USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Worcester > Town annual reports of the several departments for the fiscal year ending December 31, 1881 > Part 8
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Is Worcester to be held answerable because Benjamin Flagg did not feel as vigorous or well, at seventy-odd, as when a young man ?
Shall Worcester respond in damages because medical men fancy that their Town is not in quite as good sanitary condition as when it was one-half or third its present size : although the tables of mortality, in Millbury, show but 74 deaths in 1881, whereas there were 93 in 1880 ! !
Is Worcester to be subjected to the untold cost of repeating experiments that have nowhere proved successful ; because mill- ponds fill up, and streams become sluggish and shallow; where dams are almost as frequent as the feet of fall ?
Nor is it an affirmation of positive injury to health, so much as a claim put forward to secure ulterior damages. The dis-use of water as a motor, in the immediate future, has been anticipated by the more sagacious mill-owners. The following items, taken from the contemporary press, amply sustain the position of the writer that it will impose no hardships, or tax upon any one, to require a demolition of the dams. Rather, when accomplished,
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will the whole riverine population revert to their thoughtless objections with wonder at their own blindness : - Under date of August 29th, a local correspondent writes, from Millbury, that on Sunday the 28th :-
" Hundreds of persons visited the Blackstone River, near C. D. Morse's Sash and Blind shop, to see the large number of dead fish that were floating down the river. * The theory in regard to the fish dying is the stagnant water. * * The Burling Mills pond has been drawn off and no water has run down for a few days past, which has caused the water to be very low, and with the sun pouring down so hot that the fish could not live."
Two days later, he wrote :
" The water has been the lowest for several days past that it has been this season, and some of the mills have been obliged to stop part of their machinery."
Mill-ponds are drawn off, - fish die for lack of water, and lo ! the ill effects from Worcester Sewage ! Now for the men who foresee the future, even if they object to relax their grip !
" WILKINSONVILLE .- The Sutton Manufacturing Company recently put in two 50-horse power boilers, and are now putting in a 100-horse power engine of the Harris-Corliss make, which has a 16-inch cylinder and 48-inch stroke. The engine-house is of stone, 20 by 35 feet, and the boiler-house 18 by 40 feet. This mill has now 340 looms, but can run but 290, not having water-power enough ; but when the new engine is set up they can run all the machinery with ease."
" SAUNDERSVILLE .- The Saunders Cotton Mills, owned and run by Charles P. Whitin & Sons, are undergoing great improvement. They have thrown out 200 old looms and put in 200 new improved Whitin looms; also, new slubbers and fly frames from the City Machine Works, Providence, and put in new rollers on their mules. They have erected a boiler-house 40 by 36 feet, 14 feet studded, and an engine-house 39 by 24 feet. They have put in two new 52-feet steam boilers, 100-horse power each, with 122 3-inch tubes, 16 feet long, made by Kendall & Roberts, of Cambridgeport, and a 150-horse power Hart- ford Buckeye engine is to be put in, and is on the road now."
" MILLBURY .- A new 60-horse power boiler, from Wm. Allen & Sons of Worcester, is to be put in at the Millbury Cotton Mills, which are to be en- larged by an addition 40 by 15 feet and four stories high at the west end. The picker house at the east end, is to be replaced by a building 40 by 40 feet, and a new wooden mill 65 by 80 feet is to be constructed. The present machinery is to be replaced by new, and 250 instead of 155 looms will be operated."
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There are experts and -? Say some of those whose experi- ments in Scientific Farming have burned the fingers of capital- ists, and supplied innocent fun for plough-boys :-
" The rights of riparian owners to demand that a water course be main- tained in its original state of purity will hardly be questioned."
Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in illis. The title of a land-holder is conceded by the Common Law to be aerial, as well; it reaches vertically to the sky. Yet, we are told, the wind bloweth where it listeth. Is the control over a current of water more tangible than the grasp upon a current of air ? Will the counsel for " privilege," expert or otherwise, assert one rule for fluids and another for liquids ; admitting, as he must, that both are of the realty ? If the blast comes from Labrador just now, and I want it; shall our expert ? intercept it, with the healing on its wings, and the ice beneath its feet, because forsooth,-
" The owl, for all its feathers, is a-cold !"
