of nine years, to the highest bidders. The amount received by the commune has greatly increased, as the following returns, which are official, will show:—

It is here that the “poudrette,”[74] of which I have spoken elsewhere, is prepared. Besides this branch of commerce, Montfaucon has establishments for the extracting of ammonia from the cesspool matter, and the right of doing so is now farmed out for 80,000 francs a-year (3200l).

Montfaucon is on the north side of Paris, and the place of refuse deposit is known as the Voirie. The following account of it, and of the manufacture of poudrette, is curious in many respects:—

“The area, which is about 40 acres in extent, is divided into three irregular compartments:—

“1. The system of basins.

“2. The ground used for spreading and drying the matter.

“3. The place where the matter is heaped up after having been dried.

“The basins, standing for the most part in gradations, one above another, by reason of the slope of the ground, are six in number. The two upper ones, which are upon a level, first receive the soil upon its arrival at the Voirie; the four others are receptacles for the more liquid portion as it gradually flows off from the upper basins.

“There is a great difference in the character of the soil brought; that taken from the upper part of the cesspools, and amounting to a large proportion of the whole, being entirely liquid; while the remainder is more or less solid, according to the depth at which it is taken. The whole, however, during winter or rainy weather, is indiscriminately deposited in the upper basins; but in dry weather, the nearly solid portion is at once thrown upon the drying-ground.”[75]

“The quantity of poudrette sold in 1818 was:—

at prices of 7, 8, and 9 francs the setier.

“This is equal, at the average price of 8 francs, to 22,400l. sterling.

“The refuse liquids, as fast as they overflow the basins, or are passed through the chemical works, are conducted into the public sewers, and through them into the Seine, nearly opposite the Jardin des Plantes. They thus fall into the river at the very commencement of its course through Paris, and pollute its waters before they have reached the various works lower down and near the centre of the city, where they are raised and distributed for household purposes, for the supply of baths, and for the public fountains.

“Rats are found by thousands in the Voirie, and their voracity is such, that I have often known them, during a single night, convert into skeletons the carcasses of twenty horses which had been brought thither the evening before. The bones are burnt to heat the coppers, or to get rid of them.

“Speaking of the disgusting practices at the Voirie, Mr. Gisquet says, ‘I have seen men stark naked, passing entire days in the midst of the basins, seeking for any objects of value they might contain. I have seen others fishing for the rotten fish the market inspectors had caused to be thrown into the basins. Two cartloads of spoilt and stinking mackerel were thrown into the largest of the basins; two hours afterwards all the fish had disappeared.’

“The emanations from the Voirie are, as may well be supposed, most powerfully offensive. To a stranger unaccustomed to the atmosphere surrounding them it would be almost impossible to make the tour of the basins without being more or less affected with a disposition to nausea. Large and numerous bubbles of gas are seen constantly rising from a lake of urine and water, while evaporation of the most foul description is going on from many acres of surrounding ground, upon which the solid matter is spread to dry.”

The late M. Parent du Châtelet, a high authority on this matter, stated (in 1833) that the emanations from the Voirie were insupportable within a circumference of 2000 mètres (about a mile and a quarter, English measure); while the winds carried them sometimes, as was shown when an official inquiry was made as to the ravages and causes of cholera, 2½ miles; and in certain states of the atmosphere, 8 French miles (not quite 5 English miles). The same high authority has also stated, that in addition to the emanations from the cesspool matter at the Voirie the greater part of the carcasses of about 12,000 horses, and between 25,000 and 30,000 smaller animals, were allowed to rot upon the ground there.

To abate this nuisance a new Voirie was, more than 20 years since, formed in the forest of Bondy, 8 miles from Paris. It consists of eight basins, four on each side of the Canal de l’Ourcq, arranged like those at Montfaucon. The area of these basins is little short of 96,000 square yards, and their collective capacity upwards of 261,000 cubic yards. The expectations of the relief that would be experienced from the establishment of the new Voirie in the forest have not been realized. The movable cesspools only have been conveyed there, by boats on the canal, to be emptied; the empty casks being conveyed back by the same boats. The basins are not yet full; for the conveyance by the Canal de l’Ourcq is costly, and in winter its traffic is sometimes suspended by its being frozen. In one year the cost of conveying these movable cesspools to Bondy was little short of 1500l.

In the latest Report on this subject (1835) the Commissioners, of whom M. Parent du Châtelet was one, recommend that all the cesspool matter at the Voiries should be disinfected. M. Salmon, after a course of chemical experiments (the Report of the Commission states), disinfected and carbonized a mass of mud and filth, containing much organic matter, deposited (from a sewer) on the banks of the Seine.

The Commissioners say, “The discovery of M. Salmon awakened the attention of the contractors of Montfaucon, who employed one of our most skilful chemists to find for them a means of disinfection other than that for which M. Salmon had taken out a patent. M. Sanson and some other persons made similar researches, and from their joint investigations it resulted that disinfection might be equally well produced with turf ashes, with carbonized turf, and with the simple débris of this very abundant substance; and that the same success might be obtained with saw-dust, with the refuse matter of the tan-yards, with garden mould, so abundant in the environs of Paris, and with many other substances. A curious experiment has even shown, that after mixing with a clayey earth a portion of fæcal matter, it was only necessary to carbonize this mixture to obtain a perfect disinfectant powder. Theory had already indicated the result.”

This disinfection, however, has not been carried out in the Voiries, nor in the manufacture of poudrette.

From the account of the general refuse depositories of Paris we pass to the particular receptacles or cesspools of the French capital.

The Parisian cesspools are of two sorts:—

1. Fixed or excavated cesspools.

2. Movable cesspools.

“In early times the excavated cesspools or pits were constructed in the rudest manner, and cleaned out more or less frequently, or utterly neglected, at the discretion of their owners. As the city increased in size, however, and as the permeations necessarily taking place into the soil accumulated in the lapse of centuries, the evil resulting was found to be of grave magnitude, calling for prompt and vigorous interference on the part of the authorities. It appears certain that prior to the year 1819 (when a strict ordonnance was issued on the subject) the cesspools were very carelessly constructed. For the most part they were far from water-tight, and very probably were not intended to be otherwise. Consequently, nearly the whole of the fluid matter within them drained into the springs beneath the substratum, or became absorbed by the surrounding soil. Nor was this the only evil: the basement walls of the houses became saturated with the offensive permeations, and the atmosphere, more particularly in the interior of the dwellings, tainted with their exhalations.

