[42] I have reason to believe that this statement, though founded on the authority of Stow, is erroneous, for so much of the district as lies west of Moorgate-street; and that the main cause of this locality suffering so severely from cholera must have lain in those very extensive defects of house-drainage, which more recently I have become better able to appreciate. With the kind assistance of Mr. Haywood, I have been enabled to look over the memoranda which are kept in his office, of deep cuttings of soil made in the construction of sewers by himself and his predecessor, Mr. Kelsey. These sections do not by any means tally with Stow’s description of the Moor, as extending in part ‘from without the postern called Cripplegate, even to the river of Wels;’ for here at least there is no trace of any such condition of soil.--J. S., 1854. It is not as matter of literary curiosity that I quote these passages of your old historian, but simply that I may avail myself of his accurate local knowledge for the explanation and the cure of a serious existing evil. For if, as I believe, the unfortunate preference for certain localities evinced by the recent epidemic be, _primâ facie_, a reason for doubting the effectiveness of their sub-soil drainage, and if the ancient records of the City assure one that these very localities are such as, from conditions then in active operation, would be liable to retain, perhaps for an indefinite period, the materials of malarious poison, useful and practical deductions may be drawn. And as the liability to this severe recurrent epidemic is an extreme detriment to the population of such localities--one too, which, if unremoved, must inevitably lead to the deterioration of property, as well as to the sacrifice of life, I know that your Hon. Court will be solicitous to adopt whatever remedial measures are possible. To those measures I shall presently return, having here dealt with the question only as it relates to the distribution of our mortality, and explains the preponderance of a large class of deaths in some special districts of the City. * * * * * In the Tables which accompany this portion of my Report, I have arranged in a synoptical form, convenient for reference, the chief facts of our sanitary statistics to which I have invited your attention. In the first[43] you will read a summary of the deaths as they have occurred, male and female, in the several districts and sub-districts of the City, during each quarter of the past year. [43] _Appendix_, No. IV. In the second[44] table the deaths of the year are classified according to the ages at which they befell. [44] Now incorporated in the general table, _Appendix_, No. VIII. In the third table,[45] for the sake of comparison in respect both of general and of infant mortality, I have arranged the statistics of certain other localities side by side with our own. [45] Now inserted at page 84.