A Tale of One City | Page 4

did not it is true show much
disposition to grow and thrive, but they were planted and replanted,
though we may still have to lament that our Birmingham boulevards
will not compare favourably with those in some other cities. Mr.
Chamberlain, however, was not the man to be content with such trifling
reforms as these. He had large and spacious ideas in his mind, and he
quickly brought them out to air and grow.
In the year 1873 Mr. Chamberlain was elected Mayor, and in the
following year he brought forward his schemes for the purchase by the
municipality of the gas and water supplies. His proposals encountered
very formidable opposition, principally from those interested in the gas
and water companies, whose undertakings he proposed compulsorily to
purchase. Some of the shareholders in these prosperous companies
were fierce in their denunciations of his schemes. They regarded Mr.

Chamberlain's proposals as nothing short of confiscation. For years
they had supplied the town with gas and water. They had found the
necessary money in the "sure and certain hope" of having a good and
secure investment for their capital, and lo! when they had fairly
established their undertakings, it was proposed to blow out their
profitable light and dash the refreshingly remunerative water from their
lips. It was hard--I don't mean the water, but the situation! Of course
the shareholders were to receive a fair price for their properties, the gas
companies practically £1,900.000, the waterworks company
£1,350,000. But still they were not happy. They resisted the proposed
purchases.
Mr. Chamberlain, however, was not the man to be daunted by the
opposition of the gas and water company proprietors. He had made up
his mind that it would be for the good of the town for these
undertakings to be in the hands of the municipality, and in spite of the
Town Council "old gang" and outraged gas and water shareholders,
who felt they were being fraudulently despoiled of certain prospective
advantages, he carried his point.
There are still those among us who, for various reasons, murmur at
these extensive purchases. They maintain, for one thing, that the
possession of the gas influenced the Corporation to turn a discouraging
eye upon the electric light. Certainly Birmingham has been rather lax in
taking up electric illumination, and possibly more enterprise would
have been evinced in this direction if the Corporation had not become
dealers in gas and water on their own terms, viz., no competition
allowed. Some self-constituted prophets shook their heads and said that
before the gas debt was paid off gas would literally have "gone out" as
a general illuminant. Before the eighty-five years allowed for the
redemption of the capital invested in the gas have elapsed a good many
things may certainly happen. So far, however, gas is not extinguished,
but is in increased demand, and even water is believed to have a future.
With regard to the water purchase, however, a good deal of opposition
was offered on special grounds. Having purchased the waterworks
undertaking the Corporation were, of course, desirous to make it pay.
To buy the thing was a blunder in the eyes of some, to let it be a source
of loss would have been a crime. Consequently, it became necessary to
force the water supply business, and the municipal authorities went

about it in a way that pressed hardly sometimes and provoked not a
little hostility and resentment.
"Waterologists" and analysts are somewhat divided in opinion as to
what is pure water, or at least good wholesome water. Some authorities
take one standard, some another. The Corporation, with an eye to
business, selected a very high standard, for this brought grist to the mill,
or, I should say, trade to the tap. It meant the closing of a large number
of wells yielding water which, under a less rigorous standard than that
adopted, would have been considered wholesome. But in this matter
again, Mr. Chamberlain and the "new gang" paid no heed to the growls
of the disaffected, and pumps were disestablished in all directions,
chiefly, it was maintained, to swell the returns of the water department.
"O ye wells, bless ye the Lord"--but few were suffered to remain.
Mr. Chamberlain, however, was not long content with having
municipalized the gas and water. In accordance with the strong impetus
of his nature he sighed for more worlds to conquer. Consequently he
was soon ready with a gigantic Improvement Scheme, to be carried out
under the adoption of the somewhat misused and delusive Artisans'
Dwellings Act. His proposal was to make a grand street and a more
direct way to Aston, and in doing so to demolish some dirty back
thoroughfares and a large number of foul and filthy unsanitary
dwellings.
The scheme was a big one. It