Chapter VI: Appendix: Page (5)

And by the Northampton rate (upon the principle adopted by the society), the younger member would have to pay 1_s._ 4_d._ more and the elder member 2_s._ 7_d._ less than he ought. As an exemplification of the instability of such societies, Mr. Tidd Pratt mentioned to me that at a recent election of a poor man to a vacancy in the Metropolitan Benefit Societies’ Asylum, a condition of which is that the candidate must be above sixty years of age, and have been a member of a benefit society more than ten years, there were 32 candidates, from whose documents it appeared that the societies of no less than 14 out of the 32 had been dissolved, and that some of them had belonged to two societies, and that both had failed them. Such societies are nevertheless constantly renewed on the old and unsafe foundations; and so intense is the prevalent feeling on the subject of respectful interment, that to secure it, a large proportion of the working population pay the same extravagant premiums to several of these clubs, in the hope that one, at least, may at the last avail them. On the death of a mechanic, the first business of an experienced undertaker is to ascertain of how many societies the deceased was a member, and to arrange the funeral accordingly. I am informed that it is not unfrequent that such sums as fifteen, twenty, thirty, and even forty pounds’ expenses are incurred for a mechanic’s funeral under these circumstances. When two or three of the undertakers of different clubs meet on the same search, and when they cannot agree to “settle” between them their shares in the performance of the funerals, very complex questions arise, which, it is stated, the magistrates have great difficulty in settling.

§ 60. The exercise, on the parts of the lowest classes, of the feeling, in itself so laudable and apparently susceptible of great moral good, under proper guidance, has, in those districts where the burial societies are conspicuous and numerous, led to dreadful incidental consequences, displaying, amongst other things, the dangers of disturbing natural responsibilities, and allowing interests to be placed in operation against moral duties.

§ 61. The insecurity of the burial societies has, under the anxiety of feeling of the working classes, lest they might fail of their object from the failure of the club, led to multiplied insurances for adults, thence for families, and for children; and thence has arisen high gains on the death of each child,—in other words, a bounty on neglect and infanticide. Those who are aware of the moral condition of a large proportion of the population, will expect that such an interest would, sooner or later, have its operation on some depraved minds to be found in every class.

§ 62. Mr. Robert Hawksworth, the Visitor to the Manchester and Salford District Provident Society, recently stated to me,—“Here, the mode of conducting the funerals—the habits of drinking at the time of assemblage at the house, before the corpse is removed, renewed on the return from the funeral, when they drink to excess, the long retention of the body in the one room, are all exceedingly demoralizing. The occasion of a funeral is commonly looked to, amongst the lowest grade, as the occasion of ‘a stir;’ the occasion of the drinking is viewed at the least with complacency.” A minister in the neighbourhood of Manchester expressed his sorrow on observing a great want of natural feeling, and great apathy at the funerals. The sight of a free flow of tears was a refreshment which he seldom received. He was, moreover, often shocked by a common phrase amongst women of the lowest class—“Aye, aye, that child will not live; it is in the burial club.”

The actual _cost_ of the funeral of a child varies from 1_l._ to 30_s._ The allowances from the clubs in that town on the occurrence of the death of a child are usually 3_l._, and extend to 4_l._ and 5_l._ But insurances for such payments on the deaths of children are made in four or five of these burial societies; and an officer mentioned to me an instance where one man had insured such payments in no less than nineteen different burial-clubs in Manchester. Officers of these societies, relieving officers, and others whose administrative duties put them in communication with the lowest classes in those districts, express their moral conviction of the operation of such bounties to produce instances of the visible neglect of children, of which they are witnesses. They often say—“You are not treating that child properly; it will not live; is it in the club?” and the answer corresponds with the impression produced by the sight. Mr. Gardiner, the clerk to the Manchester Union, in the course of his exercise of the important functions of registering the causes of death, deemed the cause assigned by a labouring man for the death of a child unsatisfactory, and on staying to inquire found that popular rumour assigned the death to wilful starvation:—

The child (according to a statement of the case) had been entered in
at least ten burial clubs; and its parents had six other children,
who only lived from nine to eighteen months respectively. They had
received 20_l._ from several burial clubs for one of these children,
and they expected to receive at least us much on account of this
child. An inquest was held at Mr. Gardiner’s insistence when several
persons, who had known the deceased, stated that she was a fine fat
child shortly after her birth, but that she soon became quite thin,
was badly clothed, and seemed as if she did not get a sufficiency of
food. She was mostly in the care of a girl six or seven years of
age: her father bore the character of a drunken man. He had another
child, which was in several burial clubs, and was a year old when it
died; the child’s mother stated that the child was more than ten
months old, but she could not recollect the day of her birth; she
thought its complaint was convulsions, in which it died. It had been
ill about seven weeks; when it took ill, she had given it some oil
of aniseeds and squills, which she had procured from Mr. Smith, a
druggist. Since then she had given it nothing in the way of
medicine, except some wine and water, which she gave it during the
last few days of its life, when it could not suck or take gruel. It
was in three burial clubs; her husband told her that they had
received upwards of 20_l._ from burial clubs in which the other
child had been entered; none of her children who had died were more
than eighteen months old.

