Sentence:  But it had , as was usual in southern cities of this sort , a Black Bottom , a low region near the river where the Negroes lived - servants and laborers huddled together in a region with no sewage save the river , where streets and sidewalks were neglected and where there was <WSD>much</WSD> poverty and crime . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  (quantifier used with mass nouns) great in quantity or degree or extent