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was 22,267, or 183 only more than the census number in 1891
(22,084). A return by the rate-collectors, made in May, 1896,
shows a total of 22,630 inhabited houses; but in this number
there are included 1,131 properties which, being let as Artizans'
Dwellings and Flats, would not be counted by the RegistrarGeneral
as separate houses. These 1,131 separately rated
properties appear to represent 246 houses only, in the official
sense of the word "house."* The total number of inhabited
houses, therefore, in the census meaning of the term, would be
21,499, plus an unknown number of empty houses occupied
only by caretakers, the census number in 1891 having been, as
already stated, 22,084. I do not pretend to have solved the
intricacies of this question, and, for the present, the conclusion
I have arrived at, is, that, under existing circumstances, the
simplest course will be to assume the same number of persons
to a house as in 1891 (7.53), which would give 22,576 as the
number of inhabited houses at the date of the quinquennial
enumeration in March, 1896.
The Census of 1891.—The following Table shows the
relative number of persons of each sex at the census of 1891,
grouped according to age, (a) in the entire parish, (b) in the
Kensington Town sub-district, and (c) in the Brompton subdistrict,
there being no later information available:—
"The Registrar-General does not take note of Flats, whether in "Artizans'
Dwellings" or "Mansions." For the purposes of the census the front door
stands for a house whatever the number of separate occupations there may be.
Thus, Campden Houses, in Peel-street, which comprise about 133 separate
tenements (supposing none of them to be sub-divided, in which case there
would be more than 133), count for only seven houses in the census return for
1891. We, on the other hand, treat as a separate inhabited house, for rating
purposes, each Flat, whether in a Mansion or in Artizans' Dwellings. And a
house on which no rates are paid, is treated as "empty," even though a
caretaker and family may be living therein.