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this District, is the large number of persons inhabiting each house.
It is not uncommon to find a house, containing four or five small
rooms, occupied by 18 or 20 persons, and in some instances even
by a greater number—each room on each floor being occupied by a
separate family, as a day and sleeping room. If some plan could
be adopted for regulating the number of persons who should occupy
rooms of a given size, much disease might be prevented. In some
instances the under-ground cellars have been found to be used as
sleeping rooms. Such practices are generally recognised as the
sources not only of disease of the body, but also rendering the
minds of the occupiers a prey to vice and immorality.
The removal of these abuses cannot be too strictly attended to
in all cases brought to your notice.
Cleanliness.—In the most densely occupied parts of this
District there is a great deficiency in the general cleanliness of the
floors, walls, and stairs of the houses. Such want of attention
must become a source of disease, and the landlords or occupiers
should be required to cleanse and whitewash such dwellings.
Improper Ventilation.—The next point to which I would
allude as a source of disease is deficient ventilation. In many
houses the windows do not open at all, and where sashes do exist
they seldom come down from the top, which is the only way in
which a room can be properly ventilated. Good ventilation is of
the greatest importance to the health. The deadly effects of an
impure atmosphere gradually steal on the system. Scrofula,
Phthisis, and many other diseases can often be traced to the
depressing influence of an impure atmosphere. In the construction
of new houses and during the repair of the old, I would call the
attention of landlords to the system of more perfect ventilation.
DUST AND ASHES.
The accumulation of the house refuse is more often the cause
of disease than is generally imagined. From the decomposition of
such matter many dangerous poisons are produced. Too much
attention cannot therefore be given to the removal of this refuse
previous to such changes taking place.
During the inspections made by myself and your other officers,
frequent nuisances of Ihis kind are brought to our notice. Great