View report page

19 UPON THE SANITARY STATE OF CLERKEN WELL.
starch with cocoa and chocolate; of flour and turmeric with mustard; of
sugar and water with gin; nor of sugar and water with tobacco, &c.
On the whole, I cannot but consider the substitution of various adulterations
as a move in the right direction; and I must enter my protest against
the vulgar notion, that nothing is nutritious or wholesome but what has long
been in use, and is procured from abroad. In the course of a short time, as
already is the case with chicory, the adulterations will be sold separately
and at a very cheap rate; and so the poorer classes will be enabled to obtain
a more copious supply of food, and substitutions for the foreign articles of
luxury, which are cheaper and equally desirable.
In the course of my investigations upon the adulterations of articles of
food supplied to the district, I made application for samples of those supplied
to the workhouse, it being well known that these are very inferior as supplied
to pauper establishments in general. I regret to say, that the Guardians
refused to accede to my request. This appeared to me ill-judged, for,
although adulterations may be harmless, and even as nutritive as the genuine
substances, their detection might ensure their supply at the cheaper and
proper price.
MEAT.
The question of good or bad meat is, however, of very great importance.
There can be no doubt that decomposing and diseased meat may exert very
serious injury upon the body. When we recollect the effects of even the most
minute quantity of the vaccine or small-pox virus, and of the subtle poison
of scarlet or typhus fever, or of a wound in dissection, in interfering with the
normal processes of health, we can readily comprehend how diseased or
decaying meat may produce the same.
The Inspectors, as well as myself, have held communication with the City
Inspectors of diseased meat, so as to be enabled to detect it. No cases of
the exposure of bad meat have yet, however, been detected; but there is
reason to believe that Clerkenwell comes in for its full share of this dangerous
commodity. We must therefore be vigilant.
MORTALITY.
The mortality of the district may be well shown by the following tables,
in which the mortality in the various weeks and quarters of 1856 are compared
with the average mortality of the same periods for the last ten years.
According to this table, there died, in Clerkenwell, in 1856, 1313 inhabitants.
But this is not all: a certain number of persons from the district
die every year in the general and special hospitals and lunatic asylums of the
metropolis. These can only be estimated by apportioning to Clerkenwell its
share of the total number of deaths in these establishments, calculated in
relation to its population. In this way, 101 deaths must be added, making
a total of 1414.
If the deaths had occurred in the proportion of the average of the last ten
years, raised according to the increase of population, they would have
amounted to 1548, so that 134 fewer than the average have occurred. I
need not state how satisfactory is this; and we have a fair right to attribute
it to the generally improved sanitary condition of the district.*
* The diminution of mortality is really even greater than this, because the deaths
occurring in the hospitals, &c., are not included in the average estimate, whilst they
are so in the mortality of 1856.
c 2