[58] There is in the library of the London County Council an almost complete set of these annual reports inherited from the Metropolitan Board of Works. Unless those sent to the Secretary of State, as directed by the Act, have been preserved, there is no other collection in existence. [59] St. Giles'. [60] Fulham. [61] Rotherhithe. [62] Hackney. [63] Medical Officer of Health, 1856. [64] "Lungs for London," _Household Words_, vol. i. p. 45, 1850. [65] P.P. 1852-3, vol. lxxviii. p. 327. [66] Clerkenwell, 1856. [67] Fulham, 1857. [68] Whitechapel, 1857. [69] St. Giles', 1859. [70] St. George the Martyr, 1859-60. [71] Strand, 1859-60. [72] Clerkenwell, 1860-1. [73] 14 and 15 Vic. cap. 34. [74] Shoreditch, 1859-60. [75] St. Giles', 1857-8. [76] St. Olave, Southwark, 1856. [77] Whitechapel, 1857. [78] Whitechapel. [79] Population went up from 51,824 in 1851 to 60,278 in 1896. [80] "The moral and social benefits conferred by these buildings has been immeasurable," wrote one Medical Officer of Health (St. Pancras). "They are institutions whose larger acceptance would save the lives of hundreds, and reclaim the morals of thousands," wrote another. CHAPTER III 1861-1870 THE Census of 1861 disposed of the various estimates of the population of London, and of the death-rates in its various parishes, and gave authoritatively the actual figures. From 2,363,341 persons in 1851, the population had gone up to 2,808,494 in 1861--an increase not very far short of half a million; and the number of inhabited houses had increased from 306,064 to 360,065. The natural growth of the population, or in other words, the excess of births over deaths, accounted for but part of this increase. The rest was due to the great stream of immigrants into London, which, notable previously, "continued to flow thither with unabated force." The increase was not equally distributed. The population of the central parts showed a decline. There the great economic forces were most powerful, and under their influence the population of the "City" had decreased by more than 15,000: that of Holborn and St. Martin-in-the-Fields by nearly 2,000 each: that of St. James', Westminster, by about 1,000, and two or three others slightly. But elsewhere--east, north, west, south--the increases had been great, and in some instances remarkable. Poplar had increased in the decade by 32,000; Islington by 60,000; St. Pancras by 32,000; Paddington by 29,000. And on the south side of the river, Wandsworth had increased by 20,000; Newington and Camberwell by 17,000 each; and Lambeth by 23,000. The rate of growth in the various wards or parts of the parishes showed, both as regarded persons and houses, great differences, the most rapid increases being in the parts nearest to the centre of London. A most material factor in the sanitary evolution of any great city, and especially so of London, is the introduction into its population of fresh elements from the outside.