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6
New Maiden approaches nearest to Kingston
in the charcter of its population; but here we find a
slightly higher social stratum, living in what I will
term one-servant villas
Surbiton is very differently constituted. The
houses are many of them very large, and occupied
by wealthy men, whose sons having gone out into
the world leave a preponderance of daughters
round the domestic hearth, with a whole army of
female servants to wait upon them.
These servants are chiefly the daughters of the
Kingston artizans, and often return to their homes
when sick and likely to die.
Ham has a few large houses, some girls'
schools, and a semi-agricultural population residing
in small cottages.
Kingston Hill and Coombe is for none but the
nobility and gentry, with the exception of the
strikingly contrasting cottages of the hamlet of
Hatch.
By grouping these districts together, and
dividing the males from the females, it is found that
even after taking in the excessively feminine
Surbiton, Kingston approaches more to the commercial
than to the suburban or pleasure town.
Croydon Males 45 Females 57
Kingston (enlarged) ,, 20 ,, 24
Or proportionally as ,, 45 „ 54
The proportion of males to females will
naturally affect the proportion of children to adults,
and the presence of large numbers of children affect
to the greatest extent the incidence of such diseases
as Measles, Scarlet Fever, Diphtheria, &c., being
most prevalent amongst the young, and chiefly
becoming epidemic through the agency of schools.
In referring to death-rates and the incidence of
zymotic disease, I will, except where stated, take