A surgeon stated, that he made a _post-mortem_ examination of the
body of deceased; it was then in an advanced state of decomposition,
but not so far gone as to interfere with the examination. There was
no appearance of external violence on the body, but there was an
extreme degree of emaciation. The brain was healthy, and gave no
indication of convulsions having been the cause of death; the
process of teething had not commenced; had such been the case, it
might have led to the supposition that fits might have occurred; the
lungs, heart, stomach, and intestines were in a natural and healthy
state.

The jury having expressed it as their opinion that the evidence of
the parents was made up for the occasion, and entitled to no credit,
returned the following verdict:—“Died through want of nourishment;
but whether occasioned by a deficiency of food, or by disease of the
liver and spine, brought on by improper food and drink, or
otherwise, does not appear.”

No further steps were taken upon this verdict; and the man enforced payments upon his insurances from ten burial clubs, and obtained from them a total sum of 34_l._ 3_s._ for the burial of this one child. Two similar cases came under the notice of Mr. Coppock, the Clerk and Superintendent-Registrar of the Stockport Union, in both of which he prosecuted the parties for murder. In one case, where three children had been poisoned with arsenic, the father was tried, with the mother, and convicted at Chester, and sentenced to be transported for life, but the mother was acquitted. In the other case, where the judge summed up for a conviction, the accused, the father, was, to the astonishment of every one, acquitted. In this case the body was exhumed after interment, and arsenic was detected in the stomach. In consequence of the suspicion raised upon the death, on which the accusation was made in the first case, the bodies of two other children were taken up and examined, when arsenic was found in the stomach. In all these cases payments on the deaths of the children were insured from the burial clubs: the cost of the coffin and burial dues would not be more than about 1_l._, and the allowance from the club is 3_l._

§ 63. It is remarked, on these dreadful cases, by the Superintendent Registrar, that the children who were boys, and therefore likely to be useful to the parents, were not poisoned; the female children were the victims. It was the clear opinion of the medical officers that infanticides have been committed in Stockport to obtain the burial money.[12] Cases of the culpable neglect of children who were insured in several clubs had been observed at Preston. The collector of a burial society, one of the most respectable in Manchester, stated to me strong grounds for believing that it had become a practice to neglect children for the sake of the money allowed. The practice of insuring in a number of these clubs was increasing. He gave the following description of the frauds to which the clubs were exposed:—

A great number of individuals have themselves and family in two or
more societies, and by that means realize a great sum of money at
the death of any one of them; and I have no doubt at all in saying
that a great many deaths are occasioned through neglect, when there
is a great sum to be obtained at their decease. Such cases as these
generally happen amongst the lower orders of society.

In reference to cases of undoubted imposition, I will just name a
few out of a great many. A person residing in Manchester wished to
enter herself and grandchild into our society. We went to the house,
and there were from ten to twelve individuals present, the greater
part of them children,—two of them somewhere about three months old.
I asked who it was that was going to enter? The mistress of the
house spoke up, and said it was herself and her grandchild. I asked
which was her grandchild? She took a very fine child in her arms and
said that was it, and asked me would it do?—to which I answered,
yes. The other was a very thin ghastly-looking child. I asked what
was the matter with it? She said they could not tell; it had been so
from the time it was born. I assure you, sir, it was an awful sight
to look at. A thought struck me when I came out, that if that child
died they might say it was the child I entered, so I determined to
keep my eye on it every time I called, which was once a fortnight.
In four months afterwards this thin child died, and according to my
anticipations they brought a notice of death for the child I had not
entered. I went down to visit, and on looking at it, and examining
it, I pronounced it not the child I had entered. She said it was,
and a great contest arose for about an hour, during which time I
asked her were there not two children about the same age when first
I came into her house? which she denied at first, but afterwards
admitted it. I then asked her was not one of them a very fine and
the other a very thin child? to which she answered, yes. I then
asked her whether it was the finest or the thin one I entered? She
answered, the finest one. I then asked her was that the fine one?
She said, yes. I then asked her where was the thin child? She
pointed to one that was sleeping in a bed, and said that was it. I
looked at it, and said this was the child I entered. I then asked
her how it was that this child which was sleeping had become so fat
and the other so thin? to which she said she could not tell. Now I
said to her, it is clear enough how you have done this; you showed
me that living child, and gave me the name of the one that is dead,
which she denied having done; and so we were compelled to give her
the money because we had no means of finding it out but by some one
in the house telling of her. But since, a little light has been
thrown on it by her husband uttering a saying when he was drunk one
day when I was there. This was the saying:—“A bright set of boys you
are, burying the living for the dead!”—meaning that we gave burial
money for a living child; but he was immediately stopped by his
wife.

Another case, a woman in Salford, entered herself and two sons, and
one of them was far gone in consumption; this we discovered and on
asking, why she did it, she said she thought she could get a few
pounds to bury him. Another, a man entered his wife, and she lay
dying at the same time. When we asked him where his wife was, he
pointed to a woman that was sitting by the fireside, and said that
was her; but his wife died before she became a member. Another
person, in order to obtain the funeral money, kept his child three
weeks, until it was in a state of decomposition. The last case, out
of many more that might be named, is rather ludicrous.

