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This warning is, no doubt, a proper one; it flows naturally from the fact that it is based
upon; but, so far as I am concerned, I can safely affirm that, in my own efforts for
upholding the healthiness of Islington, I have no reason to complain of want of co-operation,
on the part either of the Vestry or of the Sanitary Committee. It is to be kept
in mind, however, that our population has increased from about 127,000 in 1857, to
173,000; that since the establishment of the Vestry, the passing of new statutes has laid
new and onerous duties upon the sanitary staff, occupying yearly a larger share of
their attention; and that, if five or six years ago the supervision of the sanitary
condition of the dwellings of the poor could not be completed within any one twelve
months, the extent to which this supervision can be satisfactorily carried out now
necessarily becomes yearly less. Experience has taught us within how very brief
a time an improved neighbourhood, inhabited by a negligent population, falls back
into a condition calculated to invite rather than repel disease. I may instance, also,
one branch of sanitary work in which we have never yet attempted to engage—I mean
the improvement of the places where people, especially young people, are engaged in
numbers, in various sedentary industrial occupations—the work-rooms of dressmakers,
mantle makers, milliners, artificial flower makers, tailors and such like.
I mention this now, because instances of dangerous overcrowding and want of ventilation
of such work rooms have been communicated to me, and my attention called to
the subject by a circular from " The Children's Employment Commission." Recurring,
however, to the warning of the Registrar General, it is to be remarked that no
vigilance on the part of Sanitary authorities will prevent the outbreak of epidemic
•visitations such as small-pox and scarlet fever, although sanitary measures will do
much to break their forc9; still less will it modify the unfavourable influence which
extremes or sudden variations of temperature, or other meteorological conditions exert
upon the very young and upon those far advanced in age. To provide a remedy against
these influences is the province of private hygiene, assisted where needful by public
liberality. Both these classes of causes have been operative in augmenting the mortality
of the year that has recently closed.