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19
Tables 2 and 3 arc interesting as exhibiting the
much greater mortality in the Long Acre over the
Charing Cross district, the gross population of each
not being very different. In the Long Acre district
we have Bedfordbury and its densely populated courts:
the total number of deaths in the Long Acre division,
exceed those of the Charing Cross division by 50: of
children under live years of age there is an excess of 35:
while of deaths from epidemic diseases the number is
more than double that of Charing Cross district, being
51 to 21. It is impossible to have a more marked
example of the differing death-rates in the differing
classes of society.
The outbreak of cholera in the east of London must
bring to the minds of all thoughtful persons the present
degraded aud abject condition of multitudes of the
poorer classes of our population, both in large commercial
towns and in those of agricultural districts, and
too often in the remotest villages the poverty of our
population is almost equally distressing. Those who
witnessed the crowds assembled to greet Garibaldi on
his entrance into London were struck with the ragged,
dirty, and poverty-stricken appearance of the vast
crowds assembled on the occasion. That the wealthy
City of Loudon could have exhibited such a mass of
poverty and wretchedness must have struck foreigners
with surprise.
Fifty years ago the same remarks have been made
in our populous towns : at that time the long continued
war was iooked to as the cause, together with the want
of education of the masses of our people, and the introduction
of general education was hailed as a means
of improving the condition of our people both socially
and morally. Unhappily we who have seen the extension
of education to all classes, do not witness that
improvement in their social condition we had hoped
for. In London the increase of rent absorbs so much
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