attention--namely, that these facts prove the possibility of bringing
down the death-rate of the class of population which inhabits this sort
of accommodation to rates varying from 15 to 16 per 1,000. I say of the
class of population, because habits and mode of life have an important
influence on health and on longevity.

Mr. Chadwick and Dr. Richardson obtained some statistics for
Westminster, for the use of a committee of the Society of Arts, which
indicate the very different conditions of health to which the different
classes of population are subject. It appeared from these statistics
that out of one hundred deaths of the first class, or gentry, six were
those of children in their first year, and nine of children within
their fifth year; while out of one hundred deaths of the wage classes
twenty-two are those of children in their first year, and thirty-nine
within their fifth year. If we take the average duration of life of all
who have died of the first class, men, women, and children, we find that
they have had an average of fifty-five years and eight months of life;
while of the wage classes they have had a mean of only twenty-eight
years and nine months. And if we take the average duration of life of
those who have escaped the earlier ravages of death up to twenty years
of age, the males who have died of the first class have had sixty-one
years of life, while of the wage class the males have had only
forty-seven years and seven months. Moreover, of the first class in
Westminster, the proportion who have attained the old age, and died
of natural causes, is 3.27 per cent., but of the wage classes only a
fraction, or two-thirds per cent., did so. I have obtained similar
returns for this town. It was considered desirable, for the purpose of
this return, to divide the population into the following five classes:
First, gentry and professional men; second, tradesmen and shopkeepers;
third, shipwrights, chain and anchor smiths, iron forge laborers, etc.,