The Sun.
London, England, 1855-10-31 00:00:00

QUARTERLY RETUR
N OF MARRIAGES,
BIRTHS, AND DEATHS IN ENGLAND.

A. return was issued yesterday by the Registrar-Gene- I
gal, comprising the births and deaths registered by 2,190
registrars in all the districts of England during the
I, warner quarter that ended on September 30, 1855 ; and
the marriage 3 in 12,145 churches or chapels, about 3,658
registered places of worship unconne
teud.siat Regestrcted with th Batarsa-,
blisbed Church, and 628 Superini
offices, in that quarter that ended June 30, 1855.
The returns of deaths (says the Registrar-General) ex-
hibit as their general result a favourable state of the
health of the country in summer, and a striking improve-
ment Dears
turn of the summer uarter of the pre-
vious y. The diminution of the number of marriages
inclicates some pressure on the resources of the people
from the high price of bread ; but the low rate of mor-
tality implies that under the English system of poor laws,
imperfect as it is, the labouring classes suffer less distress
than the workmen of the continent, who have no legal
yight, under any circumstances, to relief. Liberality in
the administration of the Poor-law is the natural remedy
of many of the evils of high prices in England.

MARRIAGES.
33;454 marriages were registered in the quarter that
ended on June 30, or less by 1,935 than the number in
the corresponding quarter of the previous year, when the
number of marriages ,was considerably above the aver-
age. The number of persons married was 76,908. The
annual average rate of the spring quarter is 1158 mar-
riages to 100,000 of the population ; in the spring of
1854 it was 872, in the last spring 822 only. In Hamp-
shire, chiefly in Portsea Island, the Isle of Wight, and
.Southampton, and in some districts of Buckinghamshire,
3itedfordshire,Northumberland, and Wales, the marriages
increased ; in the mining and manufacturing districts the
greatest decrease is observed, and notably in the mining
districts of Cornwall, in Staffordshire (Wolverhampton
and Dudley), in Cheshire, in Lancashire (Manchester,
i3olton, and Liverpool), and in the West Riding of
Yorkshire (Halifax and LeRTHSeds).
81.
154,834 births were registered in the quarter that
ended Sept. 30. This number only exceeds by 99 the
number of births in the summer quarter of the year
1854, and indicates a rate of birth (3.265) above the aver-
tege of the season (3.196 annually). The births increased
ao some extent in the counties of Hertford, Northamp-
tail, Essex, Stafford, Worcester, Warwick, Leicester,
Derby, Durham, and Northumberland.
INCREASE OF POPULATION'.
154,834 births and 87,934 deaths were registered.
The natural increase of the population of England and
)Vales iii the three months is, therefore, 66,900, which
mikes the gain of people in nine months is this part of
the- empire 157,147. Of this number of immigrants from
Scotland, Ireland, and foreign countries, no record is
kept. The emigrants from the ports of the United King-
dom at which there are Government emigration officers,
amountet? to 44,698 ; of whom 13,486 were ascertained
to be of Eieglish, 3,534 of Scotch, 18,701 of Irish, 3,093
of foreign origin ; the origin of 5,884 emigrants was not
distinguished. After taking a due proportion of the
latter class the English emigrants will amount to 15,530;
nearly half of whom sailed to Australia and the rest to
our North American Colonies and the United States.
The number of emigrants from the United Kingom,
which was 109,236 in the summer quarter of 1852,d has
fallen to 44,698, which is nearly the same number as
emigrated in the summer quarter of 1847.
THE PRICES OF PROVISIONS AND THE WEATHER.
Among the most important circumstances that -affect
the number of births, deaths, and marriages, must be
placed the state of trade, the prices of food, and the
weather. The prices of consols in the three quarters
that ended in September, 1853, 1854, and 1855, were
i 7,93,1-, and 901 ; so the interest of money rose in the
proportion of the reciprocals of these numbers. The
prices of wheat in the same seasons were 51s. 10d., 635.
10d., and 765. id. a quarter ; of beef, by the carcase, in
the London markets, Nd., and 51d. a pound. The
prices of these articles of food, therefore, rose in the
interval of two years, wheat 48 per cent., beef 15 per
cent. Mutton, in the three summer quarters, was sold
a4e6hd., 6d., and 6d. a pound. Potatoes by the Water.
vide market, Southwark, were sold at 117 s. 6d., 80s., and
1 .1. a ton. The fall of 37 per cent. in the price of au
Miele of food which is consumed at the tables of all
;lasses, and by persons of all ages and both sexes, is an
important .set.oif agaiust the rise in the price of wheat,
and may partly account for the fact that the public health
is better—the rate of mortality lower—than it was in
she summer of 18;3.
The weather of the three months is described by
Mr. Glaisher. The mean temperature was 60.4 deg.,
and was in every month sightly above the average at
Greenwich. Rain; which was in excess in July, was
below the average in August and September. Since Nov.,
/853, 321 inches of rain have been collected about Lon-
don, which is 14-1 inches or 30 per cent. less than the
average. Wheat was cut at Ryde ou July 14, at Abet-
detr on Sept. 10—so that the wheat harvest in the island
extended over nearly two months.
STATE OF THE PUBLIC HEALTH.
87,934 deaths were registered in the quarter that ended
on the last day of September, and the annual rate of
mortality in the quarter was 18.54 deaths to 1,000 liv-
ing, while the average rate of the summer quarter in the I
previous ten years was 21.91. The annual rate of the
summer quarter of the year 1854 was 24.25, and the
deaths in that year were 113,939 ; the excess being duo
in a considerable measure to the epidemic of cholera and
d'arrhees which broke out at Newcastle and other plates
in 1853, and was exceedingly fatal in London and seve-
ral districts in the summer quarter of 1854.
In 117 districts, comprising the chief towns, 44,169
deaths were registered ; while in the 511 districts com-
prising the small towns and the country parishes the
deaths were 43,765 ; the annual rate of mortality was
16.43 in the latter districts, and 21.65 in the town dis-
tricts to every I,OOC of the population; or 5.22 more in
the towns than in the open country.
The health of the towns exhibits some improvement,
or the mortality rate to 1,000 living has fallen from
26.33 in the ten summer quarters (1545-54) to 21.(5 in
the summer quarter of 1855 ; but the great incentive to
eicertion remains, that the mortality is certainly not in-
evitably at a higher rate than 16.43 in the summer quar-
ter, as that rate only was actually experienced on the
a •en of 511 districts.
The great work of the day is to. improve the health of
-,he people ; and the first iteps towards its accomplish-
ment are the throwing open building grounds on favour-
able sites, facilitating the distribution of the population
over town and country by railways, supplying the towns
with pure water, draining and opening streets, and re-
moving constantly for immediate depo-it in the soil the
town guano, which would no doubt prove an excellent
substitute for the guano that is now fetched from the
islands of a foreign state in the Pacific Ocean by British
ships, which could in former ages only be allured round
Cape Horn by silver and gold.
The health of London is described in the weekly tables.
The deaths were 13,084 in the quarter, or less by nearly
12,000 than the deaths in the corresponding quarter of
last year, when the cholera was epidemic, and less by 95
than the deaths in the corresponding quarter of 1853.
The Belgravo sub-district, which lies low, and is still sup-
plied with the impure water of the Thames, suffered, the
r eeistear states, from low continued or gastric fever.
The mortality has before in England as in other coun-
tries law after an epidemic,
been and it has been hence
inferred that epidemics only cat-rheey
coarse of
prematurely people
who would otherwise die ri,
But it will be observed that in eve'ryrdstivisioan,feawlthyueuagreh.
cholera was not generally epidemic, the mortality is
1 vier than it was in 1854.
The deaths in the South-Eastern division were 7,532,
or less by 2,010 than in the corresponding n
aqpuraervtaeirledof
ce
1854. At Gillingham dysentery and diairli
the deaths of some invalids from the Crimea and the Bal-
tic were registered. The cholera still remains about
Sandgate, where 5 persons died from the disease, besides
2 in the town of Folkestone, and 34 men of the Foreign
Legion, who were stationed in the Folkestone district.
In the South Midland Counties 5,875 persons died, or
- less by 1,100 than died in the summer quarter of the
previous year. Scarlatina has prevailed in Bedford, and
the registrar remarks that " the great majority of deaths
from this and other zyrnotic diseases. haveed occurred jr
Suffolk,
the worst drained and most densely poulat locaes."
In the Eastern Counties—Essex, and Nor-
.
folk—the mortality fell nearly the same extent, and was
at a lower rate than it was in 1853. A river bargeman
of cholera in West Ham ; he was brought from Pop-
lar in London. Two men were brought ashore and died
of " malignant cholera" at Lowestoft.
In the Southwestern Counties, where the mortality
was not raised by cholera in 1854, the mortality was
below the average in 1855 ; thus implying a favourable
sanitary constitution of the season quite independ de ently
• of any previous removal of weakly people by epidemic
cholera. The Register of Redruth says :—"People are
• now beginning to think that cleanliness and the removal
of nuisances from near their houses are conducive to
health ;" and he notices that the "deaths are much be-
. low the average." The "removal of the muck" to some
. distance
only be from the farm-houses and cottages would not
conducive to the health of the farmers' and
labourers' families, but lessen the mortality of every kind
of stock.
The West Midland. Cointies exhibit a low rate of mor-
tality (9,754 deaths) 'Birmingham has lost some lives
from diarrhoea, but has been on the whole unusually
healthy.
In the North Midland Counties the deaths are low in
when compared with the deaths of pre-
numbers (5,305),

