APPENDIX. (continued 2)

“Considered morally, the portrait of the Parisian presents colours which are not impossible to seize, notwithstanding their great variety. He may be said generally to be lively, spiritual, industrious, and deserving the name of frivolous. Much less perhaps is given him. He is inquisitive, and carries into his work a taste, an ardent imagination, and inventive 234mind, which he is willing to believe should compensate for sustained activity. There necessarily results from this a great nervous susceptibility, an encéphalique predominance, which it is important to the physician never to overlook.

“If a sound and firm organization allows a few to resist the effects of this premature exercise of the organ of thought, a rapid increase in its functions always shows itself in the injury done to the other organs, and generally to the muscular system, which bear the marks of feebleness and often of deplorable languor. In this life, too active morally and too indolent physically, the nervous system acquires not what is vulgarly called a feebleness or delicacy, but a susceptibility, or rather a predominance, which is affected by the least shock. Hence that fickleness, and that vivacity of desires, that changeableness in the tastes, in a word that coquetry, that unequal and whimsical moody character, those caprices and vapours. The character is not alone affected by this excess of susceptibility; all the organs, the whole of the economy of the body feels it in turn; the nervous system acts particularly on the uterus, developes it prematurely; thus the women generally arrive at puberty much earlier at Paris than in the provinces, and especially than in the country. It is not unfrequent to find young girls of 12 or 13 fully formed and capable of becoming mothers, whilst in the country, even in the south, they do not attain that period till the age of 15 or 16.”

No. 9. NOTE TO PAGE 128, ON SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN’S PLAN FOR EXTRA MURAL INTERMENTS, AND FOR EXCLUDING GRAVEYARDS ON THE REBUILDING OF THE CITY OF LONDON.

Whosoever examines the various modern plans for the improvement of the metropolis, and compares them with the plan of the architect of St. Paul’s, will see in them only small approximations to his conceptions, and that they only provide for a few large openings, without reference to any general sanitary considerations, and without providing for the mass of the population, whereas he was for “excluding all narrow dark alleys without thoroughfares, and courts,” such as are commonly left untouched in the new lines of streets; and he had provided that not only “all church yards,” but “all trades that use great fires, or yield noisome smells, be placed out of town.” If, as is confidently maintained on such evidence as that before referred to, ante p. 22 and 25, the proportions of death might even now be reduced by one-third in the city of London by better drainage and other sanitary measures (independently of the removal of those courts and alleys, &c.), on the evidence of the proportions of mortality actually prevalent in districts such as he would have constructed, facilitating, and almost necessitating by regular lines an early and more systematic drainage below the streets, as well as a free and copious flow of fresh air from above, it may be as confidently maintained that the mortality and numbers of burials would have been reduced in like proportions from the period of the rebuilding of the city. The whole of the deformed area stands as a monument of the disasters incurred to the living generation, by a weak and careless yielding, not of the present to the future, but of the present itself, to blind and ignorant impulses, which have entailed immense demoralization, waste of health, and life and money, and a large proportion of the evil which now depresses the sanitary condition of the population of that particular district which his improvements would have covered. “The practicability of this whole scheme,” says the Parentalia, “without loss to any man or infringement of any property, was at that time fully demonstrated, and all material objections fully weighed and answered; the only, and as it happened, insurmountable 235difficulty, was the obstinate averseness of a great part of the citizens to alter their old properties, and to recede from building their houses again on the old ground and foundations, as also the distrust in many, and unwillingness to give up their properties, though for a time only, into the hands of public trustees or commissioners, till they might be dispensed to them again, with more advantages to themselves than otherwise was possible to be effected; for such a method was proposed, that by an equal distribution of ground into buildings, leaving out churchyards, gardens, &c. (which are to be removed out of the town), there would have been sufficient room both for the augmentation of the streets, disposition of the churches, halls, and all public buildings, and to have given every proprietor full satisfaction; and although few proprietors should happen to have been seated again directly upon the very same ground they had possessed before the fire, yet no man would have been thrust any considerable distance from it, but been placed, at least, as conveniently, and sometimes more so, to their own trades than before.” “By these means the opportunity, in a great degree, was lost of making the new city the most magnificent, as well as commodious, for health and trade of any upon earth, and the surveyor being thus confined and cramped in his designs, it required no small labour and skill to model the city in the manner it has since appeared.” The plan was approved by the King and the Parliament, but opposed by the corporation, who, it is stated in a history of the city institutions, by one of its officers, conceived that they would have lost population and trade by the plan; i. e., they would have been spread beyond its jurisdiction. But on both points this policy was dreadfully mistaken. Only a burthensome population is obtained by overcrowding, that is to say, a larger than the natural proportions of the young and dependent, of widowhood, and early and destitute orphanage, and of sickly and dependent, and prematurely aged adults. As an example of the coincidence of pecuniary economy with enlarged sanitary measures, it may be mentioned, that it is shown in a report on a survey made for sanitary purposes by Mr. Butler Williams of the College of Civil Engineers, Putney, that a loss of not less than 80,000l. per annum is now incurred in carriage traffic alone on two main lines of street, namely, Holborn Hill to the Bank, and Ludgate Hill to the same point, being made crooked and with steep acclivities instead of straight and level, as Sir Christopher Wren designed them. It is to be regretted that the discussions on the rebuilding of Hamburg have presented an instance of a similar conflict of local interests, which, in a few instances, has been so far successful as to preserve several dense masses of crowded and unwholesome habitations for the poorer classes, in the face of the recent experience of the sort of population which, to the surprise of the better classes of inhabitants, issued out of them and made the city at the time of its destruction a scene of plunder and anarchy more terrible than the fire itself.

No. 10. LETTER FROM THE TOWN CLERK OF STOCKPORT, ON INFANTICIDES COMMITTED PARTLY FOR THE SAKE OF BURIAL MONEY.

Dear Sir, Stockport, 25th January, 1843.

I have no doubt that infanticide to a considerable extent has been committed in the borough of Stockport; and I have been professionally engaged in prosecuting two distinct charges of infanticide, of which I give you the following summary:—

The first case was against Robert Standring, by trade a hatter. He had 236a female child about sixteen years of age, who, from imbecility, was not very likely to obtain her own living. One morning, about five o’clock, he sent her to call up a labouring hatter, with whom he (the father) was going to work during the day; but, previous to his so sending her, he gave the child some coffee. After the child’s return she was seized with vomiting, and all the usual symptoms of illness caused by mineral poison, and died during the course of that day. The coroner (the late Mr. Hollins) held an inquest on the body, but refused to allow any surgical examination; and charging the jury that the death was a natural one, such a verdict was returned. In about three months afterwards, the case, and some suspicious circumstances, came to the knowledge of the Stockport police; and I was consulted as town-clerk and clerk to the justices. The magistrates issuing a warrant for the exhumation of the body, I attended with a competent surgeon and chemist (Mr. John Rayner), and a large—very large quantity of arsenic was found in the stomach, and all parts of the body which could be affected by arsenic taken internally were remarkably preserved from putrefaction. Standring, being apprehended, was tried before Mr. Justice Coleridge at the Chester Assizes. The judge apparently summed up for a conviction; but the jury, after a long deliberation, returned a verdict of acquittal. The verdict was an extraordinary one, and can only be accounted for by the general feeling against capital punishments, which enables so many criminals (capitally indicted) to escape any punishment.

The inducement for this murder, so far as it could be ascertained, was of a twofold character; partly to obtain money from the burial friendly societies, in which Standring had entered his child as a member, and from which he received about 8l., and partly to free himself from the future burthen of supporting the child. The judge, in summing up the case for the consideration of the jury, remarked upon the apparent inadequacy of the motives for the murder; but, with all due deference to his lordship, when it is known to be an established fact that Mr. Ashton, a manufacturer of Hyde, was murdered by two miscreants whose only inducement was 10l. divided between them, there can be no scale laid down to indicate the lowest price for murder.

The other case involved no less than three distinct cases of murder. Robert Sandys, and Ann his wife, and George Sandys, and Honor his wife, were brothers and sisters-in-law, living in Stockport, in two adjoining cellars. They were bear or mat makers. Robert had two sons and two daughters, all young children, and George had a female child also very young. Two of the female children of Robert Sandys were one morning taken very ill, and one of them died the same day, under very suspicious circumstances, the neighbours publicly declaring that the children must be poisoned. These two girls (along with their brother, a little boy about five years of age) having been in the morning of the illness in the company of Bridget Ryley (a girl of inoffensive but imbecile mind), their mother, Ann Sandys, after the neighbours said the children must have been poisoned, said, “Oh, Bridget Ryley must have given them something.” Bridget Ryley had given them some cold cabbage, which Ann Sandys well knew, and the boy who had been with them was not at all unwell. Bridget Ryley was apprehended, and by accident I was present at the coroner’s inquest. I came in just at its termination, Bridget Ryley being in custody, and Ann Sandys being about to close her examination. After she had concluded her examination, which was very strong against Bridget Ryley, she began to apologize for Bridget, saying, She did not think the poor girl (as she called her) intended any harm to the child; and she evidently wished to make it appear that the poisoning was all a matter of accident. Bridget Ryley was then asked to say what she knew about the business, and she earnestly protested her innocence, saying the child had died of the same complaint as another child of Ann Sandys had died of three weeks 237before. It appeared strange that the mother of the child should both criminate and exculpate Bridget Ryley, and I thought I could perceive a watchful restlessness in her eye, which ill accorded with the probable grief of a bereaved parent; I therefore communicated to the coroner my opinion that the mother of the children might be the murderess, and that if so, the child which had been buried three weeks before would also prove poisoned. The coroner thought it a very proper inquiry, and adjourned the inquest, directing this other child to be exhumed; and it proved to have been poisoned by arsenic. Whilst this exhumation was taking place, Honor Sandys met one of the constables, and she expressed a wish that they would not disturb her dear little infant. The constable told me this, and directions were consequently given for its immediate exhumation. Arsenic had also caused the death of this child. Ann Sandys then said that Bridget Ryley must have poisoned them all, and that a child which Bridget Ryley had nursed had died in a similar way. (This was after Ann Sandys was in custody and charged with this murder.) This last child so nursed by Bridget Ryley was exhumed, but it had died a natural death. Now all these three children so poisoned were in friendly burial societies, and their parents would receive for their funerals about 3l. for each child. The expense of the funeral would be about 1l., and the profit on each murder 2l., and the liberation from the future expense of keeping the child.

