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the census years, for example, of 1841, 1851, and
1861, when the exact number of the population of
England was known, the death-rates of the kingdom
were 21.59, 21.99, and 21.63 per 1,000 of the population;
and even upon the broader basis of a ten
years experience, as during the last three decades,
the average annual death rate has been 22.37, 22.24,
and 22.24 respectively—the mean death-rate for the
whole time having been 22.4 per 1,000 of the people.
At first sight this does not appear to be very encouraging
to our sanitary labours, seeing how much has
been done during the last thirty years for the purpose
of improving the sanitary condition of the country;
but careful observation has shown that wherever the
dwellings of the poor have been improved, and overcrowding
prevented—wherever the soil has been
drained, and kept free from excremental pollution—
and wherever unwholesome branches of industry
have been ameliorated—there has been a marked
diminution in the force of certain classes of diseases.
The researches of Dr. Buchanan, for example, have
exposed the fact—that by draining the subsoil of a
town, and so diminishing the dampness of its atmosphere,
the mortality from phthisis is invariably reduced
; and the experience of every Officer of
Health is to the effect that by freeing the soil from
organic pollution, the force of endemic bowel complaints,
and of typhoid fever and cholera is greatly