2. The second table[61] presents a summary of the City mortality for the year which terminated at Michaelmas last; showing the deaths, as they have occurred, male and female, during each quarter of the year, in the several districts and sub-districts of the City; and including at the foot of each column, a statement of the year’s death-rate _per_ thousand of the living in each such district and sub-district. [61] _Appendix_, No. V. The calculated death-rates are omitted from this, as from the other annual tables:--the quinquennial rates (App. No. II.) giving more useful results.--J. S., 1854. You will observe that, during the 52 weeks, dated from September 29th, 1850, to September 27th, 1851, there have died of the population under your charge 2978 persons; giving, for the City aggregately, a rate of nearly 23 deaths for every thousand living persons. The rate of last year was little over 21 _per_ thousand. In my last Annual Report I suggested that the death-rate then prevailing was probably (from temporary circumstances) more favourable than the true average of the City; that it corresponded to the period of recovery from severe epidemic influences; that it seemed exceptional; and that you might be prepared for this year’s mortality showing again a tendency to increase. Such has been the case; and it illustrates the necessity of appealing to cyclical averages for correct intelligence as to the healthiness of a population. To my mind the increased mortality of this year does not indicate any deterioration of the City in respect of sanitary matters under your control; it shows merely that the death-rate, which must be considered our present average for the City, is in truth higher than that which favourable circumstances, foreign to your jurisdiction, last year permitted us to attain. Looking to the total mortality of the last three years (the period for which I have had the honour of serving your Commission), I find that 9493 deaths have taken place; which, the mean population of the time being 129,922, gives an average rate of 24·35 deaths _per_ thousand _per annum_. This accords very nearly with a death-rate (24·36) deduced from the septennial period 1838-44, during which (according to the Registrar-General) 22,127 deaths occurred in a population estimated at 129,739.[62] [62] Since 1841, when the Census gave these figures, the limits of the West London Union have been slightly altered. The Inner Temple and Barnard’s Inn have been added to it, while part of St. Sepulchre’s parish has been taken away. Assuming our City mortality to be accurately represented by these averages, I need not inform your Hon. Court that such a death-rate is unduly high. I have already, in previous Reports, laid before you the materials for measuring its excess,--materials which seem to show that our existing death-rate is nearly the double of that which better circumstances have elsewhere rendered attainable.[63]