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POPULATION.
The population of the Borough on Sunday, March 31st, 1901, was found to comprise 143,976
persons. By adjusting the Census schedules of 1891, the population of the Borough (as at present
constituted) in that year has been fixed at 135,955 persons, showing a growth amounting to 8,021
persons, or 5.9 per cent. of the population in 1891. In the Metropolis the rate of growth during
the decennium 1891-1901 has been at the rate of 7.2 per cent.
For the purposes of comparison the vital statistics of the City of Westminster, of the Boroughs
of Kensington, Marylebone, and Hampstead, and of the Urban District of Willesden will
be used. These districts are immediately adjacent to this Borough, and the prevalence of disease
therein and in Paddington cannot fail to bo more or less interdependent. The changes in the
populations of the districts mentioned during the past ten years have been as set out below:—

Crude rates, in other words, rates calculated on the populations at all ages, without allowing
for varying proportions of the two sexes and for the differences in the ages of the living, are of very
little value for purposes of comparison. To set out the complete comparison of sex and age
constitutions of the populations of the districts selected would be beyond the scope of this report.
It will serve for present purposes to tabulate the proportions of females to males, and of those under
ten years of age in each sex. The infantile rates will be calculated in each case on the number of
births registered in each district.

From the foregoing figures it appears that while the ratio of females to males was as 111 is to
100 in the whole Metropolis, the ratio for Paddington was 133 to 100, being, however, exceeded by
those for Kensington and Iiampstead (155 and 158 respectively). A more extended examination of
the figures for the Borough indicates that the excess of females prevails at all ages above one year,
but if? trifling up to the age of 15, when it rises from an excess of 7 per cent. for the age-group
10-15 years to 40 per cent. for the group 15-25 years. In the two remaining groups it is higher
still, viz., 43 per cent. for the group 25-65 years and 87 per cent. for the group "over 65." Two
factors are probably effective at the ages about 15 years, viz., an excess of female servants at ages
ranging from 15 to 25 years and the survival of females at the higher ages. There is also probably
some migration of young adult males to places where work is to be more readily obtained while
others are absorbed into the Navy and Army.
In speaking of the ages of those enumerated it must suffice for the present to direct attention
to the proportions at ages under 10 years. Of every 1,000 males enumerated 194 were under 10,
and of every 1,000 females 147. In the Metropolis the corresponding figures were 218 and 196