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24
MORTALITY OF THE CITY OF LONDON.
of houses habitually exempt from fever. See, for
instance, how malignantly it prevailed along the line
of Farringdon and New Bridge streets, and in Fleet
street and Ludgate hill, where their line intersects
that just mentioned; and here, you will observe,
not only in those obscure and ill-ventilated courts
and by-ways, where fever is the familiar visitant
of a hungry and crowded population ; but also, and
very strikingly, in spacious and airy houses, situate
along the main thoroughfare of the City, and inhabited
by opulent tradesmen, by members of the
various professions, or by officers of assurance-companies.
Other infective diseases which habitually
desolate the former class of dwellings are almost
unknown in the latter. Cholera came as a startling
exception. Within the infected district (fulfilling the
classical description of death) it trod with equal
foot the gates of rich and poor.
Personal peculiarities, or vicious habits, or temporary
indiscretion, may often have determined its
choice of a victim; low nourishment—even temporary
emptiness and exhaustion, very manifestly invited
its attack; but, speaking generally, I may say
that it was a disease prevailing over a certain patch
of ground, and (within this limit) tending to strike
equally, or nearly equally, in all classes of habitations.
Crowdedness of dwellings, defective ventilation,
squalor of inhabitants, and many forms of
local nuisance, which are omnipotent in giving occasion
to fever, and in adding malignity to many