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4
The gross mortality of St. Giles' is compared with that of the districts
adjacent to it, in the table on the preceeding page. Inasmuch as some districts
contain hospitals in which persors coming from other districts may die,
correction has been made of the registered mortality. Upon comparison of
the metropolis with St. Giles', the excessive mortality of our own district (4
in the thousand) is at once apparent. And St. Giles' is as usual the highest
in its death-rate of all the districts among which it is situated. Holborn still
continued (as is the two preceding years) to present a mortality almost as
high as St. Giles'. The death-rate in the Strand, though it has risen steadily
for the last three years, is still much less than that of St. Giles'. St. Martin
and St. Marylebone show exceptionally high mortality, but remain much
below St. Giles'. In the comparison there is however this satisfaction that
St. Giles' has not fallen below its habitually poor standard of health, in a year
when almost all its neighbours have seriously retrograded from the better
position that they generally occupy. The annexed table shows the variation
in the death-rate of each district from year to year since these reports were
commenced.

* Correction is here made for the longer duration of the registration years 1857 & 1803.
Also for all deaths in hospitals and outlying workhouses.
SECTION III.—On the Causes of Death in St. Giles's District.
In the present report, as in former ones, comparison has been carefully
made between the prevalence of each class of diseases in London, and of the
same in St. Giles's. Thus have been ascertained what are the causes of
death that are especially met with in St. Giles's, and hence, of course, may
be expected suggestions for improving the health of the district.
The population of St. Giles', being numerically pretty stationary, bears
every year a smaller proportion to the aggregate population of London. In 1863
the metropolis is calculated to have 53.7 times as many residents as our own
district. Learning from the returns of the Registrar General the gross
mortality of the town, the above number furnishes the means of calculating
the quota of deaths from each cause that should be furnished by our
population. This has been done by detail on the opposite page, and it will
there be seen that some important groups of diseases were considerably more
fatal in St. Giles's than in the average of London.
Zymotic Diseases, it has been said, were unusually fatal in London. At
that high rate of prevalence the miasmatic group of these diseases would be
computed to give 366 deaths as the quota of St. Giles'. The actual deaths
* The corrected mortality comprises then for St. Giles's as for other districts, 1—those
who die in the houses of the district, 2—those who die in the Workhouse belonging
to the district,..and 3, those who die in hospitals having been removed from the houses
of the district, on account of their fatal illness. In no instance can the attempt be made
to separate persons who die in a district into a class of permanent residents and a class
of chance comers. People of the latter class, being those who resort especially to the
Workhouse and to common lodging houses, are probably more numerous in St. Giles's
than in most of the districts with which it is compared.