If the stream pours down, in surcharged volume, bearing upon its surface, or in its solution, those elements of fertility for lack of which whole countries have decayed, shall a " riparian owner " of the land (I challenge, in nature and common sense, any exclu- sive title in a current ! ) become a new Canute,- to warn,- thus far, and stop ?
When and where do those indisputable rights take their rise and find their origin ? Who shall determine them ? And how ? A pioneer, at the head-waters, builds an ont-house that discharges into the stream. The right of a community to build its privies, in that manner; if it elects such improvident way ; is surely as imprescriptible and fixed as the concession, or " privilege " of a solitary individual, here or there, to dam that stream, check its flow, stifle its current, and stagnate its water. Perhaps some of the dwellers towards the fountain may use the earth as a place of deposit for excreta ; the employment of either element being dictated by relative convenience only. Others, - nearer tide- water,- may save themselves any trouble ; availing themselves of filthier corporate facilities. The pomologist in Tatnuck, or
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Cherry Valley, has faith in high tilth, and supplies night-soil to stimulate his crops. An Aquâ-facturer, lower down, who is incessantly pouring a flood of noxious impurity into the same channel, implores legislative barriers betwixt the wind and his nobility. The excreta, - whether as manure or waste, - is innoc- nous if unpleasant; the mill refuse is offensive to every sense, and noxious. Where, at last, does that " riparian owner " find himself, - between this devil and that deep sea ? Why,- taking his chances ; as he elected to do when he purchased his home- stead.
A venerable champion appeared in the lists, complaining that the writer bases his argument upon the possible " elation" of continents. In the vicinity, and under the exhilaration of " Tassel-top," strange things happened of old. And he would be rash, indeed, who should deny that faith enough might not be inflated, there, to stir Wachusett ; or, under such "inspiration," to create a current even in the sludge occasioned by the dams of Millbury. But the writer looked not to " elation." His faith is rather in accretion. And he condoles with his venerable friend, who snuffs the air from Worcester, as it comes to him charged from over the settling-basins maintained for Aqua-moture; when he might have the elements of fertility, without their pungent fragrance, were the flow, like that of the Nile, unimpeded. Tossed and whirled among the rocks; * or fretted around and through the rapids ; the stream rushes onward and downward in its task of trituration and comminution. Absorbing, blending, and clarifying, as it flows ; so that the purified current would not be essentially fouled, were it constrained to receive, and assimi- late, the whole stale hash of exploded experiment ; in a saturated solution of encyclopædia and itch for notoriety, combined with the purchased delusions of expert ? profession.
The requirement of detached and separate sewers, with elabo- rate filtering basins, is merely a transposition ; not a remedy for, nor a solution of the imputed evil. If, as Mr. Morse swears,
* Never forget, O man of Worcester! that the fall from the overflow at Quinsigamond Village to the mean sea level is 438.24 feet; and that there might be, if unimpeded, sixty (60) feet of sheer descent, and rapids, at Millbury !
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the offence is rank at his factory, where the water complained of is precipitated ; by so much the more would it smell to Heaven as it is held in suspense, under duress of legislation, in even closer proximity to the swarming population of Worcester. The Five Thousand inhabitants of Millbury are sorely afflicted, according to the petitioners. Their remedy is, to dam back and stagnate the source of trouble as nigh as possible to the Sixty Thousand !.
If experiments are to be tried, - let Millbury and her neigh- bors reverse the Blackstone, Singletary, Ramshorn, and Quin- sigamond, over their intervales, and pocket the profits ! Worcester does enough when she wastes her substance in the effluent stream - for that it is waste, is obvious ; though not susceptible of prevention or remedy.
If the riverine Towns do not hanker after the profits from such advanced, æsthetic if not perfumed, Terræ-culture ;- if they will not withhold the pollution, by their mills, from the on- flowing current ; what remains but that Law of the Future, proclaimed by the writer ; urged, because exacted by necessity ; and advocated in and out of season ; - the demolition of Dams and an unobstructed Water-course ?
Says the Agricultural Gazette, published in London (England), in an article on "The Rivers-Conservancy Bill : "
"W. B. desires to point out that the River Pollution Act, 1876, if carried out in its integrity, would compel the removal of Weirs and locks from our rivers, and then the scour of water during floods will clear out their chan- nels. carrying down the mud, including sewage-deposit, to the ocean, forming alluvial soil in the estuaries. Special machinery may be required for cutting weeds and loosening silt : but such can be made, and probably before this appears in print will be patented in England, as it has been in America long ago. All that the lowland landlords will have to do will be to raise safety embankments for extra floods, as the clear channels, when the weirs are removed, will carry off ordinary floods, according to Mr. Bailey Denton's calculation that they are four times the ordinary flow, without raising the surface over the towpath. But rainfall calculations should not be depended upon, the better plan being to gauge the velocity and height of the stream at. bridges during floods and ordinary flows."