“The movable cesspools, for the most part, consist simply of tanks or barrels, which, when full, are removed to some convenient spot for the purpose of their contents being discharged. This form of cesspool, though not leading to that contamination of the substratum which is naturally induced by the fixed or excavated cesspool, may occasion many offensive nuisances from carelessness in overfilling, or in the process of emptying.”

“The movable cesspools are of two kinds; the one,” says Mr. Rammell, “extremely simple and primitive in construction, the other more complicated. The former retains all the refuse, both liquid and solid, passed into it; the latter retains only the solid matter, the liquid being separated by a sort of strainer, and running off into another receptacle.

“The advantage of this separating apparatus is, that those cesspools provided with it require to be emptied less frequently than the others; the solid matter being alone retained in the movable part. The liquid portion is withdrawn from the tank into which it is received by pumping.

“The other kind of movable cesspool consists simply of a wooden cask set on end, and having its top pierced to admit the soil-pipe. It is intended to retain both solid and liquid matter. When full, it is detached, and the aperture in the top having been closed by a tight-fitting lid secured by an iron bar placed across, it is removed, and an empty one immediately substituted for it.

“The movable cesspool last described is much more generally used than the other kind; very few are furnished with the separating apparatus. But the use of either sort, I am told, is not on the increase. The movable cesspools are found, on the whole, to be more expensive than the fixed, besides entailing many inconveniences, one of which is the frequent entrance of workmen upon the premises for the purpose of removing them, which sometimes has to be done every second or third day. Moreover, if the cask becomes in the slightest degree overcharged, there is an overflow of matter.”

Indeed, the movable system of cesspools (it appears from further accounts) seems to be now adopted only in those places where fixed cesspools could not be altered in accordance with the ordonnance, or where it is desired to avoid the first cost of a fixed cesspool.

An ordonnance of 1819 enacts peremptorily that all cesspools, fixed or excavated, then existing, shall be altered in accordance with its provisions upon the first subsequent emptying after the date of the enactment, “or if that be found impracticable, they shall be filled up.” This full delegation of power to a centralised authority was the example prompting our late stringent enactments as to buildings and sewerage.

The French ordonnance provides also that the walls, arches, and bottoms of the cesspools, shall be constructed of a very hard description of stone, known as “pierres meulières” (mill-stone); the mortar used is to be hydraulic lime and clean river sand. Each arch is to be 30 to 35 centimètres (12 to 14 inches) in thickness, and the walls 45 to 50 centimètres (18 to 20 inches); the interior height not to be less than 2 mètres (2 yards 6 inches). A soil-pipe is always to be placed in the middle of the cesspool; its interior diameter is not to be less than 9⅞ inches in pottery-ware piping, or 7⅞ inches in cast iron. A vent-pipe, not less than 9⅞ inches in diameter, is to be carried up to the level of the chimney-tops, or to that of the chimneys of the adjoining houses. This is, if possible, to divert the smell from the house to which the cesspool is attached.

“A principal object of the ordonnance,” it is stated in the Reports, “was to ensure the cesspools being thenceforth made water-tight; so that further pollution of the substratum and springs might be prevented; and the provisions for its attainment have been very strictly enforced by the police. The present cesspools are, in fact, water-tight constructions, retaining the whole of the liquids passed into them until the same are withdrawn by artificial means. The advantage has its attendant inconveniences, and, moreover, has been dearly paid for; for, independently of the cost of the alterations and the increased cost of making the cesspools in the outset—the liquids no longer draining away by natural permeation—the constant expense of emptying them has enormously increased. In the better class of houses, where water is more freely used, the operation has now to be repeated every three, four, or five months, whereas formerly the cesspool was emptied every eighteen months or two years. An increased water supply has added to the evil, moderate even now as the extent of that supply is.”

“It is estimated that, in the better class of houses, the daily quantity of matter, including the water necessary for cleanliness and to ensure the passage of the solids through the soil-pipe, passing into the cesspool from each individual, amounts to 1¾ litre (3·08 English pints). Foreign substances are found in great abundance in the cesspools; the large soil-pipes permitting their easy introduction; so that the cesspool becomes the common receptacle for a great variety of articles that it is desired secretly to get rid of. Article 19 of the Police Regulations directs that nightmen finding any articles in the cesspools, especially such as lead to the suspicion of a crime or misdemeanor, shall make a declaration of the fact the same day to a Commissary of Police.”

In all such matters the police regulations of France are far more stringent and exacting than those of England.

“The cesspools vary considerably in foulness,” continues the Report; “and it is remarkable that those containing the greatest proportion of water are the most foul and dangerous. This is accounted for by the increased quantity of sulphuretted hydrogen gas evolved: and is more particularly the case where, from their large size, or from the small number of people using them, much time is allowed for the matter to stagnate and decompose in them. Soap-suds are said to add materially to their offensive and dangerous condition. The FOULNESS of the cesspools, therefore, would appear to be in direct proportion to the CLEANLY habits of the inmates of the houses to which they respectively belong. Where urine predominates ammoniacal vapours are given off in considerable quantities, and although these affect the eyes of those exposed to them—and the nightmen suffer much from inflammation of these organs—no danger to life results. The inflammation, however, is often sufficiently acute to produce temporary blindness, and from this cause the men are at times thrown out of work for days together.”[77]

The emptying of the cesspools is the next point to be considered.

No cesspool is allowed to be emptied in Paris, and no nightman’s cart, containing soil, is allowed to be in the streets from 8 A.M. to 10 P.M. from October 1st to March 31st, nor from 6 A.M. to 11 P.M. from April 1st to September 30th. In the winter season the hours of labour permitted by law are ten, and in the summer season seven, out of the twenty-four; while in London the hours of night-work are limited to five, without any distinction of season. These hours, however, only relate to the cleansing of the fixed cesspools of Paris.

