down nearly three years, and I say here, in the face
of the Commission, that there have not been ten blocks taken up; but had
granite been put down, I will venture to say that it would, during the
same period, have been taken up six or seven times. Your books will
prove it, that the portion of granite pavement in the Poultry was taken
up six or seven times during a period of three years. When the wood
paving becomes a little slippery, go to your granite heaps which belong
to this commission, or to your fine sifted cinder heaps, and let that be
strewed over the surface; that contains no earthy particles, and will,
when it becomes imbedded in the wood, form such a surface that there
cannot be any possibility be any slipperiness--(hear, hear!) Do we not
pursue this course in frosty weather even with our own stone paving?
There used to be, before this plan was adopted, not a day pass but you
would in frosty weather see two, three, four, and even five or six
horses down together on the stone paving--('Oh! oh!' from Mr Deputy
Godson.) My friend may cry 'oh! oh!' but I mean to say that this
assertion is not so incongruous as the statement of my friend, that he
saw twenty horses down at once on the wood pavement in Newgate Street,
(laughter.) I may exclaim with my worthy friend the deputy on my left,
who lives in Newgate Street, 'When the devil did it happen? I never
heard of it.' I stand forward in support of wood paving as a great
public principle, because I believe it to be most useful and
advantageous to the public; which is proved by the fact, that the public
at large are in favour of it. If we had given notice that this court
would be open to hear the opinions of the citizens of London on the
subject of wood paving, I am convinced that the number of petitions in
its favour would have been so great, that the doors would not have been
sufficiently wide to have received them."

Mr Jones next turned his attention to the arithmetical statements of Sir
Peter; and a better specimen of what in the Scotch language is called a
stramash, it has never been our good fortune to meet with:--

"We have been told by the worthy knight who introduced this motion, that
to pave London with wood would cost twenty-four millions of money. Now,
it so happens that, some time since, I directed the city surveyor to
obtain for me a return of the number of square yards of paving-stone
there are throughout all the streets in this city. I hold that ret