For public use there were the great Conduit in West Cheape: the Tonne or Tun in Cornhill, fountains at Billingsgate, at Paul's Wharf, and St. Giles', Cripplegate, and conduits at Aldermanbury, the Standard in Fleet Street, Gracechurch Street, Holborn Cross (afterwards Lamb's Conduit), at the Stocks Market (where the Mansion House now stands), Bishopsgate, London Wall, Aldgate, Lothbury--and this without reckoning the supply furnished from the Thames by the enterprising German, or Dutchman, Pieter Moritz, who in 1582 started the famous waterworks close to where Fishmongers' Hall now stands.
The Fleet river (I prefer that title to the other cognomen, "Ditch"), flowing through London, naturally became somewhat befouled, and in Henry the VII.'s time, _circa_ 1502, it was cleansed, so that, as aforesaid, "boats with fish and fewel were rowed to Fleete bridge, and to Oldburne bridge." We also know, as Stow records, that more springs were introduced into the stream from Hampstead, without effect, either as to deepening or purifying the river, which had an evil reputation even in the time of Edward I., as we see in Ryley's "Placita Parliamentaria" (ed. 1661), p. 340--
"_Ad peticionem Com. Lincoln._ querentis quod cum cursus aque, que currit apud _London_ sub _Ponte_ de _Holeburn_, & _Ponte_ de _Fleete_ usque in _Thamisiam_ solebat ita largus & latus esse, ac profundus, quod decem Naves vel duodecim ad predictum Pontem de _Fleete_ cum diversis rebus & mercandisis solebant venire, & quedam illarum Navium sub illo Ponte transire, usque ad predictum Pontem de _Holeburn_ ad predictum cursum mundanmum & simos exinde cariand, nunc ille cursus per fordes & inundaciones Taunatorum & p varias perturbaciones in predicta aqua, factas & maxime per exaltationem Caye & diversionem aque quam ipsi de _Novo Templo_ fecerunt ad Molendina sua extra Castra _Baignard_, quod Naves predicte minime intrare possunt sicut solebant, & facere debeant &c. unde supplicat quod _Maior de London_ assumptis secum Vice com. & discretionibus Aldermannis cursum pre[=d]ce aque videat, & quod per visum & sacr[~m] proborum & legalium hominum faciat omnia nocumenta predicte aque que invinerit ammovere & reparare cursum predictum, & ipsum in tali statu manutenere in quo antiquitus esse solebat &c. _Ita responsum est, Assignentur Rogerus le Brabazon & Constabularius Turris, London Maior & Vice Com. London, quod ipsi assumptit secum discretionibus Aldermannis London, &c., inquirant per sacramentum &c., qualiter fieri consuevit & qualis cursus. Et necumenta que invenerint ammoveant & manueri faciant in eadem statu quo antiquitus esse solebat._"