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42
crowding lias always to be deplored as an evil difficult of
removal. It is however through this condensation, if I may
so speak, of the poor in particular neighbourhoods, that
some of the highest triumphs of industry have been achieved ;
and since it is clearly one of the concomitants of modern
civilization, it is all the more obligatory upon those who
profit by the toil of the industrial classes, to assist in removing
from their midst every known or suspected cause
of disease, by a cheerful acceptance of the cost of the application
of sound sanitary measures.
One of the chief of these measures remaining to be
applied (I mean of course through private speculation), is
the more extended house accommodation for the working
classes of this parish.
The efforts that have been made in this direction in
various parts of the metropolis and suburbs, have generally
proved great commercial successes, and it is said that
pecuniary loss has resulted in scarcely one instance. Could,
then, the wealthy and the speculative be induced to combine
in order to effect this praiseworthy object, no inhabitant
of this improving district need doubt the result, viz.,
that both the moral and social conditions of the artizan and
the labourer would be immensely and permanently elevated.
R. HARLAN D WHITEMAN,
Medical Officer oj Health for Putney and Roehampton.