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36

MR. A. W. FLUX, M.A., ON CITY GOVERNMENT AND

matters in the dustbins, the frequency of em'ptying of these receptacles rendering such a course unnecessary. The cleansing of the broader streets and open places is effected also by contract labour, much of it being that of the paupers in the most severely managed of the three workhouses of the city. The yearly cost of house and Street refuse removal has averaged £15,000 in recent years, the total cost of this and Street cleansing amounting to £18,700 per annum, which does not differ sensibly from the average of the last ten years. This means about ls. Id. per head of the population in the last five years, somewhat more previously as the population was then less. The cleansing of the Street to a distance of 30 feet from the house front is the duty of house-owners. The amount stated as Net Ordinary Expenditure in the Manchester Accounts under the head of Cleansing has averaged £123,560 during the last five years, or, roundly, 4s. 6d. per head of the population. If we add the charges of the company which attends to night-soil removal in Copenhagen to the cost of Street cleansing and house and Street refuse removal and disposal, it will be seen that the citizens there escape lightly as compared with ours, for the cost of the services which correspond in the two cities is less than half as heavy there as here, spite of the faet that some of what is included in the charges in question there fails under the head of sewage disposal here. Conditions favour the Danish capital, and in the smaller cost of cleansing in the municipal outlay we see one mark of that. Roads and Parks .—The greater part of the roads of Copen­ hagen are paved, like ours, with granite setts. Recent years have, however, witnessed a great change in the principal streets, where the replacement of the setts by asphalte has made a very striking improvement. The area of the roadways is only one- fifth, or thereabouts, of that of the roadways of Manchester. The footpaths have also been greatly improved by the replace­ ment of the small setts, with or without a line of flags in addition to the curbstone, by fully flagged or asphalted footpaths in the main thoroughfares. About one-quarter of the whole is now thus