At the ensuing assizes for Chester Mr. Justice Coltman postponed the trial to enable the boy, the son of Ann Sandys, to be educated for examination. This boy would have proved some very material facts as to the mode in which the poison was administered, but as this did not come out in evidence, as the boy was not considered capable of being examined at the subsequent assizes, it is hardly fair now to state them.

Mr. Justice Erskine tried the cases, and Robert Sandys was convicted, but his wife Ann Sandys acquitted. I afterwards was told by one of the jury that they acquitted her because they thought she acted under the control of her husband, and they thought that justified her acquittal. The judge and counsel had been silent on this point, satisfied with their own knowledge, that in murder the wife, though acting with her husband, is guilty and punishable, and thinking the jury as wise as themselves.

In consequence of an objection to the admissability of a statement made by Ann Sandys before the coroner, and also to the form of the indictment, judgment was respited to the following assizes. The judges determined for the Crown on both points, and sentence of death was passed on Robert Sandys. Afterwards, and without any communication to the parties prosecuting, the sentence of death was commuted to transportation for life. George and Honor Sandys were not tried, as the evidence was not so conclusive against them, and Robert and Ann were believed to be the principals in these murders.

I know it to be the opinion of some of the respectable medical practitioners in Stockport that infanticides have been commonly influenced by various motives—to obtain the burial moneys from the societies in question, and to be relieved from the burthen of the child’s support. The parties generally resort to a mineral poison, which, causing sickness, and sometimes purging, assumes the appearance of the diseases to which children are subject; and as they then take the child to a surgeon who prescribes after a very cursory examination, they thus escape any suspicion on the part of their neighbours. Each child in Sandys’ case was so treated, but they took care not to administer the physic obtained.

How to prevent these infanticides is a question of great difficulty. I think these societies are of great use if under proper regulation and inspection. These cases may be good argument for requiring the due inspection, after death, of each child in a burial society by a surgical examiner, who might judge, in most cases, whether a post-mortem 238examination were advisable or not; but as these societies are very useful on the whole, the partial misuse of them cannot avail against their general use. Probably an application to these societies of the law applicable to life assurance companies might tend to prevent the crime of infanticide. The object of these burial societies is the decent interment of the deceased member. In life insurance companies no person is by law allowed to recover from an insurance company more money than the value of his interest in the life of the person whose life is insured: for instance, should his interest in a life lease be worth 500l. he may insure and recover 500l., but not 600l. He therefore receives by the policy that which he loses by the death, and no more. If he has no interest the policy is void. Now, applying this principle to these burial societies would make it necessary that some officer of the society should prepare for and superintend the interment of the child, and that no further sum than requisite for the decent interment should be expended, and no money in any case should be paid to the friends of the deceased; also, no party should be insured in more than one society.

None of our registrars of births and deaths are medical men, and no case of infanticide has been discovered through the instrumentality of the Registration Act.

I shall be glad to furnish you with the briefs in these cases of murder, should you desire them, or with any further information in my power.

In all four deaths each child was in a burial society, and arsenic was indisputably the cause of death.

I may also mention that each death was of a female child. The male children, more likely to be useful to their parents, were in each case spared.

I have the honour to be,

Your most obedient servant,

Henry Coppock,

Town Clerk of Stockport, and

Clerk to the Stockport Union.

[In answer to a subsequent inquiry, Mr. Coppock stated that at the time the offences detailed in the above letter were committed, both the parties were in employment. Standring was a hatter, in full work, and making with industry 20s. a-week; the Sandys, Robert and George, were mat-makers, not making more than from 7s. to 10s. per week each; the women contributing, it is presumed, to the earnings of the family.]

239

No. 11. A RETURN OF THE AVERAGE AGES AT WHICH DEATHS AND FUNERALS OCCURRED DURING THE YEAR 1839 TO THE SEVERAL CLASSES OF SOCIETY IN THE SEVERAL SUPERINTENDENT REGISTRARS’ DISTRICTS OF THE METROPOLIS.

Also of the Proportionate Numbers of Deaths to the Population of each such District: setting forth the excess in Numbers of Deaths and Funerals in each such District above the proportionate Numbers of Deaths and Funerals in healthy and well-conditioned Town Districts: setting forth also the amount of Reduction of the ordinary Duration of Life of each Class in the District, as compared with the standards of Longevity afforded by the Insurance Tables deduced from the experience of the Population of Carlisle, and of the County of Hereford.

The explanations given in respect to the totals inserted at § 37 are applicable to the annexed district returns, which are only submitted as the best approximations that can be obtained in the present state of the registration. The practical bearing of the consideration of the ages of deaths as well as the proportionate numbers of deaths on the subject of provision for funerals is shown in §§ 72, 75, 76, 78, 79, 80, 81, also §§ 160, 161, 163, 169, 173, and note to § 150, also § 205. For the sake of those who are engaged as members of committees in the investigation of the health of the populous towns and the causes of mortality, it may be of public use to give full explanations of the principles on which returns should be made to measure the relative pressure of those causes in different localities, or amongst different classes of the community: it may also be of use to show the necessity of careful provisions for the registration of facts which are of great importance to every community.

Dr. Price, in his work on Annuities and Reversionary Payments, states that in his time the proportion of deaths in London within the bills of mortality was rather more than 1 to 22 of the population annually, which he states as an equivalent proposition to saying that the average duration of life to all who died was 22 years. Again he observes that—

“One with another, then, they will have an expectation of life of 22½ years; that is, one of 22½ will die every year.” p. 255.

In p. 274, that—

“In the dukedom of Wurtemberg, the inhabitants, Mr. Susmilch says, are numbered every year; and from the average of 5 years, ending in 1754, it appeared that taking the towns and country together, 1 in 32 died annually. In another province which he mentions, consisting of 635,998 inhabitants, 1 in 33 died annually. From these facts he concludes, that, taking a whole country in gross, including all cities and villages, mankind enjoy among them about 32 or 33 years each of existence. This very probably is below the truth; from whence it will follow, that a child born in a country parish or village has at least an expectation of 36 or 37 years; supposing the proportion of country to town inhabitants, to be as 3½ to 1, which, I think, this ingenious writer’s observations prove to be nearly the case in Pomerania, Brandenburg, and some other kingdoms.”

By Mr. Milne, in his work on Annuities, and in his article on Mortality in the last edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, by Dr. Bissett Hawkins, and by nearly all statistical writers, the proportions of deaths to the population, and the average ages of death, are treated as equivalent. Dr. Southwood Smith has been misled to adopt the same view. He states in his work on the Philosophy of Health, p. 135, that “There is reason to believe that the mortality at present throughout Europe, taking all countries together, including towns and villages, and combining all classes into one aggregate, is 1 in 36. Susmilch, a celebrated German writer, who 240flourished about the middle of the last century, estimated it at this average at that period. The result of all Mr. Finlaison’s investigations is, that the average for the whole of Europe does not materially differ at the present time.” “It has been shown that the average mortality at present at Ostend is 1 in 36, which is the same thing as to assert that a new-born child at Ostend has an expectation of 35½ years of life.”

Having of late had occasion to make rather extensive observations on this subject, it appears to be a public duty to state, that in no class of persons, in no district or country, and in no tract of time, has the fact hitherto appeared to be in coincidence with this hypothesis; and also that returns of the proportions of deaths to the population, when taken singly as the exponents of the average duration of life, are often mischievously misleading, exaggerating those chances of life sometimes to the extent of double the real amount. If Dr. Price, instead of resting satisfied with Susmilch’s hypothesis, had taken the actual ages of the dying within the bills of mortality, he would have found only a casual approximation to the hypothesis for the whole metropolis; and if he had taken the worst conditioned districts, that, as applied to them, it was in error full one-half. On Mr. Milne’s own data it appears that the proportions of deaths to the population at Carlisle, instead of coinciding with the ascertained average ages of death, 38·72, were in the year 1780, 1 in 35; in 1787, they were 1 in 43; and in 1801, they were 1 in 44. Having caused an average to be deduced from the actual ages of 5,200,141 deaths which occurred in the Prussian States from 1820 to 1834, instead of 36 years, the actual average age of deaths was only 28 years and 10 months. The average ages of death in France, as deduced from Duvillard’s table, founded on the experience of one million of deaths, instead of being 36 years, was 28 years and 5 months.

