The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-08-18 00:00:00

LETTER XIV

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD

DEAR SlR—After perusing these astounding facts from
the first authority in the kingdom who can remain listless
and unreflecting at his own assigned post of observation ?
Arc not medical men in their calling—not only figuratively
but actually—sentinels. at the outposts of this huge en-
campment of more than 300,000 souls watching the signs
of the approach, from any quarter, of the various ene-
mies which lie in wait around ? If no intelligence is
given of approaching danger or of actual attack, how
shall the camp be roused in time to stand to arms ?
A time of rejoicing has just passed over our heads, and
from this gratifying distraction and other causes, an inter-
ruption to my continuance of letters on the sanitary state
of the town has occurred, which I now propose to resume
on to the close.

The class of facts to be brought forward are no doubt
familiar to the medical mind of this town ; but it is not
for them, who do know, but for the public, who do not
know, taken collectively, that I write. All the medical
men need not write—although it would be well if some
more and abler hands would commence to sound the
alarm, until it produce an impression commensurate with
the magnitude of the evil.

The wise man says—" To everything there is a season
—a time to kill and a time to heal—a time to weep and a
time to laugh,"

The late visit of his Royal Highness Prince Albert
has been most truly a time of rejoicing; but who,
when reading the announcement that within the last
three months ten thousand lives have been sacrificed
in a part only of England to preventible causes, will
not be compelled to admit that from the date of the
fact proved, a time for solemn reflection has not ar-
rived, even if before this, there bad been little or no re-
sponsibility incurred by society on the subject. It is im-
possible for the whole community to turn away from their
plain path of duty, which their feet must seek and pur-
sue—they must bestir themselves, for if not swayed by
motives of humanity, the instinctive dictates of selfish
fear will urge them to the work in pure self defence.
" The rich and the poor meet together" in their personal
intercourse and their reciprocal interests, and duties, nay,
even in their pleasures. How can either class suffer
then alone?

I for one rejoice to see Prince Albert patronising the
efforts of this increasing port in two noble undertakings ;
and though aware that some suitable expenditure must be
thereby incurred, to do him honour and the town credit,
yet there could have been much less squandered away
over the pageant of an hour. Custom in such revolving
celebrations may establish a practice—Nos legem regith
but does a legal propriety cof►vey a moral propriety ?
They are often wide asunder, unfortunately. The plea-
sant fiction, when swallowed, must be bitter afterwards,
when the facts are duly reflected upon, which this town
is of all towns the most obnoxious to, and which the
Registrar-General has embodied in the following strong
but truthful language :

"The inadequate supply of water by companies, the imper-
fect sewerage in
,towns, the open drains and ditches, and the
general neglect of cleanliness, leave everywhere great quan-
tities of organic matter to decay and putrify in the midst of
crowded populations, In such circumstances the mortality,
like putrefaction, is always increased when the temperature is
high; and epidemics of diarrhwa, dysentery, and cholera pre-
vail. Many thousands of the people of England were carried
off in the last quarter by these diseases and others of the
zymotic fermentation-sprung class."

HOUSES ADJOINING ASHPITS WHICH ARE OVERFLOW

ING LIABLE TO ATTACKS OF VARIOUS DISEASES,
ESPECIALLY TO EPIDEMICS. - .

In Duckinfield-street there are several cul• de-sac courts
on both sides of the street; the street itself is only one
great cul-de-sac. In three or four of these courts the
ashpits are at the present time overcharged, and for want
of proper attention are becoming daily an increasing
nuisance and source of danger to the people living in the
houses of such courts, and not only to these, but to the

fr-o-niage—houses. Several cases of the cholera now epi-
demic have occurred in the street, and from the state-
ments of the residents, more than one has proved fatal,
both to mature and infant life. I have seen two cases in
the street myself, both of which I believe to have been
caused by the nuisances above mentioned. In one of
these families, occupying a front house adjoining a court,
the ashpit of which is full to overflow, I blamed the party
for throwing all their refuse, especially a lot of large
cabbage leaves, out into the street opposite their door ;
their reply was, that they had nowhere else to deposit
them, because the ashpit could no longer hold any refuse.
In this house the case was cholera in an infant.