Fixed or excavated cesspools are emptied into carts, which are driven to the receptacles. As far as regards the removal of night-soil along the streets, there are far more frequent complaints of stench and annoyance in Paris than in London. None of these cesspools can be emptied without authority from the police, and the police exercise a vigilant supervision over the whole arrangements; neither can any cesspool, after being emptied, be closed without a written authority, after inspection, by the Director of Health; nor can a cesspool, if found defective when emptied, be repaired without such authority.

“With regard to the movable cesspool,” it is reported, “the process of emptying is very simple, though undoubtedly demanding a considerable expenditure of labour. The tank or barrel, when filled, is disconnected from the soil-pipe, an empty one being immediately substituted in its place, and the bung-hole being securely closed, it is conveyed away on a vehicle, somewhat resembling a brewer’s dray (which holds about eight or ten of them), to the spot appointed as the depository of its discharged contents. The removal of movable cesspools is allowed to take place during the day.”

In opening a cesspool in Paris, precautions are always taken to prevent accidents which might result from the escape or ignition of the gases.

The general, not to say universal, mode of emptying the fixed or excavated cesspools is to pump the contents into closed carts for transport.

“This operation is,” says Mr. Rammell, “performed with two descriptions of pumps, one working on what may be called the hydraulic principle, the other on the pneumatic. In the former, the valves are placed in the pipe communicating between the cesspool and the cart, and the matter itself is pumped. In the latter, the valves are placed beyond the cart, and the air being pumped out of the cart, the matter flows into it to fill up the vacuum so occasioned. The real principle is of course the same in both cases, the matter being forced up by atmospheric pressure. One advantage of the pneumatic system is, that there are no valves to impede the free passage of matter through the suction-pipe; another, that it permits the use of a pipe of larger diameter.

“The cart employed for the pneumatic system consists of an iron cylinder, mounted sometimes upon four, but generally upon two wheels, the latter arrangement being found to be the more convenient. Previous to use at the cesspool, the carts are drawn to a branch establishment, situate just within the Barrière du Combat, where they are exhausted of air with an air-pump, worked by steam power. A 12-horse engine erected there is capable of exhausting five carts at the same time; the vacuum produced being equal to 28⅜ inches (72 centimètres) of mercury. A cart (in good repair, and upon two wheels) will preserve a practical vacuum for 48 hours after exhaustion.”

The total weight of one of these carts when full is about 3 tons and 8 cwt. This is somewhat more than the weight of the contents of a London waggon employed in night-soil carriage. Three horses are attached to each cart.

When an opening into the cesspool has been effected, a suction-pipe on the pneumatic principle is laid from the cesspool to the cart. This pipe is 3¹⁵/₁₆ inches in diameter, and is in separate pieces of about 10 feet each, with others shorter (down even to 1 foot), to make up any exact length required. Two kinds are commonly used; one made of leather, having iron wire wound spirally inside to prevent collapse, the other of copper. The leather pipe is used where a certain degree of pliability is required; the copper for the straight parts of the line, and for determined curves; pieces struck from various radii being made for the purpose.

Gutta-percha has been tried as a substitute for leather in the piping, but was pronounced liable to split, and its use was abandoned. So with India-rubber in London.

The communication between the suction-pipe and the vehicle used by the nightmen is opened by withdrawing a plug by means of a forked rod into the “recess” (hollow) of the machine, an operation tasking the muscular powers of two men. This done, the cesspool contents rush into the cart, being forced up by the weight of the atmosphere to occupy the existing vacuum; this occupies about three minutes. The cart, however, is then but three-fourths filled with matter, the remaining fourth being occupied by the rarefied air previously in the cart, and by the air contained in the suction-pipe. This air is next withdrawn by the action of a small air-pump, worked usually by two, but sometimes by one man. The air-pump is placed on the ground at a little distance from the cesspool cart, and communicates with it by a flexible India-rubber tube, an inch in diameter. The air, as fast as it is pumped out, is forced through another India-rubber tube of similar dimensions, which communicates with a furnace, also placed on the ground at a little distance from the air-pump, the pump occupying the middle space between the cart and the furnace, the furnace and the pump being portable. To ascertain when the vehicle is full, a short glass tube is inserted in the end of the air-pipe (the end being of brass), and through this, with the help of a small lantern, the matter is seen to rise.

“The number of carts required for each operation,” states Mr. Rammell, “of course varies according to the size of the cesspool to be emptied; but as these contain on the average about five cartloads, that is the number usually sent.[78]

“In addition to the carts for the transport of the night-soil, a light-covered spring van drawn by one horse is used to carry the tools, &c., required in the process.

“These tools consist of—

“1. An air-pump when the work is to be done on the pneumatic system, and of an hydraulic pump when it is to be done on the hydraulic system.

“2. About 50 mètres of suction-pipe of various forms and lengths.

“3. A furnace for the purpose of burning the gases.

“4. Wooden hods for the removal of the solid night-soil.

“5. Pails, a ladder, pincers, levers, hammers, and other articles.”

I have hitherto spoken of the Pneumatic System of emptying the Parisian cesspools. The results of the Hydraulic System are so similar, as regards time, &c., that only a brief notice is required. The hydraulic pump is worked by four men; it is placed on the ground in the place most convenient for the operation, and the cart is filled in the space of from three to five minutes.

A furnace is used.

“The furnace,” says the Report, “consists of a sheet-iron cylinder, about nine inches in diameter, pierced with small holes, and covered with a conical cap to prevent the flame spreading. The vent-pipe first communicates underneath with a small reservoir, intended to contain the matter in case the operation should be carried too far. A piece is inserted in the bottom of this reservoir, by unscrewing which it may be emptied. The furnace is sometimes fixed upon a plank, which rests upon two projecting pieces behind the cart.”

An indicator is also used to show the advancement of the filling of the cart; a glass tube and a cork float are the chief portions of the apparatus of the indicator.