The public errors created and maintained by taking the proportions of deaths as exponents of the average ages of death, or of the chances of life to the population, may be illustrated by reference to the actual experience amongst nearly two millions of the population, or upwards of forty-five thousand deaths in thirty-two districts, equivalent to as many populous towns, which the Registrar-General has obligingly enabled me to examine for the year 1839.

The Carlisle table is taken as the standard for the duration of life, to measure the loss of life in the several districts, as it gives the probability of life from infancy, well ascertained for one town, and nearly coincides with the experience of the annuity offices on the select class of lives insured by them, and with the results which I have obtained from the mortuary registries showing the average age of death in the county of Hereford. Each of the recognized insurance tables may, however, be used. If the Carlisle table be taken, the chances of life at infancy would be 38·72; by the Chester table it would be 36·70; by the Northampton, 25·18; by the Montpellier table, 25·36; by the last Swedish table, 39·39; by the experience of Geneva, 40·18. After the attainment of twenty years of age these several tables give the chances of life as follows:—by the Carlisle table it would be 41·46; by the Chester table, 36·48; by the Northampton table, 33·43; by the Montpellier table, 37·99; by the Swedish table, 39·98; by the Geneva experience, 37·67; and by the experience of the Equitable Society, 41·67. For civic purposes in this country, the most important period for considering the chances of life is after coming of age, or after the attainment of twenty-one years; the average ages of all who die above that age in each district of the metropolis are therefore given to illustrate the extent of loss of life to each class of adults, which is the more important to be observed, as it has been hastily supposed that the pressure of the more common and removable causes of disease is almost exclusively upon the infant population.

In illustration of the errors occasioned by taking the proportions of deaths as the exponent of the duration of life; if we take the proportions of deaths in the district of Islington, with its population of 24155,720, we find the deaths for the year only 1 to every 55 of the population, which would appear to be a highly healthy standard; whereas, when we examine the average age of death of all of that population who have died during that year, we find it to be only 29 years: in other words, we find that the average duration of the period of existence has even in that district been shortened by at least nine years to all, and to an extent of at least six years on the average to the class of adults. If we examine the pressure of the causes of death upon each class of the community, in the same district, we find that the class of artisans, instead of attaining 39 years, have, on the average, been cut off at 19 years; and hence that children and adults, and on the average all those of the labouring classes who have died, have been deprived of 20 years of the natural expectation of life; and that even the class of adults who have died have been deprived of 15 years of working ability, involving extensive orphanage and premature widowhood. If we take such a district as Bethnal Green, inhabited by weavers and a badly conditioned population, the returns of the proportionate number of deaths to the population (1 in 41) would lead to the supposition of an average vitality of nearly double the real amount, which appears from this year’s return to be only 22 years for the whole population. For the working classes in that district it is no more than 18 years. If we carry investigations closer, and into the local causes of the mortality, we have them developed in such evidence as that given by Mr. T. Taylor, one of the registrars of that district;—or in other districts by such information as that given by Mr. Worrell, the registrar of St. Pancras, or by registrars of St. George’s, Hanover Square, or by the registrar of a district of Marylebone, where we find the state of overcrowding (noted in § 26), combined with the insufficient supplies of water, the defective drainage and neglect of cleansing which is described in the answers—attended by a reduction of 12 years’ duration of life to the adult artisans. In the opulent parish of St. George’s, Hanover Square, it is attended by a loss of 16 years; in Marylebone and in St. Pancras, by a loss of 17 years. The external and internal circumstances of the labouring population, where such results have been obtained, vary widely, and the results are commonly the mean of extreme differences. For example, in the parish of St. Margaret’s, Leicester, which has a population of 22,000, almost all of whom are artisans engaged in the manufacture of stockings, where the average age of death in the whole parish was, during the year 1840, 18 years, I succeeded in obtaining the ages of death in the different streets, when it appeared that this average was made up as follows:—Average age of deaths in the streets that were drained (and that by no means perfectly) 23½ years; in the streets that were partially drained, 17½ years; in the streets that were entirely undrained, 13½ years. Though the defective drainage and cleansing was the main cause, it was doubtless not the only cause of this variation. That, however, was a year of a heavy mortality, and the average age of death in that and another district during the years 1840, 1841, and 1842, was in the streets drained 25½ years; in those partly drained 21, and those not drained, 17 years. The general average was 21 years. The proportions of death to the population in Leicester were during the same period, 1 in 36½. The inquiries promoted in the districts of other towns have developed instances of large masses of population amongst whom even lower average duration of life than any noted in the first report is attendant on the circumstances described as causes.

So far as estimates of the number of the people before a census was taken may be depended upon, it appears that the proportionate numbers of deaths in the metropolis were, at the commencement of the last century, 1 to 20. At the time the first census was taken (1801) the proportion of deaths to the population within the bills of mortality appeared to be 1 to 39. At the present time it appears to be 1 to 40. Having had the average ages of death within the bills of mortality in the metropolis calculated from the earliest to the later returns published, they appear to be, 242as far as they can be made out from the returns, which are only given in quinquennial and decennial periods, as follows:—

Of all returned as having died during the

The average Age was

Years, Months.

22 years, from 1728 to 1749 25 1

25 years, from 1750 to 1774 25 6

25 years, from 1775 to 1799 26 0

25 years, from 1800 to 1825 29 0

6 years, from 1826 to 1830 29 10

Thus, whilst it would appear from the proportionate numbers of deaths to the population that the average duration of life in the metropolis has doubled during the last century, it appears from the returns of the average ages themselves that it has only increased four years and nine months, or about one-fifth. The district of the old bills of mortality comprehends little more than one-half of the metropolis. The average age of death for the year 1839 for the whole metropolis, it will have been seen, is only 27 years. So far as an average for that year for the old district can be made out from the several recent district returns, it would appear to be no more than 26 years. But the earlier mortuary registration was known to be extremely defective, especially in the registration of deaths in the poorer districts, and the recent lower averages are ascribable to the closer registration of the infantile mortality in those districts. The earlier returns are only to be regarded in so far as the errors from period to period are likely to have compensated each other; they are only adduced as indicating the degree of proportionate progression, correspondent with the general physical improvements of the population. But the slow general improvement, made up by the great improvements of particular classes, is consistent with the positive deterioration of others. The average age of death of the whole of the working classes we have seen is still no more than 22 years in the whole of the metropolis. In large sub-districts, if we could distinguish accurately the classes of deaths, the average would be found to be not more than half that period: a rate of mortality ascribable to increased over-crowding and stationary accommodation, greatly below anything that probably existed at the commencement of the century. The chief errors in the existing returns are errors which cause the extent of the evils which depress the sanitary condition of the population, and the mortality consequent on those evils to be under estimated.

The erroneous conclusions as to the ages of the populations from the proportions of deaths, have perhaps arisen from assumptions of the existence of states of things rarely, if ever, found, namely, perfectly stationary populations and perfectly stationary causes of death. I have been asked “If 1 out of 40 die yearly, must not the average age of all who die be 40 years?” The answer, by actual experience, as we have seen, is, that it is often not 30 years; and perhaps the reason why it is not so will be most conveniently illustrated by hypothetical cases. For example, let it be assumed that in any given year 40 persons die out of 1600, which is in the proportion of 1 to 40, and in consequence of an unusual prevalence of measles, or some disease to which children are subject, the greater number of deaths occur amongst the infant portion of the population, and hence, out of the 40 deaths, 20 occur at 5 years of age, 10 at 25, and 10 at 60. Then the total existence had, would have been (20 × 5) + (10 × 25) + (10 × 60) = 100 + 250 + 600 = 950 years, and this divided by 40, the number who died would give 950 40 = 24 years nearly as the average duration of life to each of the 40 who died.

On the other hand, suppose a severe winter, in which the peculiar causes of mortality may have pressed unusually heavy upon the older lives, and let the numbers who died have been 20, at 60 years of age; 10 at 40; and 10 at 5; in such case, the total existence enjoyed would have been 243(20 × 60) + (10 × 40) + (10 × 5) = 1200 + 400 + 50 = 1650 years, which, divided by 40, would give 1650 40 = 41¼ years as the average duration of life to each.

And again, where, in fact, the proportion of death in one year may be represented as 1 death out of 20 of the population; the average existence enjoyed may be greater than when 1 in 40 died for the reason given in the former case. As for example, in the year when 1 in 20 died, it may have happened that the deaths were among the older lives, and that, taking one with another, the average age of all who died might be 50; while in the other case the mortality might have been amongst the infant population, when the average age might have been 20. If the proportion of 1 in 40, or 1 in 20, were to obtain each year continuously, taking one life with another, the average duration to a population just born, of whom 1 in 40 died, and whose place should be supplied each year by a new birth, would be about 20 years to each life, or one-half; and of a similar population, of whom 1 out of 20 died annually, the average duration of life to each would be about 10 years, or one-half the period at the expiration of which all the lives would have expired.

When these examples are considered, it will be understood that the average age of death may remain stationary, or may go on increasing, whilst the proportions of death remain the same, or vary. The actual mortality of most districts is found to be coincident chiefly with its physical condition, and is most accurately measured by the years of vitality which have been enjoyed, i. e., by the average age of death. The numbers of deaths increase or diminish considerably, and frequently create erroneous impressions, whilst the average ages of death are found to maintain a comparatively steady course, always nearest to the actual condition of the population, and give the most sure indications.

