Note 59 — SECOND ANNUAL REPORT. (continued 2)

I purposely refrain from any attempt to illustrate all the horrors which are incidental to this method of life; but, as a single exemplification of the text (chosen, not because of its rarity, but because it happens to occur at the moment) I insert an extract from a note, with which I was favoured a fortnight ago, by Mr. Hutchinson, Surgeon to the North District of the West London Union: ‘I was sent for to attend a poor Irish woman in labour, at half-past six o’clock yesterday morning, at 17, Fox and Knot court. There were three families, each consisting of a man and wife and two or more children, in a small room, 15 feet by 8, all lying upon dirty rags on the floor. I found one of the children suffering under small-pox. The adjoining room was occupied by six grown-up persons and two children.’ In the circumstances to which my Report refers, scenes of this description must of necessity be habitual: and it is to their habit, not to their exceptional occurrence, that my remarks apply.