The Express.
London, England, 1863-01-10 00:00:00

THE DISTRESS IN LANCASHIRE.

(FROM OUR EIPICIALL

NANCHEETER, JAZ. 9.

The weekly returns of the Manchester and Salford
Sanitary Association contain a table of all new cases
of disease coming under treatment in the poor-law
districts, charitable and public institutions of the
city and its neighbourhood. With the exception of
a part of Salford, the medical officers of which
decline, for some reason unknown to me, to give
the requisite information, this table is An accurate
statement of the sanitary condition of the people.
And on contrasting the last two months of 1862
with the last two months of 1861, the comparative
healthiness of the former again comes to view. For
it must not be forgotten that the area of observation
and record is this year indefinitely extended, as
thousands who have hitherto paid for medical
aid themselves are now dependent upon the
parish offioers or upon the various hospitals
and dispensaries. In November, 1862, there
are reported 307 new cases of fever ; in November,
1861, 312. In December, 1862, this number is
reduced to 193,; the corresponding number to which
in December, 1861, is 190. In the first week of
December the officers of the Sanitary Association—
perhaps prescient of the coming report—requested
their correspondents to separate from the general
category of " continued fever" all cases which
might be justly classified as " typhus." The num-
ber of cases of typhus, to which public attention
has been thus directed, during a period of three
weeks, amounts to six—an !epidemic (if epidemic
it be) of Lilliputian dimensions. When we recol-
lect the vast population of Manchester, and the

maaa of squalid wretchedness which at all times it
almost necessarily hides in its close courts and fetid
alleys, the wonder is that at a season like this infec-
tious diseases should have been restrained within
such narrow bounds.

From Preston I have received, after some in-
quiry, only incomplete returns, which do not take
into account cases which have occurred in the
workhouse. According to the statement of my
correspondent the chief incidence of the disease
was in November, when 109 cases, involving no
fewer than 27 deaths, are reported. This alarming
state of things was considerably modified in
December, when the cases had fallen to 38, and the
deaths to 9—probably in consequence of the
larger,provision for the physical wants of the people
to which I have alluded. An increase appears to
have again taken 'place in the first week of the
new year, the cases reported up to Jan. 7 being 15.
Still I think there is fair reason for congratulation
that in so large a town, with a population depressed
in health and hope by an early and severe pres-
sure of distress, and where the disease made its
appearance, in sporadic cases, as long ago as last
September, the epidemic should not before now
have assumed much more formidable proportions.
I have thus stated, as accurately as I know how,
what I believe to be the facts as to Manchester
and Preston, concealing nothing, and exaggerating
' nothing. I have no theory to establish ;my sole
wish is that the public—both in Lancashire and
elsewhere—should be made acquainted with the
exact state of the case. Granting the worst in re-
gard to the two towns above mentioned, it must
be a subject of congratulation to all who have
charged themselves with the administration of re-
lief, that nothing like famine fever has broken out
in any other of the many towns which are weighed
upon by an equal pressure of distress The facts,
such as they are, appear to me to point to
the advisability, not so much of an increased
rate of relief, as of a careful medical super-
vision of every district, and a special provision for
the wants of the sick. In every pier* let competent
observers be upon the watch for the first symptoms
of a danger, which, thank God, has not broken
upon us yet. Let such sick-kitchens as have proved
themselves of incalculable service at Preston and at
Hyde be established in every town ; many an in-
cipient ailment will be checked in its progress to-
wares a graver phase, many a case of imperfect nu-
trition will be hindered from development into
fever, by assistance which more than one lady who
is now eagerly seeking for au opportunity of kind-
ness can effectually and happily render. But a
general rise in the rate of relief, founded upon the
idea that the vitality of the population is low, and
ready to succumb to the first attack of epi-
demic disease, would be fraught with almost un-
mitigated evil. The difficulties in the way of a
resumption of work are already sufficiently great
sad numerous, without the interposition of an-
other. Perhaps, however, the accusations against
Lancashire relief, which came from opposite aides,
may fairly be taken to answer each other. If the
people are kept in such a condition of luxurious
comfort that they cannot be enticed from the relief
board to the factory, all the ghastly picture of hag.
gard eyes, and wan face*, and wasted forms, and
the advancing spectre of pestilence, is surely no

