View report page

8
and damp, and the noxious effluvia that come from defective
scavenging, are excluded from the modern house. On the other
hand, small rooms, wretchedly lighted and abominably ventilated
under occupied conditions, are a widespread monument of legislative
incapacity to secure the rudiments of sanitary conditions in
houses.
But broadly speaking, notwithstanding these and other
manifest defects in housing, the part they play in the production
of disease and death is insignificant when compared with that
produced by the colossal ignorance and incapacity of a large section
of the people. Devoid of the rudiments of hygienic knowledge,
deprived by the social conditions of the time of even a traditional
domestic economy such as secured to their ancestors a bucolic
content and health, the new urban population makes, by its ineptitude
and inexperience, new dangers and detriments to health, and
creates fresh menaces to the physical and social well-being of the
community. The gravity of the problems arising in this connection
is increasingly receiving attention, and if the venue of sanitary
administration is not shifting, its basis is being broadened so as to
include those educative measures which are the hope of the sanitary
reformer.
TOPOGRAPHICAL FEATURES.
Situation.—The chief fact bearing upon health in relation to
the situation of Willesden is its proximity to London. Willesden
consists of a triangular area of 4,384 acres, one of the basal angles
of which is wedged deep into the metropolis. The influences
affecting the health of the district of Willesden are the influences
operative in London. There is no greater menace to the health
of Willesden than is to be found in the contiguity of its great
neighbour; and, in its turn, Willesden may threaten, in this
respect, the huge metropolis in whose shadow it lies.