The chief test of the pressure of the causes of mortality is then the duration of life in years: and whatever age may be taken as the standard of the natural age or the average age of the individual in any community may be taken to correct the returns of the proportions of death in that same community. For example, in the returns of the St. George’s, Hanover Square district, it appears that in 1839, the proportions of deaths was 1 to 50 of the population; but the average number of years which 1325 individuals who died during that year had lived, was only 31 years, or 8 years below the average period of life in Carlisle. There was then in that district during that year a total loss of 10,600 years of life, which at 39 years may be considered as equal to an excess of deaths of 272 persons, and in a healthy state the proportions of deaths should have been 1 in 63 instead of 1 in 50 of the population. The excess in numbers of deaths in the metropolis has been measured by this standard, the total number of years of life, would in a healthy community have been divided in portions of not less than 39 years to every individual who died.

The effect of migration or of emigration, in disturbing the results of returns of the average ages of death in particular localities appears to be commonly much exaggerated.

As formerly, when navy surgeons, overlooking the filth of their ships, which has since been removed, and not perceiving the effects of the atmospheric impurities arising from the overcrowding, which have since been diminished by better ventilation, directed their whole attention to supposed distant causes and mysterious agencies, and were wont to ascribe the whole of the fever which ravaged a fleet to infection from some casual hand, who was found to have been received on board from some equally filthy and ill kept prison where the “gaol fever” had been prevalent; so now, in some of our towns, we find much ingenuity exercised to avoid the immediate force of the facts presented by such returns, by a search for collateral and incidental defects in them. Thus in Liverpool the whole of its vast excess of mortality has been charged upon the poorer passengers who pass through the 244port. In other towns also, all the excess of deaths from epidemic or infectious disease is charged upon the vagrant population. In New York and some of the American cities, where inquiries have been stimulated by the example of the sanitary inquiry in this country, a common observation made on the proved excess of mortality is, that a large proportion of “foreigners” frequent the city. An inquiry into the cases themselves would generally show that if, instead of the proportion of the immigrant population being: a small per-centage, it formed a very large proportion of the population included: still the proportion per cent. of sickness and mortality, from consumption and other diseases, amongst the resident population, is the greatest; and that even in lodging-houses the disease roost frequently appears first in the occupants who are stationary, and last in the new comers. In some badly conditioned districts, where there is a very severe mortality observable on children, a less proportionate amount of mortality prevails amongst the adults who are migrant, than on other adults resident in somewhat less depressed districts, but who are more stationary. Of all classes (unless it be the higher classes who resort to watering-places) it is not the sickly and the weakly who travel for subsistence as handicraftsmen, or for subsistence in commerce, but the healthy and robust. In so far as the general results of mortuary registration of any district are disturbed by a population who are migrant (who are not only above the average strength, but who generally come with the additional advantage of health by travel in the open air and in a purer atmosphere), they are usually disturbed by unduly raising and giving the locality an appearance of an average of health, and the fatally deceptive chances of longevity that do not belong to it Whilst therefore the localities gain by the average health and strength of the migrant population, other districts have the credit of a share of the excess of disease and mortality which really belong to unhealthy localities. In other words, the population migrating through such districts carry away more disease and mortality from the crowded districts than they take into them. If there had been a mortuary registration at Walcheren, or any pestilential stations productive of an excessive mortality in the army, the registries probably would not have given the localities credit for more than half the mortality which belonged to them. The real sickness and mortality of the more depressed town districts are often made to appear lower than they are by the number of cases treated in distant workhouses, hospitals, and dispensaries, for which no credit is given to the locality where the cause of death occurred.

It would doubtless proportionately enhance the value of such returns as those in question, if the rule were fully carried out that “the population enumerated must always be precisely that which produces the deaths registered;” the grand desideratum being, as expressed by Mr. Milne, for insurance purposes, “to determine the number of annual deaths at each age which takes place among the living at the same age;”^[43] but the facts cited of the greater proportion of adults, and of health in those adults who are immigrant, will answer the objections to the superior applicability to local or class insurance tables, deduced from actual local observation of the local rate of mortality prevalent amongst that population, whether migrant or stationary, and without reference to the actual ages of the living (though that were desirable), compared with deductions from any general insurance table, i. e. the experience of a distant and wholly unconnected population. Deductions from tables, however correctly made from the experience of other towns, must he, and are proved, by such experience as that hereafter cited, to be merely “guess-work.” Vide ‘General Sanitary Report,’ pp. 218, 219. For myself, I make it a general rule of precaution neither to receive nor adduce statistical returns as evidence without previous inquiry, wherever it is possible, into the particulars on which they are founded, or with which they are 245connected. I adduce them less as principal evidence, proving anything by themselves, than as proximate measures, or as indications of the extent of the operation of causes substantiated by distinct investigations. The general conclusions which the facts that have come to my knowledge tend to establish on the subject of the experience of mortality are, that there is no general law of mortality yet established that is applicable to all countries or to all classes, or to all times, as commonly assumed; that every place, and class, and period has rather its own circumstances and its own law, varying with those circumstances; that the actual experience of any class or place, or period, even with the disturbance of any ordinary amount of migration, or immigration, or any ordinary influx of young lives from births, is a safer guide than any experience deduced from the experience of another people living at another time and place, or any assumed general law.

For many public purposes, I have submitted it as a desideratum that population returns should give not merely the numbers of each class, or of those engaged in each distinct occupation, which only enables us to resort to the fallacious standard of the proportionate numbers of deaths, to judge of the mortality incidental to the class, but the total ages of each class, which would serve as an index of alterations in the sanitary condition of that same class. Such returns of the total ages should, for the public use, be reduced to their simplest proportions. In the form in which they are usually given, only in intervals of quinquennial or decennial periods, they are extremely meagre, and involve so much inaccuracy in any attempts that might be made to use them, for the purpose of comparing district with district, as to be generally useless. Whereas, if the ages of any class, or of the general population living in any district, and the ages of those of them who die, were reduced to the simplest proportions—that is, if the total years of age, whether of the living or dying, were divided by the total number of individuals from which the returns were made, the public would be enabled to make comparisons between district and district, and to judge of the relative degrees of pressure, in each, of the causes of mortality. As the simple proportions of average ages of the living have not yet, that I am aware of, been used, or even calculated in any instance, I beg leave to exemplify them.

Mr. Griffith Davies is theoretically of opinion, on a formula of De Moivre, that in general the average age of death in any community is necessarily higher than the average age of those living in the same community: and that in a stationary population the average age of death will, under ordinary circumstances, be in the ratio of 3 to 2 higher than the average age of the living. I have had the average age of the living population, on which the experience embodied in the Carlisle Insurance table was founded, calculated: and if that may be considered to have been a stationary population, the proportion of the ages of the living to those of the dying was practically as about 3 to 4: for whilst the average age of the dying was 383 10, the average age of the living population was 329 10. The average age of the dying in Hereford, in which the increase of population had been very slight, was 39. But the average age of the living population, so far as it can be made out from quinquennial returns, was 28 years and 5 months. On this and all returns of the ages of the living, in the mode in which the returns have been collected, allowance must be made for understatements of ages by some of the adult members of the community. On the whole, the proportion of the ages of the living to the dying appears to be in an ordinarily healthy and stationary community, as about 3 to 4.

As yet the observations have not been on a sufficiently wide basis; but it appears that wherever there is any divergence between the average ages of the living and the average ages of the dying, the divergence beyond their natural proportions may be taken as indicating the proportionate 246operation of some disturbing cause upon either line, as by some extraordinary increase of births, or by immigration or emigration, on the average ages of the living, and on the line of the average ages of the dead.

So far as I have been enabled to observe or collect from the extremely imperfect data at present available to the public service, the line of the average ages of the living is comparatively steady; the disturbances by migration and immigration which often compensate each other, for the same place and period, being much the same at different periods, and seldom affect the results materially, whilst the variations in the pressure of the causes of death from year to year, are usually considerable, and warrant the assumption that in general the disturbances occasioning the divergence described, are from the operations of causes of death upon that line. Wherever the pressure of the causes of death has yet been observed to be very great, there the line of mortality, or the average age of death, is below, what may be called, the line of vitality constituted by the average age of the living; and wherever there is on the whole any diminution of those causes of death, as by better ventilation, or by widening streets, opening new thoroughfares, better supplies of water, sewering and cleansing, and improvements in the general habits of the population, there the line of mortality, the infantile mortality especially, diminishes, the average age of each adult class, up to sexagenarians or octogenarians, increases, and the average age of death ascends above the average age of the living. The means of observation are as yet too few to elicit more than indications for the guidance of sustained investigation, to determine whether the divergence of the two lines may be reduced to any rule.

In Liverpool,—where the investigations into the condition of the resident cellar population certainly show an increase of the causes of death,—overcrowding, defective ventilation, bad supplies of water, and increased filth,—the average age of death is, for the whole town, 17 or 18 years only, whilst the average age of the living population, so far as it can be made out from the mode in which the census is prepared, is 24 years. As far as can be ascertained by reference to previous registries of one large parish, where the ages of the dead were formerly entered, the average duration of life in that town has gradually fallen. The average ages of all who were buried in St. Nicholas parish between the years 1784 and 1809 was 25.

