famine; this has helped to check the increase. So that for the last 3 months of 1899 consumption averaged 88 million gallons daily from public sources.

During the summer of 1899, Brooklyn came so near to the exhaustion of its visible supply that no further demonstration of the urgent requirement for additional supply appears necessary in this report.

The per capita consumption in Brooklyn is lower than in any other large city in this country, so there is no hope of increasing the available supply by decreasing the per capita consumption or decreasing the waste enough to more than take care of the new consumers coming in the period required for building the works for the new supply.

The Borough of Queens is in urgent need of additional supply. The conditions are in part set forth in pages 28 and 29 of the Annual Report of New York Department of Water Supply for 1898, but beyond the inadequacy of the present sources to give sufficient volume, it may be noted that the quality of the present sources, which are driven wells near to the territory already occupied by dwellings and factories and which will each year become more thickly populated, must become continually less desirable.

The Borough of Richmond, as is more fully set forth later in this report, has several considerable villages in which there is no water supply whatever and the present sources appear already taxed to the safe limit and appear liable to such pollution as the Island becomes more thickly populated, that they may ultimately have to be abandoned.

It would have required fully two months more time than that at my disposal to have collected the detailed information requisite for properly setting forth these matters in a statistical way, but the fact is apparent beyond doubt or question to any one who will give the matter brief study, that every one of the several Boroughs of Greater New York is in need of more water, due in most cases to the rapid growth in population.

TABLE NO. 1.

Notes relating to various items in Table No. 1.

New York-The population for Manhattan and Bronx by the Police census is used in 1890. This figure is about 190,000 larger than that given by the United States Census.

Brooklyn-The figures given for population and consumption are for the Ridgewood system of supply.

Boston-The figures given for population and consumption are for the Cochituate and Mystic systems of supply, which included also Somerville, Chelsea and Everett.

New Orleans-The conditions in New Orleans are abnormal, a smaller percentage of the population than is usual being connected to the city water works system. For instance, in 1895 there were only 4,800 taps, while in Atlanta, Georgia, a city with about the same consumption per inhabitant, but only with about one-fourth of the population, there were 6,266 taps.

Pittsburg-The figures given for population and consumption are for Wards I to 23, inclusive, which are the only ones supplied from the municipal water works system. The position of Pittsburg in the list is in the order of the total population.

Washington-Consumption figures given are from the Engineer Commissioner's report, which are based upon the population of the whole District of Columbia, of which about 6 per cent. is without water facilities. See "Eng. News," November 2, 1899.

Montreal-Figures in the 1898 columns are for the year 1897.

Toronto-The percentage of taps metered is given for the year 1895.

Kansas City-The average of the figures for consumption for 1896, 1897 and 1898 is given in the 1895 column.

Providence-The figures given for population and consumption are for the city and also the suburban territory supplied with water. The position of Providence in the list is in the order of the city population, without suburbs.

Denver-The consumption for 1887 is given in the 1885 column.

Allegheny—The average consumption for 1886 and 1887 is given in the 1885 column.
Syracuse The average consumption for 1896 and 1897 is given in the 1895 column.
Toledo The average consumption for 1876 and 1877 is given in the 1875 column.
tage of taps metered is given for the year 1896.

The percen

Richmond-The average consumption for 1885, 1886 and 1887 is given in the 1885 column.
Paterson-The average consumption for 1895 and 1896 is given in the 1895 column.

Atlanta-The percentage of taps metered is given for the year 1895.

London-The population figures given are for the Water District.

SECOND QUESTION.-WASTE OF WATER AND ITS PREVENTION.

More than half the present supply is wasted. The hydraulic and engineering features of preventing most of this waste are not difficult. Meters for the whole of Manhattan would cost no more than has been stated to me as probable cost of the Cross River Reservoir and would, I believe, add twice or three times as much to the available supply. The real difficulties on saving the waste, which I fear are at present insurmountable, rest in human nature, and are questions of public sentiment, politics and good government.

The consumption and waste of water per inhabitant is not greater in New York than in the other large American cities (in fact, it is less), and I believe there has been a tendency in many recent discussions to exaggerate New York's rank in wastefulness of water and to over-estimate the saving that can be made, because of failure to appreciate that the real obstacles to reform are grounded in human nature, and not in hydraulic engineering; nevertheless, the waste is excessive in New York, just as it is excessive beyond reason in all of our other large American cities, and it is an engineering certainty that much of this waste, here or elsewhere, can be prevented if the average of public sentiment really so demands. Saving a part of this waste in New York and Brooklyn is the only means by which the possibility of a shortage of water in 1901 can be avoided.

Diagram No. 4* shows where the consumption and waste of water in New York and Brooklyn stands in relation to that of other cities. Table No. I gives data that could not be added to Diagram No. 4 without confusion, for all of the forty largest American cities which measure their total water delivery, and for certain large foreign cities. This was compiled from the answers to letters written to the Superintendents of various Water Departments, and in part from the printed water-works reports. It is particularly interesting in showing the tendency of all of our American cities toward increasing consumption along with the increase in conveniences of plumbing and increase in the number of tank ball-cocks, and to the increased use for manufacturing, steam, electric power, lighting, tall buildings, etc., and of this total increase, the experience of the metered cities in comparison with the unmetered, shows that with the more fixtures per house and the older pipes, the waste is increasing more rapidly than the use.

It will be seen from Diagram No. 4 that New York and Brooklyn each make a favorable showing compared with many other cities, and it is of

* A very similar compilation pointing to the same conclusion is to be found in the extremely interesting report of the Commission of Experts (Messrs. Hering, Wilson and Gray) upon the Philadelphia supply, made in October, 1899.