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women, and grow-up children, live and sleep in one dirty confined
room, barely supplied with enough air to maintain a degenerate existence
; all decency and modesty being unobserved, and all the offices of
nature unblushingly and publicly performed.
In these rooms when a not unfrequent death takes place, the body
remains decomposing and unburied for perhaps a week, sometimes
longer, amidst remaining members of the family who take their daily
meals, and sleep around the dead body.
Application was made to me to procure the removal of the corpse of
a child which had been decomposing for several days in one small
room occupied by a widower, his sister, his grown-up son, and daughter
nineteen years of age. In another instance in the same place I have
been applied to by the neighbours to insist upon the removal of the
dead body of a child, which had been kept about a fortnight in the
heat of summer, in a confined room, in which the parents and five
children entirely lived: the body had become so offensive as to be a
nuisance to the neighbourhood.
I would, while referring to this subject, recommend you to select
some desirable spot appropriate for the reception of all bodies waiting
for interment. I know that from prejudice, and some other feelings
which ought to be respected, this receptacle might not for some time
be taken advantage of: but time and clerical persuasion would do
much to soften such prejudices.
I see no means of permanently abating the widely spread evil
of overcrowding, except by encouraging the attempts made by the
associations for bettering the people's homes, such as that promoted by
the Venerable Archdeacon Sinclair, in Kensington, and called for also
in Brompton by the Rev. Dr. Irons. From all the facts that have
been collected respecting associations formed for the improvement
of the dwellings of the poor, I am led to believe that a good return
would be yielded for capital so invested.
We may for a time lessen this evil, in certain cases, by taking
proceedings to enforce the registration of all common lodginghouses.
In the outskirts of our parish the evils attendant upon overcrowding
are, I am compelled to believe, greatly upon the increase. We
know that it is the tendency of the labouring classes to inhabit
localities near the seats of labour. From the numerous improvements
which have been taking place about the centre of this vast
metropolis, involving the destruction of the courts and alleys in
London, the poor are forced into the suburbs, into localities already
overcrowded: hence an influx of persons who in winter, when