The other case was one of very severe dysentery, oc-
curring in a poor woman, just on recovering after her
confinement ; and it proved obstinate under treatment—
as well it might, for her house was at the top end of one
of these courts, the ashpit of which was more than full,
and her bed-room window, if it were ever rashly opened,
admitted the effluvia of this nosegay. She has
had two relapses, because these causes still operate ;
therefore I ordered her removal to the hospital, to
give her a chance of recovery. How any one could
be otherwise than ill when so located in such a mal-
sanitary spot, it is difficult to imagine. The reader will
think such struggles with poverty bad enough, let alone
the cramped vicinage of all these opprobrious courts
but landlord's devices are not so easily done with as even
setting about the task of emptying places the law requires
them to look after. They have in these courts a little pet
way of their own of managing matters : for instance, they
take a brick out of the wall of the ashpit, from the lowest
row of bricks, and thus obtain an exit for the fluid lodg-
ment, which they carefully lead away by a gutter placed in
the middle of the flagged floor of the court, and thus carry
it to the street channel, where it finally sinks into the
sewer gratings, and so escapes. This, every one knows,
is contrary to the act of parliament ; and, if this were all,
it might not be worth a medical man's trouble to expose
it ; but when it is also so clearly contrary to the sanitary
laws of nature, it becomes his indispensable duty to point
it out with a view to remedy. How can people be healthy
residing in a court along the pavement of which a•steady
drainaae, such as I have described, is daily and nightly
flowing ? Is it not a comparative farce to establish dis-
pensaries for the cure of diseases sprung from sources
which themselves want curing 7 The engineer and sur-
veyor ought to pioneer the way to health, and then the
medical man follow, where and when lawful occasion
demands ; and not the contrary, where the doctor must
pioneer the engineer. But at present sanitary engineer-
ing has to be studied, and, when acquired, enforced,—
until which time dispensaries must multiply, and compa-
ratively fruitless charities flow, because society is altoge-
ther working traversely.

In common weather, the above recited nuisances are
bad enough ; but let any one listen to the complaints of
the inhabitants near, when a change from fine to wet
weather is taking place, or at midnight, when all foul
things rise from their graves, and they will hear the
nuisance described in no measured terms.

The husband of the poor womiiabove-mentioned,
smarting daily and hourly under the nuisance of the
drainage, proposed to the landlord to block up the brick
hole drain—the thing was objected to, on the score of ex-
pense, trifling as such must prove; the tenant replied
that he would go to the expense himself; then, as a
finale, it was urged by the landlord that, if done, it would
cause the liquid overplus to overflow the adjoining cellars,
so here the controversy ended. The cellars do overflow
with this filthy drainage even now, and yet all works on
as best it may ; the landlord claims his rent weekly, and
would be, of course, annoyed if the tenant, of his kind
courtesy, happened to fall into arrear through an illness
contracted at that landlord's instance.
Such is the condition of tens of thousands of our fellow-
townsmen, and women and children, and yet the duties of
the rich towards a poorer neighbour, and perhaps an ac-
tual employi:, in their eyes very generally are concluded
by the getting up of a charity ball, or some such entertain-
ment for themselves, whereby, after the bulk of the receipts
have been eaten up by expenses, some needed and needy
charity is enriched with the drivelling overflo

It is iio

_ • ...
and that gift in gold, often less precious than their time—
but they must learn to give witely, and to bestow the same
energies they throw into their business, if the grand evils of
the degraded and degrading masses are to he met with the
wise cure. The " drop to the bucket" plan will not do ;
thefuture will revealthe paltriness of the gift—a selfishness,
not a charity—a staving off of a certain evil at one's door
not a sacred loan to heaven in the name of charity ! If
the definitions of this blessed word were rightly compre-
hended by the better classes, it would render its appeal
audible in louder accents than words, and re-echo from
our innermost selves, until the wretchedness and degra-
dation of our fellow-townsmen had been exchanged for
well-being and smiling content, through the persevering
efforts of a wisely wided philanthropy.
NUISANCES COMPEL POOR PEOPLE TO GO TO THE
EXPENSE AND INCONVENIENCE OF REMOVAL.

A court in Harding-street had three out-offices at the
top end, the contents of which were overflowing and run-
ning down the court—the pavement of the court has a
water descent—the condition was most unhealthy. In-
habitants move and change on account of the smell from
the neglected matters described. One party, an asth-
matic, left the town, as he said, and came up towards the
country for fresh air, and alighted in this little stinking
court, the "dirty vapour" of which he complained-as ren-
dering his " change of air" something worse than useless.
Setting aside the disappointment in his medical object, yet
in an economical view is there no loss to society incurred
by fruitless changes ? Most certainly, but. what is that to
landlords whose pocket-selfishness. restrains their duties?
to express or
I dont scruple to say that in this town, as everywhere else,
" there are numbers of landlords who are. as much covenant
breakers as repudiators of scrip, bargains, or loans. Every
übnuirvtehresnaltlyhrirpnlieudpso4ualatteionnals,
t!cnor!intrsatraync.o
of
grind-
ing the faces of the poor," where occurs in the smaller
cottages, especially such as courts like these are composed
of, and the tenants have only the horns of a dilemma to
choose out of, either in self-defence they must pay for