“Towards the end of the operation, when the quantity of matter remaining in the cesspool, although sufficiently fluid, is too shallow for pumping, it is scooped into a large pail; and, the end of the suction-pipe being introduced, drawn up into the cart. When the matter is in too solid a state to pass through the pipe, it is carried to the cart in hods, unless it is in considerable quantity. In that case it is removed in vessels called tinettes, in the shape of a truncated cone, holding each about 3½ cubic feet. These vessels are closed with a lid, and are lifted into an open waggon for transport.”

Of these two systems the pneumatic is the more costly, and is likely to be supplanted by the hydraulic. Each system, according to Mr. Rammell, is still a nuisance, as, in spite of every precaution, the gases escape the moment the cesspool emptying is commenced, and vitiate the atmosphere. They force their way very often through the joints of the pipes, and are insufficiently consumed in the furnaces. Mr. Rammell mentions his having twice, after witnessing two of these operations, suffered from attacks of illness. On the first occasion, the men omitted to burn the foul air, and the atmosphere being heavy with moisture, the odour was so intense that it was smelt from the Rue du Port Mahon to the Rue Menars, more than 400 yards distant.

The emptying of the cesspools is let by contract, the commune acting in the light of a proprietor. To obtain a contract, a man must have license or permission from the prefect of police, and such license is only granted after proof that the applicant is provided with the necessary apparatus, carts, &c., and also with a suitable dépôt for the reception of the pumps, carts, &c., when not in use. The stock-in-trade of a contractor is inspected at least twice a-year, and if found inadequate or out of repair the license is commonly withdrawn. The “gangs” of nightmen employed by the contractors are fixed by the law at four men each (the number employed in London), but without any legal provision on the subject. The terms of these contracts are not stated, but they appear to have ceased to be undertakings by individual capitalists, being all in the hands of companies, known as compagnies de vidanges (filth companies). There are now eight companies in Paris carrying on these operations. More than half of the whole work, however, is accomplished by one company, the “Compagnie Richer.” The capital invested in their working stock is said to exceed 4,800,000 francs (200,000l.). They now require the labour of 350 horses, and the use of 120 vehicles of different descriptions.

The construction of a cesspool in Paris costs about 18l. as an average. The houses containing from 30 to 70 inmates may have two, and occasionally more, cesspools. Taking the average at one and a half, the capital sunk in a cesspool is 27l. Mr. Rammell says:—

“Adopting these calculations of the number of cesspools to each house, and their cost, and allowing only the small quantity of 1¾ litre (3·08 pints) of matter to each individual, the annual expense of the cesspool system in Paris, per house containing 24 persons, will be,—

“For interest, at 5 per cent upon capital sunk in works of construction, 1l. 7s.

“For extraction and removal of matter, 5l. 11s.

“Total, 6l. 18s.

“The annual expense per inhabitant will be 5s. 9d.

“The latter, then, may be taken as the average yearly sum per head actually paid by that portion of the inhabitants of Paris who use the cesspools.”

The following, among others before shown, are the conclusions arrived at by Mr. Rammell:—

1. “That with the most perfect regulations, and the application of machines constructed upon scientific principles, the operation of emptying cesspools is still a nuisance, not only to the inmates of the house to which it belongs, but to those of the neighbouring houses, and to persons passing in the street.

2. “That the cesspool system of Paris presents an obstacle to the proper extension of the water supply, and consequently represses the growth of habits of personal and domestic cleanliness, with their immense moral results; and that in this respect it may be said to be inconsistent with a high degree of civilization of the masses of any community.

3. “That, compared with a tubular system of refuse drainage, it is an exceedingly expensive mode of disposing of the fæcal refuse of a town.”

Of the Emptying of the London Cesspools by Pump and Hose.

Having now ascertained the quantity of wet house-refuse annually deposited in the cesspools of the metropolis, the next step is to show the means by which these 15,000,000 cubic feet of cesspoolage are removed, and whence they are conveyed, as well as the condition of the labourers engaged in the business.

There are two methods of removing the soil from the tanks:—

1. By pump and hose, or the hydraulic method;

2. By shovel and tube, or manual labour.

The first of these is the new French mode, and the other the old English method of performing the work. The distinctive feature between the two is, that in the one case the refuse is discharged by means of pipes into the sewers, and in the other that it is conveyed by means of carts to some distant night-yard.

According to the French method, therefore, the cesspoolage ultimately becomes sewage, the refuse being deposited in a cesspool for a greater or a less space of time, and finally discharged into the sewers; so that it is a kind of intermediate process between the cesspool system and the sewer system of defecating a town, being, as it were, a compound of the two.

The great advantage of the sewer system, as contradistinguished from the cesspool system of defecation, is, that it admits of the wet refuse being removed from the neighbourhood of the house as soon as it is produced; while the advantage of the cesspool system, as contradistinguished from the sewer system, is, that it prevents the contamination of the river whence the town draws its principal supply of water. The cesspool system of defecation remedies the main evil of the sewer system, and the sewer system the main evil of the cesspool system. The French mode of emptying cesspools, however, appears to have the peculiar property of combining the ill effects of both systems without the advantages of either. The refuse of the house not only remains rotting and seething for months under the noses of the household, but it is ultimately—that is, after more than a year’s decomposition—washed into the stream from which the inhabitants are supplied with water, and so returned to them diluted in the form of aqua pura, for washing, cooking, or drinking. The sole benefit accruing from the French mode of nightmanship is, that it performs a noisome operation in a comparatively cleanly manner; but surely this is a small compensation for the evils attendant upon it. The noses of those who prefer stagnant cesspools to rapid sewers cannot be so particularly sensitive, that for the sake of avoiding the smell of the nightman’s cart they would rather that its contents should be discharged into the water that they use for household purposes.

The hydraulic or pump-and-hose method of emptying the cesspools is now practised by the Court of Sewers, who introduced the process into London in the winter of 1847. The apparatus used in this country consists of an hydraulic pump, which is generally placed six or eight feet distant from, but sometimes close to, the cesspool—indeed, on its edge. It is worked by two men, “just up and down,” as one of the labourers described it to me, “like a fire-engine.” A suction-pipe, with an iron nozzle, is placed in the cesspool, into which is first introduced a deodorising fluid, in the proportion, as well as can be estimated, of a pint to a square yard of matter, and diluted with water from the fire-plugs.