In Manchester, the average age of the living is 25 years, but the average age of the dying is only 18. In Leeds, the average age of the living is also 25 years, but the average age of the dying is only 21.

Years. Months.

The average age of all who live in the town parishes of Middlesex, so far as they can be made out from the only available materials,—the returns in quinquennial periods,—is only 26 2

But the average age of all who die, judging from one year’s return, appears to be about 27 0

If, however, we allow for the understatement of ages, the two lines for the whole metropolis would be nearly coincident. On the experience of Carlisle and Hereford, the average age of death should be twelve years higher.

Arranging the several districts of the metropolis, in the order of the average age of deaths, we find the average age of the living decrease with the average age of the dying; and the proportion of births to the population increase with the decrease of the average age of death. The excess in the proportionate number of births beyond the proportions in such a county as Hereford (1 to 44), where the average age of death is much higher, and proportionate number of deaths to the population, afford important indicia.

247

Districts in which average Age of Death of the whole Population is Average Age of Death in the District, of all Classes. Average Age of all who live in the District. Proportions of Births to the Population. Proportions of Deaths to the Population. Excess above County of Hereford in the Number of:

Deaths and Funerals. Births.

Years. yrs. mon.

Highest (Comprising 2 Districts.) Population 120,678. 35 27 11 1 to 41 1 to 42 966 145

1. Intermediate (6 Districts.) Population 311,022. 30 27 5 1 to 39 1 to 46 1,836 639

2. Intermediate (12 Districts.) Population 774,937. 27 26 11 1 to 33 1 to 40 7,457 5,718

Lowest (12 Districts.) Population 663,290. 23 26 5 1 to 30 1 to 41 5,705 6,822

It will be observed that in the least healthy districts where the pressure of the causes of mortality is the most extensive, the average age of death falls nearly three years and a half below the average age of the living, whilst in the higher districts the line of mortality rises towards the natural position, or nearly four years above it. But it must still be borne in mind, in the inspection of the returns from the highest district, that the average is made up of districts which are probably retrograding, connected with others which are advancing,—of districts such as are developed by Mr. Worrell, registrar, in his note on one of the returns from St. Pancras, comprising streets, the connected courts and alleys from which are widely as separate and distinct in condition,—and, if I may use such an illustration, as little appropriate for any average that could be represented by numerals—as were the conditions of Lazarus and Dives.

Even the lowest proportion of deaths to the population presented in the district returns, that of Hackney, where it is only 1 to 56. appears to be a proportion in excess by nearly one-eighth, i. e. the deaths from epidemics, as well as the excess of more than one-third in the deaths of children under 10 years of age. The return, from the healthiest district in the returns, of the average age of deaths gives an average of 7 years’ loss of life for the whole population; whilst for the adults of the middle classes it gives 10 years, and for the adults of the working classes 7 years’ premature loss of life. Even in the county of Hereford where there is a proportion of deaths of 1 to 64 of the population, and the standard of the Carlisle table of insurance where an average age of 39 years of death is attained, it will be observed that even this average includes a large proportion (542), or nearly 1-third in the number of deaths under 10 years of age, and 123 or 1–14th deaths from epidemics, besides others involving deaths from preventible causes. Only 329, or 1 in 5 of the deaths in this very healthy county, were deaths registered as from old age. By the removal of this excess of deaths, the excess of births which replace them would even in these districts be of course still further diminished.

It may be conjectured that if there were the means of distinguishing accurately the various classes of the living amongst whom these deaths fall, the irregularity of the proportionate number of deaths which probably arise amongst the labouring classes would be accounted for. The present returns of the number of births do not distinguish the classes amongst whom the births occur. Taking the districts in the order of the average age in which deaths occur to the labouring classes, and comparing the proportions of the deaths and funerals with the proportions which occur in Hereford, the excess of deaths and funerals was in 1839 as follows:—

248

Districts in which average Age of Death of Artisans, &c., is Average Age of Death of Artisans, &c. in the Districts. Excess in Number of Deaths of Artisans, &c., in the District above the Deaths of Agricultural Labourers in Herefordshire.

1. Highest number of the class (comprising 2 Districts.) 38 483

2. Intermediate (1) number of the class (5 Districts.) 27 548

3. Intermediate (2) number of the class (10 Districts.) 23 1,773

4. Lowest number of the class (15 Districts.) 20 4,121

The totals of the subjoined district returns for the metropolis are as follows:—

Number of deaths of each class. Number of deaths from Epidemic disease. Average age at death of all who die above 21. Average age at death of the whole class, including children.

Adults. Children under 10 years. Total.

Gentlemen 1724 529 2253 210 60 44

Tradesmen 3970 3703 7682 1428 51 25

Labourers 12045 13885 25930 5469 49 22

Paupers 3062 593 3655 557 60 49

Undescribed 2996 2761 5757 1051 56 28

Totals 23806 21471 45277 8715 53 27

The following totals of the mortuary registration of the several registrars’ districts in Hereford for the same year are given for comparison:—

Number of deaths of each class. Number of deaths from Epidemic disease. Average age at death of all who die above 21. Average age at death of the whole class, including children.

Adults. Children under 10 years. Total.

Gentlemen 49 19 68 2 65 45

Farmers, &c. 205 45 250 14 60 47

Labourers 833 324 1157 87 58 39

Paupers 26 11 37 1 71 51

Undescribed 124 143 267 19 68 30

Totals 1237 512 1779 123 60 39

The total number of births registered in the several districts in the metropolis, where it is yet far from complete, in the year 1839, was 51,232, or 1 to 37 of the population. The total number of births registered in Hereford during the same year was 2579, or 1 to 44.

The positions advanced in the Sanitary Report of the greater proportion of births in the districts where the deaths are the most frequent, is confirmed in respect to the metropolis by a more recent return with which I have been obligingly favoured by the Registrar-General, in which he shows,—

249

Proportion per cent. Ratio of deaths to births.

Deaths. Births.

“Unhealthiest sub-districts 3·14 3·66 1 to 1·17

Less unhealthy sub-districts 2·68 3·18 1 to 1·19

Average sub-districts 2·43 3·35 1 to 1·38

Healthier sub-districts 2·17 2·64 1 to 1·22

Healthiest sub-districts” 1·87 2·47 1 to 1·32

“The mortality is 68 per cent. higher in the unhealthy than in the healthy sub-districts: the proportion of births is 48 per cent. greater in the unhealthy than in the healthy sub-districts.”

If the deaths in the metropolis during 1839 had been in the same proportion to the population as they were in Hereford, there would have been 8866 funerals less during that year.

If the proportion of births in the metropolis during that year had been the same as in Hereford, there would have been 16,053 births the less.

Or to vary the illustration:—

If the deaths in Hereford had been in the same proportion as the deaths in the metropolis, the community in that county would during that year have had 977 funerals the more.

If the births in Hereford had been in the same proportion as in the metropolis, there would during that year have been 540 births the more.

If the deaths in the whole of England and Wales had been in the proportions attained in some districts, and attainable in all, namely, 1 in 50, there would during the year have been 31,866 funerals less, and more than ten times that amount of cases of sickness the less.

If the proportions of births in the whole kingdom had been the same as those occurring in average healthy districts—such as that of the town district of Hackney, for example, of 1 to 42—there would have been 139,958 births the less to make up for the excess of deaths.

The importance of the subject will justify the reference to other examples.

The commissioners for taking the census of Ireland have bestowed considerable labour to effect various improvements, with a view to determine more accurately the actual condition and progress of the population. They have attempted, amongst other improvements, to ascertain not merely the total number of houses, but the number of each description of houses in each district. From the want of any system of mortuary or birth registration in Ireland their attempts to ascertain correctly the proportions of deaths and births to the population appear to have been to some degree frustrated; and the return of the average age of death must be received as an approximation, giving higher than the real chances of life in that country. From the mode which the commissioners adopted of collecting the ages of the living, by taking the actual age of each individual with precautions, it appears probable that their returns on this head are more trustworthy than those obtained in England.

The proportions of births to the population obtained by the Census Commissioners in Ireland are, I conceive, below the real amount; the proportions of deaths are confessedly so. The proportions of deaths and several other results may however serve for comparison between one province and another and between one county and another. I have taken the following results from several of their tables, or have had them calculated from their data. I submit them as indications of the momentous public truths that still lie open for investigation, of which truths the most important are the extent of the operation of the causes of mortality, which can only be correctly ascertained on the spot by inquiries for a mortuary registration, by responsible officers of superior qualifications and intelligence as officers of health. The fractional numbers are omitted in the returns from the provinces.

250

LEINSTER. MUNSTER. ULSTER. CONNAUGHT. IRELAND.

RURAL. TOWN. RURAL. TOWN. RURAL. TOWN. RURAL. TOWN. RURAL. TOWN.

Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families. Houses. Families.

First Class houses 2 2 24 33 1 1 12 14 1 1 10 9 ·5 ·6 7 10 1·3 1·4 15·9 21·

“Good farm-houses, or in towns houses in a small street, having from 5 to 9 rooms and windows” 21 21 37 39 13 13 44 49 21 21 56 60 8 8 30 33 16·8 17·2 43·6 46·6

“A better description of cottage, still built of mud, but varying from 2 to 4 rooms and windows” 47 46 23 16 34 34 30 25 45 45 23 21 39 39 36 33 41·9 41·7 26·8 21·7

“All mud cabins having only one room” 28 28 14 10 50 49 13 10 32 32 9 8 51 50 25 22 40· 39·7 13·7 10·7

Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females. Males. Females.

