‘Wherever the population is increasing the amount of mortality is under-rated in consequence of there being an excess of young people in those numbers, which make the mortality appear lower than it really is. The mortality of London appears much less by statistics than it actually is; it is reduced in two ways by having a large influx of persons at the period of age when mortality is low, and by the departure and return of patients to the country to die, as consumptives for instance. The causes of disease in London are excessively active, as is seen, for instance, in the mortality of male children under five years of age, which is about 8 per cent. (_i.e._, 80 per 1,000), while in some of the more healthy districts it is not more than 4 per cent.’ Again: ‘Of the 20,066,224 persons enumerated in England in 1861, nearly 11,000,000 were in the towns and 9,000,000 in villages and country around the towns. The total population in London and 71 of the largest towns in England was over 7,667,622, and the population in the country and in smaller towns was over 12,398,602, so that there are nearly eight-twentieths of the population in those 72 towns. The total increase from 1801 to 1861 in the population of England was over 11,173,688, and one-half of that increase was in those 72 towns. It will thus be apparent that the town population is increasing at a much more rapid rate than the country population.’ ‘The country population now is very nearly the same as it was in 1801. By a law, which at present is quite constant, the mortality increases rapidly with the density of the population. In our thinnest districts the mortality is about 15 per 1,000; in our densest districts it ranges from 28 to 33. This relation is a constant law: where there are 179 persons to a square mile, there the mortality is from 17 to 19; where the density of population varies from 3,000 upwards, the mortality ranges from 26 to 33; so that under our present arrangements there is a constant connection between the density of population and its mortality. That connection is not necessary; our towns might be made nearly as healthy as these country districts, having a mortality of 17 to 20.’ Of the circumstances under which large masses of our population grow up, another distinguished physician writes: ‘They create special diseases, demoralize the population, and in course of generations completely overthrow the physique of the people. It is impossible to walk through the central streets (of this large town) without observing that you are in contact with a population awfully degraded, both in its physical and moral attributes; a population whose mere external characteristics impress you at once with the idea of a depth of degradation of bad habits growing for generations, in consequence of these arrangements.’ ‘Thousands and hundreds of thousands are thus brought up.’