The pipes are of leather, the suction-pipes being wrapped with spring-iron wire at the joints. India-rubber pipes were used, and “answered very tidy,” one of the gangers told me, but they were too expensive, the material being soon worn out: they were only tried five or six months. The pipes now employed differ in no respect of size or appearance from the leathern fire-engine pipes; and as the work is always done in the daytime, and no smell arises from it, the neighbourhood is often alarmed, and people begin to ask where the fire is. One outsideman said, “Why, that’s always asked. I’ve been asked—ay, I dare say a hundred times in a day—‘Where’s the fire? where’s the fire?’” A cesspool, by this process, has been emptied into a sewer at 300 yards distant. The pipe is placed within the nearest gullyhole, down which the matter is washed into the sewer. When the cesspool is emptied, it is well sluiced with water; the water is pumped into the sewer, and then the work is complete.

The pumping is occasionally very hard work, making the shoulders and back ache grievously; indeed, some cesspools have been found so long neglected, and so choked with rags and rubbish, that manual labour had to be resorted to, and the matter dug and tubbed out, after the old mode of the nightmen. A square yard of cesspoolage is cleared out, under ordinary circumstances, in an hour; while an average duration of time for the cleansing of a regularly-sized cesspool is from three to four hours.

A pneumatic pump, with an iron cart, drawn by two horses (similar to the French invention), was tried as an experiment, but discontinued in a fortnight.

For the hydraulic method of emptying cesspools, a gang of four men, under the direction of a ganger, who makes a fifth, is required.

The division of labour is as follows:—

1. The pumpmen, who, as their name implies, work the engine or pumps.

2. The holeman, who goes into the cesspool and stirs up the matter, so as to make it as fluid as possible.

3. The outsideman, whose business it is to attend to the pipe, which reaches from the cesspool, along the surface of the street, or other place, to the gullyhole.

4. The ganger, who is the superintendent of the whole, and is only sometimes present at the operation; he is not unfrequently engaged, while one cesspool is being emptied, in making an examination or any necessary arrangement for the opening of another. He also gives notice (acting under the instruction of the clerk of the works) to the water company of the district, that the pumps will be at work in this or that place, a notice generally given a day in advance, and the water is supplied gratuitously, from a street fire-plug, and used at discretion, some cesspool contents requiring three times more water than others to liquefy them sufficient for pumping.

The cesspool-pumping gangs are six in number, each consisting of five men, although the “outsideman” is sometimes a strong youth of seventeen or eighteen. The whole work is done by a contractor, who makes an agreement with the Court of Sewers, and finds the necessary apparatus, appointing his own labourers. All the present labourers, however, have been selected as trusty men from among the flushermen, the contractor concurring in the recommendation of the clerk of the works, or the inspector. The cesspool-sewermen work in six districts. Two divisions (east and west) of Westminster; Finsbury and Holborn; Surrey and Kent; Tower Hamlets (now including Poplar); and the City. The districts vary in size, but there is usually a gang devoted to each: in case of emergency, however, a gang from another district (as among the flushermen) is sent to expedite any pressing work. All the men are paid by the job, the payment being 2s. each per job, to the pumpmen and holeman, and 3s. to the ganger; but in addition to the 2s. per job, the holeman has 6d. a-day extra; and the outsideman has 6d. a-day deducted from the 4s. he would earn in two jobs, which is a frequent day’s work. The men told me that they had four or four and a-half days’ work (or eight or nine jobs) every week; but such was the case more particularly when the householders were less cognizant of the work, and did not think of resorting to it; now, I am assured, the men’s average employment may be put at five days a week, or ten jobs.

The perquisites of these workmen are none, except the householder sends them some refreshment on his own accord. There may be a perquisite, but very rarely, occurring to the holeman, should he find anything in the soil; but the finding is far less common than among the nightmen, with whom the process goes through different stages. I did not hear among cesspool-sewermen of anything being found by them or by their comrades; of course, when the soil is once absorbed into the pipe, it is unseen on its course of deposit down the gullyhole.

The men have no trade societies, and no arrangements of any equivalent nature; no benefit clubs or sick clubs, for which their number, indeed, is too small; or, as my informant sometimes wound up in a climax, “No, nothing that way, sir.” They are sober and industrious men, chiefly married, and with families. Into further statistics, however, of diet, rent, &c., I need not enter, concerning so small a body; they are the same as among other well-conducted labourers.

The men find their own dresses, which are of the same cost, form, and material as I have described to pertain to the flushermen; also their own “picks” and shovels, costing respectively 2s. 6d. and 2s. 3d. each.

One cesspool-sewerman told me, that when he was first a member of one of those gangs he was “awful abused” by the “regular nightmen,” if he came across any of them “as was beery, poor fellows;” but that had all passed over now.

The total sum paid to the six gangs of labourers in the course of the year would, at the rate of ten cesspools emptied per week, amount to the following:—

Any householder, &c., who applies to the Court of Sewers, or to any officer of the court whom he may know, has his cesspool cleansed by the hydraulic method, in the same way as he might employ any tradesman to do any description of work proper to his calling. The charge (by the Court of Sewers) is 5s. or 6s. per square yard, according to pipeage, &c. required; a cesspool emptied by this system costs from 20s. to 30s. The charges of the nightmen, who have to employ horses, &c., are necessarily higher.

This is upwards of 123 per cent; but out of this, interest on capital and wear and tear of machinery have to be paid.

During the year 1851, I am credibly informed that as many as 3000 sewers were emptied by the hydraulic process; and calculating each to have contained the average quantity of refuse, viz. five tons or loads, or about 180 cubic feet, we have an aggregate of 540,000 cubic feet of cesspoolage ultimately carried off by the sewers. This, however, is only a twenty-seventh of the entire quantity.

The sum paid in wages to the men engaged in emptying these 3000 cesspools by the hydraulic process would, at the rate of 2s. per man to the four members of the gang, and 3s. to the ganger, or 11s. in all for each cesspool, amount to 1650l., which is 139l. and 250 cesspools less than the amount above given.