The work imposed upon the Blackstone, properly dyked, and restored from canal-levels to its old channel; with its fall of . 440 feet from Quinsigamond to tide-water; is insignificant in
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comparison with the task, so lately exacted from the confined current of the Mississippi, of piercing, and dissipating, the deposits of centuries accumulated at its delta. The cities by- the-sea ; Portland, Boston, Providence, New Haven ; pour their excreta into the ocean; contiguity to which is their especial good fortune. We, -inland, - must needs avail ourselves of our natural facilities ; - less immediate perhaps, but such as Nature ordained from time immemorial, and tending directly to the same common destination.
Dust, hanging for hours like a pall, smothering the very life out of plants and flowers upon whose bloom and foliage it settles, until every vestige of green is obscured or lost ;
Dust, choking the breath, and filling to suffocation the nostrils, of the tired people who seek the Park for that fresh air denied to them in the heated workshop, or crowded tene- ment ;
With the wrecks of carriages hauled in among the shrubbery, or submerged in the Pools ; - were forcible reminders to the COMMISSION OF PUBLIC GROUNDS, last summer, that a duty had been neglected. That blame might not be attributed, with justice, - the following note was written :
" COMMISSION OF PUBLIC GROUNDS.
Worcester, Mass'tts, July 15, 1881.
TO JAMES M. DRENNAN, Esq., City Marshal.
Sir : I have to complain that horses are put to their speed, along Park Avenue, every evening, in utter violation of the Ordinances; thereby creating a dust which is destructive to the vegetation and bloom in Elm Park, and annoying to those who frequent that Park in search of a place of at least temporary relief from dust and heat.
The abuse of that highway, for such illegal purpose, is the more objection- able, in so much as a specially prepared track for horses can be found within the adjoining grounds of the Agricultural Society.
I respectfully ask that this nuisance may be abated.
EDWARD W. LINCOLN, Chairman."
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CITY DOCUMENT .- No. 36.
The prompt action of the Marshal, in obedience to his oath of office, was met by the subjoined petition : -
"TO THE MAYOR AND ALDERMEN OF THE
CITY OF WORCESTER.
We, the undersigned, citizens of Worcester, do most humbly pray for the enactment of an Ordinance granting permission to use the West Boulevard or Park Ave (sic) for driving purposes the same as it always has been. Subject to such rules and regulations as you may prescribe.
We think that it is a proper place to drive as they do in Boston over the Brighton Road at a gait faster than is now allowed by the present Ordinance in force. And would recommend that parties driving there faster than eight miles an hour should do so, going South only.
(Signed) S. E. HILDRETH,
(and numerous others.)"
That Petition was presented to the City Council on the 12th of September, and was referred to the Committee on Ordinances; which Committee soon received a communication, whereof a copy is subjoined : -
" COMMISSION OF PUBLIC GROUNDS.
Worcester, Mass'tts, September 15, 1881. TO THE COMMITTEE ON ORDINANCES :
Gentlemen : I understand that a petition of S. E. Hildreth, Clark Jillson, C. M. Bent, et als., whereof the subjoined is a copy, has been referred by the Honorable CITY COUNCIL to yourselves - without instructions. I assume that such disposition of it was deemed the simplest way of getting rid of the Petition; and that a Report upon the subject-matter is scarcely expected or desired : ----
Since the Petition asks exclusive privileges for three or four hundred signers! As the Sixty Thousand (60,000) whose names are not attached, after a diligent canvass, may well be assumed to content themselves with a speed, over the highways, of eight (8) miles per hour.
Since the Petitioners ask it to the entire exclusion of others; - as the speed which they seek, even if their animals are unequal to its attainment, if sanctioned, would prevent any person, not utterly reckless of life or limb, from participating in the use and enjoyment of the same highway.
And therefore they ask an illegal privilege; - the highway being merely an easement of the public, securing to the humblest a safe and unimpeded right of transit and travel, wherewith no undue or partial concessions to the privileged or more favored by fortune, can or ought to be permitted to inter- fere.