vious years.
14,903 deaths were-registered
deathseyre-ri which occurred in the sum-
stere_din Cheshire and Lanca-
shire, against _ h 1.72.?±__
mer quarter of last year. Diarrhces. was becoming pre-
valent in Chester; and one death from cholera was re-
gistered. Liverpool and Manchester exhibit signs of
increased salubrity.
In Yorkshire the deaths were 9,189, against 10,809 in
the corm:Tin:Wog qt
iarter of 1851; Leeds and Hull
were healthier than usual.
The Northern Counties .lost s,oo,ciivte outbreak iA 1853. and 5,914 ie 1854. 11e- great
+ll,, mortality in that
ler., in Newcastle. upoo-Tyne rarieo:
town to 2,505 in the summer quarter of 1853., agairist
532 in the summer quarter of the present year. •
The deaths in Monmouthshire and Wales were 5 or,
and the mortality was less than in either of the summer
quarters of the two previous years.
The deerease of the mortality in some districts is strik-
in,z,'Kul the registrars in their notes endeavour to ac-
count for this evident fact. Some refer the improved
health of the people to the fine weather ; others to active
employment in the harvest ; others to the removal of
the population, either in search of employment, or by
drafting into the militia, and into the ranks of the army ;
in the mining district of Redruth the registrar con-
cAves that " the frugality and temperance" promoted
by the high ,trice of provisions has been salutary ; in other
districts the benefits of improved health are connected
with " good wige'w and plentiful-work ;"-;•,
many -places
theutinty of sanitary inetuures is admitted. The
registrar of Pontesbury, who has registered no deatht)r