The Sun.
London, England, 1857-02-16 00:00:00

of all the louses. One of the union medical officers

state? that his weekly reports, which usAl to occupy
four sheets, now occupy only one sheet ant a
half. Of these very satisfactory reports we quote, .
as a particular example, the following from the
local Board. of Macclesfield :
" In four years 43 streets and 245 courts have been
sewered, paved, and flagged, every privy and ash-pit be-
longiog to them numbering 290, have been drained, re-
paired, or rebuilt, and new ones have been erected where
none existed before. 1,489 houses have been drained. In

the execution of these works the board have
15,4161., and when it is stated that, in the same period,
nearly 36,0001. has been the entire expenditure;and that
the efforts of the board, and the means at their command

have uniformly been first directed where they could be

best applied fo-r the removal of the most pernicious evils,
and principally amongst that class of persons whose con-
dition, habits of life, and tone of morals, were the most
miserably wretched, the council cannot fail to contemplate
the great sanitary change that has been accomplished, and
the vast amount of sickness, suffering, and human degrada-
tion, that has thus been prevented.
" To make these observations tho more obvious, and in
accordance with former practice, the board mast refer to

- -.-.
their Table of Mortality, and causes and ages of death,
brought down to the present period. These tables show
the rate of mortality before the operations of the board to
have been 33 deaths in a thousand, whilst the average of
the last three years has been reduced to 26 in a thousand.
So with the average age of death of all persons, which
was formerly 24 years, is now 29 years. And a freedom
from the former excess of preventable deaths is shown iu
the registered "causes of death," and singularly confirmed
by the nearly uniform numbers dying in the last three

years,
Namely in 1854
1855
1856
In all these previous years there appears to have been no
such uniformity, because, no doubt, those influences were
in existence which rendered life more precarious, conta-
gion more certain, and epidemics more frequent and
malignant.
" Throughout England the mortality of children under
five years of age is 39 per cent, of all the deaths; in
Macclesfield it is 40 per cent., and the reductions have
succe'sively been from 11 to 14 per cent.
" To sum up the benefits therefore it will appear that
812 lives have been saved, •the proportionate number of
cases of sickness to each death have been prevented, and
the consequent expense avoided, the mean duration of life
has been lengthened five years, and infantile mortality,
one of the certain tests of the absence or otherwise of sani-
tary improvement, has been reduced 13 per cent.
" These results are the daily observation of the medical
man, the clergy and minister of religion, and other dis-
pensers of charity and relief, but it is only through the
medium of this report that their extent and value can be
made r.lnably evident to the public, so as to command
that attention and general co-operation which vt,,,uld.
only treble these physical benefits, but would also
strengthen the defences against vice, intemperance, and
crime. And that sanitary measures are a defence against
the latter, is clearly shown in a former report which exhi-
bits a decrease in magisterial convictions of 50 per cent. in
streets, popular in the police records, after the usual con-
structive improvements have been perfected and cleanli-
ness secured. In the old haunts of fever, Wood-street,
George-street, and Nixon's Yard, not a single fatal case
has occurred."
Here surely is an example for the Metropolis. We
have been at the pains to look into the matter, and
we find that, out of upward of three hundred then-
sand houses, it does not appear that the cesspools
have been abolished in more than thirty thousand,
and self-cleansing tubular house drains—the only
drains that are not themselves extended cesspools
and a,nuisance—substituted. More may have been
done privately than appears in the returns, but
from accounts of house to house inquiries, of houses
infected with cesspools and smells, even in districts
of a batter condition, that, at the least, two-thirds
have cesspools to be filled up, and cesspool drains
to be removed. The expense of doing the requisite
work appears to be, if done by common contract,
and under improvement rates, to be under five
pounds per house, that is to say, for filling up a
cesspool, substituting a self-cleansing water-closet
apparatus, and self-cleansing house drain, a sink
and proper dustbin. There is earthwork for all,
there will be work for the carpenter, and for the
bricklayer. In unpaved districts, moreover, there
will be work for the unemployed mason. By the
79th section of the Metropolitan Board of Works
act, the local boards and vestries have power
to do these works for the owners ; that is to say, to
borrow the money and pay for the work as an im-
provement rate. The contract price of cleansing
cesspools is stated in the blue-books to be 1/. per
, annum. The new works have been executed, with
the supply of water for the water-closet, greatly in
reduction of that existing charge. The expense of
merely rude labour is stated to be at the
rate of at least one pound each house.
Here then, for the drainage of 200,000 houses,
there is a beneficial labour fund of upwards of
200,000/., to meet the immediate need of the un-
employed. The winter is a good time for
innoxious and inoffensive to the inhabitants, as well
°pa
rfe erpfmroor arrested,ve adn ceof
and
acnhsdue ac
theph dlai
labour
floeuc
rt a
sßa tus,t
rendered nf
oo uw ebmya
perfectlytnh ae use
sti
as to the workmen, in any weather, so that all ob-
jections on that score are now rendered illusory.
Here, then, strictly within the line of duty of
the local Boards, is a sufficient source of productive
employment for the time. Mr. Simon, Dr. Chal-
lice, and other officers of health, may point out
more. We will undertake to point out more. The
surveyors of the local Boards of Health will pre-
pare the work pointed out by the health officers.
There are g,reat numbers of unemployed operatives,
and advisedly and confidently we declare that it
will be found that there is abundant public work of
the highest public utility for them to do, if the local
boards, in any proper degree, do their duty.
Those who are conversant with the subject are
aware that the measure of the extent of mortality,
which is early preventible—and in the examples
cited, proved to be so—is the greater proportion of
the diseases called " zymotic,' or fermenting, and
these are in the metropolis between two and three
hundred weekly. We are all interested in the purity
of the air we breathe, and with those who cannot
escape from cesspool-tainted houses and slice's,
the necessity of action is far more urgent than they
are even yet aware of. This or teat occupier may,
in his ignorance of the means of relief, be content
to suffer the infliction, and the owner may visit it
upon the poor inmates of his polluted premises,
but he has no right to taint the public air, and
the Boards of Health are bound by law to act for
the public protection, and should be made directly,
and even personally, responsible for continues in-
action.