A man and his wife, residing in Cotton-street, agreed that one of
them, namely, the husband, should pretend to be dead, in order that
the wife might receive his funeral money; accordingly the wife
proceeds in due form to give notice of his death; the visiting
officer on behalf of the society, whose duty it was to see the
corpse, repairs to the house, enters the chamber, and inquires for
the deceased; the should-be disconsolate widow points him to the
body of her late husband, whose chin was tied up with a handkerchief
in the attitude of death; he surveys the corpse—the eyelids seem to
move; he feels the pulse, the certain signs of life are there: the
officer pronounceth him not dead; she in return says, _he is dead_,
for there has not been a _breath_ in _him_ since 12 o’clock last
night. The neighbours are called in; a discussion ensues between the
wife and the officer: some declare they saw the husband at the door
that morning giving a light. He (the officer) requires her to bring
a doctor; she goes, and says she can’t get one to come; the officer
goes and brings one, who ordered him to be raised up in the bed, and
having obtained some water, the doctor, while the man was sitting
up, dashed it in his face.

The man was apprehended and taken before the magistrates for the fraud. Sir Charles Shaw, the Commissioner of Police, directed that he should be produced in court in the same dress in which he had been laid out and was apprehended, which produced a very salutary effect.

§ 64. The evidence in respect to the crimes committed under such circumstances may be carried into wider ramifications. Some of the better constituted societies have perceived the evil of insurances, carried to the extent of entirely removing responsibilities, or creating bounties, to the promotion of the event insured against, and have endeavoured to abate the evil, as far as they could, by the adoption of a condition, that no payment should be made where a party was found to have been a member or to have insured in another club.

§ 65. The collector of the society, whose exemplification of one class of frauds is above cited, stated, that they were about to adopt the common rule of the insurance societies, that all claims should be forfeited for an act of suicide; for they had even instances which showed that men held their own lives on so loose a tenure as to throw them away on apparently slight motives. In one instance a man went to the secretary, and asked whether, if he were to commit suicide, his widow would be entitled to the burial money? The secretary stated that, there being no rule against it, he thought, the survivor would be entitled. The man, having fully satisfied himself on this point, went away and took poison. The amount of burial money gained was supposed to be 50_l._ In another case, the letter announcing to the widow the benefit he had secured, grew indistinct from the working of the poison and the sinking of life whilst the man was writing it, until it was nearly illegible. But the occurrence of such facts, showing a recklessness of life, with a degree of strength of domestic affections which induces them to encounter violent deaths for the sake of the survivors, is not confined to one class of society. Soon after the practice of insuring from insurance companies, the payment of large sums on the deaths of parties began to extend as a mode of providing for families, instances occurred where tradesmen and persons of the higher and middle classes, having effected insurances on their own lives, committed suicide with the view apparently of securing to their families the benefit of the sums insured. It is understood that the experience of such cases, and the obvious inducement which persons having in view to commit suicide to effect insurances on their lives, and thus defraud the offices, led to the precaution, now almost universal, of inserting the condition, which, however, is confined to insurance by persons on their own lives; that “if the assured shall die by his own act, whether sane or insane,” the policy shall be void. Yet frauds are occasionally committed by persons who must know that they have not long to live.

§ 66. Multiplied payments on one death are contrary to the spirit, at the least, of the law. A payment of a sum certain to parish officers, to be relieved from any future payments in respect to an illegitimate child, has been declared to be illegal. “One of the principles on which that decision is founded is, that the payment of a large sum for the support of a child gives the parish a degree of interest in the child’s death, and might have a tendency to induce the officers to relax in their duty towards it.”[13]

§ 67. In the higher order of life insurances, the legislature has endeavoured to arrest the dangerous tendency of insuring beyond the interest, by providing, by statute 14 Geo. III., c. 48, that persons insuring the lives of others shall have an interest in such lives; and it is a principle of insurance law that where a risk paid for has not been run, the premiums shall be returned; and it would seem to be a principle of common law that insurances beyond the actual interest are void. In the case of Fauntleroy, the banker, who insured his life in the Amicable Office for 6000_l._, the claim was resisted on the fact that he had been attainted, convicted, and executed for forgeries committed since the insurance, and the House of Lords held the insurance to be void on the plainest principles of public policy. The Lord Chancellor, in delivering the judgment of the house, said—“Is it possible that such a contract could be sustained? Is it not void upon the plainest principles of public policy? Would not such a contract (if available) take away one of those restraints operating on the minds of men against the commission of crimes,—namely, the interest we have in the welfare and prosperity of our connexions? Now, if a policy of that description, with such a form of condition inserted in it in express terms, cannot, on grounds of public policy, be sustained, how is it to be contended that in a policy expressed in such terms as the present, and after the events which have happened, that we can sustain such a claim?”[14]

§ 68. The Benefit clubs in large towns cannot easily take effectual measures against the multiplication of insurances, which indeed their own instability to some extent justifies, and they may find their account, in paying sums beyond the legal authority, as the higher insurance offices avowedly do, in paying on policies to parties who have had no legal interest in the life insured. An officer of one of these large insurance establishments declared, that if they had acted upon the decision of the courts in the case of Godson _v._ Boldero, “they might as well have shut their doors.”

