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27 [1900
The ninth decade, 1881-90, began with an increased population of 69,116, and
with an addition of 6,967 inhabited houses, or at the rate of 9.92 persons for each
additional house. There were also available 1,944 uninhabited houses, mostly
highly rented premises; and there were also 563 in course of erection. The actual
proportion of inhabited houses was 1 to every 8.3 persons, which was an increase
of 0.4 persons on the preceding census return.
During these ten years the death-rate was 18.60 per 1,000, which must be considered
good, especially in the face of the more crowded conditions which prevailed.
In the tenth decade, 1891-1900, there was a still further decrease in the deathrate,
for it fell from 18.60 per 1,000 to 17.50 per 1,000 inhabitants, and that, too,
despite the continued and increased crowding of the people. The population
increased at the census of 1891 by 36,278, and the inhabited houses by 3,829, or in
the proportion of 1 house to every 9.9 of the new inhabitants, while the number of
inhabitants to each inhabited house in Islington rose from 8.30 to 8.43.
What the increase is to-day is not yet known, although doubtless before these
pages are in print the numbers will be available from the new census returns; but,
whatever else they may tell us, they ought to reveal a still further crowding of the
people, because at the present time there are only 658 empty houses in the
whole of the Borough, whereas in 1891 there were 1,656, together with 237 in
course of erection.

The three first years of the last decade showed a mean rate of 19.23 per 1,000,
but from that period to the end of 1900 it was only 16.72 per 1,000, and in its last
year only 16.23, which must be considered a really remarkable death-rate in a
large community with a mixed community like that of Islington.
As the significance of death-rates are not generally very well understood, and
as the statement that it fell from say 20.0 per 1,000 to 18.0, seems such a small
thing in itself it may be of advantage to take the last fifteen years and to translate
in figures what the deaths would have been in each year if the population had
been in each of these years the same as it was in 1900. These results are given in
the following statement:—