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7
contains the largest proportion of poor inhabitants. The greater
number of poor comprised in this sub.district, as a whole, helps
to explain the marked difference in the vital statistics of north and
south, to which, I wish, in the present report, to give some prominence.
The birth.rate of the parish in 1874 was 31.7 per 1,000
persons living, that of all London being 35.7, and of Ml England
(1872) 35.8. But the birth.rate in the Town district was 33'6,
and in Brompton only 24.8 per 1,000. The death.rate of the
whole parish being taken at 19.5 per 1,000 (and the necessary redistribution
of deaths in hospital and workhouse, in proportion to
population, being made), it appears that the annual rate of mortality
in the Town sub.district was 20.4 per 1,000 and in Brompton
only 16.6. The above facts may be made more clear by a comparative
statement. If the births and deaths in Brompton had been as numerous
in proportion to population as they were in the Town sub.
district, 1,122 children would have been born and 681 persons
would have died; whereas, in fact, only 815. children were b'orn,
and the deaths, after correction, were only 548. Or, to put it the
other way, if the births and deaths in the Town sub.district had
been on the Brompton scale only 2,567 instead of 3,536 children
wonld have been born, and only 1,726 persons, in place of 2,147,
would have died. These remarkable discrepancies, quoad the birthrate,
may be in part explained by the somewhat larger proportion
of females per 1,000 of the population in the Town sub.district
compared with Brompton. The total estimated population in
July was 138,000, viz., males 56,240, and females 81,760. In
every 1,000 living, females were approximatively as 593 to males
407. In the Town sub.district there were, at the census in 1871,
587 females to 413 males ; in Brompton the females were 608 and
the males. 392 per 1,000 persons living. We must assume, therefore,
that there are fewer marriages in Brompton, and that those
marriages are less fruitful than in the more densely.populated and
poorer northern section of the parish.*
Less difficulty is experienced in accounting for the lower rate of
mortality in Brompton, it being well known that the death.rate of
females is considerably less than that of the male sex. Taking
the whole parish, it appears that the rate of mortality was 23.9 in
the male, and only 16.5 per 1,000 in the female sex. The magnitude
of this difference may be illustrated by the statement that
if the mortality in the entire population had been at the female
rate, tho deaths would have numbered' only 2,208 instead of
2,696, while they would have been no fewer than 3,298 at the rate
that prevailed amongst males.
The difference between the two districts is not confined merely
to gross numbers of deaths. It is seen in the character of the
prevalent fatal diseases, and points to a generally better state of
health in Brompton, and to a better prospect of life for its inhabitants.
This difference depends, no doubt, on the superior status
* The births that took place in the Workhouse are all included in the Town registration,
but the number (120) is too small to affect the calculation.