§ 69. Although the practice referred to, of multiplied insurances of sums payable on the death of children, appears happily to have broken out into infanticides only in the districts mentioned, yet as the means and the temptation are left equally open in all, the necessity of preventing them, as far as a direct legislative act may, is submitted, by a short provision prohibiting payments beyond the actual cost of interment, and directing the return of the premiums or subscriptions where they have been given to more than one club.

§ 70. The means for the most direct protection of infantile life, and for giving additional security for life in general, will be subsequently submitted for consideration, with the evidence as to the means and the necessity of the appointment of medical officers for the protection of the public health.

§ 71. A collateral means of security, and of the abatement of other evils incidental to the practice of interments, will be found in the practicable administrative measures for reducing the unnecessary expense of interments, and, by consequence, of the temptations to crime constituted by the apparent expediency of the insurance of the payment of large sums to meet that expense.

It will, moreover, on further examination, become apparent, in this as in some other branches of public expenditure, that a course which attains increased efficiency with the popular desiderata in respect to interments is a course of economy.

_Total Expenses of Funerals to different Classes of Society._

§ 72. In the following table is given a proximate estimate of the total expenses of funerals of the persons of each class in the metropolis:—

────────────┬────────┬────────┬──────────────────┬─────────┬───────────
│ │ │ │ │ Annual
│ │ │ │ │Expenses of
│ Total │ │ │ │Funerals in
│ Number │ │ │ │England and
│ of │ │ │ Total │ Wales:
│Funerals│ │ │Expenses │estimating
│of each │ │ │ of the │ the
│ Class │ Number │ │Funerals │proportions
│ that │ of │ Expenses of Each │ of all │ of Deaths
Class. │ have │Children│ Funeral of Each │ the │ of each
│ taken │under 10│ Class, Inclusive │ Persons │Class to be
│place in│Years of│ of Burial Dues. │ of each │the same as
│ the │ Age. │ │ Class, │ in the
│Metrop- │ │ │inclusive│Metropolis,
│olis in │ │ │ of │ and the
│the Year│ │ │Children.│ Average
│ 1839. │ │ │ │Expenses of
│ │ │ │ │each Class
│ │ │ │ │ to be the
│ │ │ │ │ same.
────────────┼────────┼────────┼────────┬─────────┼─────────┼───────────
│ │ │Adults. │Children.│ │
────────────┼────────┼────────┼────────┼─────────┼─────────┼───────────
│ │ │£. _s._│ £. _s._│ £. │ £.
Gentry, &c. │ 2,253│ 529│100 0│ 30 0│ 188,270│ 1,735,040
Tradesmen, │ 5,757│ 2,761│ 50 0│ 14 0│ 250,792│ 2,370,379
1st cls. │ │ │ │ │ │
Tradesmen, │ │ │ │ │ │
2nd cls. │ 7,682│ 3,703│ 27 10│ 7 15│ 103,728│
and unde- │ │ │ │ │ │
scribed │ │ │ │ │ │
Artisans, │ 25,930│ 13,885│ 5 0│ 1 10│ 81,053│ 766,074
&c. │ │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
Paupers │ 3,655│ 593│ 13_s._ │ 2,761│
│ │ │ ———————│
│ │ Total expense for the │ 626,604│
│ │ Metropolis │ │
│ │ │ —————————
│ │Proximate Estimate of the Expense for│
│ │ the Total Number of Funerals in one│ 4,871,493
│ │ Year, England and Wales │
────────────┴────────┴─────────────────────────────────────┴───────────

The above, which can only be submitted as a proximate estimate, certainly shows an amount of money annually thrown into the grave, at the expense of the living, which exceeded all previous anticipations; and yet, from the information derived from the inspection of collections of undertakers’ bills for funerals, I cannot but consider it an under rather than an over estimate, and that the actual expenses of interment in the metropolis would be found, on a closer inquiry, to be nearly a million per annum. Hypothetical estimates of the amount of money which must be expended to maintain so large a body of men as that engaged in the business and service of the undertaker are confirmatory of this view. Even in Scotland the expense of the decent burial of a labouring man is not less than 5_l._, exclusive of the expense of mourning. I have been shown the payments on account of burials of an affiliated association of a convivial and benevolent character called the “Odd Fellows,” which has upwards of 150,000 affiliated members, chiefly of the better class of artisans, in different parts of the country. With them, the payments usually amount to 10_l._ per funeral. The expenses of burial of some of the smaller descriptions of shopkeepers may not much exceed the expense of the undescribed class, which is taken us an average between the sum set down for labourers and that for tradesmen; but the latter is certainly a low average for the metropolis. All the information tends to show that the expenses of the funerals of persons in the condition of gentry are, on the average (inclusive of burial dues), much higher than the sum stated. From inquiries I have made as to the practice in the offices of the Masters in Chancery, where executors’ accounts are examined, I learn that if an undertaker’s bill is 60_l._ or 70_l._ (exclusive of burial dues), for a person whose rank in life was that of the clergy, officers of the army or navy, or members of the legal or medical professions, “it would, according to all usage, be allowed as of course, and notwithstanding it should turn out that the estate was insolvent.”[15] The cost of the funerals of persons of rank and title, it will have been seen, varies from 1500_l._ to 1000_l._, or 800_l._, or less, as it is a town or country funeral. The expenses of the funerals of gentry of the better condition, it will have been seen, vary from 200_l._ to 400_l._, and are stated to be seldom so low as 150_l._ § 45.

