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87
POPULATION, INHABITED HOUSES, &c.
The population of Kensington, estimated to the middle of the
year, was 165,450: males 66,366, and females 99,084; excess
of females, 32,718. The population of the Town sub.district
was, approximately, 122,423, and of the Brompton sub.district
43,027. The natural increase during the year, represented by
the excess of births over deaths registered, was 1,636: an
estimated further increase of 274 represents the balance of
immigration over emigration; total increase, 1,910. It is
always more or less difficult to estimate with accuracy the
number of persons living in a large and populous place like
Kensington, still in the process of growth, and having a somewhat
shifting population. The best available test is the number
of inhabited houses: if these show an increase, an increase in
the number of people may be inferred, and vice versa. In July,
1882, there were some 20,908 occupied and rated premises, an
increase of 242, as compared with July, 1881. The number of
persons to a house at the census in April, 1881—taking the
return of houses from the rate.book—was 7.89, a number which
multiplied by 242 gives 1,909 as the theoretical increase of
population during the 12 months. In places having a stationary
population, e.g., parishes which have no available building land,
and which are not undergoing obvious depopulation, as by the
pulling down of the houses of the poor to make room for
mansions, warehouses, &c., the birth.rate may serve as a guide
in estimating a population. But this test is of little practical
use in a place like Kensington. We shall see, moreover, that
with a constantly.increasing population, not merely our birthrate,
but also the absolute number of births, has declined
considerably of late years, fewer children being born now than
in bygone years, when the population was less by tens of
thousands. The most remarkable feature in connexion with the
population of Kensington is the inordinate excess of females.
It was thought something astonishing when the census of 1871
revealed an excess of 22,000 females, but that excess has now
grown to upwards of 32,000. We shall be better able, when the