Statement of a Cesspool-Sewerman.

I give the following brief and characteristic statement, which is peculiar in showing the habitual restlessness of the mere labourer. My informant was a stout, hale-looking man, who had rarely known illness. All these sort of labourers (nightmen included) scout the notion of the cholera attacking them!

“Work, sir? Well, I think I do know what work is, and has known it since I was a child; and then I was set to help at the weaving. My friends were weavers at Norwich, and 26 years ago, until steam pulled working men down from being well paid and well off, it was a capital trade. Why, my father could sometimes earn 3l. at his work as a working weaver; there was money for ever then; now 12s. a-week is, I believe, the tip-top earnings of his trade. But I didn’t like the confinement or the close air in the factories, and so, when I grew big enough, I went to ground-work in the city (so he frequently called Norwich); I call ground-work such as digging drains and the like. Then I ’listed into the Marines. Oh, I hardly know what made me; men does foolish things and don’t know why; it’s human natur. I’m sure it wasn’t the bounty of 3l. that tempted me, for I was doing middling, and sometimes had night-work as well as ground-work to do. I was then sent to Sheerness and put on board the Thunderer man-of-war, carrying 84 guns, as a marine. She sailed through the Straits (of Gibraltar), and was three years and three months blockading the Dardanelles, and cruising among the islands. I never saw anything like such fortifications as at the Dardanelles; why, there was mortars there as would throw a ton weight. No, I never heard of their having been fired. Yes, we sometimes got leave for a party to go ashore on one of the islands. They called them Greek islands, but I fancy as how it was Turks near the Dardanelles. O yes, the men on the islands was civil enough to us; they never spoke to us, and we never spoke to them. The sailors sometimes, and indeed the lot of us, would have bits of larks with them, laughing at ’em and taking sights at ’em and such like. Why, I’ve seen a fine-dressed Turk, one of their grand gentlemen there, when a couple of sailors has each been taking a sight at him, and dancing the shuffle along with it, make each on ’em a low bow, as solemn as could be. Perhaps he thought it was a way of being civil in our country! I’ve seen some of the head ones stuck over with so many knives, and cutlasses, and belts, and pistols, and things, that he looked like a cutler’s shop-window. We were ordered home at last, and after being some months in barracks, which I didn’t relish at all, were paid off at Plymouth. Oh, a barrack life’s anything but pleasant, but I’ve done with it. After that I was eight years and a quarter a gentleman’s servant, coachman, or anything (in Norwich), and then got tired of that and came to London, and got to ground and new sewer-work, and have been on the sewers above five years. Yes, I prefer the sewers to the Greek islands. I was one of the first set as worked a pump. There was a great many spectators; I dare say as there was 40 skientific gentlemen. I’ve been on the sewers, flushing and pumping, ever since. The houses we clean out, all says it’s far the best plan, ours is. ‘Never no more nightmen,’ they say. You see, sir, our plan’s far less trouble to the people in the house, and there’s no smell—least I never found no smell, and it’s cheap, too. In time the nightmen’ll disappear; in course they must, there’s so many new dodges comes up, always some one of the working classes is a being ruined. If it ain’t steam, it’s something else as knocks the bread out of their mouths quite as quick.”

Of the Present Disposal of the Night-Soil.

It would appear, according to the previous calculations, that of the 15,000,000 cubic feet of house-refuse annually deposited in the cesspools of the metropolis, about 500,000 cubic feet are pumped by the French process into the sewers; consequently there still remains about 14,500,000 cubic feet, or about 404,000 loads, to be disposed of by other means. I shall now proceed to explain how the cesspoolage proper, that is to say, that which is removed by cartage rather than by being discharged into the sewers, is ultimately got rid of.

Until about twenty months ago, when the new sanitary regulations concerning the disposal of night-soil came into operation, the cesspool matter was “shot” in a night-yard, generally also a dust-yard. These were the yards of the parish contractors, and were situate in Maiden-lane, Paddington, &c., &c. Any sweeper-nightman, or any nightman, was permitted by the proprietor of one of these places to deposit his night-soil there. For this the depositor received no payment, the privilege of having “a shoot” being accounted sufficient.

There were, till within these six or eight years, I was informed, 60 places where cesspool manure could be shot. These included the nightmen’s yards and the wharves of manure dealers (some of the small coasting vessels taking it as ballast); but as regards the cesspool filth, there are now none of these places of deposit, though some little, I was told, might be done by stealth.

Of one of these night-yard factories Dr. Gavin gave, in 1848, the following account:—

“On the western side of Spitalfields workhouse, and entering from a street called Queen-street, is a nightman’s yard. A heap of dung and refuse of every description, about the size of a tolerably large house, lies piled to the left of the yard; to the right is an artificial pond, into which the contents of cesspools are thrown. The contents are allowed to desiccate in the open air; and they are frequently stirred for that purpose. The odour which was given off when the contents were raked up, to give me an assurance that there was nothing so very bad in the alleged nuisance, drove me from the place with the utmost speed.

“On two sides of this horrid collection of excremental matter was a patent manure manufactory. To the right in this yard was a large accumulation of dung, &c., but to the left there was an extensive layer of a compost of blood, ashes, and nitric acid, which gave out the most horrid, offensive, and disgusting concentration of putrescent odours it has ever been my lot to be the victim of. The whole place presented a most foul and filthy aspect, and an example of the enormous outrages which are perpetrated in London against society.

“It is a curious fact, that the parties who had charge of these two premises were each dead to the foulness of their own most pestilential nuisances. The nightman’s servant accused the premises of the manure manufacturer as the source of perpetual foul smells, but thought his yard free from any particular cause of complaint; while the servant of the patent manure manufacturer diligently and earnestly asserted the perfect freedom of his master’s yard from foul exhalations; but considered that the raking up of the drying night-soil on the other side of the wall was ‘quite awful, and enough to kill anybody.’

