The Commissioners submitted an estimate to your honorable body in their report of the 3d of July last, of the probable cost of completing the first and second divisions of the aqueduct, and promised to report an estimate of the total amount that would be required to complete the whole project, including the receiving reservoir between the 6th and 7th avenues and 79th and 86th streets, and the distributing reservoir on Murray Hill, in order that authority might be obtained from the Legislature to raise the additional funds required. The chief engineer has, accordingly, at the request of the Commissioners, furnished them with his views on the subject, so far as they relate to the operations of his department of the works, including the most substantial and economical mode of construction, with the probable expense of such construction and the Commissioners have ;

added the actual cost of the land paid for, and the probable cost of that still to be acquired also the sum paid for the temporary use of land for roads and embankments, ;

and the probable expense of what may still be required, with other damages and probable charges for water and land, incident to the undertaking also the amount already paid for ;

salaries and other incidental expenses of the Commissioners already incurred, and including the amount that may be incurred, the estimates thus embracing every expenditure already made and to be made, from the commencement to the final completion of the work. In bringing together the several items which compose this estimate, an attempt has been made to cover every positive and probable expense, in the hope, at the same time, that the actual cost will be less than that stated, which the Commissioners will use every means in their power to effect, and thus a third application to the Legislature be avoided.