The Globe. FRIDAY, JANUARY 18, 1837.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 804, 19 January 1877, Page 2

The Globe. FRIDAY, JANUARY 18, 1837.

"We are glad to notice that the Drainage Board are at last stirring in the matter of the plans for Mr (Jarruther’s scheme. Much valuable time has been lost—time in which a great deal of useful work could have been done —and we shall be well into winter before the scheme can practically be commenced. Of course, in a scheme of such magnitude time is required to elaborate and work out the details, but still it is important to the general health of the city that no delay that can be avoided should take place. If any arguments were needed to enforce this, the weather of the past few days would be ample to prove that some immediate provision for drainage is urgently needed. Therefore we are glad to find that the Board have made so urgent an appeal to Mr. Carruthers to complete his plans. It does not follow that it is necessary for the whole of the plan to be placed in hand at once. Those parts of it which are most urgently needed such as that, including Waltham, Phillipstown, Addington, and the South drain, might be put in hand at once without waiting for the details the scheme in globo to be elaborated. By this means that part of the city where drainage is most urgently wanted could be supplied before the setting in of winter, and the other portions of Mr. Carruthers’ scheme might then be carried out as occasion ofiered. Every day the south drain is I‘effc in its present condition adds to the death rate of the city, as it is one of the most fertile causes of typhoid fever. It is therefore, apart from the general sanitary condition of the city as a whole, a matter of vital consequence to the residents in its vicinity to have it removed immediately. Part of Mr. Carruthers’ scheme, as detailed by him, does provide for this, and also for the drainage of the low-lying and feverproducing parts of Philipstown, Addington, and Waltham. We trust, therefore, that Mr. Carruthers, if not able immediately to elaborate the whole scheme, will at least give us the details of the parts mentioned, so that no delay may be experienced in at once getting to work. Another. link has been added to the chain which binds us to past glories of aldermanic banquets and ermine trimmed robes. The name of Mayor Hobbs, by virtue of the link presented by him, will go down to posterity with those of the illustrious civic dignitaries who have preceded him. When his photograph shall have been added to the long line (with but one gap in it) which adorns the Council Chamber, then will he feel that he has not lived

in vain. It will be observed too that S this new “ order of the chain ” is exclusive. No one below the exalted rank of Mayor is admitted to it ; though outsiders have bagged, to bo allowed to participate in the reflected glories of the civic links. Stern as the decree forbidding the Peri to to reenter Paradise, so ex-Mayor Hobbs stands on the threshold of the inner chamber of municipal dignity and waves back the mere common councillors. No doubt when the event of adding the link was duly telegraphed from one end of the island to the other, a thrill of envy would rise in the bosoms of the Mayors of less favored boroughs. But it seems to us that there has been a slight omission, and for that reason we have referred to the subject. The Council appears to have forgotten one thing, viz., that a Mayor wearing a chain of office but without robes is shorn of half his dignity. Therefore we have a suggestion to make, which we do with all due deference, as becomes us dealing with so grave and important a question. It is that an offer —a liberal one under the circumstances—should be made to the present proud possessor of those historical robes. The chain first flashed upon the vision of the astonished councillors, reposing on that magnificent blue velvet robe, and it seems hard that they should now be severed. We are going to build a Town Hall—don’t let us on the ground of mistaken economy lose the chance of transmitting to our descendants so precious a heirloom as the robes and chain of our Mayors,