“Immediately adjoining the patent manure manufactory is the establishment of a bottle merchant. He complained to me in the strongest terms of the expenses and annoyances he had been put to through the emanations which floated in the atmosphere having caused his bottles to spoil the wine which was placed in such as had not been very recently washed. He was compelled frequently to change his straw, and frequently to wash his bottles, and considered that unless the nuisance could be suppressed, he would be compelled to leave his present premises.”

This and similar places were suppressed soon after the passing of the sanitary measures of September, 1848.

The cesspool refuse, which was disposed of for manure, was at that time first shot into recesses in the night-yard, where it was mixed with exhausted hops procured from the brewhouses, which were said to absorb the liquid portions, when stirred up with the matter, and to add not only to the consistency of the mass, but to its readier portability for land manure or for stowage in a barge. It was also mixed with littered straw from the mews, and with stable manure generally. An old man who had worked many years—he did not know how many—in one of these yards, told me that when this night-soil was “fresh shot and first mixed” (with the hops, &c.), the stench was often dreadful. “How we stood it,” he said, “I don’t know; but we did stand it.”

In one of the night-and-dust-yards, I ascertained that as many as 50 loads, half of them waggon-loads, have been shot from the proprietor’s own carts, and from the carts of the nightmen “using” the yard, in one morning, but the average “shoot” was about ten loads (half a waggon) a-day for six days in the week.

Of the mode of manufacture of this manure, a full account has been given in the details of the cesspool system of Paris, for the process was the same in London, although on a much smaller scale; and indeed the manufacture here was chiefly in the hands of Frenchmen.

The manure was, after it had been deposited for periods varying from one month to five or six, sold to farmers and gardeners at from 4s. to 5s. the cart-load, although 4s., I was informed, might have been the general average. The cesspool matter, considered per se, was not worth, of late years, I am told, above 2s. a ton (or a load, which is sometimes rather more and sometimes less than a ton). It was when mixed that the price was 4s. to 5s. a ton. This cesspool filth was shot on the premises of the manufacturer gratuitously, as it was in any of the night-yards. It was not until it had been kept some time, and had been mixed (generally) with other manures, and sometimes with road-sweepings, that this manure was used in gardens; for it was said that if this had not been done, its ammoniacal vapours would have been absorbed and retained by the leaves of the fruit-trees.

This night-soil manure was devoted to two purposes—to the manufacture of deodorized and portable manure for exportation (chiefly to our sugar-growing colonies), and to the fertilization of the land around London.

When manufactured into manure it was shipped—in new casks generally, the manure casks of the outward voyage being transformed into the brown sugar casks of the homeward-bound vessels. I was told by a seaman who some years ago sailed to the West Indies, that these manure casks in damp weather gave out an unpleasant odour.

It was only to the home cultivators who resided at no great distance from a night-yard, from five to six miles or a little more, that this manure was sold to be carted away; their attendance at the markets with carts, waggons, and horses, giving them facilities of conveying the manure at a cheap rate. But upwards of three-fourths of the whole was sent in barges into the more distant country parts, having a ready water communication either by the Thames or by canal.

The purchaser nearer home conveyed it away in his own cart, and with his own horses, which had perhaps come up to town laden with cabbages to Covent Garden, or hay to Cumberland-market, the cart being made water-tight for the purpose. The “legal hours” to be observed in the cleansing of cesspools, and the transport of the contents upon such cleansing, not being required to be observed in this second transport of the cesspool manure, it was carted away at any hour, as stable dung now is.

It is not possible at the present time, when night-yards are no longer permitted to exist in London, and the manufacture of the night-soil manure is consequently suppressed, to ascertain the precise quantities disposed of commercially, in a former state of things.

The money returns to the master-nightman for the manure he now collects need no figures. The law requires him to refrain from shooting this soil in his own yard, or in any inhabited part of the metropolis, and it is shot on the nearest farm to which he has access, merely for the privilege of shooting it, the farmer paying nothing for the deposit, with which he does what he pleases. It is mixed with other refuse, I was told, at present, and kept as compost, or used on the land, but the change is too recent for the establishment of any systematic traffic in the article.

Of the Working Nightmen and the Mode of Work.

Nightwork, by the provisions of the Police Act, is not to be commenced before twelve at night, nor continued beyond five in the morning, winter and summer alike. This regulation is known among the nightmen as the “legal hours,” and tends, in a measure, to account for the heterogeneous class of labourers who still seek nightwork; for strong men think little of devoting a part of the night, as well as the working hours of the day, to toil. A rubbish-carter, a very powerfully-built man, told me he was partial to nightwork, and always looked out for it, even when in daily employ, as “it was sometimes like found money.” The scavengers, sweeps, dustmen, and labourers known as ground-workers, are anxious to obtain night-work when out of regular employment; and, ten years and more since, it was often an available and remunerative resource.

Night-work is, then, essentially, and perhaps necessarily, extra-work, rather than a distinct calling followed by a separate class of workers. The generality of nightmen are scavengers, or dustmen, or chimney-sweepers, or rubbish-carters, or pipe-layers, or ground-workers, or coal-porters, carmen or stablemen, or men working for the market-gardeners round London—all either in or out of employment. Perhaps there is not at the present time in the whole metropolis a working nightman who is solely a working nightman.

It is almost the same with the master-nightmen. They are generally master-chimney-sweepers, scavengers, rubbish-carters, and builders. Some of the contractors for the public street scavengery, and the house-dust-bin emptying, are (or have been) among the largest employers of nightmen, but only in their individual trading capacity, for they have no contracts with the parishes concerning the emptying of cesspools; indeed the parish or district corporations have nothing to do with the matter. I have already shown, that among the best-patronised master-nightmen are now the Commissioners of the Court of Sewers.

For how long a period the master and working chimney-sweepers and scavengers have been the master and labouring nightmen I am unable to discover, but it may be reasonable to assume that this connexion, as a matter of trade, existed in the metropolis at the commencement of the eighteenth century.

The police of Paris, as I have shown, have full control over cesspool cleansing, but the police of London are instructed merely to prevent night-work being carried on at a later or earlier period than “the legal hours;” still a few minutes either way are not regarded, and the legal hours, I am told, are almost always adhered to.