§ 73. The average cost of funerals of persons of every rank above paupers in the metropolis may, therefore, be taken as 14_l._ 19_s._ 9_d._ per head. In some of the rural districts, and in the smaller provincial towns, where the distinct business of an undertaker has not arisen, coffins are made by carpenters, and services are supplied at a very moderate cost; but the allowances from the benefit and burial clubs throughout the country, of which instances have been given, may be stated as instances of the general expense to the labouring classes. To persons of the middle or higher classes, who give orders to undertakers in the metropolis, for funerals to be performed in the country, the expense is further enhanced by the extra expense of carriage; so that there is ground for believing that the same average prevails throughout Great Britain, and that the total annual expense of funerals cannot be much less than between four and five millions per annum.

§ 74. Out of 5_l._ expended for the common funeral of an adult artisan in the metropolis, about 15_s._ will be the burial dues. Of this 15_s._ about 3_s._ may be stated as the amount the clergyman will receive. The surplice fees vary in different places from 2_s._ for the lowest class, rising with the condition to 5_l._ 5_s._, or more; but taking the average of all cases which occur in the metropolis, and on the experience of the ministers of several parishes, the burial fees, which form their chief emolument, that which was anciently denominated “Soul Scot,” might perhaps be fairly taken as at 7_s._ 2_d._ per case, which is the average of the burial fees in some of the principal parishes in London.[16]

_Different proportions of the Expenses of Burials to the Community in healthy and unhealthy Districts._

§ 75. It is a prevalent popular error, not unsanctioned by doctrines held by several eminent public writers, that “as one disease disappears so another springs up,” that the positive “amount of mortality, the common lot,” is the same to all classes. But death, besides differing in the period to different individuals, differs widely in the numbers of burials, and in the consequent expenses to different families, classes, and districts. It is the _number_ as well as the separate expense of each of the funerals which occur during the year to each _class_ of persons, or to different districts, which determines the total expense of burial to the class or district. Thus, to the poorer classes, living in wretched habitations, as those comprised in Bethnal Green and Whitechapel, there is one burial to every 31 of the inhabitants, whilst in the contiguous district of Hackney there is only one burial to every 56 of the inhabitants yearly. In Liverpool there is one burial per annum to every 30 of the inhabitants, whilst in the county of Hereford there is one burial only to every 55 of the inhabitants. If the existing charge of burial, at the above rates of expense to each class of individuals, were commuted for an annual payment, commencing at birth, as a premium for the payment of 100_l._, 50_l._, and 5_l._, payable at the undermentioned periods respectively, it would in the metropolis and the county of Hereford be nearly as follows:—

───────────────────────┬───────────────────────┬───────────────────────
CLASS. │ METROPOLIS. │ HEREFORDSHIRE.
───────────────────────┼──────────┬────────────┼──────────┬────────────
│ │ Annual │ │ Annual
│ Average │Payment for │ Average │Payment for
│ Age at │ Burial to │ Age at │ Burial to
│ Death. │ every │ Death. │ every
│ │Individual. │ │Individual.
───────────────────────┼──────────┼────────────┼──────────┼────────────
│ Years. │£. _s._ _d._│ Years. │£. _s._ _d._
Gentry │ 44 │1 1 10 │ 45 │1 1 0
Tradesmen or Farmers │ 25 │1 6 8 │ 47 │0 9 9
Labourers │ 22 │0 3 2 │ 39 │0 2 9
│ —— │ │ —— │
Average of all Classes │ 27 │ │ 39 │
───────────────────────┴──────────┴────────────┴──────────┴────────────

Supposing each member of the family to have been assured at birth, a labourer’s family in Herefordshire consisting of five persons would have to pay yearly 13_s._ 9_d._, and there a farmer’s family of the same number would have to pay 2_l._ 8_s._ 9_d._ yearly; whilst in London for an artisan’s family of five, the yearly payment would be 15_s._ 10_d._ and for a tradesman’s family it would be 6_l._ 13_s._ 4_d._ per annum. To insure the payment of the average cost of funerals, 14_l._ 7_s._ 5_d._ at the end of 27 years, on the metropolitan chances of life, the annual payment would be 7_s._, whilst on the Herefordshire chances of life of 39 years to all born high or low the sum would be only 4_s._ Or to take another form of displaying the comparative burthen; the general average cost of each burial being 14_l._ 7_s._ 5_d._, and the annual _proportions_ of deaths being different from the average duration of life—being 1 of every 40 in the metropolis, a poll-tax to defray the burial expenses must there be 7_s._ 2¼_d._; whilst in Hereford the proportions of deaths being one in every 55, the poll-tax on all of the inhabitants to meet the charge would be 5_s._ 3_d._ per head.