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And, in so far as the 'humble prayer' applies to the portion of 'Park Avenue' which extends from Highland to Elm Streets, it asks the Honorable COUNCIL to betray a solemn Trust and incur a grave risk of Forfeiture. Since the City of Worcester covenanted to and with Levi Lincoln, John Hammond, and their heirs and assigns, that Elm Park, as defined within metes and bounds, mutually specified and accepted by the grantors and grantee, should ' be held and forever used and occupied by the City as and for a Public Common.' Wherefore, in behalf of the COMMISSION OF PUBLIC GROUNDS, I do unqualifiedly protest against the diversion of any portion of Elm Park from its legitimate dedication and purpose.
Whether Park Avenue could be constructed legally, across Elm Park, with or without the approval of the Mayor; (and Mayor Jillson withheld his signature), or without a formal concession by the heirs of Levi Lincoln, and John Hammond; is a question that has happily remained in abeyance, but which may demand judicial decision should the thoughtless prayer of the Petitioners be granted. But, - that any use of Park Avenue, between High- land and Elm Streets, not essential to the legitimate easements of a highway, can be accorded by the Honorable COUNCIL, would only be claimed by those who wilfully shut their eyes to that provision of the Charter whereby the ' sole care, superintendence, and management of the Public Grounds ' of the City of Worcester is vested in a COMMISSION. Whosoever may be auda- cious enough to pretend that any action of the Honorable COUNCIL can have sufficient validity to confer the rights of the whole community in the high- ways upon a very inconsiderable fraction, - to the exclusion or prejudice of any, - surely none will claim for a moment that, whether by joint resolution or formal Ordinance, the fundamental law, - the Charter - can be evaded in its plainest provisions, or openly nullified and held void.
I have the honor to subscribe myself, most respectfully,
EDWARD WINSLOW LINCOLN,
Chairman."
And thereupon, - blowing of the " hugag " and ringing of the " loud hogannah " in the local newspapers. But a few days had passed, when a poor woman - in the Meadow - hoping to earn a few cents in aid of the support of her half-dozen children, violated a State Law and being arrested by the local Police, was tried and sentenced. There has been no outery of well-to-do people ! No petition of hundreds that certain hours may be assigned for the swift sale and consumption of illegal rum ! None even of the reverend clergy have put their names to paper, asking that her offence may be condoned, and that she may, - under certain limitations, do so - some more !
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The public highways are rendered unsafe ; private enjoyment curtailed or prevented ; the public property seriously injured ; and the Common Right impaired. A mild remonstrance, - and a request that the Municipal Ordinances made for all, in the interest of all, should be put in force, when lo! a storm of indignant denunciation from some who know better, but lack the courage of their convictions ; from other some who don't know, and are thereby convicted ; and from the general pack who yelp without getting the scent. Not to omit five of the reverend clergy : - blind, leaders of the blind !
There can be no place in the New England economy for the gong-donkey ;- little room for the professional jockey, impure and unmitigated,-who, like the disciple of Mahound, makes his bed with his mare; but, unlike the Arab, is therefore the greater brute. We lack, and want not, the equine visage,-the vulture look ; and can contrive the struggle for existence without the " straight tip," or " correct cards." There may be fewer men degraded ; fewer families heart-broken, and ruined; fewer of our most promising young men enticed and led utterly astray. The whole system is English and alien.
Anathema ! Maranatha !
If indeed, the Quadrigae are to repeat, along that Avenue, the spectacle from Wagner's painting, so vivid in Peck's window ; the gratification to be derived from possible and expected homicide might prove a fitting inducement to wink at lawlessness. Perhaps keener excitement would be derived, were scythes affixed to the axles, and spikes to the tires, in hungry craving for those women and children who would surely cross the track, in a lawful aim to climb the terrace that impends over the westerly side of Elm Park.
Having stood up, alone, to be counted in the negative, thirty- five years since, when a Town-Hall full of his fellow-citizens had lost their heads in a temporary excitement ; the writer can estimate, at their true worth, the signatures which are as monotonous as sheep-tracks and equally lacking of individual direction. For a life-time an advocate of everything liberal, all who know him must smile with scorn at the imputation that he
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would abridge the pursuit of happiness, or limit any reasonable enjoyment.