Average age at death 32· 31·5 25· 25·4 28·2 27· 23·6 23·7 31·8 32· 23·8 23·6 26·1 24·3 22·6 22·4 29·6 28·9 24·1 24·3

\/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/

32 25 28 24 32 24 25 23 29 24

\/ \/ \/ \/ \/

30 27 31 24 28

Average term of premature loss of life as compared with the experience of Carlisle or the county of Hereford 7 14 11 15 7 15 14 16 10 15

\/ \/ \/ \/ \/

9 12 8 15 11

Annual proportion of deaths to the mean population 1 in 32·3 1 in 29·5 1 in 31·1 1 in 28 1 in 30·3

Average age of all who lived in 1841 25 24 24 23 24

Proportion of widows to every 100 of the population above 17 years old 13 17 12 16 12 15 12 17 12 16

Rate of increase on population since 1831 3·35 7·59 4·36 5·58 5·25

Excess of number of births to every 10,000 of the population above the proportion of births in Hereford 73 95 84 117 90

Positive numbers of births in excess above the proportion of births in Hereford 14,515 22,875 20,003 16,624 74,016

The proportion of widowhood (which would generally be attended by its proportion of orphanage) to the short duration of life in the worst conditioned districts is submitted as confirmatory of the principles expounded in the General Sanitary report on the condition of the labouring population in Great Britain. Vide p. 188, et seq.

Conformity of the rate of increase of population with the ages of the living and dying was not to be expected in the returns where the emigration from the different provinces is (probably) variable; but in the two provinces where the household condition appears to be the worst, and the proportion of mud cabins the greatest, there we find the mortality is the highest.

Where the pressure of the causes of mortality is the greatest; where the average age of death is the lowest, and the duration of life is the shortest, there the increase of population is the greatest. The proportion of children is great because life is short and the generation transient; the middle aged and the aged are swept away in large proportions; and marriages are disproportionately early. But, says a political economist in an essay in support of Mr. Malthus’s original view, “The effect of wars, plagues, and epidemic disorders, those terrible correctives, as they have been justly termed by Dr. Short, of the redundance of mankind on the principle of population, sets its operation in the most striking point of view. These scourges tend to place an old country in the situation of a colony. They lessen the number of inhabitants, without, in most cases, lessening the capital that is to feed and maintain them.” What I apprehend the actual facts when examined, place in a striking point of view, is the danger of adopting conclusions deeply affecting the interests of communities, on hypothetical reasonings, and without a careful investigation whether the facts sustain them: the facts themselves, 251when examined, show that (be it as it may with war) epidemic disorders do not lessen the number of inhabitants; and that they do in all cases that have been examined lessen the capital that is to feed and maintain them. They lessen the proportion of productive hands and increase the proportion of the helpless and dependent hands. They place every community, new or old, in respect to its productive economy in the position which the farmer will understand by the like effects of epidemics upon his cattle, when in order to raise one horse two colts must be reared, and the natural period of work of the one reared is, by disease and premature death, reduced by one-third or one-half. The exposition already given, vide General Report p. 176, et seq. p. 200, of the dreadful misery and disease-sustaining fallacy which erects pestilence into a good, is further illustrated by the effects of the proportions of the dependent populations of Ireland. Thus in England, the population above 15 and under 50 years of age in every ten thousand is 5025, and this five thousand have 3600 children below 15 years of age dependent upon them. In Ireland, the population above 15 years of age is 4900—in other words, there are 125 less of adults in every ten thousand; and this smaller proportion of living adults, with eight or ten years’ span less of life or working ability, have 4050, or four hundred and fifty more children dependent upon them. In England there are 1,365 persons in every ten thousand, or 13½ per cent. above 50 years old to exercise the influence of their age and experience upon the community. In Ireland there are only 10 per cent., or 1050 in every ten thousand of the population above 50 years of age.

It appears from a report which the Census Commissioners give on the sanitary condition of Dublin, that the mortality in the different localities of that city varies with their physical condition in the lower districts, and coincides with the description already cited in the general report, from the report of Dr. Speer, the physician to the Dublin Fever Hospital (vide General Sanitary Report, p. 96). The like consequences follow to the lower Irish population settled in the English towns with the like habits, which permit them to accumulate refuse round their dwellings, and live in an atmosphere compounded of the miasma of a pigsty and a privy, and the smoke of a chimney in a crowded room. The Census Commissioners of Ireland have endeavoured to obtain returns of the chief causes of the mortality; and it appears from the report upon them, that hitherto, notwithstanding all that has been said and written, that fever has returned nearly decennially in periods, irrespective of any general distress in that country, and has extended its ravages to classes who were exposed to the miasma, but who suffered no distress. “Cases of starvation,” it is stated, “have been registered from returns at almost every age, 79 of them took place in the rural district, or 1 death in 11,539 of the general mortality of the open country, and minor towns and villages: 18 in the civic, or 1 in 13,009 of the deaths in towns of or above 2000 people; and 20 occurred in hospitals; the patients having been admitted when suffering from want of food, or in such a destitute condition as subsequently produced death from exhaustion. Including the deaths in hospitals with those in the civic districts, to which they properly belong, it appears that the deaths from want and destitution in the larger towns have been 1 in 7240 to the total mortality of these places. During the first 5-year period, these deaths were on an average but 6 per annum, and in the last 5-year period (that ending June, 1841) they had increased to the yearly average of 18.”

The dependency of the duration of life upon the physical condition of the population, and the connexion of several classes of moral and economical facts, with the proportionate mortality, may be further exemplified. Taking the four counties in Ireland in which the proportions of mud hovels are the greatest; and the four counties in which the proportions of such tenements are the least;^[44] I have added the average ages of death as additional proofs and exemplifications of the conclusions stated in pp. 128 and 129, and other parts of the General Report.

252

The four Counties where the average proportion of mud hovels, as habitations, is the lowest. The four Counties where the average proportion of mud hovels, as habitations, is the highest.

Down. Wexford. Kilkenny. Monaghan. Kerry. Mayo. Clare. Cork.

Proportion per cent. of families occupying habitations which are mud cabins having only one room^[45] 24·7 29·4 30·9 31·5 66·7 62·8 56·8 56·7

29 61

Proportion of deaths from epidemic disease to every 10,000 of the population 36 28·5 36·8 40·4 50·2 51·0 53·1 43·3

35·5 47·8

Average age of all who have died during the 10 years ended 6th June, 1841 33·6 34·10 33·2 31·4 24·10 23·2 24·5 28·8

33·4 26·8

Average age of all the living in 1841 24·10 25·10 24·8 24·2 23·1 23·0 22·9 24·0

24·11 23·5

Proportions of births to the population 1 in 33·4 1 in 34·3 1 in 33·6 1 in 32·5 1 in 28·8 1 in 28· 1 in 28·7 1 in 31·8

1 in 33·4 1 in 29·9

Increase per cent. of the population since 1831 2·7 10·6 7·9 2·5 11·7 6·2 10·9 9·9

5·0 8·7

Per cent. of the population, 15 years and under 39·7 35·6 37·8 40·9 42·4 43·1 42·4 39·7

38·8 41·9

Above 50 years 12·0 12·5 10·9 10·9 9·4 9·4 8·7 10·4

11·6 9·5

Proportion per cent. of male and female population, 17 years and upwards.

Unmarried 42 44½ 45½ 41 37 36 40½ 42

43¼ 39

Married 49 47 45½ 49½ 55 56 51½ 50

47¾ 53

Per cent. of the population 5 years old and upwards, who can neither read nor write 27·5 41·3 51·2 51·3 70·4 79·0 63·1 65·6

42·8 69·7

Proportions of crimes^[46] of violence or passion to each 10,000 of the population on an average of 8 years to 1812:—

Murders and Manslaughters Proportions ·11 ·20 ·44 ·55 ·71 ·87 1·08 ·52

Positive Numbers. 31 35 83 88 166 271 249 316

Proportions ·32 ·72

Rapes and Assaults, with intent to commit Proportions ·06 ·15 ·22 ·35 ·71 ·51 ·46 ·28

Positive Numbers. 15 22 31 58 166 159 108 178

Proportions ·17 ·44

253The general sanitary condition of the population of Scotland and the pressure of the preventible causes of death appears to be lower than in England, and higher than in Ireland, and so it appears from the recent census is the average age of the living.

It may be conceived that the low average age of the living in these cases is ascribable mainly to an increasing proportion of children incidental to an increasing population. Not so, however: the average age of the living is more powerfully influenced by disturbing causes affecting the population of adults, each with accumulated years, than by causes affecting the infantile population. One adult of 50 years added to the living is equal to the addition of 50 infants, and so with the average ages of deaths. The average ages of the living appear to have increased and not diminished with the increasing population. Be the sanitary condition of the poorest classes and the amount of disease and death what it may, as compared with former periods (and there is direct evidence that it is in populous districts increasing), there has been some improvement in the residences of the middle and higher classes; household drainage and cleanliness has in some districts been improved; the quantity of town and land drainage and cultivation has of late increased in various proportions in each country; and the decrease in the causes of mortality appears to have been followed by an increase of the average age of the living, of particular classes at the least, sufficient to present an increase, though a dreadfully slow one, in the average age of the adults living. The increase of the proportion of adults may be represented as follows:—

England. Ireland. Scotland.