[TWOPENCE

more stable than a dissolving view, which was
called up at the showman's wand, and at the
same bidding will fade away. Such would
be a fair rhetorical argument : a more
judicial procedure would be to take the mean
between the eontradictory extremes. There is un-
doubtedly much privation, a large loss of accustomed
comfort, especially among those whose standard of
comfort was once the highest, and who are now too
proud to be importunate and successful beggars.
But I still hold to my belief that few have yet
wanted necessary food ; that " famine" is a word
which can be applied to the condition of things in
Lancashire only by rhetorical license, and that by
God's providence, and the help of good Christians
all the world over, we are yet safe from the mere
fearful danger of pestilence.

The following is the variation in the amount of
pauperism in the undermentioned twenty-one
unions, on a comparison of the first week of the
present month with the last week of December.
The total number of paupers in the fourth weak
of December in the section of unions marked (a)
was 6,130 ; in the section (b), 24,2,0 ; and in the
section 236 740--togethse 267,160. The ag-
ef these unions is 2,060,000.
g7altroWisenlivil Lao 3 Pauses.
Maley
Warringtas ao

To6‘l 250
(k) Two trams are in respect of thematic* et pauperism
the sauce as la the preview, week :
Liverpool.
Wigan.
(c) Seveoloso Unions have leis : Peewee.
Ashton-under-Lyne
Blecklaus
Bolton
Burnley
Boxy 270
Claorlto• 240
Glossop
Hasliogden B4O
Macclesfield
kleaeheator
Oldham
Prides ' 740
210 .
Rochdale 6O
Suldowerlk
SeMowl
Stockport
Tolman SO

• Teed
Net decreer le tke pup of tie whole district :
224 week December, 186 r
3ed weekDeemeber, 1862
4th week December. 1862
Lt week Jeavery, 1862

i 8,200
ELPINDITURZ n 0137.1111L1NT.
The weekly average of out-door relief ; its actual mount
is tie lest weak ; with the total of 14 weeks of the half-
yew ending at Lady-day next. The other items a& " relief
to the poor" will for the whole district average about
6.000 f. a week.

Aransas Bana
weekly actually I Total ex-
es, = expended pentlturo
Usk's% as. ,Io Bat weak , of the last
Quarter, of present 114 weeks.
. . . 1912. quarter.
Blac
Aahtoo-tumler4eas . 41,1/16 33,069 327,7119
kburn • 1,116 1,116 16.149
Bolton*
Barnley 627 4.31 9,889
Bury
Morley 2ll 248 3,124
=o ll4 n
796 1,146
263 11,479
3,948
Hadtmedis 667 610
16
796 776 9,219838
=listemig* 217 2i4 91
3,206
BlinottriWrit
Mama • 79 crewrirp
WO 10,526 RUM
Preeles• . 1,673 1,743 32,186
leabaski - + 9lO 942 12,906
Ballard
666619inee11t Cl'eusidp)
1171 793
136 168 1.367
9,601
1103aper6 1166 Me*
Tod ascedis 213 $4l 4,362
WWarrilia•
136 LW L
NW 1.166
4430
Total 316 in 1 317,160 sistais

• The returns of espiadttere for the Bolton aod Preethe
Unions hare sot bees seeped for the 14th weeL The Owes
Inserted In the third edema ere for the 13th week.
FREDERICK PURDY, Statiatioil Dopartmi,
Poor-law Boar* Jas. 9, 1563.

STOLEN KISSES. —PIESSE and LUBIN'S
211 W PIIIYMUS for the festivities—ltioka rams sad
their !Aegis!, Box-his-Dark goo air Roger de Cove*, bp flavour,
throe hoMMe. hi a pretty ger, 75.-2, New Baal street.