Classes of the Community. 159 ment is not shown to be injurious in any increase of the proportion who die in the second stage. In a return obtained from a district differently situated (Bethnal Green, where the manufactory is chiefly domestic) it appears that of 1,268 deaths amongst the labouring classes in the year 1839, no less than 782, or 1 in 14, died at their own residences under 5 years of age. One in 15 of the deaths occurred between 5 and 10, the age when employment commences. The proportion of deaths which occurred between 10 and 15, the period at which full employment usually takes place, is 1 in 60 only. In that district the average age of deaths in the year 1839 was as follows, in the several classes, from a population of 62,018 :BETHNAL GREEN. No. of Deaths. 101 Gentlemen and persons engaged in professions, and their families 273 Tradesmen and their families : Average Age of Deceased. 45 years. 26 1,258 Mechanics, servants, and labourers, and their families 16 The mean chances of life amongst the several classes in Leeds appear from the returns to the Registrar-general generally to correspond with the anticipations raised by the descriptions given of the condition of the labouring population. 824 Tradesmen, farmers, and their families 3,395 Operatives, labourers, and their families. 44 27 19 But in Liverpool (which is a commercial and not a manufacturing town) where, however, the condition of the dwellings are reported to be the worst, where, according to the report of Dr. Duncan, 40,000 of the population live in cellars, where 1 in 25 of the population are annually attacked with fever, there the mean chances of life appear from the returns to the Registrargeneral to be still lower than in Manchester, Leeds, or amongst the silk weavers in Bethnal Green. During the year 1840, the deaths, distinguishable in classes, were as follows: No. of Deaths. LIVERPOOL, 1840. 137 Gentry and professional persons, &c. 1,738 Tradesmen and their families 5,597 Labourers, mechanics, and servants, &c. Average Age of Deceased. 35 years. 22 15 39 Of the deaths which occurred amongst the labouring classes, it appears that no less than 62 per cent. of the total number were deaths under five years of age. Even amongst those entered as shopkeepers and tradesmen, no less than 50 per cent. died before they attained that period. The proportion of mortality for Birmingham, where there are many insalubrious manufactories, but where the drainage of the town and the general condition of the inhabit ants is comparatively good, was, in 1838, 1 in 40; whilst in Liverpool it was 1 in 31. I have appended the copy of a map of Bethnal Green, made with the view of showing the proportions in which the mortality from epidemic diseases and diseases affected by localities, fell on different classes of tenements during the same year. The localities in which the marks of death (x) are most crowded are the poorest and the worst of the district; where the marks are few and widely spread, the houses and streets, and the whole condition of the population, is better. By the inspection of a map of Leeds, which Mr. Baker has prepared at my request, to show the localities of epidemic diseases, it will be perceived that they similarly fall on the uncleansed and close streets and wards occupied by the labouirng classes; and that the track of the cholera is nearly identical with the tract of fever. It will also be observed that in the badly cleansed and badly drained wards to the right of the map, the proportional mortality is nearly double that which prevails in the better conditioned districts to the left. To obtain the means of judging of the references to the localities in the sanitary returns from Aberdeen, the reporters were requested to mark on a map the places where the disease fell, and to distinguish with a deeper tint those places on which it fell with the greatest intensity. They were also requested to distinguish by different colours the streets inhabited by the higher, middle, and lower classes of society. They returned a map so marked as to disease, but stated that it had been thought unnecessary to distinguish the streets inhabited by the different orders of society, as that was done with sufficient accuracy by the different tints representing the degrees of intensity of the prevalence of fever. In the Whitechapel union, in which the special investigation which led to the inquiry into the sanitary condition of the metropolis was first directed, the numbers were as follows in the year 1838:: 45 years. 27 1,762 Mechanics, servants, and labourers, and their families 22 To judge of the comparative mortality amongst the average of a town population, I obtained the following returns; the one from the clerk of the Strand union, the other from the clerk of the Kensington union : No. of Deaths. - 674 Mechanics, labourers, servants, and their families. 43 33 24 |