1821 1841 1821 1841 1821 1841

Percentage of Population of 15 Years and under 39·09 36·07 41·06 40·44 41·0 36·4

Over 15 Years 60·91 63·93 58·94 59·56 59·0 63·6

Yrs. M. Yrs. M. Yrs. M. Yrs. M. Yrs. M. Yrs. M.

Average age of each living individual 25·3 26·7 2·37 24·0 25·1 25·9

In abundance of employment, in high wages, and the chief circumstances commonly reputed as elements of prosperity of the labouring classes, the city of New York is deemed pre-eminent. I have been favoured with a copy of “The Annual Report of the Interments in the City and County of New York for the Year 1842,” presented to the Common Council by Dr. John Griscom, the city inspector, in which it may be seen how little those circumstances have hitherto preserved large masses of people from physical depression. He has stepped out of the routine to examine on the spot the circumstances attendant on the mortality which the figures represent. He finds that upwards of 33,000 of the population of that city live in cellars, courts, and alleys, of which 6618 are dwellers in cellars. “Many,” he states, “of these back places are so constructed as to cut off all circulation of air, the line of houses being across the entrance, forming a cul de sac, while those in which the line is parallel with, and at one side of the entrance, are rather more favourably situated, but still excluded from any general visitation of air in currents. As to the influence of these localities upon the health and lives of the inmates, there is, and can be, no dispute; but few are aware of the dreadful extent of the disease and suffering to be found in them. In the damp, dark, and chilly cellars, fevers, rheumatism, contagious and inflammatory disorders, affections of the lungs, skin, and eyes, and numerous others, are rife, and too often successfully combat the skill of the physician and the benevolence of strangers.

“I speak now of the influence of the locality merely. The degraded habits of life, the filth, the degenerate morals, the confined and crowded apartments, and insufficient food, of those who live in more elevated rooms, comparatively beyond the reach of the exhalations of the soil, engender a different train of diseases, sufficiently distressing to contemplate, but the 254addition to all these causes of the foul influences of the incessant moisture and more confined air of under-ground rooms, is productive of evils which humanity cannot regard without shuddering.”

He gives instances where the cellar population had been ravaged by fever whilst the population occupying the upper apartments of the same houses were untouched. In respect to the condition of these places, he cites the testimony of a physician, who states that, “frequently in searching for a patient living in the same cellar, my attention has been attracted to the place by a peculiar and nauseous effluvium issuing from the door indicative of the nature and condition of the inmates.” A main cause of this is the filthy external state of the dwellings and defective street cleansing, and defective supplies of water, which, except that no provision is made for laying it on the houses of the poorer classes, is now about to be remedied by a superior public provision.

Years. Months.

The average age of the white population living in New York, according to the census, is 23 3

But the average age of all who die there is only 20 0

Or an excess of deaths over the ages of the living of more than three years and three months; denoting, if the like excess prevailed from year to year, an increasing pressure of the causes of mortality. If the mortality be the same from year to year the chances of life would appear to be lower in New York than in Dublin, where, according to the data given by the Census Commissioners, it would appear to be 25 years 6 months.

In America little attention and labour appear to have been bestowed in any of the rural districts on general land drainage. Yet nature inflicts terrible punishment for the neglect of the appointed and visible warnings and actual premonitory scourges, amongst which are the mosquitoes and the tribes of insects that only breed in stagnant water and live in its noxious exhalations. The cleansing and the general sanitary condition of the American towns appear to be lower than in England or Scotland, whilst the heat there at times is greater and decomposition more active; pestilence in the shape of yellow fever, ague, and influenza is there more rife, the deaths in proportion to the population more numerous, and the average age of death (so far as there is information) amongst the resident population much lower.

Years. Months.

The average age of the whole of the living population in America, so far as it can be deduced from the returns at the periods given in the census, is only 22 2

Notwithstanding the earlier marriages, and the extent of emigration, and the general increase of the population, the whole circumstances appear to me to prove this to be the case of a population depressed to this low age chiefly by the greater proportionate pressure of the causes of disease and premature mortality. The proportionate numbers at each interval of age in every 10,000 of the two populations are as follows:—

United States of America. England and Wales.

Under 5 years 1744 1324

5 and under 10 1417 1197

10 and under 15 1210 1089

15 and under 20 1091 997

20 and under 30 1816 1780

30 and under 40 1160 1289

40 and under 50 732 959

50 and under 60 436 645

60 and under 70 245 440

70 and under 80 113 216

80 and under 90 32 59

90 and upwards 4 5

10,000 10,000

Average age of all the living 22 years 2 months 26 years 7 months.

255Here it may be observed, that whilst in England there are 5025 persons between 15 and 50 who have 3610 children or persons under 15; in America there are 4789 persons living between 15 and 50 years of age who have 4371 children dependent upon them. In England there are in every ten thousand persons 1365 who have obtained above 50 years’ experience; in America there are only 830.

The moral consequences of the predominance of the young and passionate in the American community are attested by observers to be such as have already been described in the General Sanitary Report as characteristic of those crowded, filthy, and badly administered districts in England where the average duration of life is short, the proportion of the very young great, and the adult generation transient.

The difference does not arise solely from the greater proportion of children arising from a greater increase of population, though that is to some extent consistent with what has been proved to be the effect of a severe general mortality; the effects of the common cause of depression is observable at each interval of age: the adult population in America is younger than in England, and if the causes of early death were to remain the same, it may be confidently predicted that the American population would remain young for centuries.

Years. Months.

The average age of all alive above 15 in America is 33 6

The average age of all alive above 15 years in England and Wales is 37 5

The average age of all above 20 years in America is 37 7

In the whole of England the average of all above 20 years is 41 1

The difference at the different stages of age appear also to prevail in proportion to the different pressure of the causes of disease and mortality in different districts in England: e. g. In the town parishes of Middlesex the average age of the living above 15 years is 35 years and 10 months; but in Hereford it is 39 years and 2 months. In Middlesex the average age of the adult population, that is of all above 20 years, is 38 years and 8 months; whilst in Hereford it is 42 years and 1 month.

The comparative amount of disease and death elsewhere it need scarcely be said, in no way affects the positive amount of evil in this country, or dispenses with the duty of adopting such practical measures as may be preventive of a single one of the cases of preventable deaths which abound in masses in the large districts having the least unfavourable averages.

The instances have been adduced to exemplify the suggestions of amendment in the mode of measuring the amount and influence of mortality, and more especially to show the importance of giving the average age as well as the numbers of deaths and the average age of the living in each class of the community.

The subsequent district returns and the notes extracted from the reports made by the local registrars to the Registrar-General, in corroboration of the General Sanitary Report, will show the immense importance to the community of the facts that require investigation. It cannot be too urgently repeated that it is only by examinations, case by case, and on the spot, that the facts from which sound principles may be correctly distinguished. They can only be well classed for general conclusions and public use by persons who have large numbers brought before their actual view and consideration, and who have thus brought before them impressively the common circumstances for discrimination, which no hearsay, no ordinary written information will present to their attention. The attainment of this immensely important public service might properly have been submitted as a principal instead of a collateral object, to the improvement of the practice of interment, for the appointment of such a small well qualified agency as that proposed, § 225, of some five or six trustworthy officers of public health for each million of a town population with the requisite 256powers and responsibilities for ascertaining the actual amount of the preventible causes of death, and informing the local officers and the public of what is to be done for their removal.

The districts are placed in the order of the average age of death of the whole population during the year 1839, commencing with the highest average.

District. Class. Number of Deaths of each Class. Deaths from Epidemic. Average Age at Death of all who die above 21. Average Age at Death, including Children. Years’ Average premature loss of Life by Proportionate Number of Deaths to Population. Excess in Number of Deaths above a Healthy standard.

Adults. Children under 10. Total. Deaths above Age of 21. Deaths of all Classes.

No. No. No. No. Years. Years. Years. Years. No. No.