§ 76. It appears, therefore, that in considering the means of relief from the evils connected with the number and expenses of burial, it should at the same time be borne in mind that the primary means of abatement and relief of the misery of frequent funerals will be found in the means of the removal of the developed and removable causes of premature mortality. Had the annual mortality amongst the population in the high, open, and naturally-drained district of Hackney been the same proportionate amount of mortality as that in the contiguous, but low, ill-drained, ill-cleansed, and ill-ventilated district of Bethnal Green and Whitechapel, instead of 759 deaths per annum, Hackney would have upwards of 1138 deaths, and an expense of 5448_l._ more for funerals during the year than it has. So the county of Hereford, if it were afflicted with the same amount of mortality as that which prevails in Liverpool, would have 1488 more deaths annually and an additional expenditure of 21,390_l._ per annum in burials. How directly, certainly, and powerfully, defective sanitary measures in respect of drainage and cleansing, bear upon health and life, and, by consequence, on the frequency of burials, will be seen in the latter portions of the examination of Mr. Blencarne, surgeon, one of the medical officers of the City of London Union, and of Mr. Abraham, surgeon, one of the Registrars of Deaths in the same Union; which I select as an instance, because the City stands high in wealth, in endowed charities, and in supposed immunity from the removable or preventible causes of disease.[17]

§ 77. Two individual cases which were narrated by the physician who attended them, will serve to convey a conception of a large proportion of the common cases denoted by the units of the statistical evidence derived from towns, and will illustrate more clearly the economy of the prevention of sickness and death, as a superior economy of the incidents of sickness as well as of funerals.

One case was that of an intelligent industrious man who had been foreman to a tradesman, and having married and established himself as a master tradesman, had a family of children. To diminish the expense of his family he took a house which he let off to lodgers, retaining to himself only the garrets and the underground or kitchen floor. He had five children who became unhealthy and were attacked with cachectic diseases and scald head; and the expense of an apothecary to the family during one year was 59_l._: but still more serious disease afterwards appearing, a physician was called in, who perceiving the impure air of the apartments, pointed out the causes of the varied illness which had prevailed, and the remedy—removal from the house.

In another case the foreman of a brewery married a healthy wife, who gave birth to seven children, of whom six died at various ages, while young, from diseases evidently springing from impure air. The source of this impure air was an ill-constructed cesspool in the lower part of the house, the stench of which was pointed out by the physician, who happened to have a perception of such causes, and advised the immediate removal of the family. Since that time they have had two other children, who with the third which escaped, are now living in their better lodging in the enjoyment of good health; the last of the children who died, when “ailing,” was sent to the purer atmosphere of a rural district, and returned in robust health, but soon after his exposure to the impure atmosphere was attacked with fever, of which he died within a fortnight.

It was in the power of neither of these persons to obtain an amendment of the general system of drainage, which occasioned the atmospheric impurity under which they suffered; but the actual expenses of structural measures of prevention would not, as an entire outlay, have amounted to half the apothecary’s bill for drugs in the first case, or of the expenses of the funerals (superadded to the expenses of drugs) in the second case; but if the expenses of those structural arrangements were defrayed by an annual payment of instalments of principal and interest, spread over a period of 30 years, or a period coincident with the benefit, the expense of the extended or combined measure of prevention would not be more than 1_l._ 5_s._ 10_d._ per tenement, or perhaps a small proportion of that sum, to the individual family.[18]

§ 78. But to return to collective examples. Mr. Blencarne, on a view of the sanitary condition of the population, and the causes of mortality within his district, expresses a confident opinion that in that district the average amount of mortality might be reduced one-third by efficient sanitary measures. The saving by a reduction of 71 funerals yearly, or one-third of the burials in that district, at the average expense of funerals for the metropolis, would amount to nearly 1020_l._ per annum. If, as appears to be practicable, there were a reduction of one-half of the expenses of the other two-thirds of the average number of funerals, the total saving from this source would be 2040_l._ per annum to the population inhabiting, according to the last census, 1416 houses. Now the annual share of the expense of the chief structural sanitary arrangements, supposing every house in the district to be deficient, would, on the proximate estimate, amount to a sum of 1829_l._, or less than the amount saved by the reduction of the funeral expenditure, giving the health and longevity, and all the moral and social savings, _plus_ the mere pecuniary saving; these remoter savings being in themselves unquestionably far greater than can be represented by the pecuniary items directly economised.

§ 79. Whosoever will carefully examine what has been done in scattered and fortuitous instances amongst persons of the same class, following the same occupation, living in the same neighbourhoods, and deriving the same amount of incomes, and will from such examinations judge of the inferences as to what may be done by the more systematised application of the like means, will not deem the representation extravagant, that the same duration of life may be given to the labouring classes that is enjoyed by professional persons of the first class; or that it is possible to attain for the whole of a town population such average durations of life as are attained by portions of existing towns; or say, such an average as is attained by the population of the old town of Geneva, that is to say of 45 years, or six years higher than appears to be attained by the whole population of the county of Hereford, which, as we have seen, is 39 years.

§ 80. To take another example. If the proportion of deaths to the population in the Whitechapel Union were reduced to the proportion of deaths to the population in Herefordshire, then, instead of 2307 burials, there would only be 1305 burials per annum; and if the cost of the remaining burials were reduced 50 per cent. of the average present cost, then the saving of funeral expenses to the Whitechapel district would be at the rate of more than 23,000_l._, or nearly 3_l._ per house on the inhabited houses of the district; about half that sum being deemed sufficient to defray the expense of the proposed structural improvements. The funeral expenses in the parish of Hackney on the proportion of burials amongst them, are at the rate of 5_s._ 2_d._ per head on the living population. Were the burials in Liverpool reduced to the same proportion, 1 in 56 instead of 1 in 30,[19] at the rate of expenses for funerals in London, nearly 50,000_l._ per annum would be saved to the population of Liverpool, being more than sufficient to enable them to pay 30 years’ annual instalments, the principal and interest, at five per cent., of a sum of 845,065_l._ sterling for structural arrangements.

