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sentences the results, as they are indicated by the state of the
public health, attained under the system initiated in 1856, by
the passing of the Metropolis Management Act, 1855,
supplemented as that Act has been by others entitled
"Sanitary," "Nuisances Removal," etc. The effects of these
Acts, as carried out by the several Local Authorities, are
apparent enough in the reduced death-rate by which London
compares favourably with the great cities of the civilized world.
The statistics at my command go back to 1841, and I find
that in the three quinquennial periods—1841-5, 1846-50, and
1851-55, the death-rate in London was 24.2, 25.4,and 24.8 per
1,000 persons living; or for the fifteen years prior to the
passing of the Metropolis Management Act, 24'8 per 1,000.
In the following fifteen years, 1856-70, the rate had fallen to
23.9, the rate in the three five-yearly periods being—in 1856-60,
22.7; in 1861-65, 24.4; and in 1866-70, 24'3. In the next
fifteen years, 1871-85, the average rate fell to 21.3 per 1,000;
the rate in the three quinquennial periods being—in 1871-75,
22.9; in 1876-80, 22.2; and in 1881-85, 20.7. In 1886 the
death-rate was 19.9; in 1887 it was 19.6, and in 1888 it
further fell to 18.5, the lowest rate recorded since the present
system of civil registration began. It is almost needless to
observe that this remarkable decline implies the saving of many
thousand lives, to say nothing of illnesses prevented.
It is not in my power to furnish a similar return showing
the results of the administration of the Acts in this parish;
there are no statistics for the period antecedent to 1856, and the
figures relating to 1856-60 are unreliable. But the statistics
for subsequent years may be relied on, and these years may be
grouped for comparison into quinquennial periods. The deathrate,
then, in the five years, 1861-65, was 20.3 per 1,000 persons
living, that in 1866-70 being 20'2 per 1,000. In 1871, upon
my appointment, a more vigorous sanitary administration was