Where there is a will may always be found a way. There can be no difficulty in attaining an exhilarating gait, when it is not sought as a merely selfish gratification. But the people,-least of all, this COMMISSION,-will never consent to the perversion of a cheerful enjoyment into an excessive abuse. The sheer pretence that the system of Broad Avenues, to encircle the City,-first proposed in the Reports of this COMMISSION,-ever contemplated a continuous, or even intermittent Race-Track, is wholly baseless. There are, as there have been always, such Tracks; and this COMMISSION seeks not to disturb their use or impair their value. What was intended, for the development of Worcester, - for the permanent welfare of its whole population ; which should be diffused rather than concentrated ; can best be told by referring to the record. The "second, sober thought" of the community has never failed to uphold that system, many and curious as have been the changes of administration ; and it is even now in course of prosecution. The general sense and perception of a permanent need for inter-communication will not be paralyzed by individual greed or pique. The shortest way there shall be the nearest way around.
And the record is found in the very first Report of this COM- MISSION, as at present organized, A. D. 1870 :-
" The broad Boulevards that encircle the fair city upon the banks of the Seine, contribute largely to the facilities of intercourse and traffic. A similar AVENUE, encompassing our own Worcester, would contribute more to the development of the whole city, in the judgment of this COMMISSION, than any other project that has been devised or consum- mated for years."
"With such an Avenue constructed, there would be an amount of inter-communication of the extremities of the city, as of the outlying but adjacent towns, that would astonish those whose ocular mote is Main Street. That great artery of business would be relieved of much needless yet serious incumbrance : a relief which, attempted in season, can be both cheaply and prudently afforded. As it is now, from Holden to Leicester, from Paxton to Shrewsbury, everything must pass through our one great thoroughfare, wearing out our pavements, impeding our local traffic, laming beasts used for traction and scaring into disease
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animals destined for consumption. All these annoyances and evils would be obviated ; all those benefits and more would be derived ; from the construction of the Avenue suggested. So broad as to admit of adequate and grateful shade to ample footpaths ; so thoroughly built as to be proof alike against autumnal frost or vernal flood : a conve- nience for the loaded team and an attraction for the pleasure carriage ; wooing occupation of hundreds of charming dells and nooks by its ruthless exposure of rustic beauty, thereby benefiting individuals and augmenting the general valuation ; a measure which commends itself in proportion as it is considered : one which this COMMISSION will advocate in season and out of season, living or dying, in the hope and faith of its ultimate consummation."
Some correspondence between the CHAIRMAN of the COMMISSION and his old schoolmate, Hon. Andrew H. Greene, of New York, left no room for surprise at the receipt of the following letter :- " NEW YORK, May 27th, 1881. My Dear Mr. Lincoln :
I send by express to-day to your address a pair of White Swans which arrived at this Port yesterday. Finding it impracticable to obtain them here, I imported these birds from Europe, expressly for the City of Worcester; hoping that they may be interesting objects among the varied attractions of the Public Grounds of the City, in which you have taken so deep an interest and which you have done so much to adorn.
These birds were procured from the Corporation of the City of Weymouth, and are descended from the stock of Abbotsbury Swannery, the largest and most celebrated of England. Will you turn them over to the City in such manner as you deem best.
I read your Reports with great pleasure, and I desire to express my high appreciation of your persevering and intelligent efforts, amid many obstacles, for the development and adornment of the City.
I am, with great respect, very truly yours,
AND. H. GREENE. To
E. W. LINCOLN,
Chairman, Comm. P. Grounds,
Worcester, Mass."
Those beautiful birds were received in good condition, con- sidering the close confinement to which their long voyage sub- jected them. For a while they appeared to be content in their new home; although some fear was excited, by their shy avoid- ance of everything offered to tempt their appetite, that it might become difficult to supply their natural wants. A considerable
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amount of letter writing elicited a singular lack of definite knowledge about the habits of the family of Cygninæ ; and the COMMISSION were substantially obliged to trust to luck which, in this instance, turned against them. Since, after getting man- ifestly weaker, for a while, one of the swans was found, at early morn, but just alive. There had been an unusually heavy thunder shower, the night previous ; and the bird was lying at the edge of the water, just over the iron pipe that leads to the Spray in the Diamond Pool. Whether the electrical disturbance had aught to do with its collapse cannot be told. It never rallied, and died at noon.
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