§ 81. Strong barriers to the improvement of the sanitary condition of the population are created by the common rule and practice of levying the whole expense of permanent works, immediately or within short periods, on persons who conceive they have no immediate interest in them, or whose interest is really transient, and who under such circumstances will see no _per contra_ of benefit to themselves to compensate for the expenditure. It may be of use to exemplify the _contra_ of advantage to the inhabitants at least, to make it a good economy to them to pay the proportions of rates required for the additional expenditure in efficient means of preventing sickness and mortality.

The following may be given as an instance of the superior economy of prevention, by the appliance of vaccination, afforded by the experience obtained under the partial operation of the Vaccination Act in the metropolis as compared with the experience in Glasgow, to which the same arrangements do not extend. In the metropolis, in the year 1837, the deaths from small-pox were 1520. The deaths from small-pox in the metropolis, and in Glasgow for the years after the Vaccination Act came into operation are thus compared in a report by Dr. R. D. Thompson.

DEATHS FROM SMALL-POX.

Glasgow. London.

Population 282,134 Population 1,875,493

——— —————

1838 388 3,090 Epidemic.

1839 406 634 [20]

1840 413 1,233

1841 347 1,053

1842 334 350

———— —————

Mean 377, or about one inhabitant daily dies of
small-pox in Glasgow.

A confident opinion is expressed that the decrease of small-pox in the metropolis is ascribable to the extension of vaccination. The rate of reduced mortality from that disease has continued during the present year; and the average of the present rate, as compared with the average preceding the extension of vaccination, would give a reduction of 946 deaths and funerals from 1652 annually. But as not one attack in ten of small-pox usually proves fatal, the reduction of the number of deaths may be taken as representing a reduction of some 9,460 cases of sickness. The amount paid from the poor-rates for vaccination in the metropolis was 1701_l._, which at the average fee gives 22,680 of the worst conditioned and most susceptible cases out of about 56,000, in which vaccination was successfully performed. The attention directed to the subject has also promoted the extension of vaccination, by others than the appointed vaccinators. The various expenses of each case of sickness to the sufferers, inclusive of medicines, may perhaps, on a low estimate, be represented at 1_l._ each case; and taking half the average expenses of funerals for the 946 funerals saved, the total expense of funerals and of sickness saved by the expenditure of the sum stated of 1701_l._ in well-directed measures of prevention, would exceed 16,000_l._ in the metropolis alone. Throughout the whole country, the deaths from small-pox in 1840 were 10,434, as compared with 16,268 in 1838, on which, if the reduction may be ascribed to the extension of vaccination solely, pounds of immediate expenses must have been saved by the expenditure of half crowns,—in other words, upwards of 90,000_l._ in money has been saved by the expenditure of about 12,000_l._ in vaccination.

The excess of deaths in the metropolis above the healthy standard of Islington or Herefordshire, of 1 in 55, is 11,266 (vide returns, Appendix); the expense of burial of this excessive number, at the average cost, is 168,990_l._ per annum, which (without taking into account the expenses of the corresponding excess of sickness) as an instalment, would in 30 years liquidate the principal and interest, at 5 per cent., of a loan of 2,856,168_l._ towards house drainings and the structural improvements and arrangements, by which the excess might be prevented. To the charge of the excessive deaths must be added the charge of the births which take place to make up the ravages of the mortality in the most depressed districts. Taking the proportion of the births to the population in the Hackney Union, 1 in 42, as the standard of proportion of births in a healthy district, the excess of births for the whole metropolis during that year was upwards of 8000: or 52,609 instead of 44,541.[21]

§ 82. The grounds will hereafter be submitted which appear to sustain the position that all the solemnity of sepulture may be increased, and solemnity given where none is now obtained, concurrently with a great reduction of expense to all classes.—Vide post, § 113 to § 120.

In considering the expenses of funerals, the arrangements and consequent expenses of the funerals of the wealthy are of importance, less perhaps for themselves than as governing by example the arrangements and expenses of the poorest classes, even to the adoption of such arrangements, and consequently expensive outlay as to have hired bearers and mutes with silk fittings even at the funerals of common labourers. The expenditure by the wealthy, in compliance with supposed demands at which their own taste revolts, for a transient effect which is not gained,[22] would suffice to produce permanent effects of beneficence and taste worthy of their position in society. A gentleman who recently, in distaste of the ordinary undertaker’s arrangements, reduced them on the occasion of the burial of his daughter, applied the money in erecting to her memory, and partly endowing, a small school for 25 children of a village, in which, as the tablet on the school recorded, the deceased had, when alive, taken a kindly interest. Where no such objects are offered for the surplus expenditure, that which would be unsuccessfully thrown away for the transient effect would suffice for a statue or some work of art that would ensure permanent admiration. The aggregate waste on funerals in the metropolis would, in the course of a short time, suffice for the endowment of educational or other institutions, that would go far to retrieve the condition of the poorer classes. The waste of two years in the metropolis would suffice for the erection of a magnificent cathedral, and of a third year for its endowment for ever.