Greenwich. Population 80,811. Gentry 62 18 80 9 62 48 }

Tradesmen 150 97 247 42 54 31 8 8 }

Artisans, &c. 947 414 1,361 227 56 36 6 3 } 1 in 39 159

Undescribed 141 110 251 35 58 30 4 9 }

Paupers 109 21 130 17 62 52 }

Totals and 1,409 660 2,069 330

Averages. 57 36 5 3

No. of Births 1,780 Age of Living 28 Births 1 in 45

Camberwell. Population, 39,867. Gentry 58 23 81 11 58 38 4 1 }

Tradesmen 111 86 197 35 54 28 8 11 }

Artisans, &c. 137 134 271 54 51 26 11 13 } 1 in 51 100

Undescribed 98 37 135 13 61 42 1 }

Paupers 92 6 98 7 62 56 }

Totals and 496 286 782 117

Averages. 57 34 5 5

No. of Births 709 Age of Living 27·5 Births 1 in 44

Hackney. Population 42,274. Gentry 50 11 61 6 61 47 1 }

Tradesmen 134 94 228 21 52 29 10 10 }

Artisans, &c. 117 120 237 35 55 27 7 12 } 1 in 56 155^[47]

Undescribed 80 102 182 36 60 25 2 14 }

Paupers 46 4 50 1 67 61 }

Totals and 427 331 758 99

Averages. 57 31 5 8

No. of Births 995 Age of Living 26·10 Births 1 in 42

St. George. Hanover Square. Population 66,433. Gentry 110 28 138 12 59 45 2 }

Tradesmen 112 79 191 23 50 29 12 10 }

Artisans, &c. 528 344 872 130 47 27 15 12 } 1 in 501 272^[48]

Undescribed 18 17 35 3 61 32 1 7 }

Paupers 77 12 89 8 59 51 3 }

Totals and 845 480 1,325 176

Averages. 50 31 12 8

257 No. of Births 1,260 Age of Living 28·3 Births 1 in 53

Rotherhithe. Population 13,916. Gentry 6 6 1 57 49 5 }

Tradesmen 12 2 14 2 50 40 12 }

Artisans, &c. 70 14 84 2 51 40 11 } 1 in 41 79^[49]

Undescribed 78 121 199 50 52 19 10 20 }

Paupers 33 5 38 3 68 56 }

Totals and 199 142 341 58

Averages 54 30 8 9

No. of Births 385 Age of Living 26·7 Births 1 in 36

St. Olave. Population 18,427. Gentry 4 4 64 }

Tradesmen 55 46 101 24 48 25 14 14 }

Artisans, &c. 603 215 818 107 43 30 19 9 } 1 in 19 229^[50]

Undescribed 5 14 19 7 50 16 12 23 }

Paupers 47 4 51 8 59 54 3 }

Totals and 714 279 993 146

Averages 45 30 17 9

258 No. of Births 519 Age of Living 27·0 Births 1 in 36

Kensington, (including Chelsea). Population 114,952. Gentry 193 50 243 17 60 45 2 }

Tradesmen 204 120 324 33 50 30 12 9 }

Artisans, &c. 559 619 1,178 223 53 24 9 15 } 1 in 51 582^[51]

Undescribed 202 181 383 47 58 30 4 9 }

Paupers 106 36 142 24 61 44 1 }

Totals and 1,264 1,006 2,270 344

Averages 55 29 7 10

No. of Births 2,782 Age of Living 27·5 Births 1 in 41

Islington. Population 55,720. Gentry 83 35 118 11 61 42 1 }

Tradesmen 151 121 272 43 50 26 12 13 }

Artisans, &c. 177 260 437 108 47 19 15 20 } 1 in 55 261

Undescribed 106 27 133 9 61 46 1 }

Paupers 49 10 59 3 60 49 2 }

Totals and 566 453 1,019 174

Averages 54 29 8 10

No. of Births 1,177 Age of Living 26·11 Births 1 in 47

St. Martin in the Fields. Population 25,195. Gentry 23 4 27 2 57 46 3 }

Tradesmen 60 47 107 22 45 24 17 15 }

Artisans, &c. 165 137 302 82 48 26 14 13 } 1 in 36 200

Undescribed 89 112 201 42 51 21 11 18 }

Paupers 68 4 72 4 65 60 }

Totals and 405 304 709 152

Averages 52 28 10 11

No. of Births 601 Age of Living 28·4 Births 1 in 4

Poplar. Population 31,091. Gentry 16 7 23 2 61 43 1 }

Tradesmen 44 40 84 18 51 26 11 13 }

Artisans, &c. 235 240 475 80 53 25 9 14 } 1 in 47 186

Undescribed 19 10 29 2 63 36 3 }

Paupers 45 3 48 2 64 53 }

Totals and 359 300 659 104

Averages 55 28 7 11

259 No. of Births 1,106 Age of Living 25·10 Births 1 in 28

Marylebone. Population 137,955. Gentry 156 40 196 20 59 46 3 }

Tradesmen 198 172 370 57 51 27 11 12 }

Artisans, &c. 682 759 1,441 251 48 23 14 16 } 1 in 45 857^[52]

Undescribed 347 324 671 104 54 27 8 12 }

Paupers 288 73 361 61 54 42 8 }

Totals and 1,671 668 3,039 493

Averages 52 28 10 11

No. of Births 3,511 Age of Living 27·9 Births 1 in 39

Stepney. Population 90,657. Gentry 64 9 73 3 65 56 }

Tradesmen 169 104 273 47 53 31 9 8 }

Artisans, &c. 568 591 1,159 247 48 23 14 16 } 1 in 41 620^[53]

Undescribed 203 274 477 101 56 22 6 17 }

Paupers 189 28 217 28 63 54 }

Totals and 1,193 1,006 2,199 426

Averages 53 28 9 11

No. of Births 2,502 Age of Living 26·6 Births 1 in 36

St. Mary, Newington. Population 54,607. Gentry 79 13 92 6 62 50 }

Tradesmen 75 64 139 23 50 26 12 13 }

Artisans, &c. 325 420 745 162 52 22 10 17 } 1 in 46 338

Undescribed 75 76 151 31 59 30 3 9 }

Paupers 64 6 70 1 60 55 2 }

Totals and 618 579 1,197 223

Averages 55 28 7 11

260 No. of Births 1,620 Age of Living 26·8 Births 1 in 34

St. Pancras. Population 129,711. Gentry 151 49 200 15 61 45 1 }

Tradesmen 349 286 635 108 50 27 12 12 }

Artisans, &c. 622 674 1,296 287 47 22 15 17 } 1 in 43 934^[54]

Undescribed 269 354 623 199 55 23 7 16 }

Paupers 232 49 281 47 61 50 1 }

Totals and 1,623 1,412 3,035 656

Averages 53 27 9 12

No. of Births 3,264 Age of Living 26·10 Births 1 in 46

West London. Population 33,629. Gentry 12 4 16 2 58 38 4 1 }

Tradesmen 83 103 186 41 49 22 13 17 }

Artisans, &c. 393 381 774 186 46 22 16 17 } 1 in 27 337^[55]

Undescribed 149 17 166 23 47 38 15 1 }

Paupers 99 16 115 26 64 55 }

Totals and 736 521 1,257 278

Averages 49 27 13 12

261 No. of Births 698 Age of Living 27·7 Births 1 in 48

Whitechapel. Population 71,758. Gentry 17 4 21 58 47 4 }

Tradesmen 142 130 272 42 50 26 12 13 }

Artisans, &c. 741 637 1,378 261 48 25 14 14 } 1 in 31 768^[56]

Undescribed 116 313 429 107 58 16 4 23 }

Paupers 166 37 203 38 63 51 }

Totals and 1,182 1,121 2,303 448

Averages 51 26 11 13

No. of Births 2,103 Age of Living 26·2 Births 1 in 34

St. James Westminster. Population 37,407. Gentry 27 9 36 1 57 42 5 }

Tradesmen 68 66 134 23 51 26 11 13 }

Artisans, &c. 161 190 351 59 46 21 16 18 } 1 in 50 251

Undescribed 52 83 135 28 52 20 10 19 }

Paupers 81 15 96 7 58 49 4 }

Totals and 389 363 752 118

Averages 51 26 11 13

No. of Births 844 Age of Living 28·2 Births 1 in 44

East London. Population 39,655. Gentry 14 3 17 63 50 }

Tradesmen 134 164 298 76 53 23 9 16 }

Artisans, &c. 265 391 656 145 51 21 11 18 } 1 in 36 372

Undescribed 36 10 46 1 50 38 12 1 }

Paupers 87 11 98 18 65 57 }

Totals and 536 579 1,115 240

Averages 54 26 8 13

No. of Births 1,235 Age of Living 27·0 Births 1 in 32

Holborn. Population 39,720. Gentry 36 9 45 3 58 47 4 }

Tradesmen 144 164 308 75 52 24 10 15 }

Artisans, &c. 231 353 584 149 50 19 12 20 } 1 in 36 367

Undescribed 21 6 27 2 54 41 8 }

Paupers 105 32 137 35 60 46 2 }

Totals and 537 564 1,101 254

Averages 53 26 9 13

262 No. of Births 969 Age of Living 27·2 Births 1 in 41

Shoreditch. Population 83,552. Gentry 63 23 86 14 65 47 }

Tradesmen 153 150 303 63 47 23 15 16 }

Artisans, &c. 498 802 1,300 271 51 19 11 20 } 1 in 38 732^[57]

Undescribed 150 75 225 34 57 37 5 2 }

Paupers 234 49 283 56 57 46 5 }

Totals and 1,098 1,099 2,197 438

Averages 54 26 8 13

No. of Births 3,058 Age of Living 26 Births 1 in 27

City London. Population 55,967. Gentry 32 12 44 3 63 43 }

Tradesmen 247 244 491 84 48 23 14 16 }

Artisans, &c. 213 270 483 94 50 22 12 17 } 1 in 50 403

Undescribed 77 29 106 15 58 39 4 }

Paupers }

Totals and 569 555 1,124 196

Averages 51 25 11 14

No. of Births 1,210 Age of Living 27·7 Births 1 in 46

St. John & St. Margaret, Westminster. Population 56,718. Gentry 37 14 51 9 55 42 7 }

Tradesmen 82 102 184 47 46 20 16 19 }

Artisans, &c. 458 581 1039 264 48 21 14 18 } 1 in 39 521^[58]