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Underground Kitchens.—No steps have been taken either
by the District Surveyor or the Vestry to prevent the occupation of
underground kitchens or cellars as dwelling rooms; this is a serious
evil, especially where children are brought up in them. I cannot
think that there would be any hardship in insisting that no children
should be allowed to sleep underground.
In a large number of houses in the District, brick drains run
beneath the basements , these are in most instances old and decayed,
often being rendered pervious by rat-holes. The sewage thus escapes
into the soil, and the noxious effluvium is drawn into the room by the
heat of the fire, being especially evident in the morning, after the
rooms have been shut up during the night. This evil can only be
remedied by laying down impervious pipe-drains; but even when
this has been down, the noxious emanations are often still evolved;
and this, from the old soil saturated with the sewage not having been
removed. This is, likewise, a very important point to be attended to,
for these emanations are eminently prejudicial to health.
House Cleansing.—I wish I could induce the Vestry to insist
more upon having the poorer dwellings cleansed—lime-whited. In
the reports of the other Medical Officers of the Metropolis, I read that
hundreds of these dwellings are cleansed and purified in this way
every year, and scarcely a day passes, but what I see in this District,
numerous houses which are extremely dark and dirty from the walls
and ceilings not having been cleansed for many years. To bring up
families amidst this filth and dirt, is to train them to discard the first
element of health—cleanliness. Moreover, there is no doubt that
infectious matters may be retained and imparted to new occupants by
the foul walls of apartments; and as the poor very frequently change
their habitations, their is great reason to believe that diseases are often
propagated in this way.
Vaults of Churches.—Early in the year, an Order in Council
was issued to the effect that the coffins in the vaults of St. James's,
St. John's, and St. Mark's Churches, and Pentonville Chapel should
be distributed over the floors of the vaults, and be covered with
charcoal and fresh earth.
There has been considerable delay in attending to this order,
which has only been carried out as far as concerns St. James's Church,
and Pentonville Chapel.
It is to be hoped, that the necessary improvements will soon
be made in the vaults of the remaining Churches, especially St.
John's, where the coffins are very numerous, crowded, and in a state
of decay, and where the Church is small; for it is painful to think
that the inhabitants in their attendance at a place of worship, should
be subjected to the danger of imbibing the seeds of disease, by respiring
the noxious effluvia from vaults, which are readily drawn into a
heated Church by the rarified state of the air within.
Sanitary Improvements.—The following sanitary improvements
have been effected during the year