§ 83. In justification of the funeral exactions from the labouring classes, it is sometimes alleged that if they did not expend the money in the funereal decorations, they would expend it in drink. But this would only occur in a minority of cases, and in those only for a time. The reduction would be an immediate and most important relief in an immense number of cases of widowhood, and especially in those cases where there has been no insurance, where the widow incurs debts which often reduce her to destitution and dependence on the poor’s rates, or on charity. It forms a large part of the business of some of the small-debt courts in the metropolis to enforce payments of the undertakers’ bills, incurred under such circumstances. For all classes, what is deemed by them respectful interment is to be considered a necessity; and in general the expenditure beyond what is necessary to ensure such interment competes not with extravagancy, but with high moral obligations. By the arrangements which throw the savings of the poor family into the grave, children are left destitute, and creditors are often defrauded, and heavy taxes levied on the sympathies of neighbours and friends.[23]

_Failure of the objects of the common Expenditure on Funerals._

§ 84. Notwithstanding the immense sacrifices made by the labouring classes for the purpose, neither they nor the middle classes obtain solemn and respectful interment, nor does it appear practicable that they should obtain it by any arrangement of the present parochial means of interment in crowded districts.

§ 85. Few persons can have witnessed funeral processions passing in mid-day through the thronged and busy streets of the metropolis, without being struck with the extreme inappropriateness of the times and places chosen for such processions. This want of regulation as to appropriate times is the subject of complaints, which must attach, even to a greater extent, to numerous processions, without regulation, from the centre of the populous town districts to the suburbs.

Mr. Wild, the undertaker, was asked—

What besides the expense, and the objection to the ground, do you
find is the objection entertained to the existing mode of burial in
the crowded districts of the metropolis?—One very common objection,
is the inconvenient time; the average time is about 3 o’clock, but
it varies from 2 to 4 o’clock. This is very inconvenient for persons
in business, who wish to attend as mourners. From this cause,
interments are frequently delayed; at this time, also, the streets
are very much crowded; sometimes boys crowd round the gates, and
shout as ill-educated boys usually do; sometimes there are mobs; I
have known the service interrupted more than once during the
ceremony; sometimes the adults of the mob will make rude remarks. I
have heard them call out to the clergyman, “Read out, old fellow;”
sometimes I have known them make rude remarks in the hearing of the
mourners; on the clergyman frequently; but this has been on the week
days, when, of course, the numbers attending are very great. At
times, the adults and mob at the gates have an idle and rude
curiosity to hear the service. I have known them rush in past the
mourners, and go in indiscriminately. It is part of my business to
see the mourners and corpse safe in, before I go in; and I have been
sometimes severely hustled, and have had great difficulty in getting
in myself.

Are the crowds in the town, or districts, ever characterized by any
reverence for the dead?—Not the slightest: quite the contrary, and
it makes part of the annoyance of interments in town to have to
encounter them.

Are you not aware that on the Continent it is generally the custom
for passengers of every condition in the streets, to stop and take
off the hat, on the approach, and during the passage of the dead?—I
have met with several instances of persons stopping in our streets
in London, and taking off their hats. On looking at them, I had
reason to believe they were foreigners.

Have you ever known carriages or common coaches, or carts or
waggons, stop in the streets on the approach of a funeral?—I have
seen gentlemen pull their check-strings, or tap at their windows,
and stop their coachmen in towns; but, if the carriage were empty,
there was no stoppage. But none of the common conveyances ever stop.
I have several times ran the risk of being knocked down by them. I
have known cabmen and omnibus men drive through the procession of a
walking funeral, and separate the mourners from the corpse. These
characters display complete indifference to such scenes.

§ 86. In the rural districts the population appears to be so far better instructed and more respectful; but, according to the testimony of living persons, the same indifference has not always characterized labouring classes in the town districts, even of the metropolis. It is described as an unavoidable consequence of the increasing numbers of funerals, and familiarity with them arising from the neglect of appropriate general arrangements, a neglect from which not only the relations and parties engaged in such services, but strangers have to complain, that their feelings are not duly regarded. In a rural parish, the deceased who is interred is generally known, and the single funeral arrests attention and excites sympathy. In crowded districts neighbourship diminishes; a vast portion of the population of the metropolis pass their lives without knowing their next-door neighbours, or even persons living in the same building; the great majority of burials are, to the mass of the population, burials of strangers, for whom no personal sympathies can be awakened; the inopportune and unexpected passage of small funeral processions through busy and unprepared crowds of the young and active, create a familiarity that stifles all respectful or reverential feelings, whilst the numbers of separate funerals make undue demands on the sympathies, and harass the minds of the sickly and the solitary by their continued passage, and the perpetual tollings of the passing bells. Examples in some of the German cities might be cited of refined and successful arrangements by which the feelings of all are consulted, by interments either in the quiet of evening or of early morning, or by the selection of retired routes for the processions. The funeral processions to the cemetery of Frankfort are generally held at early morning for the labouring classes.

§ 87. The celebration of religious ceremonies in a satisfactory manner at some of the populous parishes, appear to be often extremely difficult, if not impracticable. Mr. Wild further answers:—