Nightwork is carried on—and has been so carried on, within the memory of the oldest men in the trade, who had never heard their predecessors speak of any other system—after this method:—A gang of four men (exclusive of those who have the care of the horses, and who drive the night-carts to and from the scenes of the men’s labours at the cesspools) are set to work. The labour of the gang is divided, though not with any individual or especial strictness, as follows:—

1. The holeman, who goes into the cesspool and fills the tub.

2. The ropeman, who raises the tub when filled.

3. The tubmen (of whom there are two), who carry away the tub when raised, and empty it into the cart.

The mode of work may be thus briefly described:—Within a foot, or even less sometimes, though often as much as three feet, below the surface of the ground (when the cesspool is away from the house) is what is called the “main hole.” This is the opening of the cesspool, and is covered with flag stones, removable, wholly or partially, by means of the pickaxe. If the cesspool be immediately under the privy, the flooring, &c., is displaced. Should the soil be near enough to the surface, the tub is dipped into it, drawn out, the filth scraped from its exterior with a shovel, or swept off with a besom, or washed off by water flung against it with sufficient force. This done, the tubmen insert the pole through the handles of the tub, and bear it on their shoulders to the cart. The mode of carriage and the form of the tub have been already shown in an illustration, which I was assured by a nightman who had seen it in a shopwindow (for he could not read), was “as nat’ral as life, tub and all.”

Thus far, the ropeman and the holeman generally aid in filling the tub, but as the soil becomes lower, the vessel is let down and drawn up full by the ropeman. When the soil becomes lower still, a ladder is usually planted inside the cesspool; the “holeman,” who is generally the strongest person in the gang, descends, shovels the tub full, having stirred up the refuse to loosen it, and the contents, being drawn up by the ropeman, are carried away as before described.

The labour is sometimes severe. The tub when filled, though it is never quite filled, weighs rarely less than eight stone, and sometimes more; “but that, you see, sir,” a nightman said to me, “depends on the nature of the sile.”

Beer, and bread and cheese, are given to the nightmen, and frequently gin, while at their work; but as the bestowal of the spirit is voluntary, some householders from motives of economy, or from being real or pretended members or admirers of the total-abstinence principles, refuse to give any strong liquor, and in that case—if such a determination to withhold the drink be known beforehand—the employers sometimes supply the men with a glass or two; and the men, when “nothing better can be done,” club their own money, and send to some night-house, often at a distance, to purchase a small quantity on their own account. One master-nightman said, he thought his men worked best, indeed he was sure of it, “with a drop to keep them up;” another thought it did them neither good nor harm, “in a moderate way of taking it.” Both these informants were themselves temperate men, one rarely tasting spirits. It is commonly enough said, that if the nightmen have no “allowance,” they will work neither as quickly nor as carefully as if accorded the customary gin “perquisite.” One man, certainly a very strong active person, whose services where quickness in the work was indispensable might be valuable (and he had work as a rubbish-carter also), told me that he for one would not work for any man at nightwork if there was not a fair allowance of drink, “to keep up his strength,” and he knew others of the same mind. On my asking him what he considered a “fair” allowance, he told me that at least a bottle of gin among the gang of four was “looked for, and mostly had, over a gentleman’s cesspool. And little enough, too,” the man said, “among four of us; what it holds if it’s public-house gin is uncertain: for you must know, sir, that some bottles has great ‘kicks’ at their bottoms. But I should say that there’s been a bottle of gin drunk at the clearing of every two, ay, and more than every two, out of three cesspools emptied in London; and now that I come to think on it, I should say that’s been the case with three out of every four.”

Some master-nightmen, and more especially the sweeper-nightmen, work at the cesspools themselves, although many of them are men “well to do in the world.” One master I met with, who had the reputation of being “warm,” spoke of his own manual labour in shovelling filth in the same self-complacent tone that we may imagine might be used by a grocer, worth his “plum,” who quietly intimates that he will serve a washerwoman with her half ounce of tea, and weigh it for her himself, as politely as he would serve a duchess; for he wasn’t above his business: neither was the nightman.

On one occasion I went to see a gang of nightmen at work. Large horn lanterns (for the night was dark, though at intervals the stars shone brilliantly) were placed at the edges of the cesspool. Two poles also were temporarily fixed in the ground, to which lanterns were hung, but this is not always the case. The work went rapidly on, with little noise and no confusion.

The scene was peculiar enough. The artificial light, shining into the dark filthy-looking cavern or cesspool, threw the adjacent houses into a deep shade. All around was perfectly still, and there was not an incident to interrupt the labour, except that at one time the window of a neighbouring house was thrown up, a night-capped head was protruded, and then down was banged the sash with an impatient curse. It appeared as if a gentleman’s slumbers had been disturbed, though the nightmen laughed and declared it was a lady’s voice! The smell, although the air was frosty, was for some little time, perhaps ten minutes, literally sickening; after that period the chief sensation experienced was a slight headache; the unpleasantness of the odour still continuing, though without any sickening effect. The nightmen, however, pronounced the stench “nothing at all;” and one even declared it was refreshing!

The cesspool in this case was so situated that the cart or rather waggon could be placed about three yards from its edge; sometimes, however, the soil has to be carried through a garden and through the house, to the excessive annoyance of the inmates. The nightmen whom I saw evidently enjoyed a bottle of gin, which had been provided for them by the master of the house, as well as some bread and cheese, and two pots of beer. When the waggon was full, two horses were brought from a stable on the premises (an arrangement which can only be occasionally carried out) and yoked to the vehicle, which was at once driven away; a smaller cart and one horse being used to carry off the residue.

TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF MASTER-SWEEPS, DUST, AND OTHER CONTRACTORS, AND MASTER-BRICKLAYERS, THROUGHOUT THE METROPOLIS, ENGAGED IN NIGHT-WORK, AS WELL AS THE NUMBER OF CESSPOOLS EMPTIED, AND QUANTITY OF SOIL COLLECTED YEARLY. ALSO THE PRICE PAID TO EACH OPERATIVE PER LOAD, OR PER NIGHT, AND THE TOTAL AMOUNT ANNUALLY PAID TO THE MASTER-NIGHTMEN.